[LEAPSECS] Terminology and Requirements (was Re: How good could civil timekeeping be? )

christopher hoover ch at murgatroid.com
Thu Feb 14 20:50:00 EST 2008



Steve Allen wrote:

> > On Thu 2008-02-14T19:00:09 -0500, Tim Shepard hath writ:

> > If the TAI/UTC synchronized ticking were lost for awhile, what would

> > happen then?

>

> Audoin & Guinot (2001)

> p. 252, sect. 7.3.1 "Reliability"

>

> ... Imagine for a moment what would happen if, just as a

> practical joke, someone found a way to stop all atomic clocks,

> just for a short time. This would cause such a tremendous

> disturbance in world affairs that the loss of TAI would be a

> totally insignificant matter. Furthermore, when it came to

> setting it up again, the phase of TAI could be retrieved to within

> a few tenths of a microsecond by observations of rapidly rotating

> pulsars...


That would be a fun experiment to try, if everyone would agree to play
"blind."

-ch





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