[LEAPSECS] Cost: getting rid of GMT & discontinuing leap seconds

Brian Garrett mgy1912 at cox.net
Mon Oct 25 03:01:52 EDT 2010


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From: "Rob Seaman" <seaman at noao.edu>
Sent: Sunday, October 24, 2010 4:53 PM
To: "Leap Second Discussion List" <leapsecs at leapsecond.com>
Subject: Re: [LEAPSECS] Cost: getting rid of GMT & discontinuing leap
seconds


>(snipped in fulfillment of Abrahamic covenant)

> The heart of my argument remains that civil timekeeping is mean solar

> time. Astronomers are just caught in the crossfire.

>

> Rob

>


More accurately, civil timekeeping is sorta kinda like mean solar time. For
now.

There's no reason that couldn't change. If legislators were somehow to be
convinced that TAI or GPS time were the way to go, then that's what they'd
impose and that's what _hoi polloi_ would use.
Indeed, I can totally imagine how that could happen, especially since they
already think imposing an offset of 216000 seconds for seven months out of
the year is a good idea.

Anybody who uses UTC professionally and does not live in a place where UTC
is the local zone time has already divorced themselves from local mean solar
time. So has any location that uses summer/daylight saving time.
The time is whatever TheyT say it is, and for the unwashed masses that's
true for all values of $THEY whether it be ITU-R or one's elected officials.
Astronomers (and the rest of you in the washed minority :-)) may be caught
in the middle, as you say, but no more so than farmers or anybody else who
doesn't like the sun rising or setting an hour earlier than it should.


Brian Garrett







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