[LEAPSECS] Straw men

[Gerard Ashton]

On 1/9/2012 3:14 PM, Ian Batten wrote:

> And you do this not by looking up sunset in an almanac, a newspaper, a website, but by performing a calculation that relies on UTC-plus-leapseconds?  Could you give me more detail of this?

 > ...

> No one has yet provided even the beginnings of the suggestion that sunrise and sunset times are enforced to a precision of better than tens of minutes.  And as I've said, if this is a real worry to you, turn your lights on a minute earlier.  You're safe for the rest of your life.


Although almost everyone will look up sunrise/sunset time in one of the 
manners suggested by Mr. Batten, the organizations
that provide the reference materials must change their method.

Also, one can easily find cases where defense attorneys challenge, in 
detail, the calibration of blood alcohol measurements
and police radars in traffic offenses; some of these challenges are 
successful. Anyone enforcing a sunset/sunrise law
will have to verify that their source of sunrise/sunset times has made 
appropriate corrections and may have to change
the training of officials who testify in court about the calibration. 
Cases could be won by defendants if the testifying
official does not understand the UTC change, even when it is negligible.

I don't claim these are insurmountable problems, just that there 
expenses that must be borne by someone.

Gerry Ashton