[LEAPSECS] alternative to smearing

[John Sauter]

On Wed, 2017-01-04 at 13:57 +0100, Preben Nørager wrote:
> We don't know how future generations will see the "problem", if leap
> seconds are abolished. As generations today see it, the "problem" is
> that without leap seconds the sun is getting ahead or behind the
> official international timescale, so that the noon transit not
> normally will occur around 12 midday. I think leap seaconds are to be
> abolished, as soon as possible, and that we should leave to future
> generations the only logical way to deal with that "problem". The
> only logical way is to continue praksis, and let each sovereign
> nation individually decide, how many minutes and/or hours its
> official time is ahead or behind the international timescale.
> Currently the time in Denmark is 1 hour ahead of international time
> (UTC), but I don't see any problem if future generations in Denmark
> should decide, that Denmark instead of 1 hour, is 1 hour and 30
> minutes, or 2 hours ahead. Great Britain, and other nations, should
> get used to a constant difference between international time, and
> national time, but I dont see why they should not live comfortably
> with that, like everybody else.
> 
> Preben

Preben,

You and I disagree on this issue.  For me this is fundamentally a moral
concern.  I believe that each generation should handle its problems as
best it can, leaving to the next generation only unforeseen problems.  

The tension between the need of civil society and science for a time
scale that simultaneously matches the Earth and atomic time is met by
the Gregorian Calendar and UTC.

The reform that brought the calendar back into synchronization with the
seasons was proposed several times but got no traction until 1582. 
That generation bit the bullet and suffered the dislocation of dropping
10 days from the calendar rather than continue to defer the problem. 
It took centuries for everyone to get on-board, but today almost
everyone uses the Gregorian calendar.

UTC, as it is defined today with leap seconds, is a similar challenge. 
We can fix the buggy software or we can cause a problem for the next
generation.  I feel that it would be immoral to remove an adequate
solution just because we are too lazy to write code correctly.
    John Sauter (John_Sauter at systemeyescomputerstore.com)

-- 
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