Who else hates switching times?

[JS Princeton]

Oh, I do. If I am travelling, I don't mind switching time zones, but Daylight Savings Time versus Standard Time irks me to no end. First of all, why is it that Daylight Savings Time lasts longer than Standard Time? I know the answer of course (that Standard Time is closer to Solar Time), and granted it's only by a few weeks, but that still makes me feel like it's a stupid thing to switch back and forth. Why can't it be Daylight Savings Time always? Is it really that awful to have the sun come up late in the wintertime?

Harumph... I guess I'm just grumpy about losing an hour a sleep.

[RafaelAustin]

Put me in the 'discontent' column! In fact the clock just switched over! I'm minus one hour right now!

[Colt]

Could someone explain what standard and daylight savings time is exactly, please? I had heard that it was so the Japanese couldn't find us in WWII to bomb Anchorage.. I think this probably just rumor though. -Colt

[RafaelAustin]

Well, I found this site on Daylight Savings Time. Goes back to Ben Franklin.

[Glom]

I'd rather we stayed on Greenwich Mean Time over here. It means I can start my observin' earlier.

[kilopi]

First of all, why is it that Daylight Savings Time lasts longer than Standard Time? I know the answer of course (that Standard Time is closer to Solar Time), and granted it's only by a few weeks, but that still makes me feel like it's a stupid thing to switch back and forth.

Why is Standard Time being closer to Solar Time a reason for DST lasting longer then ST?

And it hasn't always, has it?

[SAMU]

Daylight savings time was so in olden days greedy buisiness owners could use their workers more hours without burning candles for light. They just got them up earlier when the sun came up earlier in the summer. They didn't know about biological cycles. These days, even though they don't need to conserve candles and though they know about physiological cycles, they just don't care or they like mucking up people just because they can.

Evil villans, mumble, gripe, revolution, gillotine.

[David Hall]

When I lived in the US I always questioned the necessity of DST. I wondered why we couldn't just stay on the same time. But since moving to Japan, which doesn't have DST, I've actually been missing it. I'll tell you, it's no fun trying to get your last few hours of sleep in the morning when the Sun comes up before 5 am. And it sure would be nice to have everything stay light later in the evening. I could finish my late classes or other chores and still go out at twilight to catch satellites and early evening phenomena like Mercury.

Hmm. stay on DST all year round...that might work. In the winter it'd still be dark even late in the morning, but you'd have more light in the evening. I like that idea. I never liked mornings anyway, I prefer to sleep through them.

[Glom]

It seems that the is strong feeling that we should do away with this summer time stuff. However, there is massive division over which one to choose.

[John Kierein]

It's Daylight Saving Time, not Savings according to the Today Show folks. Nice to correct the Princeton guy.
Anyhow I'm working in Tucson at the moment and it's always Mountain Standard Time here. But the Airline folks always screw it up and announce it as Pacific time in the summer.
I think in Australian places, Daylight Saving Time may be a change of only a half hour. How's that for a compromise??

[Chuck]

Arizona doesn't go on daylight saving time. I consider it an evil plot to make me miss the first hour of Monday Night Football once per year.

[JS Princeton]

First of all, why is it that Daylight Savings Time lasts longer than Standard Time? I know the answer of course (that Standard Time is closer to Solar Time), and granted it's only by a few weeks, but that still makes me feel like it's a stupid thing to switch back and forth.

Why is Standard Time being closer to Solar Time a reason for DST lasting longer then ST?

And it hasn't always, has it?

Yeah, that was a bit nebulous. I'm just saying that it would seem to me since DST lasts longer than ST, shouldn't we call DST Standard? The reason we don't, of course, is because ST is closer to Solar Time.

Talk about confusing.

I really don't have an explanation for why DST is longer than ST.

[Comixx]

I'm in Phoenix too, so no DST for me...I'm GMT -7 all year 'round.

Of course, that really messes up trying to stay in contact with out-of-state relatives and friends when you're not sure if they're 2 or 3 hours ahead/behind THIS month...sigh...it's an antiquated idea that needs to be abolished. Maybe we should abolish DST at the same time we finally convert to metric. I can dream, cant I?

[Dickenmeyer]

Here in Indiana we don't go on daylight savings time (except for a couple of little slices of the state near Chicago and Cincinnatti) so we don't have to inconvenience the livestock. There's a whole lot of argument about it in the state legislature every year but nobody can decide whether we should align ourselves with Eastern Time or Central Time so by not changing we get to be both.

[darkhunter]

Could be worse: the hodge-podge of times (each town clock set to it's own local time) before they invented time zones....

[kilopi]

Yeah, that was a bit nebulous. I'm just saying that it would seem to me since DST lasts longer than ST, shouldn't we call DST Standard? The reason we don't, of course, is because ST is closer to Solar Time.

Yep, pretty much. Some years, in the USA, we've had DST year-round.

It boggles my mind that if there is an advantage to it, why we just don't change the hours we wake and do business. Too much inertia and expense, I guess.

[SeanF]

Here in Indiana we don't go on daylight savings time . . . so we don't have to inconvenience the livestock.

The page Rafael posted made a similar point with a chicken farmer quoted as saying, "The chickens do not adapt to the changed clock until several weeks have gone by so the first week of April and the last week of October are very frustrating for us."

I'm curious as to why farmers would feel the need to milk the cows or whatever by the artificial clock instead of by the natural clock? It's not like the chickens need to run on the same 9-to-5 schedule as office workers, do they?

It boggles my mind that if there is an advantage to it, why we just don't change the hours we wake and do business.

It boggles my mind that you seem to think that's not exactly what we're doing.

[freddo]

My opinion on the topic changes depending on the time shift.. Here in Oz we've just come down off DST so I gained an hour..... Ask me again when Daylight Savings resumes, and I'll be one unhappy chappy.

My extra hour BTW was used in gaining some extra zz's - but wasted bcause it fell on a Sat (i think) nite, and Sundays are sleep-in days anyway.

[kilopi]

It boggles my mind that if there is an advantage to it, why we just don't change the hours we wake and do business.

It boggles my mind that you seem to think that's not exactly what we're doing.

It boggles my mind that two people can use the same words to talk about the same subject, and mean two different things.

But then, I like being boggled.

[kucharek]

In Germany, DST is called "Sommerzeit" (Summertime). In 1947, we even had a "Hochsommerzeit" (Midsummertime). Normally, Germany is GMT +1.
6 April 1947 it went to GMT+2 and 11 May 1947 to GMT+3. On 29 June 1947 it went back to GMT+2 and finally on 5 October 1947 back to GMT+1.
This was during the time, Germany was under allied occupation (The FRG was proclaimed on 23 May 1949).

Poor cows. (*)

Harald

(*) That refers to that they had to adopt to new milking times four times that year, not to that they had to give milk in an occupied Germany... ;-)

[beskeptical]

Personally, I'd like to see the day changed to 26 or so hours instead of 24. We could all get more sleep.

[logicboy]

I am in Scottsdale, AZ and I work on New York Time because by job revolves around the stock market so this time of the year I have to be at work at 4:30am. One standard time please!!!!
I only get about 4hrs sleep this time of year because for some reason I cant go to bed before 10:00 pm. It's just not right.

[kucharek]

I am in Scottsdale, AZ and I work on New York Time because by job revolves around the stock market so this time of the year I have to be at work at 4:30am. One standard time please!!!!
I only get about 4hrs sleep this time of year because for some reason I cant go to bed before 10:00 pm. It's just not right.

Come to Old Europe, the time zone where you have plenty of time to sleep out and have a nice breakfast before working for the stock market in NY... :-)

Harald

[ToSeek]

Why can't it be Daylight Savings Time always?

It was for at least one winter during the 70s energy crisis. There was some concern, though, about situations like children standing at the bus stop in the morning in the dark (instead of in daylight).

I'm not sure what to think: I'm bleary-eyed today, but then I was already starting to get up earlier because the Sun was rising so much earlier, so DST is just a reflection of reality - I was already setting my alarm an hour earlier as of a week or so ago.

[CJSF]

I just think it's so American (as in USA) to change TIME instead of modifying our habits. If you want to have stuff open when it's still light out, CHANGE STORE HOURS. I mean, why not just shift work schedules by one hour come spring?

Wouldn't it make more sense from an energy conservation perspective to have DST in the WINTER?

CJSF

P.S.
I used to have my watch always set to EST, year 'round in protest, until my wife forbade it. She used to use my watches to see what time it was and would be late for appointments.

[logicboy]

Come to Old Europe, the time zone where you have plenty of time to sleep out and have a nice breakfast before working for the stock market in NY... :-)

Harald

breakfast whats that my breakfast consists of coffee and this morning included Peanut M&M's

[Moose]

I'm sure I have an opinion on the subject, but I'm too sleep-short from missing that hour to really know.

I'll let you know once my sleep patterns normalize. Like, say, in autumn when 6am is no longer ungodly early.

ops:
^
Me, holding my breath to get my hour of sleep back.

[ToSeek]

I just think it's so American (as in USA) to change TIME instead of modifying our habits. If you want to have stuff open when it's still light out, CHANGE STORE HOURS. I mean, why not just shift work schedules by one hour come spring?

I think it says something about America that if the president went on television and said that he was issuing a directive that everyone was required by law to get up an hour earlier the next morning that there would be riots in the streets, but if he just says to adjust your clocks (thus causing the same thing to happen), the most people do is go on a message board and complain.

[ljbrs]

kilopi wrote:
It boggles my mind that if there is an advantage to it, why we just don't change the hours we wake and do business.


It boggles my mind that you seem to think that's not exactly what we're doing.
_________________
SeanF

I think you missed kilopi's point. I believe that he (kilopi) meant that, instead of changing time each year, simply change work schedules for once and for all and let the time zone remain the same for once and for all. (Correct me if I am wrong, kilopi). I realize that time zones are dependent upon the Sun's being overhead at the point of change. However, unless you live directly under the time zone marker, the Sun is never overhead, anyway. So it is an unrealistic position for the rest of us.

I simply hate time-zone change. I believe that this time this year, I have out-thunk them all. I purposely keep my waking and sleeping times the same, so when the time zone changes, my waking and sleeping are unaffected, with the exception that the sun is at a different position for most of the day. Of course, getting used to a varying work schedule can be a real pain!

Whatever. The golfers want to play golf. The astronomers want the night sky. We cannot please them all.

ljbrs :wink:

[daver]

Why can't it be Daylight Savings Time always?

It was for at least one winter during the 70s energy crisis. There was some concern, though, about situations like children standing at the bus stop in the morning in the dark (instead of in daylight).

I'm not sure what to think: I'm bleary-eyed today, but then I was already starting to get up earlier because the Sun was rising so much earlier, so DST is just a reflection of reality - I was already setting my alarm an hour earlier as of a week or so ago.

Yep, i remember. I got some nice views of Venus on the school bus.

Traffic accidents are said to go up whenever we switch times.

I think we ought to go to sidereal time. That way everyone on earth can be on the same time zone, and morning people and evening people can be equally annoyed. We get an extra day in the year. Hmm. Even better, everyone goes on sidereal time, but offset by your zodiacal sign. People whose sun sign is Pisces have their personal midnight when Pisces is overhead (well, pick a Pisces). This should allow for much greater utilization of freeways. All businesses by necessity become 24 hour businesses (well, 23 hours, 57 minutes). There would actually be a rationale for asking someone's sign.