Why can't we leave the clocks on summertime year round?

Quackster · 05-02-2018 12:48am

Franz Von Peppercorn wrote: »

Yeh he got that totally wrong. Sunrise is later here.

The best compromise is the end of February, not the start. If we set the clocks forward in a month the sunset would be about 7pm and the sunrise about where it is now, which is 40 minutes earlier than a month ago.

And due to the rapid changes in March sunrise will be earlier more than 15 minutes a week.

4 months of winter time makes sense. 5 months makes no sense.

This makes complete sense. We should fall into line with North America, switch to summertime on the first Sunday in March and switch back to wintertime on the first Sunday in November.

That would give us eight months of summertime versus four months of wintertime.

Quackster · 05-02-2018 12:55am

Water John wrote: »

Interesting to hear that clocks, in the 19thC had a second minute hand, giving local time.
It should change in Mid Feb at the latest. 8 weeks at most, each side of the shortest day. March is ridicolous.

Wintertime is designed so that its midpoint is roughly the day of latest sunrise rather than the shortest day (winter solstice). The day of latest sunrise varies by latitude but it's in early January. Hence wintertime in Europe starts roughly two-and-a-half months before early January and finishes roughly two-and-a-half months later.

dxhound2005 · 05-02-2018 12:56am

Dylan Thundering Arena wrote: »

I'm referring to now, at this time of the year and throughout Spring. But how much brightness do you need in the evening in June for that matter? Why do we need it to be bright until after 11 pm? Why is that better than 4am?

Why can't we just stick with actual real scientific time? And stop all the associated adverse effects (increased car crashes, increased heart attacks, poorer academic performance, signigicant decreased quality of life for several weeks in Spring) that come from messing around with it.

We are blessed to be sort of halfway between the equator and the North Pole. Further south no twilight, further north 24 hour daylight and 24 hour darkness at times. I don't know what real scientific time means, but because the power lay with the British Empire they got to decide what noontime was at Greenwich.

jfly57 · 05-02-2018 1:08am

If I may go back to where this thread started. I remember when it was decided, as an experiment, in either 1970 or 1971, to not change back to winter time at the end of October. What a horrible mess. In December it was still almost completely dark at 9 o'clock in the morning. Going to school and starting class while still dark was an absolute horror. No thanks, please don't dream of altering the current arrangement; it was tried then and it was deemed a disaster.

Water John · 05-02-2018 2:39am

I remember it and much preferred it. I was going to school in the dark anyway, as we had a distance to travel and got a bus just before 8 o'clock. At least we had daylight at one end of the day. Our morning was going to be dark anyway.

Franz Von Peppercorn · 05-02-2018 3:11am

Dylan Thundering Arena wrote: »

I'm referring to now, at this time of the year and throughout Spring. But how much brightness do you need in the evening in June for that matter? Why do we need it to be bright until after 11 pm? Why is that better than 4am?

Why can't we just stick with actual real scientific time? And stop all the associated adverse effects (increased car crashes, increased heart attacks, poorer academic performance, signigicant decreased quality of life for several weeks in Spring) that come from messing around with it.

Because brightness to 11 gives a lot of time to do stuff after work. If we were to stop the change of time summer time beats winter time. They are all constructs.

The real local time isn’t GMT. It’s different in every county. Local noon tomorrow in Dublin as measured by a sundial or by the highest point in the sky - halfway between sunrise and sunset - is 12:39 pm and because of the equation of time it isn’t necessarily 24 hours apart either from the next noon. Galway noon is about 12:50.

(This time of year is the maximum clock deviation from solar noon).

It’s all fake.

r93kaey5p2izun · 05-02-2018 3:31am

Franz Von Peppercorn wrote: »

Because brightness to 11 gives a lot of time to do stuff after work. If we were to stop the change of time summer time beats winter time. They are all constructs.

The real local time isn’t GMT. It’s different in every county. Local noon tomorrow in Dublin as measured by a sundial or by the highest point in the sky - halfway between sunrise and sunset - is 12:39 pm and because of the equation of time it isn’t necessarily 24 hours apart either from the next noon. Galway noon is about 12:50.

(This time of year is the maximum clock deviation from solar noon).

It’s all fake.

And early brightness gives a lot of time to do stuff before work. I completely disagree with you that "summertime beats wintertime". Of course I'm aware that we are not completely aligned with GMT given we are not on the same longitude. But arbitrarily altering time back and forth is a nonsense - and has many serious negative consequences according to several major studies. And if we are to stop the changing and stick with one then I see no convincing argument for it not to remain on standard time, other than certain individual preferences.

Peregrinus · 05-02-2018 3:47am

Dylan Thundering Arena wrote: »

And early brightness gives a lot of time to do stuff before work. I completely disagree with you that "summertime beats wintertime". Of course I'm aware that we are not completely aligned with GMT given we are not on the same longitude. But arbitrarily altering time back and forth is a nonsense - and has many serious negative consequences according to several major studies. And if we are to stop the changing and stick with one then I see no convincing argument for it not to remain on standard time, other than certain individual preferences.

"Standard time" in Ireland is GMT + 1; this has been so since 1968. It's in the winter that we deviate from standard time, not the summer.

If we were to stay on GMT + 1 year-round, we'd be on the same time zone as most of our EU partners (except when they move to summer time). Of course, we'd be on a different time zone to the UK (except in the summer). The main argument against this is that it would mean a time zone border in the island of Ireland, which would be a signficant inconvenience.

Franz Von Peppercorn · 05-02-2018 3:57am

Of course whatever we define as standard time is a construct. All clock time is a construct - sun dials aside. The west of Ireland is 30 minutes ahead of London. GMT isn’t the local time.

The change in the clocks and the health issues are all based on limited studies. And the claim that energy isn’t saved is based on American and Australian studies. In the US increases in air conditioning usage was enough to increase energy use even as people used less electric lights,TVs etc. That doesn’t apply in Ireland.

In the Australian case less lighting used at night was balanced by more in the morning. In mid summer Ireland, unless you get up at 3am, that’s not going to be an issue.

Anyway we might as well use Irish standard time if we need to stick to one time. Northern Ireland can follow even if the rest of the U.K. doesn’t.

Peregrinus · 05-02-2018 4:22am

Franz Von Peppercorn wrote: »

Of course whatever we define as standard time is a construct. All clock time is a construct - sun dials aside . . .

Yes, of course. Solar time - the time worked out simply by looking at the position of the sun in the sky - is too variable to be useful for all the purposes for which we require time. It varies from place to place and, even in the same place, varies over the course of the year.

The world has pretty much agreed on a set of time zones which, with a very few exceptions, are each a whole number of hours offset from Universal Coordinated Time. There is much to be said for any country slotting itself into one of those. After that, you can make a choice about whether to mark summer time or not, but that's about it.

Beyond that, issues about optimising energy use, or maximising daylight during hours of recreation, etc, can be dealt with in other ways - e.g. standard office hours don't have to be nine-to-five, and in many places they are not. If we want to maximise daylight in the evenings year-round we don't have to change the clocks; we can just go to work earlier and come home earlier. And this approach has the merit of flexiblity, since we don't all have to do the same thing.

Obviously, you can't necessarily have individual workers deciding their own optimal hours; not every business lends itself to flexitime. But many businesses do, and even those that don't can make a decision about standard working hours that is appropriate for their circumstance, their location, their workers, without needing to have the nation's clocks changed to suit them.

Which leads to this thought; if it really suited us all to be going to work in the dark year-round, and having lots of daylight in the evenings, we'd already be doing that, wouldn't we?

whisky_galore · 05-02-2018 9:31am

It's not farmers, or school children, blame the Germans!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=br0NW9ufUUw

Quackster · 05-02-2018 11:51am

Peregrinus wrote: »

Which leads to this thought; if it really suited us all to be going to work in the dark year-round, and having lots of daylight in the evenings, we'd already be doing that, wouldn't we?

You only have to look at the poll on this thread to see that the vast majority of people value daylight in the evenings after work much more than in the mornings before work. Hence why, if given a choice, they'd rather stay on summertime year-round.

Changing to wintertime for a few months is a necessary evil IMO to optimise daylight usage when it's at its scarcest. The idea that this minimal timezone change might directly cause adverse health effects is downright bonkers.

DanMurphy · 05-02-2018 1:16pm

I'm old enough to remember the 50s and 60s when our Governments played around with this time change, sometimes the clocks went forward and back TWO hours!
It was a disaster, for many reasons which people today would think crazy.
I grew up in a rural farming community. Our simple lives revolved around the Creamery, The Church, the Village, the Cinema and a Dance hall.
When the clocks changed, the new hour/s was called 'New Time.'
Many Businesses / and parishioners, depending upon their flavor of Civil War Politics, flatly refused to put the clocks forward, and used 'Old Time' in their daily routine.
Some of the reasons given were hilarious.
"No feckkin Fianna Fail Government is goin' ta tell ME, to change my daily routine!"
0r..." No bloody Blue Shirt will dictate TO ME, when I get up in the feckkin' mornin'!"
The Church stubbornly remained on Old Time, for any Government, because the PP was a feckkin' rebel ( but only in his head)
The Cinema and Dance Hall...New Time.
The School remained Old Time, because of the milking, the Creamery being the only industry in the Parish and the farmers kids had to be accomodated.
The Creamery...Old Time, because cows don't understand time change and, used to being milked at a certain hour, not a drop would they part with before or after that time!
The Post Office went officially New Time, but Old Time in practice.
It was normal to ask a neighbor, "Are ye goin' new time or auld time?"
At Mass, the Priest would be announcing events and had to stress if the event would be held at New Time, or Old Time.

If one had a hot 'date' at say, 8 pm Friday night, it was made clear if it was New Time or Old Time or one could easily be 'stood up'!

One Spring in the late 1960s, to make matters worse, some bright spark in the Parish, Limerick County Council or Government Official ordered/suggested that our clocks would only go forward by a HALF-hour.
This fiasco was to be called 'Local Time'
Now one had three questions to ask!
"Is that New Time, Old Time...or Local Time"?

Now, a new generation want to open that old can of worms...again!

Be careful what you wish for guys.

Franz Von Peppercorn · 05-02-2018 1:27pm

Well I dont think people are advocating double summer time which is what you had. Ireland would feel like Alaska if we did that.

People don’t like the hours changing, particularly the loss of an hour.

However office workers do like the lateness of our summer days - even foreign workers who are critical of the weather in general like that.

Most people probably on get home close to 7pm or later in Dublin. If we kept to GMT only June and parts of May and July would allow much outdoor activity, the sun would set between 8 and 9. With the extra hour there’s quite a few months with enough hours to enjoy the evening.

05-02-2018 4:53pm

Peregrinus wrote: »

"Standard time" in Ireland is GMT + 1; this has been so since 1968. It's in the winter that we deviate from standard time, not the summer.

If we were to stay on GMT + 1 year-round, we'd be on the same time zone as most of our EU partners (except when they move to summer time). Of course, we'd be on a different time zone to the UK (except in the summer). The main argument against this is that it would mean a time zone border in the island of Ireland, which would be a signficant inconvenience.

That's rather an Irish way of putting it, in reality Ireland should be GMT -0.5 then the sun rise and sunset times would allow midday to be near to 12:00.

Summer and winter times are only a psychological trick anyway, you could use the same timezone the whole year round and just get up earlier in the summer start earlier in work and enjoy the long evenings.

Peregrinus · 06-02-2018 1:56am

Deleted User wrote: »

That's rather an Irish way of putting it. . .

It's a historical accident. In 1968 we embarked on a same-time-all-year regime, which was GMT+1. (The UK did the same thing.) In Ireland, this was done by passing the Standard Time Act 1968, which declared that "the time for general purposes in the State (to be known as standard time) shall be one hour in advance of Greenwich mean time throughout the year". When they ended the experiment, they did so with the Standard Time (Amendment) Act 1971 which provided that, notwithstanding the provisions made in 1968, "the time for general purposes in the State shall during a period of winter time be Greenwich mean time". The Act went on to define what "a period of winter time" was.

Deleted User wrote: »

. . .in reality Ireland should be GMT -0.5 then the sun rise and sunset times would allow midday to be near to 12:00.

If you're going to depart from the convention of a time zone being offset by a whole number of hours from UTC, why pick one that is offset by half-an-hour? You may as well do the job properly. Solar time in Dublin is 21 minutes behind Greenwich, not half-an hour.

Water John · 06-02-2018 12:18pm

Well North Korea off set their time by 30 mins to be different to South Korea. Maybe we should do the same to differentiate ourselves from the historic enemy, the Brits. Ha. Then we could put up a zip wire across the border with NI and travel back, in time, just like there is between Portugal and Spain.
Though I think having two minute hands on the clock, is an interesting quirk, from times past.

Dakota Dan · 06-02-2018 12:24pm

Dr Crayfish wrote: »

Usually people go on about farmers being the reason for this. I really detest it. Dark at 5pm, it's horrible. I kind of like dark mornings however. If it is to do with farmers, can't they just adjust their working days?

It's more to do with schools and paye workers than farmers as it will be brighter in the mornings. Farmers work long hours anyway it's not as if you can get an extra hour of daylight during winter.

06-02-2018 6:40pm

Peregrinus wrote: »

It's a historical accident. In 1968 we embarked on a same-time-all-year regime, which was GMT+1. (The UK did the same thing.) In Ireland, this was done by passing the Standard Time Act 1968, which declared that "the time for general purposes in the State (to be known as standard time) shall be one hour in advance of Greenwich mean time throughout the year". When they ended the experiment, they did so with the Standard Time (Amendment) Act 1971 which provided that, notwithstanding the provisions made in 1968, "the time for general purposes in the State shall during a period of winter time be Greenwich mean time". The Act went on to define what "a period of winter time" was.

If you're going to depart from the convention of a time zone being offset by a whole number of hours from UTC, why pick one that is offset by half-an-hour? You may as well do the job properly. Solar time in Dublin is 21 minutes behind Greenwich, not half-an hour.

Historically, Dublin time was 30 minutes behind GMT simply because of being 7 degrees west of London.

Water John · 06-02-2018 8:41pm

All standardised for the trains.

Peregrinus · 07-02-2018 3:10am

Deleted User wrote: »

Historically, Dublin time was 30 minutes behind GMT simply because of being 7 degrees west of London.

It was 25 minutes and 21 seconds behind. Mean time for Britain was determined at the observatory at Greenwich; for Ireland, at the observatory at Dunsink.

In the nineteenth century, Britain and Ireland could have different standard times because, for obvious reasons, there were no railways running between them, so no pressing need for a uniform standard time. But with the growth in the late nineteenth century of the telegraph business this became more and more inconvenient, and in 1916 Ireland was moved to Greenwich Mean Time. TCD (which operated the observatory at Dunsink) was a holdout, for some years after clocks in TCD were set to Dunsink time ("college time"), and the time of lectures, exams etc were regulated by that. But eventually they had to bow to the pressures of conformity.

Capt'n Midnight · 09-02-2018 11:40pm

Point Of Information

Here we use Irish Standard Time , which is UTC +1

See.
STANDARD TIME ACT, 1968
Standard Time (Amendment) Act, 1971

10-02-2018 12:28am

Capt'n Midnight wrote: »

Point Of Information

Here we use Irish Standard Time , which is UTC +1

See.
STANDARD TIME ACT, 1968
Standard Time (Amendment) Act, 1971

You can't use the tla IST as that is already claimed by india (Indian Standard Time)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_Standard_Time UTC+05:30.

anyway the EU want to revise the whole summertime changing process again.

https://www.rte.ie/news/2018/0208/939344-clocks-eu-parliament/
Members of the European Parliament have backed a motion calling for an assessment of whether Europe should stop moving clocks forward and back between summer and winter time.
EU law since the 1990s has coordinated the shift to summertime, with citizens in all 28 EU countries moving their clocks an hour forward on the last Sunday in March and switching back to winter time on the final Sunday in October.
MEPs voted today by 384 to 153 for a motion calling on the European Commission to study the effects of switching clocks and, if necessary, to come up with an alternative plan.

If carried ,that will mean that Ireland would need to base its time on UTC/GMT like it already does.

Franz Von Peppercorn · 10-02-2018 12:35am

[Deleted User] wrote: »

You can't use the tla IST as that is already claimed by india (Indian Standard Time)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_Standard_Time UTC+05:30.

We do use Irish standard time already.

anyway the EU want to revise the whole summertime changing process again.

If carried ,that will mean that Ireland would need to base its time on UTC/GMT like it already does.

It doesn’t.

10-02-2018 12:44am

Franz Von Peppercorn wrote: »

We do use Irish standard time already.

It doesn’t.

We use UTC/GMT in the winter and UTC +1 in the summer.
What's so hard to understand.

Franz Von Peppercorn · 10-02-2018 12:53am

[Deleted User] wrote: »

We use UTC/GMT in the winter and UTC +1 in the summer.
What's so hard to understand.

We use Irish standard time (IST) in summer despite what you said. That’s UTC+1 but it is the standard time. Our summer time is the standard time. In winter we are IST-1.

If the EU decides on not changing the hour we revert to standard time which is IST, not GMT. Unless we change the law

10-02-2018 1:19am

Franz Von Peppercorn wrote: »

We use Irish standard time (IST) in summer despite what you said. That’s UTC+1 but it is the standard time. Our summer time is the standard time. In winter we are IST-1.

If the EU says decides on not changing the hour we revert to standard time which is IST, not GMT. Unless we change the law

IST (Indian standard time)
Do you want to argue that with 1.324 billion Indians?

Bob_Marley · 10-02-2018 1:27am

Definitely needs looking at. I don't think winter time needs to start as early in the winter as it does, and finish in the spring so late.

Franz Von Peppercorn · 10-02-2018 11:06am

[Deleted User] wrote: »

IST (Indian standard time)
Do you want to argue that with 1.324 billion Indians?

I know it’s also Indian summer time. IST is also Irish standard time. You could do a simple google on that yourself.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Time_in_Ireland

MajesticDonkey · 10-02-2018 11:09am

Deleted User wrote: »

IST (Indian standard time)
Do you want to argue that with 1.324 billion Indians?

You're really clutching at straws.

Irish Standard Time is a thing:
https://www.timeanddate.com/time/zones/ist-ireland
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Time_in_Ireland
https://greenwichmeantime.com/time-zone/europe/european-union/ireland/

Why can't we leave the clocks on summertime year round?

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