"About Time A History of Civilization in Twelve Clocks"

[LittleWatchShop]

First of all on this New Year's eve 2022/2023: Happy New Year!

I just finished this book.  Frankly, I am a little surprised that I finished it because it was not delivering as expected...was hoping for more clocks and less philosophy.  (This is not a book review.)  I found on page 167 a sort of synopsis of the tenor of the book: "The standardization of time and space is all about maintaining order, controlling people's behavior, making money, securing political power, building empires and waging war."  A bit of pathos, no?

Yeah, the book is about how time pieces are instruments of oppression.  Well, like I said...I was not hopeful about finishing it, but I stayed the course hoping for redemption.

Should you read it?  Dunno.  There is some interesting clock history (Gog and Magog, e.g.) and as a result of this read, I appreciate that time-keeping contraptions have been around for quite awhile (not referring to sun dials and such...the mechanical ones).

I think that I need time for this book to sink in before I get its full impact.  My mom would have enjoyed it...she was obsessed with time.  She has now gone after living 98 years on this good earth (2016).  Attached is one of her poems "Damn Time"

 

Edited December 31, 2022 by LittleWatchShop

[AndyHull]

It started snowing..

... Heavily...

... Really heavily ...

...so we decided to drive down to Stirling anyway to see the fireworks.

My friends in the Canada office fully understood.

It was well worth the effort.

I'm not sure about the whole human race becoming more civilised as time passes, but maybe some of us are.

Particularly round here, I would suggest.

I guess it depends on your definition of "civilised". 

Happy 2023 everyone.

Oh.. and "the algorithm"  suggested a few hours back that I should read this.

https://www.npr.org/2022/12/16/1139780043/what-is-time-physics-atomic-clocks-society
 

Edited January 1, 2023 by AndyHull

[AndyHull]

Another piece of (translated) horological poetry, berating time and its measurement. This one from Plautus in Roman times.

Quote

The gods confound the man who first found out
  How to distinguish hours! Confound him too,
Who in this place set up a sundial,
  To cut and hack my days so wretchedly
Into small portions—When I was a boy,
  My belly was my sun-dial: one more sure,
Truer, and more exact than any of them.
  This dial told me when 'twas proper time
To go to dinner, when I had aught to eat—
  But now-a-days, why, even when I have,
I can't fall to, unless the sun gives leave.
  The town's so full of these confounded dials,
The greatest part of its inhabitants
  Shrunk up with hunger, creep along the streets.

Source - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_timekeeping_devices

Edited January 1, 2023 by AndyHull