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Britain is 240 miles to the left of where it should be.
http://www.x404.co.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?f=19&t=2373		 Page 1 of 2
Author:  ProfessorF [ Thu Aug 20, 2009 6:08 pm ]
Post subject:  Britain is 240 miles to the left of where it should be.
Quote:
Edinburgh Researcher Discovers Time Is More Relative Than We Thought

"There is no time like the present", or so the saying goes. But it turns out that the present isn't what it used to be.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

PRLog (Press Release) – Aug 18, 2009 – "There is no time like the present", or so the saying goes. But earlier today it turned out that the present isn't what it used to be as scientists from the University of Edinburgh announced that our international time zones are actually 20 minutes fast.

The reason? A geographical mistake that pegged Britain's position in the Atlantic some 240 miles too far east back when the original time zones were designed.

The mistake was discovered by post-doctoral Research Assistant Dr Tomas Domingues during routine historical analysis into how the horizon has shifted in regions of the United Kingdom over the millenia.

"I ran the numbers and it just didn't add up", says Dr Domnigues. "The equations wouldn't balance unless I moved all of the British Isles 240 miles to the left. So I'm afraid I have no choice but to inform the world that we all need to adjust our clocks. Today, if possible."

Dr Domingues' paper, "Shifting Sands of Time: How the United Kingdom ended up in the wrong place", lists a bewildering array of numbers that prove beyond a doubt his assertions are true. But why did no-one notice this before?

"I guess it was hiding in plain sight", says Domingues. "It's just not the sort of thing anyone thought to question."


Source
Author:  Linux_User [ Thu Aug 20, 2009 8:57 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Britain is 240 miles to the left of where it should be.
Somehow I can't see this happening. And even if it did, what would it change? The world's time operates off of GMT anyway.
Author:  finlay666 [ Thu Aug 20, 2009 9:01 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Britain is 240 miles to the left of where it should be.
Linux_User wrote:
Somehow I can't see this happening. And even if it did, what would it change? The world's time operates off of GMT anyway.

No it doesn't

A lot of places operate off CET or PST, or the one for Asia which I forget, not many places go by GMT any more
Author:  Linux_User [ Thu Aug 20, 2009 9:02 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Britain is 240 miles to the left of where it should be.
finlay666 wrote:
Linux_User wrote:
Somehow I can't see this happening. And even if it did, what would it change? The world's time operates off of GMT anyway.

No it doesn't

A lot of places operate off CET or PST, or the one for Asia which I forget, not many places go by GMT any more


Oh of course! Nowhere operates off of "GMT/UTC +/- X hours". :?
Author:  ProfessorF [ Thu Aug 20, 2009 9:05 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Britain is 240 miles to the left of where it should be.
finlay666 wrote:
A lot of places operate off CET or PST, or the one for Asia which I forget, not many places go by GMT any more


Well, kinda.
http://www.answers.com/topic/time-zone
Author:  finlay666 [ Thu Aug 20, 2009 11:17 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Britain is 240 miles to the left of where it should be.
Linux_User wrote:
finlay666 wrote:
Linux_User wrote:
Somehow I can't see this happening. And even if it did, what would it change? The world's time operates off of GMT anyway.

No it doesn't

A lot of places operate off CET or PST, or the one for Asia which I forget, not many places go by GMT any more


Oh of course! Nowhere operates off of "GMT/UTC +/- X hours". :?


GMT/UTC +/- X hours is not GMT/UTC straight up

It's used as a basis for differentiating time zones, I am aware of that

I was reffering to businesses, and UTC is different to GMT as BST is no longer approximately equivalent to UTC and more to WET
Author:  veato [ Fri Aug 21, 2009 6:58 am ]
Post subject:  Re: Britain is 240 miles to the left of where it should be.
finlay666 wrote:

I was reffering to businesses, and UTC is different to GMT as BST is no longer approximately equivalent to UTC and more to WET


I have a little PET that is a CAT that once scratched my LEG when it was naughty so I threw it OUT
Author:  HeatherKay [ Fri Aug 21, 2009 7:44 am ]
Post subject:  Re: Britain is 240 miles to the left of where it should be.
finlay666 wrote:
I was reffering to businesses, and UTC is different to GMT as BST is no longer approximately equivalent to UTC and more to WET


Whatever. In my book UTC = GMT as near as dammit. What folk in other timezones choose to do is purely down to their own requirements. As far as I am concerned, Coordinated Universal Time is the same as Greenwich Mean Time.

wikipedia wrote:
In casual use, Greenwich Mean Time (GMT) can be considered equivalent to UTC or UT1 when fractions of a second are not important. Owing to the ambiguity as to whether UTC or UT1 is meant, GMT is generally avoided in technical contexts.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Utc
Author:  timark_uk [ Fri Aug 21, 2009 7:48 am ]
Post subject:  Re: Britain is 240 miles to the left of where it should be.
HeatherKay wrote:
Whatever.
And I thought it was just me who was the grumpy dismissive this morning.

Mark
Author:  HeatherKay [ Fri Aug 21, 2009 7:59 am ]
Post subject:  Re: Britain is 240 miles to the left of where it should be.
timark_uk wrote:
HeatherKay wrote:
Whatever.
And I thought it was just me who was the grumpy dismissive this morning.

Mark


Nope. It's Friday and I'm grumpy.

*avoids corny Catherine Tate reference*

;)
Author:  veato [ Fri Aug 21, 2009 10:05 am ]
Post subject:  Re: Britain is 240 miles to the left of where it should be.
Grumpy on a Friday. Surely you've confused today with Monday. Friday is the best day of the week! :D :D :D
Author:  HeatherKay [ Fri Aug 21, 2009 10:14 am ]
Post subject:  Re: Britain is 240 miles to the left of where it should be.
veato wrote:
Grumpy on a Friday. Surely you've confused today with Monday. Friday is the best day of the week! :D :D :D


Usually it is, but it's only two days to go until Monday. :x :D
Author:  okenobi [ Fri Aug 21, 2009 10:32 am ]
Post subject:  Re: Britain is 240 miles to the left of where it should be.
To be fair Heather, the article you posted does in fact mention UTC replaced GMT as the central time reference in 1972.

Quite an interesting story, but how far do you wanna take it? We're almost half an hour behind London down here, but you don't see us trying to create Cornish Time. That would be silly.
Author:  HeatherKay [ Fri Aug 21, 2009 10:40 am ]
Post subject:  Re: Britain is 240 miles to the left of where it should be.
okenobi wrote:
To be fair Heather, the article you posted does in fact mention UTC replaced GMT as the central time reference in 1972.


Yer-but-no-but it's still GMT in all but name.

Look, it was decided that the base meridian should run through Greenwich back in the halcyon days when Britain had an empire. Call it GMT, UTC, Charles or Camilla, it's still where it all starts from.

Sorry, I've lost the thread of my argument. I'll go and lie down for a bit. :lol:
Author:  okenobi [ Fri Aug 21, 2009 12:03 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Britain is 240 miles to the left of where it should be.
HeatherKay wrote:
okenobi wrote:
To be fair Heather, the article you posted does in fact mention UTC replaced GMT as the central time reference in 1972.


Yer-but-no-but it's still GMT in all but name.

Look, it was decided that the base meridian should run through Greenwich back in the halcyon days when Britain had an empire. Call it GMT, UTC, Charles or Camilla, it's still where it all starts from.

Sorry, I've lost the thread of my argument. I'll go and lie down for a bit. :lol:


Yer-but-no-but....

Time (or anything else important for that matter) hasn't been run out of London for bloody ages. Yes, it started with GMT, but things have moved on considerably. You'd need to have more than a passing interest in physics to understand the full complexity of just what exactly time is. Then of course, there's solar time, atomic time, local time, relative time etc. etc.

UT1 is the (rough approximate) equivalent of GMT. UTC is measured from atomic clocks throughout the world, and although it has to use leap seconds to keep close to UT1, is in fact what most of the world runs off.

Enjoy your lie down :)
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