Monday, March 14, 2016

back to 13

With the coming of Daylight Saving* Time this past Sunday, Seoul is back to being only 13 hours ahead of DC. Come fall, we'll be back to being 14 hours ahead.

I've long considered DST a relic of the past that needs to be done away with. In fact, with time zones drawn as crazily as they are, we should move to a global standard, and if this means that some people work 9 to 5 while others work 4 to 12, then so be it! We can get used to anything.

Stop this local-time nonsense!



*Apparently, I've been saying it and spelling it wrong all these years. It's not Daylight Savings (plural) Time; it's Daylight Saving Time. And technically, if we're dealing with a phrasal adjective, it ought to be Daylight-saving Time, with a lower-case "s." (You capitalize only the first letter of the first word in a hyphenated compound or phrasal adjective. Yes—the rule obtains even if it doesn't "look right" to you. Sorry.)


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2 comments:

brier said...

I disagree with you on this one. Circadian rhythms shouldn’t be ignored. Mid to high latitudes require a bit on natural time management for sunlight hours. Of course time is used by governments to exert control too. Like most people, I find myself on a schedule and sunlight at 5 am in midsummer is wasted on most people who do keep to a schedule. Maybe Korea needs to drop the yoke with Japan's time zone, and get back into the Celestial Empire’s time zone. That wouldn’t bother me, and would make for pleasant summer evenings in Seoul outdoors with Jr.

Kevin Kim said...

If the US were to drop DST, I don't think it would affect circadian rhythms at all. It's just a single hour we're talking about, after all. If you've ever traveled to a place that's just one time zone over, then you'll have noticed there's no adjustment period whatsoever—no jet lag to speak of.

And if we were all to move to a global standard time (a suggestion I made facetiously), I think our circadian rhythms would quickly take care of themselves. For the purpose of work schedules, local businesses (and not governments) could decide what hours they expect their workers to come in. The standard would still be to work from local mid-morning to right around dinnertime. But again, I wasn't being serious about this, although it'd be cool if it happened.