EU to end daylight savings time

[DavidSh]

Have you got a link to one of those archaeological discoveries? Curious what these things looked like.

Sure. The term for this hemispherical-shaped dial is a scaphe, and here is one from a Hellenistic colony in Afghanistan.

[Bohandas]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scaphe

[Yora]

Question: If the EU (at least those participating countries) switches to "always daylight saving time", does this mean that the EU will always be using UTC?

And does anyone know if Portugal, Ireland, and Iceland plan to switch to "always regular time"? Because then they would always have the same time as most of the EU.

I thought always having daylight saving on would be inellegant because then noon closer to 13:00 instead of 12:00 for most countries. But with UTC being used by international traffic, in antarctica, and IN SPACE! this actually makes way more sense.

Or did I get it all wrong again and we will be at permanent UTC+2?

[halfeye]

Question: If the EU (at least those participating countries) switches to "always daylight saving time", does this mean that the EU will always be using UTC?

And does anyone know if Portugal, Ireland, and Iceland plan to switch to "always regular time"? Because then they would always have the same time as most of the EU.

I thought always having daylight saving on would be inellegant because then noon closer to 13:00 instead of 12:00 for most countries. But with UTC being used by international traffic, in antarctica, and IN SPACE! this actually makes way more sense.

Or did I get it all wrong again and we will be at permanent UTC+2?

I have no clue what's going on, I thought it was this year but it seems to have been put off.

I personally would prefer to never have daylight saving time, it only makes a significant difference in April and October, and the difference it does make is silly.

The EU is huge, it ought to have several timezones within it, like the USA does.

[AMX]

Or did I get it all wrong again and we will be at permanent UTC+2?

This one.

(Most of the EU uses CET, which is UTC+1. Standardising on CEST would add one hour to that, so UTC+2)

[Yora]

I hate this stuff! So glad it will be over. :D

But in that case, it can be Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania, Bulgaria, and Greece who could switch to always winter time and have the same time as central Europe.

[veti]

As I understand it, each country can choose any timezone it likes. That's what happens now, anyway. The difference is just that they'll stop changing twice a year.

[snowblizz]

As I understand it, each country can choose any timezone it likes. That's what happens now, anyway. The difference is just that they'll stop changing twice a year.

Basically.

I think the real decision will be on the thos countries not on CE(S)T, Portugal, Ireland and those east Finland, Estonia etc etc etc.

Worst case ofc is the guys in the east pick one to become +2 over CET (I wouldn't mind going over to CET myself honestly, I watch mostly Swedish tv).

One would hope countries could pick whatever options gets us all closer but I know am asking too much there. It's going to get messier am sure.

[Lvl 2 Expert]

I have no clue what's going on, I thought it was this year but it seems to have been put off.

I personally would prefer to never have daylight saving time, it only makes a significant difference in April and October, and the difference it does make is silly.

The EU is huge, it ought to have several timezones within it, like the USA does.

It's not that big. Natural time wise there's London time, +0, Berlin time, +1, (edit: or Prague, is actually a bit closer to the actual center line) and St Petersburg time, +2. For most of the union +1 would be a workable time.

That's not what's going to happen of course, Germany is going to pick St Petersburg time, and it's all going downhill from there. But it could work.

[halfeye]

It's not that big. Natural tine wise there's London time, +0, Berlin time, +1, and St Petersburg time, +2. For most of the union +1 would be a workable time.

That's not what's going to happen of course, Germany is going to pick St Petersburg time, and it's all going downhill from there. But it could work.

London is in the far east of Britain, all of Iberia is west of it (though not by as much as I thought).

[veti]

It's not that big. Natural tine wise there's London time, +0, Berlin time, +1, and St Petersburg time, +2. For most of the union +1 would be a workable time.

I see no reason why countries shouldn't adopt any of those three zones. Although I would use Cyprus as the Eastern marker, because unlike St Petersburg, that actually is in the EU...

It's not unusual for a large country to have multiple timezones. USA, Canada, Russia, Australia all seem to manage well enough.

[Kato]

I think we debated this already but I don't see why we don't all run on the same time worldwide, or at least every country that wants to be part of the world community.

[Lvl 2 Expert]

I think we debated this already but I don't see why we don't all run on the same time worldwide, or at least every country that wants to be part of the world community.

Because "everyone having the same idea about when mornings and evenings and workdays happen" was judged just as valuable as or even more so than "everyone having the same idea about when right now is".

[Manga Shoggoth]

I think we debated this already but I don't see why we don't all run on the same time worldwide, or at least every country that wants to be part of the world community.

Because "everyone having the same idea about when mornings and evenings and workdays happen" was judged just as valuable as or even more so than "everyone having the same idea about when right now is".

It is really on the "even more so" side.

Even if you are a member of this "world community", the vast majority of people's time will be spent in local time (with its relation to dawn, noon and dusk). Very, very few people need to care what time it is outside the local time zone.

There are edge cases - people on the boundary of a time zone is a rather literal example - but outside that it only affects people in specific jobs that go cross-timezone (and a few labelled clocks on the wall fixes that quite nicely). Even in a country with multiple timezones, I doubt that most people need to worry about them very often.

I was in this situation when I was working in Atlanta many years ago - all the work was being done in Atlanta time (whichever TZ that is), and we only had to worry about London time on the few occasions we had to call back to the office. I actually ended up in a half-way house between the two due to an experiment in shift working to ease the load on the somewhat overrun hardware, but even then I was oriented on the local time, because that's how everyone else in Atlanta was living.

Even people who go on holiday in another country will simply switch to local time when they get there.

[halfeye]

There are north-south time zone things as well as east-west. Here, in winter there are sixteen hours of night in midwinter, and eight hours of night in midsummer, if you go north it gets even more extreme, in the arctic circle the sun doesn't set in summer, and doesn't rise in winter, and it's very similar in the extreme south.

[Manga Shoggoth]

There are north-south time zone things as well as east-west. Here, in winter there are sixteen hours of night in midwinter, and eight hours of night in midsummer, if you go north it gets even more extreme, in the arctic circle the sun doesn't set in summer, and doesn't rise in winter, and it's very similar in the extreme south.

Shhh!! They might add legislation to have the Earth rotating around the horizontal axis as well!!!

[LordEntrails]

I think we debated this already but I don't see why we don't all run on the same time worldwide, or at least every country that wants to be part of the world community.

We already do, it's called UTC. It just that as others have said, it doesn't make much sense for most people. Do you want to start work at 2300 UTC? And have the sun set at 1300 UTC? (i.e. 1pm). That doesn't help anyone; i.e. "Let's meet at 9am." "Can't, I'm sleeping then." "Sorry, that's when happy hour starts..."

Local time is ingrained in our cultures and works well for what it needs. i.e. the local needs and most of life's daily situations. Universal time works well for what it is, coordinating timed events for non-local situations (i.e. multi-national meetings, online games, military use, etc). There is a really useful and insightful meeting planner, check it out and it will give you a good idea of the trouble with a single time zone; https://www.timeanddate.com/worldclock/meeting.html

My only "complaint" is a twice yearly change of the local time (i.e. daylight savings). That to me is... detrimental.

[Kato]

We already do, it's called UTC. It just that as others have said, it doesn't make much sense for most people. Do you want to start work at 2300 UTC? And have the sun set at 1300 UTC? (i.e. 1pm). That doesn't help anyone; i.e. "Let's meet at 9am." "Can't, I'm sleeping then." "Sorry, that's when happy hour starts..."

Yes, because humanity is unable to adapt local schedules to a universal time zone... What do I / you care if your clock says 6 am or 3 pm or 10pm when you wake up? What difference does it make if you have to go to work at 8am or 2am or 6pm? How many people really care about when exactly it's noon? (dusk and dawn I guess are more relevant but those are basically what we time our shedule around) Imagine the confusion in a world where not all schools start at the same time and not all shops close at the same time....


I mean, I get it, we're way too ingrained with "at what time a day should start and end". Most people don't care and don't see the point in changing. And that's fine. But claiming there is a good reason why the day should start at 6am or so beyond it's what we're used to makes no sense to me. I know we'll never get everyone to change but I can dream, can't i?

[LordEntrails]

Yes, because humanity is unable to adapt local schedules to a universal time zone... What do I / you care if your clock says 6 am or 3 pm or 10pm when you wake up? What difference does it make if you have to go to work at 8am or 2am or 6pm? How many people really care about when exactly it's noon? (dusk and dawn I guess are more relevant but those are basically what we time our shedule around) Imagine the confusion in a world where not all schools start at the same time and not all shops close at the same time....


I mean, I get it, we're way too ingrained with "at what time a day should start and end". Most people don't care and don't see the point in changing. And that's fine. But claiming there is a good reason why the day should start at 6am or so beyond it's what we're used to makes no sense to me. I know we'll never get everyone to change but I can dream, can't i?

:)
But do you want all schools to start at the same universal/common time? So kids going to school in the middle of the night? Some people sleeping in the middle of the day? All depending upon where you live in the world? The human body has issues if you don't keep your schedule synced with sunrise and sunset. The doctors call it "Non-24". And the scientists call it the "circadian rhythm".

But yes, we can dream :)

[Kato]

:)
But do you want all schools to start at the same universal/common time? So kids going to school in the middle of the night? Some people sleeping in the middle of the day? All depending upon where you live in the world? The human body has issues if you don't keep your schedule synced with sunrise and sunset. The doctors call it "Non-24". And the scientists call it the "circadian rhythm".

But yes, we can dream :)

No, that's almost the opposite of what I meant to say, that's why I said local schedule doesn't have to do anything with the universal time. I guess living in Germany I would get lucky if this change ever happened but if we decided to pick another meridian for utc, say somewhere in Asia because population I would not care if my new day was waking up at 12am, going to work at 2am, getting home at 10am etc.
As I said, it's not like places pick their own time to open / close anyway.

[Wardog]

That would require almost the entire world to change all their timetables and reschedule everything, plus get their heads round doing everything at a different time than normal. Which would be a huge hassle, and for what benefit? The minority of people who need to coordinate things across timezones can already do so by using UTC or the appropriate local time zone.

[Lvl 2 Expert]

Plus it means that if you move or go on vacation, you have to "manually" adjust all your ideas about time. Is 03:00 a good time to go to a restaurant in Cairo? No? 01:00 maybe? With time zones you only have to change what time it is right now, and these days your phone does that for you.

So while a single time zone is good for trade, it's bad for travel.

[farothel]

There was a fun april fool's joke today in a Belgian Newspaper: Flanders (the North part) wanted Always winter time and Wallonia (the South part) Always summer time so the time in Belgium would be different (and that in a country the size of New Jersey) and that not on an east-west divide, but a north-south divide.

The weird (and annoying) part is that I can totally see that happen in a couple of years (when the change happens) as there is a divide along that axis as to which time we want.

[Razade]

There are edge cases - people on the boundary of a time zone is a rather literal example - but outside that it only affects people in specific jobs that go cross-timezone (and a few labelled clocks on the wall fixes that quite nicely). Even in a country with multiple timezones, I doubt that most people need to worry about them very often.

Anyone who has family living in another time zone or, perish the thought, multiple time zones have to think about it fairly often and that's a fair larger amount than you'd expect. Add to that people have friends outside their own country and time zones become a real hassle. Making sure I can play video games with my friends in the Netherlands is a logistic nightmare and if I don't wake up early, I won't get to speak to my parents because they're old and like to wake up at the crack of dawn and go to bed half past when does the local diner close. Time zones, and knowing the differences, is literally a part of my every day life and since I live in a city where the native population is significantly lower than the population of what we lovingly term ex-pats there isn't a single person I work with in a job of sixty that don't also have the same concerns.

[halfeye]

There was a fun april fool's joke today in a Belgian Newspaper: Flanders (the North part) wanted Always winter time and Wallonia (the South part) Always summer time so the time in Belgium would be different (and that in a country the size of New Jersey) and that not on an east-west divide, but a north-south divide.

The weird (and annoying) part is that I can totally see that happen in a couple of years (when the change happens) as there is a divide along that axis as to which time we want.

As I said above, north-south is also a consideration. I'm surprised Belgium is big enough for that to be a thing there.

[Rogar Demonblud]

You missed the line about April Fool's Joke, I think.

[halfeye]

You missed the line about April Fool's Joke, I think.

I always do, on purpose if I spot it, which this time I didn't.

[Maelstrom]

You missed the line about April Fool's Joke, I think.

EDIT: Yikes, darned time change making me groggy and missing the obvious ;)

[LordEntrails]

I could care less how many time zones there are and if they are divided on latitude or longitude. I just hate when places change what their time zone is twice a year. Get rid of that stupidity and I'm happy. Use timeanddate.com or something similar and it's not a big deal to figure out when you can/should reach out to someone or have a meeting.

We have local times for a good reason, we have a universal time for good reason. Just get rid of seasonal time shifts and educate people and everything will fall into line easily enough.

[Lvl 2 Expert]

There was a fun april fool's joke today in a Belgian Newspaper: Flanders (the North part) wanted Always winter time and Wallonia (the South part) Always summer time so the time in Belgium would be different (and that in a country the size of New Jersey) and that not on an east-west divide, but a north-south divide.

The weird (and annoying) part is that I can totally see that happen in a couple of years (when the change happens) as there is a divide along that axis as to which time we want.

Yes, could totally happen.

It would probably indicate that the country has finally become politically completely unworkable, and since that never seems to happen no matter how bad things get my guess is this is not going to happen and Belgium will stay in one time zone. But the magic of Belgium makes it a very real possibility right up until the moment it isn't.