I was really worried about the poor people of Samoa, who went to bed Thursday night, December 29th and woke up on Saturday morning, December 31st. They just skipped Friday the 30th.
Not some science fiction plot but a rational decision based on Samoans' desire to be on the same calendar page as their trading parners in nearby New Zealand and Australia. So everyone agreed simply to move the date line so that Samoa was on the good morning side along with its neighbors, making it the first to welcome in 2012 instead of the last to bid farewell to 2011.
But what happens when you eliminate a day? Are you two days older instead of one? And what about wages for working people? Do they lose a day's pay? Does the government lose a day's worth of taxes?
Not to worry, really. The earth just keeps spinning on its axis, making sunrise and sunset without any concern for man's arbitrary beginning and ending of days. The cows don't care. Sea birds fly back and forth across the date line all the time without worrying.
But what of my more philosophical questions about being a day older or younger? It's the same as contemplating whether you get older or younger if you travel around the world in this direction or that one. Granted, Samoa didn't move, just the arbitrary date line. But we measure all kinds of actuarial data based on calendar day counts.
Actually there are no worries about this one either. It seems that 2012 is a leap year. February will have an extra day -- so it all balances out.
Except, it doesn't really. Because everybody worldwide will get the extra day. So, relatively, we're back to square one about the age of someone living in Samoa when they eliminated a day.
Trivia? Yes, but at least it changes the subject from what's happening in Iowa.
Ralph
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