[Tfug] A sense of time

[bpoag at comcast.net]

2007 = 2006 years since the birth of Christianity. There was no 0 A.D.   1 B.C. was directly followed by 1 A.D.

> 
> All of the tools we use operate on establishing a point in time and 
> marking time following that event. The month is August: 8 months from 
> the beginning of a new year. It is 9am: 9 hours from the start of a new 
> day. It is 2007: 2007 years from the birth of Christianity. When we set 
> our clocks on our PC's we establish the starting point and the hardware 
> tries its best to keep an accurate count of crystal oscillations so as 
> to measure the time that has transpired between the setting of the start 
> point and "now".
> 
> The problem is that we have the ability to set that start time to be 
> anything we want it to be. There is nothing that keeps us from lying to 
> the hardware. What we need is the ability to force a starting time on a 
> computer that is predefined and immutable. This has been solved in other 
> technologies. I think of the GPS systems and the various public atomic 
> clocks that are available. I am wearing a watch that picks up the time 
> from the air and is highly accurate.
> 
> Because our marking of time is our own creation we will always be 
> dependent on some device of our making to set the starting point for 
> other devices. There must exist some "gold standard" for getting that 
> initial starting place. It is not rational for every device to have the 
> ability to watch the stars, calculate our position in the universe and 
> report a calculated time reference. We must depend on something else to 
> do that for us. In developed countries we currently we have access to 
> these types of sources via the air, internet, cell towers, satellite and 
> phone. The choice of which technology to use is based on the resources 
> we have when developing the devices that depend on it.
> 
> Clearly, as Ben has stated, we are not there yet. It is not a problem in 
> search of a solution. It is a solution in search of an implementation. 
> We can not continue to use current solutions because the initial 
> starting point for time calculations are under our control. The solution 
> will have to involve taking that control away from us. Perhaps future 
> hardware can have have components that can extract the time from various 
> sources. If you have a network card, maybe it could have a component 
> that taps the internet source for time. A radio on the mother-board that 
> picks up time form the air. As computers and wireless networks such as 
> G3 become more ubiquitous they could be imbued with the ability to take 
> time from cell towers. I believe the days of setting time via the 
> land-line phone are limited but a huge percentage of people still 
> connect to other networks via a modem. Modems could easily be made to 
> deliver correct time.
> 
> So, there are solutions. They are just not ubiquitous enough to be 
> depended on. What we need to do is to communicate our desires to the 
> engineers of today and tomorrow so that the solutions become reality 
> instead of wishes,
> 
> -- 
> Sometimes I wonder.  Were our faith able to stand upright and look around, would 
> it be looking down at the mustard seed or standing in awe of the height and 
> bredth of it.
> 
> 
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