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Comment by kemiller | Hacker News Reader

Good God, no. The time isn’t just an arbitrary number to help coordinate meetings, it communicates what time of the day/night cycle you’re experiencing, to a reasonable approximation. Having separate time zones may be annoying, but it forces you to think about others’ experience. If I say I was up last night til 4 in the morning, that tells you something.

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Agree. Noon should be the moment when the sun is at its highest altitude in the sky, or a close approximation thereof.

> Agree. Noon should be the moment when the sun is at its highest altitude in the sky, or a close approximataion thereof.

I too want the same time worldwide but I guess the best we can do is UTC. I mean we could do it but I fear we'd just be sweeping the ugliness under the rug. I don't want this kind mess https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Time_in_China

> Currently, timezone usage within Xinjiang is roughly split along the ethnic divide, with most ethnic Han following Beijing time and most ethnic Uyghurs following Ürümqi Time.

We already have UTC when you want the same time worldwide. Using UTC in everyday life would be somewhat confusing when travelling. I guess it would take quite a while to get used to things happening at a different time on the clock.

I think the sunrise is a better fixture socially, and maybe the sunset is a better fixture biologically. Noon is just an easy to measure compromise for the above two.

Social life and timing mostly revolves around how early you get up. "Its late" kind of means "I am behind schedule to get enough sleep before waking up".

Biologically, we are programmed around sunlight. Whilst our mornings aren't really controlled by the biological clock (that is what the alarm is for), the evening really are. Besides, the for many people, the evening is what separates 'civil life' from 'private life'.

I agree, but sunrise and sunset have the disadvantage of not being fixed (unless you live on the equator).

Ah, yes. The time between sunsets isn't fixed but the time between noons is.

Why? Noon is just a number on a clock. Midday is when the sun is half-way between dawn and dusk.

Noon literally means midday. It predates clocks and solar noon would drive your sundial.

> If I say I was up last night til 4 in the morning, that tells you something.

No it doesn't.

If you say you got two hours of sleep, that tells me something. When you sleep is your own choice.

https://xkcd.com/361/

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