Received: from ELI.CS.YALE.EDU by NEBULA.SYSTEMSZ.CS.YALE.EDU via SMTP; Wed, 6 Oct 1993 16:43:06 -0400 Received: from YALEVM.YCC.YALE.EDU by eli.CS.YALE.EDU via SMTP; Wed, 6 Oct 1993 16:42:11 -0400 Message-Id: <199310062042.AA20494@eli.CS.YALE.EDU> Received: from CUVMB.CC.COLUMBIA.EDU by YaleVM.YCC.Yale.Edu (IBM VM SMTP V2R2) with BSMTP id 7863; Wed, 06 Oct 93 16:40:23 EDT Received: from CUVMB.COLUMBIA.EDU by CUVMB.CC.COLUMBIA.EDU (Mailer R2.07) with BSMTP id 0906; Wed, 06 Oct 93 16:43:02 EDT Date: Thu, 7 Oct 1993 09:48:10 GMT+1200 Reply-To: Chris Handley Sender: Lojban list From: Chris Handley Organization: University of Otago Subject: Re: local units To: Erik Rauch Status: RO X-Status: X-From-Space-Date: Thu Oct 7 09:48:10 1993 X-From-Space-Address: @YaleVM.YCC.YALE.EDU:LOJBAN@CUVMB.BITNET John Cowan: > 1 gigasecond = 31 years 251 days 13 hours 34 minutes 51.52 seconds > ^^? >(assuming all years are 365.2422 days long exactly). The _tropical_year (which is the one we use because it stays in time with the seasons) is measured as 365.24219 (or 365.24220 depending on which reference you choose) is usually _defined_ as 31,556,926 seconds. (In fact, for some time the second was defined as that part of the year 1900, until more modern methods took over). Every so often a leap second is added, to allow for inaccuracies in measurement, changes in the speeds of rotation and revolution, etc. BTW, the current method of specifying leap years (+1/4 -1/100 +1/400 -1/4000) is accurate for about 20,000 years. An alternative would be (+1/4 - 1/128) is accurate for about 400,000 years. Which is 'better'? ====================================================================== Chris Handley chandley@otago.ac.nz Dept of Computer Science Ph (+64) 3-479-8499 University of Otago Fax (+64) 3-479-8577 Dunedin, NZ ______________________________________________________________________ There are three types of Computer Scientist: those who can count and those who can't.