Subject: Re: [lojban] (from lojban-beginners) pi'e

From: [email-masked]
Date: Tue, 18 Sep 2001 04:33:11 EDT

In a message dated 9/17/2001 8:29:14 PM Central Daylight Time, [email-masked] 
writes:

> from my observation people in germany tend to mix the 24h and the 12h style 
> in speech.
> 

It would be interesting to figure out what factors influence the different 
uses. I tend to predict "official" vs. homebody usage.

<and the fact that 12 hour clocks have
> persisted since the Babylonians were the last to use a duodecimal multiple
> as a base makes it hard to imagine that this will change quickly).
which might have to do with the fact that most analog clocks only have a 12h 
scale (or is it the other way around? ;) ). >

12 hour days (& 12 hour nights) go back to at least the -7th century, before 
clocks of any mechanical sort. They were taken over by most of the world 
(from Babylon as far as we can tell) and standardized in various ways in 
different cultures. But when better means came along, (candles, clepsydra, 
pendula, mainsprings, etc.) they were measured off in 12s again, despite 
rampant decimalism in most places and worse in some: 7 or 9, say).