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Carrion Luggage #1101388 added November 11, 2025 at 8:44am
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Big Throbbing Clock
You've no doubt heard of border disputes. They happen all the time. Some are going on right now. Well, here's the time equivalent, from Mental Floss:
And already, I have to quibble: Time isn't what's complicated, here. Timekeeping is. That's kind of like saying "measurement is complicated" when two countries have two different definitions of the meter.
I mean, time is rather complicated, what with acceleration and relativity and gravity wells and all. But that's not what the article is about.
Today, it’s standard to have multiple time zones around the world. But the history of how we got to this point has been fraught with a number of strong disagreements over the years—and some disputes remain unresolved to this day.
This should, of course, surprise no one. The Eastern church resisted the Gregorian calendar developed by the Western church right up until the 20th century in some cases (and, if my understanding is correct, continues to do so for liturgical purposes). And that's an example from what's nominally the same religion.
France and the UK’s Battle Over the Center of Universal Time
Also known as "the main reason I saved this link despite becoming increasingly frustrated with Mental Floss."
...in 1884, an international conference was held to determine a universal center of time. This event brought a long-running dispute between France and the UK back to the forefront, with each country clamoring to make a claim for its spot at this center.
Disputes between France and the UK should also surprise exactly no one. They're like siblings who are always fighting, until some bully attacks one of them, at which point they band together to defeat said bully.
The UK ultimately won. Greenwich Mean Time (GMT) took on the accolade (Greenwich being in London, the capital of the UK). France initially resisted GMT, but eventually adopted it in 1911.
It's way more complicated than that, but I don't expect much from a quick overview. I just find the whole thing fascinating. Anyone who's read Dan Brown (I will admit to reading the book) will already have heard that there was a Prime Meridian in Paris that predated the Prime Meridian in London. The dispute is even funnier once you realize that the Paris meridian is only a bit over two degrees of longitude different. And a bit more tragic when you remember that the original definition of the meter (or metre) was based on the geodesic distance between north pole and equator at that Paris meridian.
But it gets better. Look at a map. France lies mostly to the south of England, so you'd think they'd be in the same time zone, right? Right? Wrong. France uses Central European Time, UTC+1. England, unsurprisingly, uses UTC.
Sometimes I think the only thing those countries can agree on is that Americans suck. Until the next big war, anyway.
Dublin’s 25-minute and 21-Second Difference
Dublin, Ireland, used to have its own time zone from 1880 to 1916. It was known as Dublin Mean Time (DMT), and was 25 minutes and 21 seconds behind GMT.
Another place that had good reason to annoy the Brits.
Even after the Irish Free State gained its independence from the UK in 1922, time in both countries generally stayed consistent to avoid Northern Ireland becoming out of step with either country.
And technically, Ireland could have gone either way. Or, if they were following time zones exactly, the island would be split in half vertically. That may have made things worse. Or better; I don't know.
Spain Being in the “Wrong” Time Zone
Spain used to share a time zone with Portugal and the UK.
Like France, it's on CET. Portugal, however, is not.
France’s Time Change While Under Nazi Occupation
German orders caused the French to change their time zone following the Nazi occupation of France during World War II. France had been following Greenwich Mean Time; now, they were obligated to follow CET (along with other countries the Germans occupied).
Yeah, so, that's the original reason for France being on CET. Still, I wouldn't be surprised if they kept it just to annoy the UK.
The UK on Double Summer Time
The UK adopted British Summer Time from 1940 onwards; this meant that the clocks no longer fell back one hour to GMT in October as they previously had.
So, basically, for a while there, even England didn't use its own time zone. (For our purposes, GMT and UTC can be used interchangeably).
The country adopted this method in part so that there would be more light in the evening, giving people extra time to be outside before darkness fell and any blackouts—and the threat of nighttime air raids from the enemy—began.
Apparently, they found this to be a better solution than the far simpler "end the work day earlier in the winter" thing. And some people still seem to think that summer time, or daylight saving time, gives you extra daylight, when the truth is it's more like cutting off the first 5 centimeters of your meter stick and gluing it onto the other end.
The difference in daylight hours between summer and winter becomes more pronounced the further north you go, and parts of the UK are very far north indeed.
The Argument Over Whether We Should Have Different Time Zones at All
Despite their ubiquity around the world, not everyone welcomes the concept of time zones. There are even some who have argued they should be abolished altogether. One of the arguments in favor of abolishing time zones is that it would stop people from using them as a political tool.
Spoiler: time would still be used as a political tool.
The article doesn't even go into the places where time zones are really weird. China, for example, while spanning roughly five time zones, uses one standard time across the country. And, of course, the one standard time favors the heavily populated east coast of that country, at least in terms of lining up with day/night, at the expense of the people in the west.
As another example, there are places in Australia and South Asia that are off from UTC by 1/2 hour.
In summary, time isn't an illusion. But the way we measure it is pretty damn arbitrary. |
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