A republication of a post first shown on 28th October, 2009 which still seems relevant as British Summer Time is due to end in a couple of days time.

oooOOOooo

An ancient idea may have run it’s course?

What is the purpose of “Daylight Saving”? [Interesting history of Daylight Saving on Wikipedia. Ed.]

This week we are in a particularly interesting situation as we are in the middle of a one week separation between the dates when Europe and US change their clocks back to “normal” winter time. I.e. Europe changed their clocks back at 2am last Sunday and most, but not all, US States change their clocks back at 2am this coming Sunday.

This is even more confusing than normal. But why are we doing this at all?

Is it to save fuel, to save lives, to save time or to save something else?

In my humble opinion it is all nonsense!

“Time management” is a myth

Time is time! People say that they do not have enough time to do this or that, as if they have ways to make some more; and, of course, there is much talk about “time management”. Yet we all have the same amount of time and no amount of management will change that!

We are certainly able to manage the things that we try to fit into the available time.  That is, we can manage tasks, effort and so on. But, in everyday (Newtonian rather than Einsteinian) regimes, time is an inelastic independent variable. Fiddling about with the clocks and trying to “manage time” have no effect on the stuff whatsoever. Let it be!

There must be a better way!

Yes, I know! Some people make claims of wasted daylight or of the dangers to schoolchildren walking to or from school in the dark. These are valid areas of concern. If adjusting the times of business operations or schooling helps to deal with them, then by all means do so. But, for goodness, let’s not pretend the time is different.