Very interesting. Only thing that I see is that it's difficult to tell a difference between an 8 and a 9. Like I could see how it was different on the physical clock as it changes, but if I were to just look at it on its own, it would be hard to tell without literally trying to count the sides. I'd probably just make up some symbol for those. but otherwise very cool!
Crowing over omitting Arabic numerals in the name of avoiding any kind of cultural influence or bias seems silly when everything is still going to be expressed in decimal.
And in hours, minutes and seconds. Yes, those are near universal (I guess there may still be a few tribes in the Amazon or Indonesia that don’t use them), but still are cultural.
Also, having each hour have the same duration is cultural. The Romans, for example, at some time, used a clock where “the period of the natural day from sunrise to sunset was divided into twelve hours” (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_timekeeping). That means hours were shorter in winter than in summer.
The author wanted it to retain some practical value, hence the discussion of the four “layers” of time—departing from the 12-hour system completely, even if there is a better way to represent time outside of it, would make the clock difficult to use.
I wonder if this article got inspired by the recent movie Project Hail Mary?
Another thing related to this subject is the frequency in watch making. I own a manual winding watch that I wear everyday. It is certainly an engineering marvel. These watches are ticking by the hair spring and its frequencies are targeted to 2.5Hz to 4Hz (5 times per second, or 8 times per second). I don't know the rationale behind these numbers. I guess that they must have been a combination of engineering constraints and finding a good balance to keep every second accurate.
Humans are really bad at counting groups larger than five (might be related to the amount of things you can point on at once). So the choice of using ten polygons seems suboptimal to me, especially given the 12 hour system used. I think using only six shapes might work better for an actual clock.
What about a continuous scale ?
Choosing a base 60/24 for counting time is cultural and even if it is now the world’s norm, I would argue that an alien would not get this choice
I was about to say that if it's still using a 12-hour system, it should use duodecimal numeric system instead of decimal. But then the polygons became much harder to differentiate the larger the number is so I'm not sure. Perhaps make the polygons spiky?
Also, having each hour have the same duration is cultural. The Romans, for example, at some time, used a clock where “the period of the natural day from sunrise to sunset was divided into twelve hours” (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_timekeeping). That means hours were shorter in winter than in summer.
Another thing related to this subject is the frequency in watch making. I own a manual winding watch that I wear everyday. It is certainly an engineering marvel. These watches are ticking by the hair spring and its frequencies are targeted to 2.5Hz to 4Hz (5 times per second, or 8 times per second). I don't know the rationale behind these numbers. I guess that they must have been a combination of engineering constraints and finding a good balance to keep every second accurate.
Cool idea nevertheless.
But that’s how Arabic numerals are made, it’s the count of the angles in each one.
Still, I like the concept of this watch.
http://www.goodmath.org/blog/2015/07/21/arabic-numerals-have...