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Time to Ditch Greenwich Mean Time: Scientists

France-based bureau calls for new system

By Matt Cantor, Newser Staff

Posted Oct 8, 2011 7:20 AM CDT

(Newser) – Time may be almost up for Greenwich Mean Time. A panel of scientists in France has called for an end to the official measurement, which has been in place for more than a century, the Daily Mail reports. The International Bureau of Weights and Measures says we should depend on atomic clocks instead of looking to London.

The current system is based on such clocks but adds “leap seconds” in accordance with the rotation of the Earth, as tracked in London’s Greenwich Park. The addition of leap seconds threatens to throw the system into disarray, the Mail notes. Under the proposed new system, which faces a vote in Geneva in January, a “leap minute” would be added once every 50 years. “Britain has lodged the main objections, but they are based on tradition, not science,” says a member of the bureau.

Visitors stand around the Greenwich Meridian Line at the Royal Observatory in Greenwich, London, Tuesday Dec. 30, 2008. (AP Photo/Matt Dunham)

Fireworks explode over Big Ben, in central London, Saturday, Jan. 1, 2011. (AP Photo/Alastair Grant)

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COMMENTS

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Showing 3 of 4 comments

Kneesox

Oct 9, 2011 2:51 AM CDT

Wow Newser, pretty good. Getting your sources from perhaps the most dirty, most corrupt newspaper in the UK, the Daily Heil.

JoeQ

Oct 8, 2011 6:40 PM CDT

We count on the world GPS system to define synchronization. We count on astronomers for updates to the definition of the sidereal day. What the heck does that have to do with France?

passinthru1

Oct 8, 2011 8:02 AM CDT

Use atomic clock, everybody just switch to using UTC and for Pete's sake, drop all this Daylight Savings Time nonsense.. Between morphing daylight savings times and odd geographic cut-outs, managing time universally is a huge headache. Just ask any programmer who works on cloud based projects or any person who regularly has to schedule calls internationally. Time settings are pretty arbitrary anyway, why not pick a system that makes sense in a global economy? Posted from my laptop at (quick peek at World Clock on my desktop...) 1302 UTC.

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Time to Ditch Greenwich Mean Time: Scientists

France-based bureau calls for new system

OTHER STORIES ON OUR RADAR

London • Greenwich Mean Time • time • atomic clock

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