Why is time set to change every leap year, surely it can be set accurately .?

Question

if a year is so many hours and days and minutes, why not put clocks forward every year, instead of adding an extra day on a four year cycle, is time ever correct

Answer 1

If we did that, then noon would occur at midday one year, at evening the next, at midnight the next...

The problem is that the time it takes for Earth to revolve one revolution is not an interger factor of the time it takes for Earth to go exactly once around the sun.

Even worse, the excess isn't exactly a quarter of a day, so every 400 years we have to skip a leap year. And then there is the occasional leap second that has to be accounted for too. No solution is perfect, we're just using the one that seems to have the fewest problems.

Answer 2

If it could be set accurately we would do it! But the division of time is set the way it is because mathematically it's the easiest way. If we put the clocks forward every year then we'd have midday occuring in the middle of the morning instead of at the time when the sun is highest in the sky. Adding an extra day every four years keeps it fairly accurate over a 400 year period. But it will never be totally accurate.

Answer 3

The problem is the daily rotation of the earth is not a direct integer value of the year - so we measure days minutes and seconds to measure the length of a day, rather than a year as that is more convienient. It would not be feasible to shift the clocks annually to account for the difference, as that would shift the time of day relative to the sun. the current orbital/rotational pattern works out to add a day every four years almost exactly, but every once in a while, an additional correction factor is applied (Y2K came with a one second correction)...

Answer 4

Simplicity. It is MUCH simpler to just add a day every four years. You try adding time every year, and you will create confusion all over the world. People will forget. Some people will do it wrong. Being that time is an artificial measure anyway, what difference does it make how accurate it is? So long as we can get through each day and make our appointments, it doesn't matter how they do it. With that in mind, the simplest way is the way they do it now.

Answer 5

Because a year is 365 and one quarter days long. adding 1 day every 4 evens it out. The current system has uniformity to it, people dont get confused because the clocks arnt changing all the time.

Can you imagine the confusion if we started measuring time in a whole new way?

And no, the time is never 100% accurate, its just a "best fit"

Answer 6

ok,,,, i'm uncertain what you recommend precisely by utilising having a sunlight upward thrust or set without postpone or slowly. a dawn isn't an unquestionably incidence. it is in basic terms something that looks a undeniable way from earth. --- uhm,,,, i for my section don't understand a thank you to circulate approximately answering your question different than by utilising asserting it quite is basically not the way issues artwork. bounce year has not something to do with sunrises or sunsets (or sunlight hours saving). the earth takes a undeniable quantity of time to make an entire revolution around the sunlight, and that quantity of time is form of three hundred and sixty 5 days and six hours. besides the indisputable fact that it could be kinda weird and wonderful if we had a december thirty second that throughout basic terms lasted 6 hours long, and then all of us yelled "chuffed new year" basically because of the fact the sunlight became into springing up. then, for that total year, lifeless night might continuously be appropriate around whilst the sunlight could be increasing, and new year's might come whilst the sunlight became into right this moment above persons. you persist with??? ---- this could be a stupid thank you to do issues. further however,,,, we can't basically overlook with regard to the greater 6 hours. in any different case, after 730 years, we'd be celebrating the 4th of july in the snow and yuletide in the warmth sunlight. so,,,, how we restoration that's,,,,, we overlook with regard to the greater 6 hours for 3 years on the instant. (and this implies have been 18 hours in the back of), then on the fourth year, we go forward and observe the 6 hours alongside with the 18 hours we already ignored. (it quite is 24 hours finished.,, an entire day) because of the fact it is in basic terms form of 6 greater hours in step with year however, that's a splash greater complicated than that. we observe bounce year on any year it quite is divisible by utilising 4 (i.e. - 1980, 1984, 1988, 1992, 1996, etc) except that quantity is divisible by utilising a hundred (i.e. - the 1700, 1800, 1900, etc). and on those years we don't observe bounce year,,, except the quantity is likewise divisible by utilising 4 hundred (i.e. - the year 1600 and 2000, etc) wherein case we DO observe bounce year.

Answer 7

The day is not twenty-four hours long. It takes the Earth twenty-three hours and fifty-six minutes to rotate on its axis, so every year we end up with an extra quarter of a day of unused time (all those extra four minutes, added up).

The days would be pretty messed up if we put the clocks back six hours every year, so instead we save the time up and have an extra day every four years.

Answer 8

If time was divided equally, then eventually all the seasons would get out of sync.

By doing it the way we do with the leap year, all the seasons stay in the correct months.

Answer 9

time is set to change every leap year because time is never time at all you can never ever leave without leaving a piece of youth and our lives are forever changed we will never be the same the more you change the less you feel