Do you think it's possible that in the future there will be more hours in a day?

Question

For example, instead of 24 hours in a day, it would be 100 hours a day.

I was just curious.

Is it possible?

Answer 1

Maybe not all the way to 100. But the day is getting longer, because the Moon's tidal effect is slowing down Earth's rotation.

The 2008 Observer's Handbook of the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada states that in 300 million years, the day will be 26 hours long (if we do not redefine the hour until then).

As the Moon moves away from us in the meantime, its influence on the tides will decrease, so that the rate at which Earth's rotation slows down will diminish.

After another 300 million years, the day might be 27.8 hours long (not 28), and so on.

Even if the rate stays at 2 hours per 300 million years, we need to gain 76 hours to reach a 100-hour day. This would take 38 times 300 million years (over 11 billion years). In less than half that time, our Sun will have gone through its red giant phase.

By then, we may not care.

Answer 2

Yes. the Earth is spinning more and more slowly. The second has been defined in terms of electron transitions in an atom, which will not be affected by this slowdown.

Before we see, say, 25 hours in the day, a long time will have to pass.

Alternatively, because 24 hours a day is a handy idea, someone may decide to use a separate time system based on the earth revolving on its axis once every 24 hours.

Answer 3

Not, 100 hours in a day, but there will be more. The Earth is slowing down in its rotation around its axis. This is due to the gravitational pull of the Moon. In billions of years, the Earth might no longer even exist, the Earth and the Moon would be tidally locked to each other. The Moon is tidally locked, that is why we only ever see one side of it. The Earth could eventually be this way.

Answer 4

not in my day, only more work in the same 24 hours.

In the earth's day, though, yes. As the moon's orbit slowly moves away, the earth and moon will become tidally locked so that the earth and moon will present the same side to each other all the time. A day at that time will be equal to the time that it takes the moon to orbit the earth, which will be a lot more hours than the 24 that fill our current, too short, days.

Answer 5

As the Moon robs momentum from the Earth (and moves faurther away from us) the Earth's rotation will slowly slow down. This will take a very long time (millions of years). So the time it takes from sunrise to sunrise will get longer.

Whether this will change the length of time we officially use for a day (24 hrs) I do not know. We may continue to use 24 hrs for histories sake or decide to change. This of course assumes that humans are around Earth at that time.

Answer 6

Yes. Every year our planet moves farther away from the sun. The earth is a satellite and all satellites have a degrading orbit. This is seen by the need to add seconds to our atomic clock. We have added 22 seconds onto the atomic clock on different occasions to keep it in sync with the Earth's rotation. For example 22 seconds were added between 1972 and 1998.

http://usinfo.state.gov/xarchives/display.html?p=washfile-english&y=2005&m=December&x=20051228120843lcnirellep0.41&t=livefeeds/wf-latest.html

This is a small amount of time over the course of 26 years, but when you do the math over the course of millions of years, this will add up to much longer days.

Our planet isn't going to "slow down" it will just take longer to orbit our sun as the distance it travels will be greater like Mars or the gaseous planets in our system.

Answer 7

Not only is it possible, but it's happening right now. The moon is slowly robbing the Earth of rotational speed and eventually they will become tidally locked, making our day significantly longer than it is now (I don't know how much longer). The year-to-year changes are infinitesimal, though, so it will be millions of years before the change became noticeable as compared to today.

Answer 8

the day is not exactly 24 hours - we are still only at 23 hours and 56 minutes - this is why, at the moment, have an extra day in febuary every 4 years. yes the earth is slowing down and so one day we will have to get-rid of this 'leap year'
you only have to look at a planet without a moon (mercury) - it has no moon and it's day is longer than it's year!!!!
this would take millions or even billions of years for our planet - but human kind won't see it!!

Answer 9

No it won't be. There will be only 24 hours.

Answer 10

Nope ain't gonna happen...