The Lens:
We just got through the most exhausting week of the year – when we lose an hour so we can make the switch from standard time to Daylight Savings time (DST). In a sense, it is the equivalent of jet lag. We need to adjust our rhythms to a different time zone. It is just so painful.
The last several years, the debate has resumed to abandon this whole ritual of twice-yearly time adjustments. But, which time to keep – standard or Daylight Savings? The push in government is for permanent DST Not everyone agrees.
From those I have talked to about this, it seems people are probably either (vehemently) for standard time or (vehemently) for Daylight Savings time. There don’t seem to be too many who could go either way.
So, picking one permanent time and forgo ever adjusting the time again would mean roughly half the people would be thrilled (or so they think – see below) and the other half extremely unhappy. Of, course, leaving as is, just about everyone is a bit grumpy.
One argument for permanent DST is getting an extra hour of sunlight, though this is not true. The name Daylight Savings Time, itself, is a complete misnomer. We do not save any daylight.
In spite of what people say, we don’t get an extra hour of daylight with Daylight savings time. We just change when we get that daylight. We give up daylight in the morning so we can have it in the afternoon. For some people, that is a tradeoff worth making.
Still. that means getting up in the dark just about every morning and going to work (or school) in the dark a good part of the year. A tradeoff others are not pleased about at all.
Here’s the thing . . . we already tried permanent DST. Back in the 1970’s, the US adopted year-round DST in what was supposed to be a two-year experiment. People hated it so much it lasted only one year.
That year in the 1970s of permanent DSL, I remember waiting for the bus to go to school in the dark. It was kind of scary. At school, I’d see the day dawn sitting in class. It was so unnatural.
Clearly, I am on the side of permanent standard time if we had to choose. But, unfortunately, my arguments would likely not sway the permanent DST folks – which is probably why we keep things the way they are. I guess a little grumpy isn’t so bad.
Refraction:
Years ago, there was a commercial for a margarine brand. Mother Nature tastes some Chiffon margarine and declares how tasty the sweet butter is only to be told it is margarine. She then says, a scowl coming over her face, “It’s not nice to fool Mother Nature.” She waves her arms and a thunderous crack fills the air.
I kind of agree. We shouldn’t try to fool Mother Nature. It baffles me that we think we can improve on nature, that somehow we know better, that time was created all wrong and we need to fix it.
On a somewhat related note, I have another goofier reason for preferring permanent standard time.
Permanent DST would completely change our idea of time. Coming from the perspective of a teacher, how do you explain high noon to students?
Imagine trying to teach the concept of the sun rising and setting to 1st graders (which I used to do).
“Ok, kiddos, the sun rises in the east, and continues to rise in the sky until high noon. At high noon, the sun is at the highest point in the sky. The sun, then, begins to lower to the west until night when the sun’s light is no longer visible.
“If you were to look at a sundial before noon, the shadow would be at the left. After noon, the shadow would be on the right. At high noon, there would be no shadow as the sun is directly above the sundial.
“Only, that isn’t what you will see on a sundial anymore because, by our clocks today, the sun is at its highest at 1:00 pm instead of noon. That is because we have decided we want more sunlight at the end of the day than in the beginning. So, we have artificially moved time one hour ahead. So, what is now 1:00 pm, in reality, is high noon. Make sense?”
Of course, I have to explain that the sun doesn’t actually rise and fall. The sun doesn’t move. We move around the sun. That helps make everything much clearer, doesn’t it.