ASTRONOMERS INSIST
IT’S TIME TO CHANGE
By Professor G. Schindler
Originally published in
Sternenwelt—Star World,” a Munich astronomical journal, October 1950
(Printed in The Journal of
Calendar Reform, Vol. 20, Fourth Quarter 1950, pages 223-224
ANYONE
who has given much thought to our existing system of time measurement comes
quickly to the conclusion that the present calendar has certain definite
defects, which are annoying and costly in an age of progressive scientific
techniques and accurate controls. While
we have good clocks which for a lifetime we can use in telling the time of day,
yet we have to suffer a new calendar each year.
In economic research, statisticians find
it highly impractical that the quarter-years are of unequal length and lacking
in comparability. It is especially
disturbing to them that the quarters begin with different weekdays, and that
the months have an ever-changing number of working days. Add to these troubles that each year starts
with a different weekday, and any given date in the year can fall on any of the
seven weekdays. What could be more
disorderly?
Demands for eliminating these defects
grow constantly more insistent. We
first heard them from the astronomers and other representatives of science; now
we hear them, in ever-increasing strength, from the economic world.
It would be outside our present province
to examine all the weighty remedies that have been proposed. Some of the plans, such as the suggested
decimal system and the 13-month proposal, bring disadvantages with them that
actually outweigh their advantages. To
be practical, a proposal must not only eliminate defects, but also avoid
changes that are too drastic and disturbing.
At the present time the plan of The World
Calendar has the best prospect of being adopted in the foreseeable future. It came out on top after the League of
Nations had elaborately examined the question of calendar reform from a
worldwide viewpoint. Now the United
Nations has taken it up, and the progressive leadership of that organization
hopes to find a way to get the thing done.
A large number of the member nations have voted for The World Calendar,
but at the 1949 session a final decision was postponed because of urgent
international pressures in the political arena.
The advantages of this plan lie in the fact that it gives the calendar four equal quarters, while at the same time it preserves the present division of the year of the year into 12 months. Also the other subdivisions are palpably simple: the first month of each quarter has 31 days, the other two months have 30 days each. The quarters begin identically with a Sunday, and end on a Saturday, so that each quarter contains exactly 13 weeks and 91 days. Every month has, with the exception of church and state holidays, exactly 26 working days.
The first month in each quarter has five
Sundays; the other two have four each.
The year begins with a Sunday.
Because the year has 365 days, there is one extra day. The World Calendar envisions this yearly surplus day—and also the quadrennial leap-year day—as having no weekday designation. The surplus day which falls each year after 30 December will be observed as Worlds Day, a world holiday. Similarly, the extra day falling after 30 June in leap years will be observed as Leap Year Day.
The development of the calendar at the
end of the year would be as follows: the Worlds Day holiday follows Saturday,
30 December; and the first day of the New Year, a Sunday, follows this. Likewise in leap years, Saturday, 30 June is
followed by the world holiday Leap Year Day, and the 1st of July is
always a Sunday.
Advantages of the new arrangement are
obvious. Economy and science will be
well served by it. The approval that it
has received comes not only from leading nations and governmental but also from
the most important church groups. Of
course the latter are also keenly interested in the fixation of Easter, which
is left open in the proposals for calendar reform because here the sole
jurisdiction rests with the church authorities. Once The World Calendar is established, the stabilization of
Easter will probably be easily managed.
Next convenient date for putting the new
calendar into effect is 1956 2012. The intervening years are just about enough for
necessary preparation and legislation.
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Links to this document:
http://www.TheWorldCalendar.org/AstronomersInsistOnChange.pdf
and
http://www.TheWorldCalendar.org/AstronomersInsistOnChange.htm
E-mail to: TWCA@TheWorldCalendar.org
Rev. 6 August 2009