Re: Religion and Holidays, were Socialism (WAS: Re: Why Can't We Just Not Talk Politics?

On Thu, Jan 08, 2004 at 04:47:25PM -0500, Isidora Zamora wrote:
> I believe that it is.  Eastern Orthodox also begin the day at sundown, as
> Jews do.
And Muslims and many other traditional cultures with lunar calendars.  When
the onset of a new month depends on the sighting of the lunar crescent,
it only makes sense to start the day at sundown, since you can't usually
see the moon at dawn and it would be annoying to have to wait 12+ hours
into the new day to figure out what date it was. :)

Most other traditional cultures started the day at sunrise; the
modern practice of using midnight is an artifact of the mechanical
clock.  Once we had the means to measure time independently of
the sun, it became apparent just how dramatically the time between
successive sunrises or sunsets varies throughout the year.  By the
same token, the time between successive noons or midnights (defined
as the midpoint between sunset and sunrise) stayed relatively
constant.  Between noon and midnight, midnight was chosen because
it was inconvenient (for pretty much everyone but astronomers)
to change the date in the middle of the day.

-Mark

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