Submitted 1 year ago by zephyr@lemmy.world to nostupidquestions@lemmy.world
Was there an alternative adjective to “clockwise” other than “the rotation you take around left hand”?
Also, how did all watch companies around the world agree on what the direction of “clockwise” is?
Turnwise and widdershins. I read it in a book once.
Sunwise, as it was based on the movement of the sun during day (in the Northern hemisphere). As watch faces were modelled after sundials, sunwise and clockwise describe the same direction.
Turnwise is a word invented by Pratchett for a book, but it’s clearly based on sunwise. He also used widdershins in his book, which is indeed the unmodified antonym to sunwise.
Not just any book. The discworld series. It’s the direction the disc rotates! He has so many easy to miss spots of genius. Amongst many easy to see spots of genius
I have found my people.
Deosil (sunwise) was the opposite of widdershins (against the usual). Both had a wide range of uses too, not just directionality.
Was it Name of the Wind or Wise Man’s Fear? I just read both of those and I remember looking up one of the words and going down a Wikipedia rabbit hole.
No, those words don’t appear in those books. He’s referring to Discworld by Terry Pratchett.
A guy I know owns this clock, which basically proves that everything in life is pointless and arbitrary: Image
I find this deeply unsettling, please delete
I have one of these, it was a gag gift from a friend. I’ve had it up so long now though I have to double check which clock in looking at before I tell the time because I’ve got so used to it
That’s pretty cool. Also, your username contains an anagram of the name of the man who owns the clock from my comment. That’s also pretty cool.
Also why the seemingly arbitrary graduations, 24 hours, 60 minutes, 60 seconds. If it was say 10 hours in a day, 100 minutes in an hour, 100 seconds in a minute, seconds would be close to the same amount of time. Same with latitude and longitude, why 360 degrees in a circle with 60 minutes in a degree and 60 seconds in a minute.
It’s all based on 12, which is nice cause it’s divisible by 2, 3, 4 and 6.
A system based on 10 gives you issues if you want to divide the year into 4 seasons, the day into morning, midday, evening and night, the compass into cardinal directions, etc…
The units of time we use come from a bronze age civilisation that used base twelve instead of base ten. They’d count on their hands using the finger joints of one for single digits, and then the joints of the other for multiples.
The short explanation is that those numbers are more easily divided by a larger set of denominators. 24 is divisible by 2, 3, 4, 6, 8, and 12. 100 is divisble by 2, 5, 10, 25, and 50. 60 is divisible by 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 8, 10, 12, 15, 20, and 30.
Metric is great for scaling up and down ad infinitum, but it sucks for fractions. Fractions are easier for daily use without precision measuring equipment.
That’s called Decimal time and revolutionary France already tried it.
Other commenters hit on the reasoning, just adding that they’re called highly composite numbers. My favorite!
Oh, you mean like the order of the Alphabet?
That’s actually the only non-arbitrary thing in existence. If the alphabet wasn’t in alphabetical order, we’d all be dead right now.
You just flipped the image!
(/s)
Turnwise and widdershins
I always heard it as ‘deosil and widdershins’
GNU Terry Pratchett
Deosil, which is the direction the shadow on a sundual moves (in the Northern Hemisphere).
Imagine you’re in the Northern Hemisphere and you face east toward the rising sun. Over the course of the day, the sun will seem to move to the south, and then set in the west. This forms a “sunwise” turn, which is what we now call “clockwise” because we made clocks in imitation of sundials.
In Swedish it's called medsols and motsols. The iteral translation is with the sun and against the sun.
Is there a large perceptible pronunciation difference? Because if not med and mot being opposites seems like it’s rife for sitcom hijinks
Good question!
The real answer seems to be “right” and “left”.
To your second question, the direction of clockwise is mostly influenced by sundials. In the northern hemisphere the shadows move in a clockwise direction, and so the early clocks made in the northern hemisphere mimicked that. In the southern hemisphere it’s naturally reversed, but because so much of that hemisphere is either empty ocean or colonized lands, the clocks move in the same direction. Bolivia had a sort of flash in the pan moment in the news about a decade back for reversing their clock direction on a big central clock (think like big ben) as a way of staking their independence from a colonial past.
On the first question, I have no idea. But in Sweden they use terms that translates to “with the sun” and “against the sun” but I don’t remember what they are without googling it.
This turned out to be a surprisingly fascinating question lol.
Semi related: QI uploaded this bit the other day about an aboriginal tribe that can flawlessly pinpoint north/east/south/west.
Cardinal directions as references instead of left/right are often a better option when describing locations, more people should use them. It's not like it's hard to get an idea of where north is - even if you're a bit challenged on the spatial awareness front basically everyone these days has a phone that will easily tell you this.
I think saying "keep turning the component to the west" wouldn't really work.
I have the feeling that the direction of the water in the toilet when flushing plays an important role here.
Ah yes, turdwise and widdershits as it was known in the olden days, before the invention of sundials
The first mechanical clocks were invented around 1300. The first flushing toilet was 1775.
"we don't have clocks, how do we describe right ways or leftways rotation?"
"Well, the tires on my Dodge Ram 3500 rotate to the right when I drive it forward, so we'll call it ramforward and rambackwards"
"Brilliant"
Yup. That’s definitely “down”.
In czech, we have a phrase “jak sa kráje chleba” (same way as a bread is sliced). Problem is, that (at least in my social group) nobody knows, wether it means clockwise or anticlockwise, as everybody slices the bread differently.
It’s just negative rotation
Yes, but it’s learning optimism.
I don’t have an answer for the original question, but what about just saying rotate right/left?
I mean, if I imagine a circle rolling on a flat surface, rotating right means the rotation that rolls the circle right (so clockwise rotation), and rotating left would be the opposite; where the circle rolls left.
It works, but it’s ambiguous. You have to specify which part you’re referring to if you want to be sure you’re understood.
Honestly the hardest concept for me to grasp in organic chemistry was left vs right chirality. I could understand why they were different, but fuck me if i could ever consistently identify them.
You have to specify which part you’re referring to
What do you mean by that?
What if the wheel is fixed to a frame and it moves a sheet above it like a conveyor system? Is the frame of reference the direction the sheet moves or is it how the wheel moves against the sheet? What if the sheet is below it like a pasta machine or sheet metal former? That being said, “right tightly, lefty loosey” has certainly prevailed
Solange das Deutsche Reich besteht, wird die Schraube nach rechts gedreht!
Rotating right/left as measured from the top or the bottom changes the rotation.
It is a non-existing problem, because they were talking in other languages then.
Spuddaccino@reddthat.com 1 year ago
“Sunwise”, and for the exact same reason.
Clocks go clockwise because their predecessors did. What were their predecessors?
Sundials.
How does the shadow go around a sundial? Well, sunwise, of course.
Counterclockwise, as said in another comment, was “widdershins”, from a Middle Low German phrase meaning “against the way”.
NotYourSocialWorker@feddit.nu 1 year ago
I find it interesting that in Swedish the opposite of sunwise is “motsols”, i.e. counter sunwise or literally “against the sun”. Sunwise is called “medsols”, lit. “with the sun”.
jbrains@sh.itjust.works 1 year ago
IJLM.
db0@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 year ago
Widdershins needs to make a comeback. It’s a cool word
meyotch@slrpnk.net 1 year ago
It seems like something a pirate would say. Widder me shins, but that’s a cold wind blowin’!
bionicjoey@lemmy.ca 1 year ago
Also turnwise. Also we need to switch from a globe to a disk on the backs of four cosmic elephants, who are themselves on the back of a giant turtle
dirkgentle@lemmy.ca 1 year ago
I am trying to picture it, but I think the sunwise convention only works in the Northern hemisphere.
Auk@kbin.social 1 year ago
Yep - in the northern hemisphere a sundial shadow will move from west to east in a clockwise fashion; in the southern hemisphere it still goes west to east but does so moving anticlockwise.
Synthead@lemmy.world 1 year ago
Yes but, how did people know that time went sunwise before the sun?
sawdustprophet@midwest.social 1 year ago
Back before the solar system was fully formed, it was called “gaswise”.
southbayrideshare@lemmy.world 1 year ago
I somehow read this comment in the voice of the cleric performing the “mawwiage” ceremony in Princess Bride.
Cleric: “Sunwise…” long, uncomfortable pause. “And for the exact same weason.” Pause. “Clocks go clockwise because their pwedecessors did… and what were their pwedecessors?”
Humperdink: “Look, can we hurry this up?”
Cleric: “Sundials.”
Humperdink: “Just skip to the end!”
Cleric: “Countewclockwise… as said in another comment… would be… widdershins.”
clockwork_octopus@lemmy.world 1 year ago
Haha, thank you for this!
kozel@lemmy.world 1 year ago
I’ve just find (in wiktionary) the word “moonwise”, meaning antisunwise/counterclockwise. But the moon moves the same way as the sun does. So is there some deeper meaning based off of some long-term patterns in lunar movement, or is it just simple antagonism sun×moon?
Spuddaccino@reddthat.com 1 year ago
That’s what it appears to be. This is supported somewhat by the term “moonwise” not having a lot of historical usage, leading me to believe that it came along much later by someone who wanted a related antonym.
The only bit about the moon that seems to travel right to left are it’s phase changes, and even that is because we’re outside the rotation and watching along it’s horizontal plane. You’ll see the same thing with anything spinning clockwise in front of you: the closer edge goes right to left, the farther edge goes left to right.
Ultraviolet@lemmy.world 1 year ago
Sundials are also responsible for why we say “o’clock”. It’s a differentiatior. Because the speed of a sundial would vary based on the time of year while a clock was constant, you had to clarify what kind of time you were talking about. Did you mean 10 of the clock or 10 of the sun? Somehow, that stuck around long after sundials fell out of common use.