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Zen Z


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in reply to loaExMachina

That is a good point, but analog clocks are IMHO in the realm of sundial clocks or audio casettes or floppy discs. Technology that was once usefull, but now it's replaced by better alternatives. Time is after all just a number, and it does not matter how we choose to represent it.
in reply to amotio

Time isn't just a number though. Especially not when it comes to clocks. And it's also bound to Mass.

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in reply to amotio

As someone who struggled with analog clocks into my twenties, being able to see the hands move gives me a better sense of time passing and I remember reading stuff that supported that. I have a better sense how much time I have left for something looking at analog vs digital basically and it's a fairly common experience apparently
in reply to amotio

Are they going anywhere, tho? They start cheap and are very energy-efficient, so I think they'd stay. If there is a probability to face them IRL it won't be bad to learn how to read them.
in reply to amotio

Absolutely not comparable to floppy disks. The hands are a representation, not a technology. Technology-wise, most modern "analog" wristwatches are quartz, and therefore digital, not actually analog. Yet we choose to make them with hands because that provides a better representation of the passing of time.
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in reply to Jrockwar

Technology-wise, most modern “analog” wristwatches are quartz, and therefore digital, not actually analog.


Wat.. that's not how that works. Quartz watches can be digital or analog but what matters is whether it has a digital display or analog hands.

in reply to amotio

Knowing a clock is more than just telling time.

When you're walking with your homies you gotta be able to call out "gyat 3 o'clock" , so your fellow bros know where to look.

in reply to bstix

Ok you know what. I was ready to conclude that learning to read analog clocks isn't that useful but you've actually convinced me otherwise.
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in reply to amotio

I need reading glass (sigh I got old)
With an analogue watch face I can work out the time, blurred lines can be seen.
Cant read blurred numbers.
in reply to amotio

100% it is antiquated technology.

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in reply to amotio

It's not better, it's just different, your comparison is flawed.
Personally, I prefer analog watches for most cases, because it's much easier for me to do calculations visually. To add 6 to 7/19 on a digital clock I need to turn on my math brain (19+6=25, 25>24 => 25-24=1), but on an analog watch I can just visually read the number opposite of 7.

And that's just one example, there are other cases, besides just being easier to read at a glance. I've used both digital and analog watches since birth, but analog watches are marginally better for daily use, where to the second precision isn't necessary.

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in reply to loaExMachina

Honestly, how often do you read analog clocks?

I mean, I learned it as a child, but it's been probably months since I actually had the need to read an analog clock, and I'm just not used to it anymore. I have to think about it, 20 years ago it was just my spine doing the thinking and it felt effortless.

in reply to leisesprecher

A lot, since I have an analog wristwatch and a wall clock. There were also analog clocks in several of the exam rooms where I last had exams.

I guess many people don't use them regularly, but regardless, the simple fact that they still exist is enough to be worth learning about them. Not everything you learn at school is meant to be used every single day.

in reply to leisesprecher

Every day? I use an analog watch face on my smartwatch, I have an analog clock in my car, I have another couple at home….
in reply to ramble81

So what? I don't.

I don't have a smart watch and hardly anybody I know actually owns some analog clock?

Take a look around you. Where are any analog clocks? Church towers, train stations, old people. That's pretty much it. Your smartwatch is a choice. You could just as well use a digital watch face. There is literally no benefit in that case - except your personal preference.

in reply to leisesprecher

You literally asked “Honestly, how often do you read analog clocks?” and I answered. And then you say “So what?” So why did you even ask if you were gonna turn around and belittle answers?
in reply to ramble81

It's called rhetorical question.

I'd argue that you are a very small minority. Most people under 50 probably barely have any analog clocks around.

in reply to leisesprecher

I disagree, I am under 50 and wear an analog wristwatch every day, but if I want to know the time I just look on my phone.

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in reply to leisesprecher

Most people under 50 probably barely have any analog clocks around.


Every home/apt of every under 40 year old person I have ever been in has had at least one analog clock. And most have had several.

Also, grandfather clocks are a thing. And they're gorgeous.

Extremely anti-social to act like digital clocks are better - similar to acting like social media and Facetime calls are in any way superior to irl face-to-face interaction - as our current loneliness epidemic demonstrates

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in reply to leisesprecher

So since you don’t use something no one should learn it? Crap take.

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in reply to leisesprecher

It's not just about telling time though. It's about representing things in a different way. Correlating one thing to another, and making someone think until the representation automatically becomes the output. You are forced to see things in a different way, which is what learnding is all about.

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in reply to Cheradenine

Learning how a sundial works would teach them more than leaning how an analog clock works, in that regard.
in reply to leisesprecher

I actually agree with you. I can read an analog clock, but what worth is the skill? Most clocks are digital, and it gives me nothing more to read an analog one. People downvoting you is just silly. Some skills are allowed to die out if they add no value in modern life.

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in reply to The Dark Lord ☑️

I wonder how many people feel this way about writing when everyone just types/texts everything.
in reply to WalnutLum

There are fewer and fewer applications for writing, but it’s still more important than reading an analog clock.
in reply to The Dark Lord ☑️

How so?

I genuinely don't understand the clock-face-reading-is-a-useless-skill opinion so both seem equally important to me.

in reply to WalnutLum

Fair enough. Most people don’t encounter analog clocks anymore. And many of us have smart watches or phones where we check the time. Since I have a non-analog watch, I don’t find I ever look at analog clocks anymore. If it’s in a room, I just don’t notice it. Growing up, it was important to know, but now I just never have a use for it. Learning is important, but there are so many more interesting and useful things to learn.

You could also make an argument about automatic or manual cars. Sure, we could teach our kids how to drive manual, but why? Most cars are automatic. If they want to have a manual car, they can learn. Otherwise it’s just a useless skill.

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in reply to The Dark Lord ☑️

Yea that's kind of what I was thinking when I said eventually handwriting will go the same way.

If people never encounter it and do all their writing on keyboards, it'll eventually be a useless skill as well.

in reply to WalnutLum

Exactly. I find that I sign the back of checks and write brief sentences in birthday cards. Neither of those feel like they’ll be around for a lot longer.
in reply to The Dark Lord ☑️

Someone else made a comment and I think it's great so imma plagiarize it-

If kids are taught to read an analog clock early, which isn't very hard to learn, they are getting a leg up on fractions, percentages, and geometry.

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in reply to MutilationWave

I don't actually believe this is true.

It rather, I imagine that they could get an even greater leg up if that time was spent teaching something else

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in reply to leisesprecher

Daily. There’s one in my kitchen and one at my office.

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in reply to loaExMachina

Yes.

But they don't need to know it. So they stopped teaching it.

in reply to Arun Shah™

I know, it's just a meme, but... The article. It's about clocks during exams specifically, when students are under pressure and more likely to misread the time on an analogue clock.
in reply to Machefi

IMO all the more reason to keep them. In the real world we all have to perform under pressure. With practice they can learn to read the clock under pressure, maybe take a breath or two and slow down before trying to read it. It may be a simple hurdle to overcome but practicing overcoming these things is important for development.
in reply to FireRetardant

You on the other perform excellent in being abrasive, despite social pressure not to be an asshole.

10/10 no notes.

in reply to leisesprecher

Lol that dude was not being an asshole. Getting a little defensive?

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in reply to FireRetardant

You're right it's good to prepare young people for challenges. Still, that should mean challenges that would come up anyways, not artificially making things more difficult.

It's good to know how to read an analog clock, just like it's good to be able to read cursive. But both of them are outdated and aren't inherently required in day to day life. Inserting them into a testing situation that's meant to test something else is creating an unnecessary challenge.

in reply to LesserAbe

There are tons of equipment and tools out there that very closely resemble an analog clock and require the same skills. Pressure gauges for example. These skills are not out dated.

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in reply to FireRetardant

Except, a pressure gage reads the number it's pointing at. Not 1 hand means the number it's pointing at and the other means 5 times the most recent digit passed plus 1 for each tick mark.

I'd wager that most people would never even see a pressure gage with two hands. Dual-indicating double-bourdon tube differential pressure gages are quite rare in the real world. Usually for that kind of application you'd go digital.

in reply to LesserAbe

Not to mention the amount of analog clocks that are just wrong. I work at a fortune 500 company, most clocks are digital and synced to a time server. Every analog clock is wrong. Just yesterday I walked through the cafeteria and glanced at the clock and it read 5:20... For a second I panicked and was like it can't be that late. I checked my phone, it was 3:06. The clock was just not set properly.
in reply to vrek

There are radio controlled clocks which theoretically shouldn't be wrong. At least as long as there isn't a battery or motor issue...
in reply to Scrath

How do you tell whether you’re looking at a radio-controlled clock though?
in reply to ddh

Sometimes they have it written on the clockface. I don't think that's a general rule though.

In the same way there are digital clocks that can be wrong too though.

in reply to ddh

How would you tell you're looking at a synchronized digital clock or cheap battery model?
in reply to Machefi

Kids cant ask the teacher for the time?

At my school, because the clock was always between 2 and 10 minutes wrong, the students(mostly me) would just raise their hands and ask how much time they have left

in reply to RandomVideos

they could ask the teacher, sure, but why not fix the problem instead of using a disruptive workaround until the end of time? phrased another way, should we as a society fix problems or provide half solutions that don't fully resolve them?

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in reply to ᗪᗩᗰᑎ

I wrote the reply before reading the article so i didnt think of digital clocks being the alternative(i also never seen a digital clock in real life excluding smart devices)

Also, i was referencing the part of the comment that said that kids were misreading the time(do kids rely on analog clocks that may be wrong during tests?) , not saying that the problem shouldnt be fixed

Unknown parent

lemmy - Collegamento all'originale
unexposedhazard
It absolutely is tho. Usually more precise, 1:1 translatable into written text, can use the superior 24h system and uses the same reading system that is already taught in school anyways.
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in reply to unexposedhazard

Right! Just to prove a point, I am going to make an NTP enabled rolex, and sync it to my microsecond accurate local NTP server! 😛

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Unknown parent

mbin - Collegamento all'originale
r00ty
Yeah, but you need to factor in the distance to the transmitter. Going to add at least a few microseconds to your time accuracy!

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Unknown parent

lemmy - Collegamento all'originale
TheSlad

Wristwatches are just jewelry at this point tbh. They've been rendered completely redundant by cell phones. The only people under 60 who wear them are doing so as a fashion statement.

I'm sure a lot of wristwatch stans will downvote me but I don't care I'm still right

in reply to TheSlad

Ever since college I've always worn a cheap watch on my wrist least for the same reason my grandpa stopped keeping a pocket watch: its more convenient to check on your wrist for the time than your pocket.

Granted we're getting way off topic here since except for a few years its ways been a digital watch. Asserting analog watches are more numerous in models when digital watches are more numerous in sales, therefore reading an analog clock is a useful skill is odd to me. When I was wearing an analog watch for my allergies it was a flieger because the mental tax of making the hands turn into a singular time was a frustration.

I learned, though, from this that how you present time changes how you perceive time. Kids who grow up with digital representations of time consider "the current moment" in a much narrower and instantaneous scope than people who grew up thinking of time as being a spectrum on a dial

in reply to r00ty

Latency is accounted for in the sync process
in reply to unexposedhazard

"Ususally more precise" > This depends on how precisely it is set, not on the display. Unless it's a connected watch, but then it's much more expensive and less energy efficient.

"1.1 translatable into written text" > Both are, you're reading the same number

"Uses the superior 24h system" > Adding 12 to a number isn't complicated. And with habit, most people who use analog watches and the 24h system know which position of the needle means what number in 24h format without doing the math. Some clocks don't even have digits. Unless you've been sedated and woke up in a room without windows, you'll know which side of 12 you're on. And otherwise, you've got more pressing issues.

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in reply to Rooskie91

Yup, hating on the next generation is a tale as old as time. Idk why, but every generation seems to do it. Maybe it's being uncomfortable with them being different or afraid of their youthfulness. I don't get it.
in reply to Rooskie91

I'm not gonna do that, fuck that. I do hope this much screen time is ok for kids, even as a young programmer I didn't have an iPad everywhere. Nobody seems concerned about their privacy, but guess what: neither did my millennial peers.

I think everything will be ok with alpha and Z. Let's not repeat our the mistakes of our parents.

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in reply to RubberElectrons

I think it's important to not give certain things the benefit of the doubt. This clock stuff is just plain stupid to get bent out of shape about, but the other two are serious concerns.

This is just anecdotal, but I was a late 90's kid that had as much screen time as I wanted growing up. I played an absurd amount of videogames, and had to be dragged outside by my siblings or I could comfortably stay indoors in front of a game or the internet for hours on end. I spent most of my early years (age 3 to age 15) in front of a screen. Yet, I did just fine in school, got a degree, and now work as a software engineer. I fell in love with my highschool sweetheart, and after waiting until I had my degree, we got married at 23, almost 10 years after we started dating. It felt like my obsessive amounts of screen time as a kid didn't have any negative side effects to my life as a whole (outside of being a quiet and reserved person, and some could argue that that's not a negative) and led me down a successful career path.

However, I don't think kids these days have the luxury of doing that anymore. The content put in front of me as a kid was games made by teams that were passionate about the thing they were working on. Forums and early YouTube videos were created by some no name person with the hope of sharing something they openly cared about. Social Media didn't exist yet and once it did, I never really got into it.

The content put in front of children these days is one of three or so things:
1. Mindless dribble. (looking at you, Youtube Kids)
2. Rushed, broken games made barely finished enough to get people to buy them just to make a quick buck, and the ones that are finished are so heavily tied into marketing it's like the game is basically one big ad. (looking at you, Fortnite and Rocket League)
3. Content made with the express purpose to either gain influencer status, or to use that influencer status to market something, primarily to children who are especially vulnerable to the scummy marketing practices they are using.

Obviously there are exceptions to these everywhere, but I'm talking about the things that are actively being shoved down kids' throats. It's not that I think that the content I consumed was better than what I see kids consuming now, but I think that the motivations behind the content can just as easily influence children as much as the content itself. I think that in a lot of ways, this kind of content is actively degrading kids' brains, and from my experience, it's not the screen time, it's what's being shown on screen that's the issue.

Thankfully I'm tech savvy enough that I can make the internet for my children what it was for me as a kid, without all the marketing and money making schemes that pass as content these days, but a lot of people just toss a tablet in front of their kids and call it parenting.

I was going to rant about privacy as well, but this is getting way too long. Just know that I think digital privacy is really important, and think that we've paid the price for not considering it earlier, and there are ways we can save our kids from the same fate.

Sorry, I tend to write way too much on topics I care about, thanks for coming to my TED Talk.

tl;dr - The clock thing is stupid, but please approach the constant exposure to the modern day internet and the digital privacy topics with a bit more scrutiny.

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in reply to Rooskie91

"Gen-z is killing the analog clock industry" news articles incoming
in reply to Unforeseen

Sync process? The other comment was talking about the old receivers for the atomic clocks on SW/MW frequencies. It was a one way thing.

Now in theory if a receiver also had GPS they could account for the distance. But, then they'd get far more accurate time from the GPS receiver so..

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in reply to TheSlad

Watches are just more convenient. You don't need to carry a phone everywhere and with texts and calls showing on the watch you don't need to find your phone to check.

I use my watch with alarms/ timers to know when I need to clock out or in from lunch etc while I mostly leave my phone at my desk while at work so if I'm walking around the building I still get my alerts through my watch

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in reply to Arun Shah™

When I worked data entry, there was a chart for cursive as people couldn't understand cursive writing, and these were adults. I think this may check out (not because they're lacking, but because they probably weren't taught).
in reply to 2ugly2live

Yeah but people's cursive is more inconsistent than print. It can be super bad and print is more practical.
You could say it's Same with a digital clock but an analog clock is always the same with circle and 2 hands while I don't know what characters people are trying to do with cursive.
in reply to Spacehooks

I agree that it takes practice, but I wasn't aware (until that job) that most people learned how to write their name only. I had to learn it when I was in 2nd or 3rd, then I kept it up because note taking was faster. But I don't think it's stopping anyone from doing anything unless you're going through hand written docs all the time. Just surprised me at the time.
in reply to 2ugly2live

I know how to read and write in cursive but there are still a lot of people whose handwriting I can't read because it's so sloppy and idiosyncratic. A chart wouldn't help me.
in reply to lolcatnip

That's true. But the chart was more like, "this is what cursive looks like" sort of thing. Like, some people couldn't recognize a curve "G" or other "different" letters. But I've certainly seen some cursive that might as well have been an alien language 🤣
in reply to 2ugly2live

I learned cursive but I'm sure have forgotten how to write it, especially some of the capital letters. Thing is learning it now is really just for backwards compatibility. Yes, it's faster to write in cursive when writing by hand, but how often is that coming up these days, for most people?
in reply to LesserAbe

Not often I think, unless you read a lot of historical documents/letters. But even a lot of those are transcribed these days. So likely only people working with doctors (and even then, probably just specific medications). Outside of the data entry job, I don't think it's come up in my life outside of school.
in reply to LesserAbe

Yeah I am way out of practice in my cursive. I can still read it but it wouldn't come naturally. Cursive was pounded into my head at a young age. Teachers saying we would used it every day in our lives. That was probably true for them but it was certainly not true for me.

The only time I ever use cursive is signing my name. The only time I read cursive is a letter from my grandparents once they pass that would basically be the end of my cursive reading.

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in reply to LesserAbe

If I don't have access to a keyboard something has gone catastrophically wrong (I work in IT)
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in reply to Arun Shah™

1 if u dont kids how to do a thing they dont learn

2 and more importantly; finally, analog clocks have no place in our wold and every last one should be in trash they serve literally no purpose, i have always hated them and i will delight in their death.

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in reply to Iampossiblyatwork

digital clocks will rule the world our time will come ur children's children wont even say clockwise and anti clockwise cuz they wont know what those are

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in reply to linkhidalgogato

I am curious how else we would describe the direction of circular motion
in reply to Iampossiblyatwork

idk i was gonna say what they would say instead but the i realize i have no idea what they could say.
in reply to TheSlad

For office attire or going out, sure.

If you're doing repair work, running lines, etc, a watch is the choice. Your hands are busy, so a watch is what you need (Except for specific trades where you don't want to risk it getting caught in machinery).

I can say with 100% certainty that I know large swaths of folks in their 20's and 30's who regularly wear watches. Some smart, some digital, some analog.

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in reply to Arun Shah™

I've worked in 2 different schools in the IT department and 4 others as a volunteer lecturer (I got a name tag that said Technology Evangelist) I found that putting an analog clock on the screen saver of computers in the classroom was more likely to result in the clock actually being on time.

Too many clocks in classrooms are very old or even battery powered but neglected.

I don't think kids are dumb just they aren't getting a world that is properly maintained by competent people that care about their work and are adequately resourced to do the whole job.

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in reply to AFaithfulNihilist

Well, in Germany... depending on the school and people, we cared a lot for those clocks and maintained them well

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in reply to AFaithfulNihilist

During my final exams that lasted from may to July they didn’t even bother to set the analog clock to the right hour…

Even for our baccalaureate

in reply to ngwoo

Seriously! I'm pretty sure that was part of 1st or 2nd grade. Maybe both....
in reply to AngryCommieKender

In my elementary school we even had clocks, where the numbers were large dice the teacher could take out and rotate so they showed ½, 30 or 18 instead of 6, for example. It’s not hard to learn, if you’re at a school. But then again, digital clocks are so everpresent that it might not actually matter…
in reply to AngryCommieKender

The problem is unless you really use the skill a lot you're not really gonna learn it from school. I had to teach myself how to read analog clocks in highschool cause even though I'm pretty sure I learned it in elementary school I grew up with computers and eventually smart phones so I never had to use it.

Edit: Also for context I was born in 2001

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in reply to WarlordSdocy

We had one in every classroom. So we only had to look at it for reinforcement of the original lesson.
in reply to Maggoty

We had them too but at least for me in elementary school I didn't really care what time it was. I remember I knew what position on the clock meant school was done but other then that didn't really need to read it cause the teachers would just bring us as a class to whatever our next class was for that day. By the time I got old enough to start caring smartphones were prevalent enough that I never really needed to learn how to read a clock. It wasn't until highschool where teachers got more strict about enforcing no phones out in class that I then learned how to read clocks so I could know when class would be done.
in reply to ngwoo

Gather round, children, time to learn how to use a dial up modem, and after that we'll go over Morse code.

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in reply to LesserAbe

Did you not learn morse code in school...? I'm rather young and that was taught in one of my classes I'm fairly certain. Even if it was mainly for fun, and only really remembered how to do SoS

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in reply to ngwoo

We learned analogue clocks in children's TV also
in reply to Arun Shah™

As if they teach us how to read those clocks anyways
in reply to Arun Shah™

I lied about knowing how to read these until high school, then I was too embarrassed to ask, so I learned how to read them.
in reply to Arun Shah™

Kids these days do absolutely still know how to read analog clocks.

Besides, they probably shouldn't put effort into that. Those things are close to useless nowadays. It's mostly a case of schools being conservative... but then, it's not that much of an effort, so there are more important things to care about.

in reply to marcos

Actually, a lot don't. I mean, like, at least fifty percent. You would be surprised. I don't think it's schools being conservative so much as it didn't occur to teachers and staff that analogue clocks are frankly obsolete (I still like them). I didn't read this article, but it sounds like that's being corrected.

Anyways, I really respect your attitude that it's not worth getting bent out of shape or spending a lot of time on, I think you're right. A lot of people get precious about it or, worse, make fun of kids like they're stupid because they haven't wasted their time learning to read, essentially, a sundial.

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in reply to marcos

Not sure about that. For high school math it is still quite important that students are familiar with circles and angles on circles. Analogue clocks are a gentle introduction to this.

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in reply to marcos

I'm guessing they know how, but it's not as quick as just glancing at it. I mean fuck I'm in my 40s but that's true for me, too.
in reply to marcos

I do know how to read an analog clock, but I dont read it subconciously, because my brain works on digital time, so I will have to look at it and then figure out what that time is if it were on a digital clock.

So if I see an analog clock I would rather look at my phone because that is just quicker than doing the conversion.

If you want to know more, look at the video Technology Connections (2?) did about it.

in reply to Noobnarski

I read analogue clocks subconsciously, converting them automatically to 24h time.
in reply to marcos

If we only taught things that were "useful" then we'd be discarding half the curriculum. Stuff like history, art, and how a fucking analog clock works, is worth teaching, even if it's not something everyone uses every day.

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in reply to TwistedTurtle

Stuff like history, art, and how a fucking analog clock works


Well, I don't exactly disagree... but one of those things is completely different from the others.

I would agree more if we were talking literally about "how an analog clock works" instead of the convention to reading them. But it would still be a niche knowledge that you can take from Wikipedia if it ever becomes relevant to you.

in reply to Arun Shah™

Real talk, is there some benefit to an analog clock that would prevent them from all being replaced by digital ones? Being able to know exactly the time in a moment's glance seems better to me.

They're certainly not better looking than a digital one, considering most of the ones used in schools are just the cheapest and most basic version they can get.

Power requirements maybe? Longevity?

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in reply to Halosheep

It proves to be somewhat useful as an example when trying to teach fractions and decimals, something we are absolutely terrible at teaching. Incomprehension of fraction to decimal conversion is why 90% of people who say they are bad at math, say they are bad at math.

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in reply to AngryCommieKender

Teaching someone how to read a clock for the sole purpose of using it as a math example seems like a poor use of effort.

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in reply to PeriodicallyPedantic

I wouldn't say that's the sole purpose, just an additional purpose to being able to tell time. It's also useful if the kid wants to be a pilot.

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in reply to AngryCommieKender

So what are the purposes? Nobody uses analog clocks anymore so afaict:

  1. To teach fractions
  2. Something to do with being a pilot???

What am I missing? 😛

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in reply to PeriodicallyPedantic

Clockwise, counter clockwise. Classic time shorthand (IE, half past ten, quarter to eleven). Time estimations (easy to see a half minute on a analog clock, digital just goes from 2:00 to 2:01)

I think analog clock displays are more elegant, and are overall nicer than digital. Personal preference though.

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in reply to Bytemeister

I'm not saying nobody should learn it, I'm saying it's not a great use of school resources. If you appreciate the aesthetic or functionality, then by all means go out and learn it. I personally like them, but I think that it should remain out of the curriculum for purely practical reasons.

I still don't really see any useful skills that learning an analog clock teaches you, besides how to read an analog clock, which isn't useful because analog clocks are so rare IRL.\
The handful of useful skills they assist teaching isn't worth it because there are better ways to teach those things. The clock isn't so good at teaching all those things that it's worth using the clock instead.

in reply to AngryCommieKender

Incomprehension of fraction to decimal conversion is why 90% of people who say they are bad at math, say they are bad at math


I feel called out. I was in high-school Calculus (11th grade) before I "truly" understood fractions. Like, I honestly somehow managed to make it to Calculus without knowing how to add and subtract fractions without a calculator. Thought I was dumb in math until 9th grade algebra, and didn't start becoming a bit of a math nerd until Calculus

in reply to Halosheep

It helps give people a geometrical understanding of the cyclic nature of time.

WldFyre doesn't like this.

in reply to RaoulDook

Lol I don't think that's true, and I don't think those words work the way you used them anyway
in reply to WldFyre

Sounds like you just didn't understand. Each hour of the 12 on the clock takes up 30° of the circle, and we measure time in cycles of hours, minutes, seconds that all match up well with the 360° of a circle.

WldFyre doesn't like this.

in reply to RaoulDook

Cutting pizza would also teach kids a geometrical understanding of how circles work, I don't see how that translates at all to being innate to reading a clock. I know tons of people who can read a clock who suck at math. It seems like an incredibly weak assertion.

RaoulDook doesn't like this.

in reply to WldFyre

Making any excuse to not learn how analog clocks work is what's really a weak assertion. It's not that fucking hard.

WldFyre doesn't like this.

in reply to Halosheep

I prefer analogue clocks because I tend to have time blindness with ADHD, and it’s easier to see at a glance how much time is visually left in an hour or how much time is passing with an analogue clock. Just knowing that “15 min left” isn’t really as effective as being able to see a visual representation of “15 min left”, for example.
in reply to Halosheep

Can't do that with a digital display, can you?

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in reply to Tudsamfa

It literally says on the image you sent how to do it with a digital display (besides, it's pretty reasonable)

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in reply to JeyNessuno

Yeah, but you have to imagine it, and some people have Aphantasia. Have a watch ready for when you suddenly can't form mental images any more and also get lost somewhere.
in reply to JeyNessuno

Not if you can't imagine analogue clock.
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in reply to MonkderVierte

Their method is "imagine a clock face showing that hour" how are you going to do that if you don't know how analogue clocks work?
in reply to Halosheep

Being able to know exactly the time in a moment’s glance seems better to me.


That seems more like a pro for analogue to me. It's much easier with an analogue clock since you get a visual presentation of time. Whenever someone tells me a time, I have to first imagine an analogue clock to understand what that time means.

in reply to Faresh

Honestly that's just about being used to one versus the other. For me it's basically the other way around
in reply to Halosheep

Genuine question, how precise do you need the time to be? Maybe you actually need precise readings for something. I figured that "on the 5 min marker", "slightly before/behind the 5 min marker" and "in the middle of two 5 min markers" is precise enough for me. And I see a hand at these positions faster than reading numbers.

I think for precise readings (eg. entering the time I start working), the speed is the same for me, but obviously I didn't test this.

I also think looking at the time but still not knowing what time it is a few seconds later happens less on an analog clock.

I don't know how much personal preference influences this though.

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in reply to windpunch

Loads of places round working time to whole quarter hours
in reply to Halosheep

They convey time instantly, without reading. You don't even need the numbers for them to work. It's like showing a progress bar versus just giving the percentage as a number.

stevenm2406 doesn't like this.

in reply to Halosheep

An analog clock is just three sets of loading bars with their ends glued together. You can tell geometrically what proportion of each division of time (day, hour, and minute) are spent and what proportion remains. You don't even need the numbers.

If you need stopwatch-level precision, sure, a digital display is superior. But how often do you need that? Most of what I need clocks for is, "Oh, it's about a quarter to noon, I have a lunch appointment to get to".

It is my personal preference to visually intuit that the clock hands are roughly separating the hour into 3/4 spent and 1/4 remaining and use that to know how much time I have left to the hour, rather than read the symbols "42" on the display and manually do the mental gymnastics of "well that's basically 45, which is three quarters of the way to 60 minutes".

I'll admit this benefit is marginal.

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in reply to pixelscript

I think that's an interesting way to look at it. I find it easier to do the mental gymnastics, as you call it.
in reply to Halosheep

You can use them as a crude compass next time you find yourself unexpectedly in the wilderness.
in reply to Halosheep

From a practicality standpoint, a round clockface is easier to create a mechanical drive system for.

You can create a digital mechanical face (see: Flipboard style numerical displays) but they usually require more gears and are more susceptible to wear and tear than the gears of a round clock face.

The simplest designs for mechanical digital displays actually just take 24 hour and 60 minute/second circular displays and hide the other numerals as the clock face spins around. Technically this I suppose counts as both analog and digital?

Example:

Image

As for electronic displays? Nah not much of a reason to use a round display unless again, you have an electric-mechanical drive and want to save on gears and parts.

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in reply to Arun Shah™

Analog clocks are like cursive, there isn't any real world benefit so it seems like we should spend that effort on one of the many other things that schools could teach.

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in reply to PeriodicallyPedantic

They look nice. Some of them anyway, not specifically school clocks which I mentally associate with "when is this day going to fucking end?" But reading a clock is not a difficult skill that takes a long time to teach.
in reply to johannesvanderwhales

It's somewhat easy to teach, but also it's not a useful skill. If someone likes how analog clocks work, then they can learn it on their own time, since it's easy.

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in reply to PeriodicallyPedantic

I feel like there's a bit of a difficulty difference. One requires basic spacial understanding. The other requires hundreds of hours of practice to become good. Nevertheless, learning both is a good idea for different reasons. Activating your brains via fine hand coordination is a great activity for children.

As a comparison, think about how much writing chinese children have to learn in school. They don't come out as exactly poorly educated, rather vice versa. Then again, the competetiveness in chinese schools is pretty brutal, at least if I can trust what my chinese colleagues have told me.

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in reply to vga

I shouldn't say there is no value in learning cursive or analog clocks, I just want to say that analog/cursive is being taught in place of more valuable lessons.

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Unknown parent

lemmy - Collegamento all'originale
Jrockwar

The reason is better is because a number on its own doesn't provide any representation whatsoever of the passing of time. It represents the current observed time, but it does nothing to represent graphically how much of the day is left.

The arguably best representation of the passing of time is a 24h analogue watch/clock, even if that has its own set of issues which make it a terrible way of displaying the current time.

in reply to rustydomino

Ok but there are still many places with analog clocks, learning how they work shouldn't take more than 5 minutes.
in reply to pewpew

I feel like this says more about these students' schools, rather than the students themselves.

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in reply to Arun Shah™

Who need analog clocks??
Want the time use digital!
Digital is to little use Millitary time?
Millitary time is to small?
Use UNIX TIME

The only thing i really use thats a dial/analog is calipers and micrometers.

Its like veirneer calipers, there just time consuming and inefficient to modern offerings

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in reply to Steamymoomilk

Whenever somebody asks you what time it is, tell them in UNIX time. Become ungovernable.
in reply to candle_lighter

I don't play video games. Although I don't actually own an analogue clock, either. But they are quite nice.
in reply to feedum_sneedson

playing video games is a slippery slope to owning a lot of analog clocks. youre saving yourself a LOT of money
in reply to feedum_sneedson

Crazily enough, living frugally is also a slippery slope to owning analog clocks.
in reply to chuckleslord

Believe it or not, the penalty for not owning analog clocks in my country is jail. Straight to jail.
Unknown parent

lemmy - Collegamento all'originale
Steamymoomilk

Question one for Advanced Algebra

Solve for time.

in reply to Arun Shah™

It was the only way I could tell how much time is left, I didn't have a phone till highschool. In school counting down the second till school was over was so crucial.

Gloomy doesn't like this.

in reply to TheSlad

Wristwatches don't have the negative psychologically addictive and anxiety-producing effects of smartphones
Unknown parent

lemmy - Collegamento all'originale
Faresh
I used to have one, but now I set my phone clock to be displayed as an analogue clock so that kind of made it obsolete, since it now has all the benefits of an analogue display with the additional advantage of automatically syncing time and adjusting for time zones and daylight saving time.
Unknown parent

lemmy - Collegamento all'originale
Faresh
It goes beyond just showing what part of day you are in. Everything is reduced to angles. You don't have to do any math with numbers, just look how much the pointer has to move to see how much time is left until an event you are interested in, and you get to visually compare that angle with the entire half of a day to get an even better perception of the passage of time.
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in reply to Arun Shah™

I assume replacing them with digital? It’s just an upgrade in technology.

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in reply to UncleGrandPa

My first thought was "yes", my second thought was "actually, maybe not?" and my third thought was reading the word clockwise in another comment which would need to be replaced with another word to indicate direction around an axis and its opposite

salmoura doesn't like this.

in reply to UncleGrandPa

Well you can use the clock for giving headings. "that tree at 10". Then you have historical and ornamental clocks which might be nice to read. Like you can not design a digital clock to look as good as an analog one.

But yeah. Probably not many reasons really

in reply to UncleGrandPa

You can certainly make an argument for young kids, i.e. teaching fractions and literally how to count (counting seconds).

Teenagers? No, not really. They'll all have phones or something to tell the time by a certain age and hopefully they know their fractions / how to count. It might as well just be digital at that point.

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in reply to UncleGrandPa

Other than the things already mentioned, you can read analog clocks easily from great distances, as long as the handles and the face have appropriate contrast (e.g. black on white). Even with impaired vision and large distance, being able to discern the rough position of black smudges on white background is enough to tell the time. This is not possible with a digital clock, because you can't distinguish between the digits as easily. Therefore, I'd certainly argue their much better for legibility in the back of a classroom or a lecture hall.
in reply to Opisek

Or on big-ass clock towers that are supposed to be visible from a large part of the surrounding area.
in reply to UncleGrandPa

This might be just me but I feel like they help me think about time more clearly, and manage my time better. Maybe I'm a visual learner.
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in reply to UncleGrandPa

It's a cheap and easy way to teach children to visualize.

flerp doesn't like this.

in reply to UncleGrandPa

Clocks were invented before electricity. If an EMP took out all the electronics, a mechanical clock is still the best way to measure longitude at sea
in reply to supertrucker

If an emp took out all the electronics, the need to measure longitude at sea would not make my top ten concerns.

snail_stampede doesn't like this.

in reply to KillerWhale

But I bet it would be in someone's top ten concerns
in reply to supertrucker

While true, most clocks are quarts oscillators
These days so would die also. That said, love me a mechanical clock and have a skeleton watch I daily drive.
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in reply to UncleGrandPa

Accessibility.

We will never get rid of the analogue clocks from our school, we're an adult education and alternative model highschool qualifications centre.

We primarily teach adults with no to low English, adults and teens with disabilities, and adults and teens refered via corrections services.

There is a significant level of illiteracy within numeracy, and for some of our students, it's not a failing of the education system, it's just a fact of life given their specific circumstances (eg, acquired brain injuries are common among our students)

Some students can learn to tell time on an analogue clock even if they didn't know before.

But even my students who will never in their life be able to fully and independently remember and recall their numbers can tell the time with an analogue clock.

I tell my students "we will take lunch at 12pm, so if you look at the clock and the arms look like this /imitates a clock/ we will go to lunch"

And now I avoid 40 questions of "when's lunch?" because you don't need to tell time to see time with an analogue clock, they can physically watch the hands move, getting closer to the shape they recognise as lunch time.

And my other students can just read the time, from the clock, and not feel infantalised by having a disability friendly task clock like they've done at other centres I work at - they've had a digital clock for students who can tell time, and a task clock as the accessible clock. But a well designed face on an analogue clock can do both.

I myself have time blindness due to a neurological/CRD issue, so analogue clocks, and analogue timers are an accessibility tool for me as well, as the teacher.

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in reply to UncleGrandPa

The swiss will never get rid of their iconic railway clocks
in reply to Arun Shah™

Not sure if true or clickbait, but if true it means we'll eventually lose clockwise and counter-clockwise as descriptive references.
in reply to crazybrain

Yep. Like uppercase and lowercase letters. Cause back when type was metal the uppercase letters were in the upper case. And the lowercase letters were in the lower drawers.
in reply to Shlocktroffit

Which today just reminds you that left handed women have lower standards for casual sex. Nobody remembers its origins in manual tool usage.
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Unknown parent

lemmy - Collegamento all'originale
Scrath

Depends for me. In my casual day to day I don't but when I had a lot of appointments to meet I find it quicker to check the time on my wrist than bu fumbling for my smartphone in my pocket, something that is probably even more true for women if they store their phone in a small bag due to lack of pockets.

Also, sometimes I like leaving my phone at home because I have unfortunately developed the tendency to give it a short glance whenever I have downtime. If I still need to know the time I can still wear a wristwatch.

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in reply to Unforeseen

The watches/clocks they are talking about listened to WWV, a set of radio stations transmitting from Fort Collins, Colorado. The system long predates the Network Time Protocol you're referring to. Radio controlled clocks/watches had no means for accounting for latency.
in reply to Rivalarrival

Ahh OK my bad. I've only worked with NTP for a long time and wasn't aware of the earlier stuff.
in reply to Arun Shah™

Ugh kids these days can't even prime a Magneto
What's next morse code!?!

Eiri doesn't like this.

in reply to Arun Shah™

You fool! I use 24H time, which requires analogue, or a really cluttered clock face. THIS is the signature look of superiority.
in reply to HEXN3T

THIS IS NOT THE SIGNATURE LOOK OF SUPERIORITY I MEANT DIGITAL CLOCK THE GODS BE FUCKING DAMNED I'M SO EEPY AND I WANT TO DIE BY EEPING FOREVER SKULL EMOJIIIIIIIIIII
in reply to HEXN3T

HOW CAN I BE SO BRAZEN THE WALTER BREAKING BAD WHITE GIF DOESN'T EVEN EMBED PROPERLY 😭😭😭😭😭
in reply to HEXN3T

Your life has to be extremely messy, to not just know which part of the day you are in. For knowing what time it is, 24h is unneccesary. For communicating time it makes sense.

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in reply to Kalysta

Perhaps we should start paying teachers so that we attract more intelligent ones with more passion
in reply to Kalysta

Feels like we have a limited amount of time to teach kids and we have more important things to teach them during that time

Edit:\
It'd be nice if all the fuckin edgelords downvoting had the courage to say what they'd like to remove from the curriculum to make room for fuckin analog clock lessons.

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in reply to PeriodicallyPedantic

I am pretty sure this was being taught for maybe 1 day in 1st grade after you learn about numbers. For first grader learning analogue clock probably is also a fun activity.
in reply to OfficerBribe

If you think a first grader learns anything but swear words, after a single day of teaching, I've got some news for you.
in reply to TheSlad

I use my wristwatch all the time to take dogs’ pulses.

Having a cell phone next to a grumpy dog is asking for a broken cell phone. I’m sure people in other fields need wristwatches as well.

Just because you don’t use them don’t mean they’re not useful.

in reply to Unforeseen

If you're interested in prehistory, listen to this for a couple minutes.
in reply to Arun Shah™

Wife, for years, thought the "second hand" on a clock was called that because it was the "2nd" hand on the clock...which confused her. Took her over 30 years to realize it's the "seconds" hand because it counts seconds.
in reply to nexguy

I guess she is not entirely off, either. It's called that because it is the second division of an hour.

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in reply to Arun Shah™

So, schools aren't even capable of teaching students how to read clocks anymore?
in reply to bitMasque

Schools have more important things to teach kids with the limited time they have
in reply to PeriodicallyPedantic

No, screw that whataboutism. When I went to school, I learned so much information that is virtually useless to most people, and not nearly enough skills and knowledge that would actually be helpful in daily life. I would like to see the situation improve for future generations.

Analogue clocks are everywhere and being able to read them is still important. Besides, if schools aren't even capable of teaching something so simple to students, I think that calls into question their ability to teach far more complex things.

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in reply to bitMasque

Perhaps the fact that we pay them like 30 grand a year is a factor?
That's how much my one bedroom apartment costs 😂 there's no money left over for food or loans or electricity or gas

Financial stress has been proven to make you dumber

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in reply to 4lan

Tell me about it. I feel dumber by the day!
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in reply to bitMasque

It's because analog clocks are becoming obsolete. You can scream about the young peoples all you want but that's the reality.

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in reply to ThatWeirdGuy1001

I'm not screaming about the young people; I was "the young people" not that long ago. Not everyone who criticizes education is an out of touch boomer resisting every societal change.

Actually, analogue clocks have been obsoleted in almost every way by digital clocks for at least half a century, as digital wristwatches first hit the market in the 1970s. And yet, analogue clocks are still found everywhere. Classes, stores, train stations, homes, offices, not to mention the majority of wristwatches, still mostly use analogue clocks. In fact, excluding screens, I wouldn't be surprised if most people came across more analogue clocks than digital clocks on a daily basis. They're technologically obsolete, but haven't fallen out of use.

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in reply to bitMasque

Sorry I just assumed this was more boomer shitting on the youngins like usual so that's my bad.
in reply to ThatWeirdGuy1001

It's alright, I totally understand. There's no shortage of those around, unfortunately.
in reply to bitMasque

I have to have an analog clock within sight in the morning. When I first wake up I'm too tired and bleary eyed to think about numbers but I know what angle the minute hand will be at when I have leave to catch the bus to work. When you're familiar with an analog clock it's far more user friendly than looking at some numbers and have to do some math. Sure it's simple math, but first thing in the morning, I'd rather just glance at the minute hand and when I see the angle I just know.

So I don't think it's not going away despite it being obsolete, it's not going away because it's more user friendly. Sure there's a learning curve, but once you've gotten the hang of it, it's a more efficient way for a human to get a sense of time, which in many cases is more important than having a numerical representation of time.

in reply to bitMasque

How is that whataboutism?

It's not that schools have become unable to teach kids to read analog clocks or kids have become unable to learn it. It's not that they can't it's that they don't

But speaking of whataboutism, your argument is literally "well what about all the useless stuff that I learned in school???" \
How about they stop teaching useless stuff, and the first things they can throw out are cursive and analog clocks.

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in reply to bitMasque

We also need to teach them how to write in cursive so they can read the declaration of independence.

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in reply to unexposedhazard

There's nothing stopping an analog clock face from representing 24h time:
in reply to Arun Shah™

It floors me just how many people in this thread feel like analog clock reading is a useless/outdated skill.

But I'm of the opinion that there's no such thing as a truly outdated and useless skill, so I'm not sure I have the capability to empathize with those people...

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in reply to WalnutLum

I perceive remaining time much better with an analogue clock. It's also why I perceive time in fractions. I think it's the superior clock, and people should probably learn to fucking read one since they're everywhere.

I also think it's kind of insane that we're not at least learning how to read cursive in schools anymore. There are countless documents written in English that English speakers will not be able to properly decipher.

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in reply to Stalinwolf

To be fair i learnt cursive and i can still not decipher most of it, even my own writing (or rather especially my own writing)

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in reply to WalnutLum

It's not useless.

It's just less useful that other things that should be taught in school. There is only so much time in a school year, and it shouldn't replace those more useful things in the curriculum.

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in reply to WalnutLum

As a person who prefers analog clocks I disagree

What benefit does analog bring over digital other than nostalgia?
Once is objectively faster to read granularly, by the minute

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in reply to 4lan

For the usability of the clock, likely nothing.

I did mention In another comment that there are a number of advantages a round clockface provides to the creation of the clock, however.


From a practicality standpoint, a round clockface is easier to create a mechanical drive system for.

You can create a digital mechanical face (see: Flipboard style numerical displays) but they usually require more gears and are more susceptible to wear and tear than the gears of a round clock face.

The simplest designs for mechanical digital displays actually just take 24 hour and 60 minute/second circular displays and hide the other numerals as the clock face spins around. Technically this I suppose counts as both analog and digital?

Example:

Image

As for electronic displays? Nah not much of a reason to use a round display unless again, you have an electric-mechanical drive and want to save on gears and parts.


in reply to TheSlad

I'm a watch nerd with a collection of mechanical watches and I'm not going to downvote you because you're right. I wear them because I like them even though I know they are anachronistic. I can't remember the last time I interacted with somebody significantly younger than me who was wearing a watch, and as I said, I'm a watch nerd, someone's watch is one of the first things I notice about them.

I will say that they are occasionally more convenient than other places I could check the time but I've built my life in such a way that I very rarely have to care about what time it is and I go weeks at a time without checking the time, just wearing them because I'm fascinated by tiny gears and springs doing their business and I like the feeling of it on my wrist.

in reply to Asclepiaz

Yup. Of course it is and half of the comment section is falling for it.
in reply to Asclepiaz

Litter box thing? I thought it was just my half wit town who believed in that bullshit.
in reply to Encrypt-Keeper

My mother in law informed me that the left wants kids to have access to litter boxes and all kinds of stuff. She swears her friend said it's true. I told her to her face that she's been duped but you know she's a bit too far and drank the juice.
in reply to Dark_Dragon

Fun fact, 10:10 is the default time most photographers take photos of a clock/watch to help display all the logos and things a watch face has to offer!
in reply to Don Escobar

Fun fact number 2: because of this tradition, even digital clocks are sometimes shown as 10:10
in reply to Arun Shah™

Analog clocks are kind of annoying tbh. Sometimes you need that little extra energy you have to spend on wondering whether it is 11:37 or 11:38 already by carefully visually bisecting the circle section between 7 and 8.
Millimetres of white space keep you wondering about the nature of analogue vs digital, discrete vs continuous and measurement uncertainty while you have better things to do but cannot just give up on OCDing whether it is exactly 11:37:30 already or maybe it is 11:37:35? And boom in these seconds you were wondering it is already pointless because it is the past and now it is time to wonder if it is 11:38:15 or 11:38:30

Whereas for digital it is just:
oh it is 11:11 on 11.11.11, how cool, life’s good

Thus it is my opinion that analogue clocks are virgins whereas digital are chads

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in reply to Emmie

seconds hand: am I a joke to you?

ThatWeirdGuy1001 doesn't like this.

in reply to el_abuelo

Most clocks have only two hands. Actually all school clocks I seen had only two
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in reply to Emmie

There's a huge difference between "most clocks" and "most clocks I've seen" - especially if your clock experience is restricted to schools.

Do you see a lot of schools? Do you know whether the schools you've been to all use the same supplier? How broad is your school clock experience? How many clocks do you think you've seen, ever?

Most clocks I've seen recently (I can recall exactly 1) have seconds hands. Regardless though I'm not suggesting "most clocks" have seconds hands...I'm just making a quip about how traditional, analogue, clocks have seconds hands to deal with the exact problems noted.

wildwhitehorses doesn't like this.

in reply to el_abuelo

And yet in schools they don’t have seconds. Never had

I still have ptsd thanks to that. Can you imagine? No seconds?

This is pure torture that should be forbidden by Geneva convention. So uncivilised

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in reply to Emmie

I cannot fathom such deep despair for I only live in a world of seconds.

God speed my simple friend. God speed.

in reply to Emmie

Yeah we had a problem with the seconds hand in scools, too many students keep starting at them and we all know that if you stare at them time stops ....
in reply to Emmie

I love having an analog clock. It makes it feel like you have more time compared to a digital clock, making me more relaxed. For example, if the time is 12:34 PM, my subconscious will think, "Ahh, shit, 26 more minutes before 1 PM." But with an analog clock, I read it as around half an hour before 1 PM. The visual representation also helps, like seeing that there is a distance that the hands need to travel to reach a certain time.

All in all, I very much prefer having analog clocks vs digital when given the chance.

in reply to Emmie

I read both kinds of clocks differently and have to sit and process to translate between them. A digital clock I read as "six twenty-five AM." An analog clock I read as "almost half-past six." I usually don't bother reading an analog clock at greater resolutions than a quarter hour.
in reply to Emmie

The specific time isn't as important as how long it is until things are going down. You know the part of the clock the minute hand will be pointing at when it's time to do shit then you got a handy little progress arc to check in on and instantly know when it's time to do the things.
in reply to SpaceCowboy

So you say that your bowel movements are synchronised with your clock?
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in reply to Emmie

Kinda. Finishing my coffee is synchronized with the clock. I take a shit soon after that.
in reply to Arun Shah™

I have a hard time with analog clocks because my brain scrambles shit up and I get really confused. Like, even the hands seem weird when your brain flips the numbers around
in reply to Arun Shah™

When I look at a digital clock I always convert it to analogue in my head. Guess I’m that old.
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in reply to WalnutLum

I was ready to hate it but after a good look, it doesn't look that bad. Doesn't work for small wristwatches but could look nice for a big wall clock.
in reply to Arun Shah™

So many edgelords in the comments shit talking younger generations for learning different things. \
Y'all sound like old farts crying about how schools stopped using slide rules and how modern music just isn't as good.
in reply to PeriodicallyPedantic

I think keeping analog tech along side the digital equivalent is probably a good idea, just in case. Plus learning varied systems makes for more adaptable and smarter people.
in reply to Pilferjinx

There is some truth to that, but this doesn't seem like the thing to focus on, if that's the goal. Surely there is a better subject to fulfill those needs.

Like... If we all forgot how to keep time, and we had to invent a new system of time keeping... Surely we could do better than what we have now.

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in reply to PeriodicallyPedantic

You sound like someone who doesn't know how to read an analoge clock.

I bet you could figure it out if you looked it up. And you would be better for it ❤️

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in reply to ziggurat

Probably not. I can read an analogue clock and I am no better or worse for it.
in reply to Encrypt-Keeper

What? Of course you are better off for it. You know how to read time more than one way.

Encrypt-Keeper doesn't like this.

in reply to WIZARD POPE💫

In what way am I better off for being able to read time in more than one way?

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in reply to Encrypt-Keeper

Imagine life in the post-apocalyptic hellscape. All electronic devices have been rendered useless due to the EMPs from all the nuclear blasts. You, with your unfathomable ability to tell the time from an old wind-up clock, are viewed as a literal god among men (and women)

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in reply to Encrypt-Keeper

In what way am I better off being able to read cyrilic as well as latin script? Truly a dilemma of a century.
in reply to Encrypt-Keeper

Jokes on you, because just that you learned to read analogue clocks, makes your brain more plastic. I am sure you know what that word means, but for anyone else, plastic means adaptable. The more things you learn the easier it is to learn more things.

Encrypt-Keeper doesn't like this.

in reply to ziggurat

LMAO yeah right. If it wasn’t for learning to tell analogue time, I wouldn’t have had enough brain plasticity to finish college, oh thank god for being able to tell round time. I think you might need to keep chipping away at your own brain plasticity friendo because I don’t think learning analogue time was enough for you.
in reply to ziggurat

You sound like one of those edgelords who acts like grumpy old men who cry at young people for doing things differently.

I bet you could stop talking and everyone would like you better ♥️

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in reply to PeriodicallyPedantic

No publisher, no byline, no way to know what the source of the claim is coming from.

But they did include a bit of meme art, so it seems indisputable.

in reply to Arun Shah™

If only they still taught how to read a sundial, but those damn new fangled analog clocks...

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in reply to variants

Watches that can get alerts can show digital time. So, chalk another point up for not learning analog time.

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in reply to Kalysta

Also, just because they’re useful doesn’t make them necessary.
in reply to WalnutLum

🤢 what an utter abomination

This is why puppies die

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in reply to Arun Shah™

oh look yet another warmed over "DAE the kids r bad" talking point that i've been hearing literally since i learned language.
in reply to texasspacejoey

Brain rot is only a moral failing of the children. What more can the teachers and parents do?!

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in reply to Arun Shah™

Guys lets be honest why point at small Numbers which you have to read in a specific sequence while doing some math when you can easily and nowadays probably more efficiently (paper-ink) display them... Analog clocks are going to disappear and people will watch at them with the same eyes as we watch a sundial...(Btw I had to search for the translation of the world sundial that's how common it is ... 😉)
I can ready It but i get teens Who dont

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in reply to DNOS

They should just be taught how to read time in school
in reply to DNOS

Analog clocks are a better representation of how we think of time than a digital clock.

If someone looks and immediately afterwards someone asks them for the time, they will look at their watch again. The number isn't really what matters, it's "how long until X will happen" that matters more.

You know you're meeting is at 10:30, you see it's 9:55. You know it's about a half hour until the meeting, and the meeting will happen when that big hand gets to the bottom. The numbers themselves won't do that for you, you have to think 60 minutes in an hour, 60-5 = 5 + 30 = 35 minutes away. When you check the digital clock again you see 10:17, so you have to think 30-17 = 13 minutes until the meeting. But with an analog clock it's like a reusable progress bar (well progress arc to be more accurate). Quick glance and you see how far the minute hand has to go and you're good.

Sure the mental math needed to get a sense of time with a digital clock isn't all that hard. But it is an additional step over the adhoc progress arcs that analog clocks provide.

Digital clocks are fine and all, but are just slightly worse than analog clocks. Just how technology is going I guess, always giving us something that's technically more advanced but worse for humans to interface with.

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in reply to SpaceCowboy

Er, what? If I look at the clock and see it's 0955 I know exactly that it's 35 minutes. Same for every other example you give. If it's 1252, it's so easy to add 8 minutes then add whatever it is more. And you can do that for any time. Say 1017. "Oh no!" Never fear, the just add it to the time wangs are here: +13 to 30 and woah! Easy, foolproof and actually intuitive
in reply to GelatinGeorge

1030-955=75. So intuitively, it would be 75 minutes until the meeting. Oh wait... maybe it's not intuitive?

210 degree arc is always going to be 35 minutes. Whether it's the 35 minutes from 9:55 to 10:30 or 9:50 to 10:25 or 3:15 to 3:50 or whatever. Sure you have to get used to the arcs. But once you do, it's a quick glance at the minute hand and seeing how far away it is from the time of the meeting (or whatever the next thing is). Time for a computer is a number, time for a human is how long until a thing is going to happen.

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in reply to Arun Shah™

I just really enjoy the photo, the character looks funny. I agree that shit like this just causes division but at the same time it's like any other rude meme towards group X or person Y. just another dumb meme to go ha ha to and move on
in reply to Arun Shah™

Anyone who wants to understand how to read an analog clock can learn it in two minutes, it's not like you need to be taught in school.
edit to add: My brother recently told me that he was at the library and his friend's teenage daughter looked at the analog clock and said indignantly "I can't read that!" So apparently it is true that people aren't learning simple skills like this.
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in reply to leadore

I personally know how to read an analog watch but I do it so rarely that it takes a bit of time thinking before I figure it out and convert it to 24 hour time. Because I use digital time absolutely everywhere and never analog time.

Hell I even got a digital wrist watch, mostly because it's easier and faster to read for me but also because it's more accurate. I will admit that the hitchhikers guide to the galaxy also played a role in the purchase.

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in reply to lud

Digital vs. analog watches that run on batteries are no more or less accurate because of how the time is displayed. I have a digital clock display on my battery-powered cordless phone (yes I also have a landline) that is constantly plugged into a power source and it loses a minute or two every day. Your computer and phone only keep displaying the correct time because they frequently update themselves from an online source.
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in reply to leadore

My watch frequently (daily but only if I'm sleeping with it, for some reason) updates itself via radio. It's generally accurate to a second or maybe even half a second.
But the main reason, It's easier to tell exactly what the time is in seconds when it's digital compared to a fast spinning stick. Not that it really matters, I just like it.
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in reply to leadore

Honest question; why would they? Digital clocks and watches are have been cheaper and more accurate (and as a result more ubiquitous) for many years now. I think there's a strong argument that analogue clocks are obsolete, and that's why teens and kids aren't learning to read them.
in reply to leadore

Are all public clocks in the US digital clocks? Off the top of my head, I can tell you 4 locations within walking distance that have analog clocks, one of them being the train station.
in reply to bleistift2

Nope, it still seems like most of the ones I see are analog, as in my library example. Probably most people ignore them and just check their phones for the time since they are constantly looking at them anyway.
in reply to bleistift2

The point is the instinct to check phone for the time is so strong that they're not looking around for clocks.
in reply to Arun Shah™

It's true. I teach college kids, and a couple of years ago my class was taking a midterm. The room didn't have a clock so I put my watch on the document camera display so they'd know how much time was left. A girl in the front row asked me what time it was, because she couldn't tell time. After she turned in her test, thinking she must be kind of embarrassed about this, I told her I'd be happy to teach her how to tell time. She gave me a look like "ok, boomer" and said no thanks.

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in reply to thesushicat

Yeah that girl is going places in life. Though probably not on time.
in reply to Arun Shah™

bruh I can read analogue clocks and I'm gen z. it's probably rage bait though, so who cares :/
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in reply to openrain502r

it's not rage bait, I've seen it happen plenty of times

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in reply to Arun Shah™

I don't believe this for a second. You can literally just look at it and intuitively understand. Not to mention part of the standard elementary school curriculum is how to read a clock.
in reply to Anti-Face Weapon

Wait...you think those are intuitive? Fuck no.

Who's going to intuitively know that "long hand pointing at 2" means "10 minutes after the hour"? Also, having the long hand for minutes is super unintuitive when hours are longer than minutes.

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in reply to zarkanian

May not be super intuitive, but getting rid of them is intellectually lazy. If you know an hour is 60 minutes, it makes enough sense.

If an hour is 60 minutes, 60/12 is 5 minutes per number on the clock. Long hand is minutes because there are more minutes in a day than hours. Or at least that's how I can rationalize it.

If you can explain an analog clock that quickly, it's just lazy for them to not learn it. It also has cross application to make people more comfortable with mental math and multiples commonly seen in trigonometry.

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in reply to zarkanian

Minutes are the smaller time division with 60 possible values so that hand is longer to reach to the tick marks for easier reading of the exact minute.

The hour hand only needs to distinguish between 12 possible values that are more spread out around the perimeter, so it doesn't need to reach very far to tell which hour out of 12 it is.

in reply to Anti-Face Weapon

Real reason is probably that the schools don't have the budget to pay for the batteries, or for someone to make sure the time is correct on all of them in the school...
in reply to Venator

My high school all the analog clocks attached to a big box that had the intercom in it. The clocks were all synchronized remotely through that system school wide. So no need for batteries. We did have digital clocks at the ends of most hallways. I’d imagine because they’re just physically smaller and less ambiguity for when 1 minute matters before a bell in between classes.
in reply to JordanZ

In that case the rats probably ate the wires and they can't afford to repair it... 😅
in reply to Arun Shah™

OK let's have a lesson for those who find this difficult. First, remember that little kids pick this up quickly and easily, so you can too!

We all know there are 60 seconds in a minute, 60 minutes in an hour, and 24 hours in a day, right? and that the day is divided into the a.m. of 12 hours and the p.m. of 12 hours.

So analog clocks show those 12 hours as the numbers 1-12 evenly spaced around the clock face. Now look a little closer and you see it's also divided into 60 marks with a tick mark for each of the 60 seconds/minute or 60 minutes/hour. Hang on, we're almost there!

The little hand points to the HOUR number (1-12). If it's in between two numbers, that means the time is in between those two hours.

The big hand points to the MINUTE tick mark. Notice that the 1-12 numbers coincide with each 5th tick mark so it's easy to count them. Just count by 5's! So if the big hand is between the 3 and the 4, that means the minute of the hour is between 15 and 20, look at which tick mark for the exact minute.

Now, can you figure out how the second hand works? Good! Kindergarten dismissed!

/s

in reply to leadore

I can tell the time perfectly well unless someone asks me what time it is. Then my brain is completely useless and I just have to twist my wrist around awkwardly to show them.
in reply to Arun Shah™

I'm a millenial and I can read analog clocks, but it takes me a few seconds, it's not as instant as with digital ones.
in reply to Arun Shah™

Not only we have retarded boomers, we also have kids who are too stupid to read an analog clock. Wonderful.

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in reply to FatherGascown

Yeah definitely a stupidity problem and not an education problem. /s
in reply to Arun Shah™

Who cares. Analog audio, video, phones, all out the window. Next people will be complaining people don't even know anything about vacuum tubes. Digital clocks are easier to read and make more fuckin sense. Leave the kids alone. 🙄🙄🙄

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