Re: [LEAPSECS] pedagogically barren?

From: Tom Van Baak <tvb_at_LEAPSECOND.COM>
Date: Thu, 5 Jun 2003 13:26:25 -0700

> A propos of both the topic and the discussion of notation, I've observed
> that in the U.S., hospitals (where 24-hour notation, or "military time" as
> civilians inevitably call it) are one of the few businesses where wall
> clocks are nearly always set to the correct time (within+/- one minute,
and
> often within +/- 10 seconds, as checked against my WWVB watch). The
correct
> time on birth and death certificates is important, but I was not aware of
> how important until I saw a posting from Prof. David Mills on
> comp.protocols.time.ntp in which he said that UT1 (not UTC) is the legal
> standard for death certificates. My reaction was that this is fascinating
> if true, but even if it is (I couldn't find any documentation of this), I
> would have to wonder how DUT1 becomes an issue if the tolerance is (as
> currently) less than one second?
>
> Does anyone have any firshand knowledge of forensic medical issues related
> to DUT1? The implications of removing the 0.9s limit are clear if Prof.
> Mills is correct, but my impression was that time-of-day need only be
> precise to within one minute for birth and death certificates.
>
>
> Brian Garrett

I'd be interested to hear how one measures the
leading edge of the human life to death transition
pulse with a precision that makes the UT1 vs.
UTC question even relevant.

/tvb
Received on Thu Jun 05 2003 - 13:34:21 PDT