The first article, “Why is a minute divided into 60 seconds, an hour into 60 minutes, yet there are only 24 hours in a day?”, explains how early civilizations created and maintained systems for dividing time. It shows the behind-the-scenes process of how people determined how a day should be divided and how seconds and minutes came to be, leading to the system we use today. People measured time using tools such as sundials to divide the day, stars to mark what the article calls “periods of darkness,” or water clocks called clepsydras. The second article, "Babylonian Numerals," is really interesting to read since the Babylonian number system uses only two symbols and is in base 60. We learn how to understand these numerals, how they are separated and expressed in decimal notation, how spacing helped distinguish between two symbols that may look similar but have different values, how there was no representation of zero so an empty space was used, how fractions are represented, and why base 60 was chosen.
When I think about my own experiences, I realize that I still mark years by school calendars, since I spent the majority of my life in school and have only worked full time for 1.5 years. I also think of a year in terms of major events like graduation or trips. Seasons, even though they have official start and end dates, I mostly judge by the weather. Autumn, for example, begins at the equinox on September 22, but if it still feels warm, I think of it as summer. Each season has a different meaning for me. Winter is my favourite because of the festivities and my birthday. Spring feels like a fresh start. Summer is for holidays and vacation. Fall is back-to-school time. For months, I used to mark them by birthdays in school, but now I often think of them by my credit card statement. Weeks were tied to paycheques or assignment deadlines. I don’t focus on exact hours. It depends on my routine. For example, 8am to 4pm used to be my working hours, and the rest was free time. Even now that I’m back in school, I think of hours as commuting, being in class, eating, doing homework, or sleeping. I don’t think “12pm,” I think “time for lunch,” and 7am is when I’ll be on the bus. When it comes to the geometry of time, I see a year as a cycle. The start of the cycle depends on my life situation. When I’m in school, the start is in September, and when I was working, the start was in January. A day feels like a line of events, and a season feels like a segment with its own attributes such as weather or holidays.
Things that Surprised Me:
- Sunlight and dark periods were not considered part of the same day.
- The number 12 is important because it equals the number of lunar cycles in a year and the number of finger joints on one hand.
- The measuring system that used a set of 24 stars.
- A minute could have 60 or 61 seconds.
- That you can count to 60 using your hands. As there are 12 finger joints on a hand. Then using the other hand you can point to one of these 12 sections with one of the 5 fingers.
- A theory that suggests that the Sumerian civilization may have formed when two groups joined, one using base 12 and the other using base 5.
This is a rich and well-developed reflection that combines the historical information from the articles with your own lived experiences of time. I especially like how you describe the “geometry of time” in personal terms, such as seeing a year as a cycle or a day as a line of events. This gives your writing a very engaging and relatable dimension. To make your reflection even stronger, you could briefly tie your personal experiences back to the ancient practices (for example, how using seasons or school calendars mirrors how ancient people relied on natural cycles). This would make the connection between past and present even clearer.
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