A Clock That Runs for 10,000 Years 438
Justin Blanton writes "Discover magazine is running an article about a clock designed to run accurately for 10,000 years. It's essentially a "future-proof" clock that blurs the line between art and functionality through advanced engineering. From the article: 'Everything about this clock is deeply unusual. For example, while nearly every mechanical clock made in the last millennium consists of a series of propelled gears, this one uses a stack of mechanical binary computers capable of singling out one moment in 3.65 million days. Like other clocks, this one can track seconds, hours, days, and years. Unlike any other clock, this one is being constructed to keep track of leap centuries, the orbits of the six innermost planets in our solar system, even the ultraslow wobbles of Earth's axis.'"
Boring old news... (Score:3, Informative)
I want to have one! (Score:5, Informative)
The article is rather slow to get already so use mirrodot instead: http://www.mirrordot.org/stories/608e5b4931282247
Re:enough? (Score:2, Informative)
The clock requires maintenance (Score:1, Informative)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clock_of_the_Long_No
the article seems slashdotted.
Seems a bit silly to me for them to require that, given that we as a species get bored of things
I first read about this in 1998 (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Outta time (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Outta time (Score:3, Informative)
Reminds me of this (Score:4, Informative)
I don't know the price but since their wristwatches start at around USD$8,000 and go up to over $200k, I suspect you could buy a very nice car for the price. Patek make rolex look like cheap crap (which is mostly true).
It's a beautiful idea (Score:2, Informative)
The references in other comments to atomic clocks miss the point entirely. Atomic clocks are about precision and accuracy. This clock is concerned with accuracy, but only at long scales. A mechanism to re-set to local noon, as described in the article, is plenty to catch the daily drift and would probably compensate for running fast/slow for many days if the sky were cloudy. For the kind of astronomical time this clock is concerned with, being a few seconds behind or ahead is irrelevant.
Re:Actually, it just occurred to me... (Score:3, Informative)
2014, I think. There was a difference in opinion between lowland Mayans and highland Mayans but it was only a matter of a year.
Also, they didn't think it was the end of the world; they thought the Gods would return and judge our progress. If they didn't like what they saw, THEN it would be the end of the world. So, obviously, we're okay...er...where's the exit again?
TWW
Applied Minds (Score:2, Informative)
These guys are geniuses, the kind you see in movies. Danny Hillis himself thought up the idea of parallel processing for his doctaral thesis while he was a grad student. They don't specialize in any fields, they apply their creativity to R&Ds in almost any field, be it medical, defence or engineering.
They are the ones who created that voicebox [prnewswire.com] which replies incomprehensible snippets of your voice to prevent eavesdropping, a human-size Dino [wikipedia.org] robot walking around Hong Kong Disneyland that can mingle with the tourist without any danger because it is able to shift its weight such that if its foot encounters an eggshell, it can back off without breaking it. (that's in the middle of a step) and the company also created a tabletop display that can show a 3D view of any location on earth by using thousands of pins to replicate the actual reliefs.
Re:The clock requires maintenance (Score:3, Informative)
Brian Eno Did an Album for This (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Actually, it just occurred to me... (Score:1, Informative)
"The turn of the great cycle is conjectured to have been of great significance to the Maya, but does not necessarily mark the end of the world. According to the Popol Vuh, a sacred book of the Maya, they were living in the fourth world. The Popol Vuh describes the first three worlds that the gods failed in making and the creation of the successful fourth world where men were placed. The Maya believed that the fourth world would end in catastrophe and the fifth and final world would be created that would signal the end of mankind.
The last creation ended on a long count of 13.0.0.0.0. Another 13.0.0.0.0 will occur on December 21, 2012, and it has been discussed in many New Age articles and books that this will be the end of this creation or something else entirely."
To paraphrase Bill Gates, 13.0.0.0.0 should be enough for anyone.
Re:Outta time (Score:3, Informative)
A bit more accurate than 10-9 sec/day
Is it noon? (Score:3, Informative)
Local noon is an easy time to measure. When the sun is due south, it's local noon. Due south is halfway between local sunrise and local sunset. If the clock were to drift, it would be saying something like "it's two oclock" whereas the sun would be telling you it was local noon so you'd know the clock was wrong. The clock is designed to reset itself based on the position of the sun using a bimetallic strip so unless it breaks completely, it should keep time.
The bigger problem to my eyes is they're planning on tucking it hell and gone inside a mountain so no one will steal or vandalize it. For a monument that is intended as a statement of hope for the future, that strikes me as counter productive. "Umm, we built this thing for you kids whom we've never met but we figure you're not trustworthy enough to let you know where it is."
The architects in the middle ages trusted their offspring to finish and maintain the cathedrals that the architects laid the foundations for. Seems that turned out ok - most of the cathedrals are still here and don't show signs of being stolen or vandalized. Even the Germans had the good sense to leave Paris alone during both wars and they're the original Vandals.
Put it in the desert to keep it free from humidity but don't go and hide the damn thing. Kind of defeats the idea.
Re:Outta time (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Boring old news, even older than that (Score:3, Informative)
http://www.longnow.org/projects/clock/ [longnow.org]
Interesting Stuff (Score:5, Informative)
Currently, you can find the project's web page at http://www.longnow.org/projects/clock/ [longnow.org]
The mechanical computer, the solar synchronizer, and the power mechanism are all very cool pieces of engineering. However, the most fascinating part of the entire clock is the "Equation of Time Cam". A bit more information about the cam follows.
The proposed clock not only keeps accurate solar time (it resets itself every day at noon via the solar synchronizer), it also keeps accurate "clock time". How it does this is pretty amazing:
In general, when the sun reaches its highest point ("solar noon"), you can look at your watch & find that it's not really noon. On any given day, the variation between "solar noon" & "clock noon" is +/- 15 minutes. Of course, this variation chanages through out the year, following a well defined curve known as the "equation of time" (http://www.sundials.co.uk/equation.htm [sundials.co.uk]) (it looks like a 5th order polynomial equation).
So, when the mechanical clock resets itself at "solar noon", it's needs to account for this variation to determine "clock noon". One way to do this is to make a disc that is not perfectly round; it has a wider diameter at portions & a narrower diameter at other parts (something like a cross between a circle & an ameoba). This "disc" makes one revolution per year, and the variations in its diameter represent the difference between "solar noon" & "clock noon". So, at "solar noon", the clock resets itself & uses a feeler gauge on the disc to figure out how much variation to add or subtract to display "clock noon". So, assuming you have a sunny day every once & a while, you have a clock that will always have accurate clock time. Ingenious!
There's a problem, though: each year, the equation of time changes slightly. So, in order to keep accurate clock time for 10,000 years, you need 10,000 of these discs, each representing the distinct equation of time for each year. The Long Now foundation solves this problem by making an "Equation of Time Cam" - a continous stack of these cylinders. In my mind it is a thing of beauty - engineering at its best - well thought out and so simple. Here's a picture of the cam - it's the cylinder that looks like it melted a bit:
http://www.longnow.org/projects/clock/prototype1/
The Long Now's explanation can be found here (complete with Cad drawings!):
http://emsh.calarts.edu/~mathart/Clock_Cam.html [calarts.edu]
I hope everyone enjoys this project as much as I have - Have fun!
Re:Actually, it just occurred to me... (Score:3, Informative)
It's actually December 21, 2012.
Maya Calendar on Wikipedia [wikipedia.org]
Re:mice spiders and rodents (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Is it noon? (Score:4, Informative)
You are wrong. Most cathedrals are no longer there. Most cathedrals collapsed within two centuries after being built, and many others will collapse within 50 years because of car traffic.
You are also wrong about the Germans. A number of old inner cities and over 200 medieval castles in my country (the Netherlands) were destroyed beyond repair by the Germans in the 4 days we fought them. Paris was saved because it wasn't fought over. Still the Germans are not more destructive than our other neighbours. Overall they are our most peaceful neighbours.
The town I live in now was for instance razed and flooded by the sea in 1350 in a civil war, and razed again in 1572 by a Spanish army, who also murdered the entire population. It was rebuilt in 1574 with strong city walls and shelled again in the same year by the Spanish. It was shelled by the French in 1672, and by our own army liberating it in 1673. Last time it was shelled was again by our own side in 1814, after Napoleon lost the battle of Leipzig, and the French garrison refused to surrender to Dutch militia claiming the town.
The town I grew up in was destroyed by the English fleet in 1809. The inner city was largely destroyed again in 1940 and in 1945, when the Allies also flooded it by bombing the dikes. Sources also recount that the town was razed to the ground twice in the middle ages by the Flemish because of our excessive river tolls.
It is really just a fluke that some buildings survived over the centuries, and generally speaking it is the best buildings that survive.
Re:Is it noon? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:You've just scratched the surface (Score:2, Informative)
Clocky! [mit.edu]