[HN Gopher] SS Warrimoo, the Ship That Existed in Two Centuries ...
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       SS Warrimoo, the Ship That Existed in Two Centuries at Once
        
       Author : passwordoops
       Score  : 17 points
       Date   : 2024-08-07 10:27 UTC (5 days ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (www.atlasobscura.com)
 (TXT) w3m dump (www.atlasobscura.com)
        
       | variaga wrote:
       | FTA, the ship crossed the international date line on December 31,
       | 1899 so briefly the front of the ship was on Jan 1, 1900 while
       | the back of the ship was still in Dec 31, 1899.
       | 
       | Both of these dates are still in the 19th century, however, so
       | "two centuries at once" is wrong. The 20th century did not begin
       | until Jan 1, 1901.
        
         | DonaldFisk wrote:
         | That's true in strict usage where there's no year 0 between 1BC
         | and 1AD, but in popular usage years in the 19th century begin
         | with 18 (i.e. from 1800 to 1899), and in astronomical year
         | numbering 1BC is year 0, so the first century is 1BC to 99AD
         | inclusive, and so on. This is also true in ISO 8601.
        
         | Stratoscope wrote:
         | As a counterpoint, was the Y2K problem something that would
         | have happened on January 1, 2001, or January 1, 2000?
         | 
         | Sometimes the common understanding of a century as being the
         | years xx00 through xx99 is more relevant than the "technical"
         | understanding.
        
       | focusedone wrote:
       | Yet another fun story assaulted by pedantry.
        
         | klyrs wrote:
         | I'm not sure I see a story without the pedantry. Or, perhaps,
         | the only fun in this story _is_ the pedantry?
         | 
         | (Sorry, should have prefaced this, "well actually"
        
       | inglor_cz wrote:
       | Time resolution is a funny thing. With enough detail, it can be
       | said that your head exists in a slightly different time than the
       | PC you are sitting at, or that one end of a RAM module has a
       | slightly different time than the other end.
       | 
       | Fortunately we haven't yet reached situations where that would
       | actually matter, and, with some luck, never will.
        
       | ThinkingGuy wrote:
       | Crossing the international date line is fun. On my first trip
       | from Hawaii to New Zealand, we got to skip a Monday on the way
       | there, and enjoy two Saturday nights on the way back.
        
       | jsnell wrote:
       | I don't get it. Straddling any time zone boundary at midnight
       | would have just the same effect, no?
        
         | AnimalMuppet wrote:
         | At midnight on New Year's Eve on the boundary of a century,
         | yes.
        
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       (page generated 2024-08-12 23:01 UTC)