bulko@ut-sally.UUCP (Bill Bulko) (09/02/86)
In article <430@rtech.UUCP> bobm@rtech.UUCP (Bob Mcqueer) writes: >> >> I remember reading a book of essays by Isaac Asimov in which >> he proposed a new calendar. I don't remember the details, but >> it seemed very logical (if unconventional). I believe it had >> the virtues of not having to account for "leap" years, and each >> date fell on the same day of the week each year. It had something >> like an 80 day month, and I think the "week" may not have had >> 7 days. >> > >I'm pretty sure I'm not thinking of the same one, but I remember a >similar "calendar reform" proposal many years ago. . . The proposal Bob described sounds a lot like one I saw in Science Digest about 10 years ago. I think the plan was called "the Equal-Quarter Calendar" or something like that. The months were redefined as follows: 30 days: Jan Apr Jul Oct 30 days: Feb May Aug Nov 31 days: Mar Jun Sep Dec I really don't remember just which months were assigned 31 days, but it's not important. The important facts were: (1) There were 364 days in a year, broken into four equivalent quarters of 91 days. Since 91 is a multiple of seven, each quarter represented a group of complete weeks with no stray days. Therefore, in implementing the calendar, we would define January 1 to be Sunday (or whichever day you prefer) and from then on, every quarter of every year would always start with a Sunday. Also note that the same three-month physical calendar (of 30,30,31 days) could be reused forever. (2) The 365th day of the year would be tacked on at the end (after Dec 31) as a "Year-End Day", with no weekday designation (i.e. Sun, Mon, etc.) associated with it. The author of the article suggested this be a national holiday or something, sort of like our current New Year's Day. (National Football Bowl Game Day?) (3) On leap years, we would have an extra day called "Mid-Year's Day" -- inserted after June 31. Like "Year-End Day", this would have no weekday designation. I kind of liked the proposal myself, but I also realized that it would certainly not be implemented in my lifetime. Sort of like the US going metric, I suppose. Bill -- _______________________________________________________________________________ "In the knowledge lies the power." -- Edward A. Feigenbaum "Knowledge is good." -- Emil Faber Bill Bulko The University of Texas bulko@sally.UTEXAS.EDU Department of Computer Sciences _______________________________________________________________________________