Abstract
USE or THE 24-HOUB DAY.—About forty years ago an effort was made to assimilate the astronomical and the civil day, making both begin at midnight and using 24-hour reckoning. The effort was a failure, little encouragement being given by astronomers as a whole, and no response being received from the general public. In the last few years the situation has changed; astronomers in general have abandoned the plan of beginning the day at noon, and now follow the civil reckoning in this respect (except that they do not use summer time). This change was suggested by the British Admiralty, and after international discussion was adopted in all the ephemerides from the beginning of 1925. The International Astronomical Union, which met at Cambridge in July 1925, gave further endorsement to the new system, making, however, an exception in the case of the Julian day, which still begins at Greenwich noon.
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Our Astronomical Column. Nature 122, 936 (1928). https://doi.org/10.1038/122936b0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/122936b0