| Show mother earth still better timekeeper than the best clocks astronomer says notwithstanding that observations and calculations of astronomers have proved that actually the moon is six seconds off its predicted course notes a writer in the new york tunes times dr H spencer jones the astronomer royal explains that the earth is still a better timekeeper than the best clocks ile he added Hou however rever we hope that a clock we are experimenting with will prove a better timekeeper even than the earth in a report rt to the board of 0 visitors at greenwich observatory the astronomer tro nomer royal said it used to be assumed that the rotation of the earth was absolutely invariable but of recent years it has been found that the earths timekeeping time keeping does vary to say that the moon itself is oil its c ourse course is to repeat a common error actually it is off its predicted course deviations in the I 1 rotation of 0 the earth were previously suspected but not confirmed until recently the discovery was made by detailed tailed investigation of the motion of the sun venus mercury and mars in the case of these bodies it was found that there was also a deviation though smaller in amount the moon being oft its course means that the earths time is wron wrong g because the c cause ause of the moon altering its predicted position Is the slowing down of 0 the rotation of the earth this may be caused by tidal friction or a contributory factor might be a land upheaval occurring somewhere like the siberian plateau the attraction a of the sun or perturbation by planets such as mars and venus the earth Is slowing down by about part of a second a century this means it is losing time of about two hours every 2000 years eventually the days will become much longer but this will not be for thousands of years probably until alter after human life ills is extinct from the earth |
