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While it's possible for an advanced enough civilisation to get some value from atoms and record it in a computer, how would a civilisation without that technology first develop some form of time measurement units (preferably in the scale of years)?

Even though they could temporarily use the time system of whatever planet they're on, though probably only in the scale of days, what units would they use to measure the amount of time they stay on a specific world?

EDITS FOR MORE CLARIFICATION:

  • The civilisation is not advanced enough to use computers, and all their travelling is magical, unpredictable, and irreversible.
  • The time units would be used in a physical record of each world they travel to, usually around the scale of years.
  • This is only relative to the travelling civilisation, like @elemtilas said.
  • Updated to mean units.

Hopefully this will make things clearer!

value1
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  • How would a time at one place make sense at another separated by time and space and speed (i.e relativistic) – Thorbjørn Ravn Andersen Dec 05 '23 at 17:54
  • Does that civ have a FTL communication means? If yes, they'd choose a standard unit and develop a time system around all of their sphere of influence to use that unit for anything interstellar, leaving a system related to local day/night cycle for anything local to a specific planet. But if no, this would likely not ever happen, they might have a second defined somehow, but everything local would have to use weird values for local time. – Vesper Dec 05 '23 at 18:07
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    VTR I'm voting to reopen this query for the following reason(s): having read JBH's absolutely delightful question regarding the establishment of a universal time scheme, I don't think that is what value1 is asking for. The other question seems to be based on the premise that people in different locations & who communicate with one another might want to synch up their relative time measurement schemes. Much like how we made railway time tables, time zones, world clocks, and the like. I think this query is asking almost the polar opposite. As I understand it, the OP is asking (cont) – elemtilas Dec 06 '23 at 03:48
  • (cont) for a segregated time system --- something that only pertains to me as a Traveller and perhaps others like me, entirely independent of any kind of local or universal time scheme that might be in place. – elemtilas Dec 06 '23 at 03:49
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    @elemtilas Yes, that was what I was asking for! Though @L.Dutch♦ did provide a good answer to my question even without knowing this. – value1 Dec 06 '23 at 12:50
  • Probably they'd use "whatever the local day and night cycle is" for everyday use and "wild guess" when it comes to dates and times on a different planet. If traveling is unpredictable anyways whats even the point of knowing what the exact date might be somewhere else? If they are advanced enough to have somewhat reliable clocks they might use "look at clock" instead of "wild guess" though. – LazyLizard Dec 06 '23 at 17:13
  • There are two questions here - what units would they use and how would they develop the process of using those units. Without modern(ish) timepieces and with no information provided on the biology of the species concerned or any domestic animals they may keep with them, we have no idea. (With information on the biology - for example, are they human? - we could look at biological processes they can measure.) – KerrAvon2055 Dec 22 '23 at 00:51

1 Answers1

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If you are not bound to a planetary motion, I think it's best to simply abstract from it.

Define a suitable unit of time and a way to measure it, and then go up or down one unit on a log scale.

Using base 10 and seconds for ease of understanding, one would go:

  • 1 second = base unit
  • 1 decas = 10 seconds
  • 1 hettas = 100 seconds
  • 1 kilos = 1000 seconds

at this point one could define that

  • 1 "hour" = 1 kilos,
  • 1 "day" = 1000 kilos,
  • 1 "year" = 1000 days

and so on.

As long as they have access to their time measuring device, they can be independent from a specific planetary motion.

L.Dutch
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  • Thanks, I'll give this some thought. Somehow, I didn't think of making some base measurements. I can definitely do something like this out of other time measurements I already have! – value1 Dec 05 '23 at 17:36
  • This is about units though, but the question was about measurements?

    For units, it seems to me more likely that they would just stick to whatever they had on their home world. Not because it makes sense but because habits die hard. Like we still measure time seconds, minutes and hours with wild relations to each other instead of something decimal based.

     – LazyLizard Dec 06 '23 at 17:19
  • By measurements, I meant units. I updated the question. Also, they don't technically have a home world, but there is at least one constant they can use to measure time while travelling, so I could probably make that into a unit. – value1 Dec 07 '23 at 12:25