Day lenths on DS9
- Thread starter backstept
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DS9 went by that way because it was a Bajoran station.
...Of course, those were probably Bajoran hours, as it would be a literally astronomical coincidence if the Bajoran day was exactly 26 Earth hours long.
The difference would probably not be major, a few minutes one way or the other, so that the practice of referring to both the Bajoran and the Earth units as "hours" could be sustained. But it would really wreak havoc if there were both Bajoran and Earth minutes; crucial countdowns might run out of sync if Kira used Bajoran minutes and Worf used the Earth ones familiar from the rest of his Starfleet career. And the laws of nature would break down if people couldn't agree how long a second was: the definition of second is crucial to the way the Systeme Internationale of physical units is set up.
Timo Saloniemi
The difference would probably not be major, a few minutes one way or the other, so that the practice of referring to both the Bajoran and the Earth units as "hours" could be sustained. But it would really wreak havoc if there were both Bajoran and Earth minutes; crucial countdowns might run out of sync if Kira used Bajoran minutes and Worf used the Earth ones familiar from the rest of his Starfleet career. And the laws of nature would break down if people couldn't agree how long a second was: the definition of second is crucial to the way the Systeme Internationale of physical units is set up.
Timo Saloniemi
I believe that they used the 26 hour a day system. Not only on DS9 but on the Defiant. In the episode in Season 4 where the Station was attacked by the rogue Jem'Hadar and the Defiant gives chase (and rescues Weyoun's Attack Ship in the process) he mentions that sometimes he wished that he could have the Defiant on guard duty of the station 26 hours a day.
I wonder if the sleep cycles of the human crew are tied to the Bajoran hours or not. I mean, it wouldn't be completely necessary for the station to maintain the same day/night division as Bajor, even when this might make some things simpler. Starfleet is going to keep calling Sisko at ungodly hours no matter what, so the few hails from Bajor might not disrupt the schedule much further.
Then again, if a human had two extra hours to his or her day, I don't think there would be too many complaints. Labor rules would probably prevent those hours from going to working time, anyway...
Timo Saloniemi
Then again, if a human had two extra hours to his or her day, I don't think there would be too many complaints. Labor rules would probably prevent those hours from going to working time, anyway...
Timo Saloniemi
Could this be why Worf over slept in Insurrection? Picard makes the comment/ jab of "I don't know how they do it on Deep Space Nine, but on the Enterprise we still report for duty on time." Maybe he was commenting on the 26 hour day. I always thought that it was the radiation from the rings, but that really doesn't make sense with over sleeping, now that I think about it.
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If we assume that our DS9 heroes are referring to 26 Bajoran hours per Bajoran day, then...
(1 Earth day) x (24 Earth hour / Earth day) x (1 Bajoran hour / X Earth hour) x (1 Bajoran day / 26 Bajoran hour) = number of Bajoran days in one Earth day
For grins, if we set X to 0.91 -- meaning that each Bajoran hour is 0.91 Earth hours (54.6 Earth minutes) long -- then each Bajoran day is about 1.01 Earth days (24.24 Earth hours) long.
There's nothing "cannnnnnnnon" about this exercise, but it does demonstrate that Bajoran days can be 26 Bajoran hours long, without making the Bajoran time units too different from Earth time units, thus keeping human circadian rhythms happy.
(1 Earth day) x (24 Earth hour / Earth day) x (1 Bajoran hour / X Earth hour) x (1 Bajoran day / 26 Bajoran hour) = number of Bajoran days in one Earth day
For grins, if we set X to 0.91 -- meaning that each Bajoran hour is 0.91 Earth hours (54.6 Earth minutes) long -- then each Bajoran day is about 1.01 Earth days (24.24 Earth hours) long.
There's nothing "cannnnnnnnon" about this exercise, but it does demonstrate that Bajoran days can be 26 Bajoran hours long, without making the Bajoran time units too different from Earth time units, thus keeping human circadian rhythms happy.
Although none of DS9's time unit references might hold up to much scrutiny, I would think that, while aboard DS9, O'Brien's references to seconds might be to the Bajoran equivalent of the Earth second, 60 of which might conveniently equal one Bajoran equivalent of the Earth minute.
Another thing to consider is that an off-the-cuff reference to a time unit, such as "give me a minute," probably isn't very precise in nature. If such a reference winds up equaling 60 seconds, 75 seconds, or 50 seconds, then no worries.
Probably not, but it's a nice fan theory
I doubt it's EXACT, in the sense that 1 Bajoran day = 26.0000 hours (hell, there aren't 24.0000 hours in an Earth day....). After all, all the uses of "26 hours [in] a day" were fairly casual, and wouldn't break down if it was 25 hours 51 minutes, or 26 hrs 11 mins in a Bajoran day.
However, I'm pretty certain that it IS referencing Earth hours, for much the reason everyone else has said - if you redefine hours, you need to redefine minutes and seconds as well. Starfleet is probably used to dealing with varying day lengths, since day length is absolutely tied to a place - but the shorter units aren't tied in the same way.
What I'm more curious about is the (occasional) use of am/pm - in one episode at Vic's, someone ties 2100 hrs to 9pm for Vic's benefit. What happens to the additional hours - is noon still 1200 hours, and 2500 hrs is 13pm?
If the Bajoran day is about 26 Earth hours long, it's quite possible it is in fact exactly 42 Bajoran kubatons long, and all the references to 26, 52 or 78 hours being significant are artifacts of the human customs and the Universal Translator only, not a feature of the Bajoran culture at all...
That aside, there has been a DS9 reference to "meeting at 13 o'clock", I vaguely recall. Of course, us folks who use the 24 hour clock regularly speak of "13 o'clock" when meaning "1 o'clock pm", but I gather it's not standard usage for the 12 hour clock folks at all.
As for where this reference was... Uh, I think Phil Farrand's Nitpickers' Guide mentions it, but I can't reach the book right now. Anybody have a sharper memory?
Timo Saloniemi
That aside, there has been a DS9 reference to "meeting at 13 o'clock", I vaguely recall. Of course, us folks who use the 24 hour clock regularly speak of "13 o'clock" when meaning "1 o'clock pm", but I gather it's not standard usage for the 12 hour clock folks at all.
As for where this reference was... Uh, I think Phil Farrand's Nitpickers' Guide mentions it, but I can't reach the book right now. Anybody have a sharper memory?
Timo Saloniemi
