[aprssig] Re: metrics

[Mark Fellhauer]

At 09:26 PM 9/7/2007, Glenn Little WB4UIV wrote:

>Somewhere in this thread, someone mentioned time and why we did not use 10 
>hours vs 12 hours.
>
>A circle has 360 degrees, why I do not know.


A circle has 360 degrees because a year is 13 Lunar periods of 28 days.  13 
x 28 = 364.  The Greeks rounded it down to make the math a bit 
easier.   The Greeks borrowed the idea again from the Egyptians.  Of course 
today we have to add in that pesky 1.242199 extra days and a leap day 97 
out of every 400 years.   Back in the day, every civilization had their own 
way of dealing with Intercalation.

When the Greek astronomer Phidias of Syracuse (now Italy) realized his son, 
Archimedes, was a rather bright child he sent him to study in Alexandria, 
Egypt.   That's almost 1000 miles away by open ocean.  And it was 280 B.C. 
!!!   That's how highly the Greeks regarded the Egyptians.

I see a lot of hubris by people of today in regards to our fore 
bearers.   They were supremely smart.  We keep having to push back the 
dates of the bronze and copper ages.  And a large number of you kooks out 
there think the Egyptians couldn't have built the pyramids without the help 
of space aliens.

73,

Mark
KC7BXS