Talk:Unit of time

Tenth of a year

Is a decimonge is a tenth of a year? Is there such word for it?

Why is a second a second and what is a third?

I have heard that the reason a second is called a second is because it is the SECOND division of the hour into 60, the first of course being the minute. And historically, there was a unit of time called a third, which was 1/60 of a second.

If this is true, then the Jiffy, if that measures "time between power cycles", turns out to be equal to the Third, at least in North America.

We talk about seconds all the time, but does anyone ever stop to think: second WHAT? What is the first? Or the third?

Adding this would fill in these gaps in knowledge.

Thanks - let me know what I can do. 2601:147:8500:330:F59A:23CF:25A5:D094 (talk) 01:52, 17 July 2023 (UTC)

I have now created an account so if anyone wants to respond to this then I should get a notification. Thanks. BigChipmunk (talk) 01:54, 17 July 2023 (UTC)

Cosmological decade

What does "10 times the length of the previous cosmological decade" mean? Χιονάκι (talk) 17:14, 23 February 2024 (UTC)

Should the unit of a score be included?

I was looking through the revision history and noticed the pattern of a "score" being repeatedly added and removed. I would like to try to explain the primary argument against its inclusion here (as I am of the opinion that it should not be included) so that we may hopefully reach a consensus or at least have a civil discussion to that will ultimately help us do so.

• A score is not necessarily a set of twenty years, but rather a unit for any set of twenty things; Merriam-Webster defines a score as "a group of 20 things, often used in combination with a cardinal number," e.g., "two score."
• This is consistent with expressions such as "scores of people," which is an indefinite approximation for a large number of people and clearly does not involve anything related to years or any other units of time.
• This is similar to a dozen representing twelve of anything rather than twelve of a specific thing (see the page non-numerical words for quantities).
• Probably the most famous example of a score being used this way is in the Gettysburg Address speech given by Abraham Lincoln in 1863, which begins with the line "four score and seven years ago." The "four score" in question refers to "four score years" (i.e., 4 x 20 years = 80 years). So it should be noted that the phrase is "[four score and seven] years," not "[four score] and [seven years]."

Xenonts (talk) 18:30, 8 April 2024 (UTC)