Did you ever wonder why there are 90 degrees in a right angle instead of 100, and 24 hours a day instead of 10?

Perhaps you can blame Napoleon.

In 1795, as part of the French Revolution, the French passed a law requiring that clocks have 10 hours in a day, 100 minutes in an hour, and 100 seconds per minute. They also brought in a system of angles with 400 degrees in a full turn, or 100 degrees in a right angle. With this, the earth would rotate 40 degrees in an hour - and thanks to how the meter was defined, each degree of latitude would be 100 kilometers long.

Of course, changing to the new system would require a lot of work. The economist Condorcet proposed that teams of unemployed wig makers be used to calculate mathematical tables with the new units. Why wig makers? Because after the revolution, aristocrats no longer needed them! (You don't need a wig if you don't have a head.)

The mathematical physicist Laplace was enthusiastic and had his watch converted to the new time. His great five-volume work Traité de Mécanique Céleste was written using the new units of time and angle! But in general the metric system for time and angle did not catch on, despite the law. And in 1806, Napoleon Bonaparte decreed that the French calendar should revert to the old style.

More details are here:

https://mathshistory.st-andrews.ac.uk/HistTopics/Decimal_time/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decimal_time

Below, a picture of a French clock using decimal time made by Pierre Daniel Destigny, and now at the Fitzwilliam Museum in the Cambridge.

Decimal time

Maths History

@johncarlosbaez

Thirty years ago when you logged in on the Ecole Normale Supérieure's computer network (on rue d'Ulm, and remember Sun workstations?) you'd get the day's date according to the Calendrier Républicain system.

ENS was founded in 1794.

@quatrezoneilles - wow! I've been to rue d'Ulm.

So they no longer use the Calendrier Républicain? 😿

@johncarlosbaez
It's probably the case but you have to be more of an insider than I am now to ascertain. Our relationship with institutional networks has changed in 30 years, and my Normalien friends have drifted away from the maison-mère.

I'll ask around.

@johncarlosbaez
No, I never did because that would be a completely stupid number.
🙂
#French #angles <sigh>
Babylonians: 2, French: nil.
#DecimalNonsense #maths #engineering #math #angle #metrology
Babylonian mathematics - Wikipedia

@johncarlosbaez one really unpopular part in the calendar change was that weeks were replaced by 10-day décades. Which means one day off every 10 days instead of every 7.
@johncarlosbaez @JamesGleick The reverse question is more interesting I think. Why do we count in 10s and not 12s, a more versatile number? (or the faith-based version of that perhaps, why did god give us 5 + 5 digits)
@johncarlosbaez @JamesGleick, let's not forget "Swatch Internet Time" from 1998. It was decimal-based and without time zones. They actually made watches.
@periplum @johncarlosbaez @JamesGleick Oh, that's still around: http://www.swatchclock.com/ And don't forget, it was invented by N. Negroponte.
SwatchClock.com - Live clock for Swatch Internet Time. The Time of the Future!

Live clock for Swatch Internet Time. The Time of the Future!

@johncarlosbaez For a more modern take on decimal time, see @mikeolson's MultiClock.
https://www.olsons.net/projects/multiclock
MultiClock

It's weird, if you think about it, that the only fundamental unit we have to measure time is the second. For most other stuff, we have different units we can choose from. Weight comes in kilos and pounds and stone. There are miles and furlongs and kilometers to measure distance. You can buy drinks

A Solar Metric Clock | Mike Olson

YouTube
@johncarlosbaez Decimal time is for people who can't count to 12.
@groovemd - they should just use their feet!

@johncarlosbaez ...you have 12 toes too, huh?

This little piggy went to market
This little piggy stayed home
This little piggy had roast beef
This little piggy had none
This little piggy had a pork chop
This little piggy had...

Oh god.