this post was submitted on 08 Sep 2023
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Alaska is simultaneously the northernmost, westernmost, and easternmost US state.
How is Alaska easternmost?
Its Western most point crosses the international date line and is therefore technically "really far east" instead of "really far west".
It's arbitrary, though. And I've never heard of the dateline being the border where east and west start. It makes no sense.
Wait until you find out that some places breach that line (in addition to it being wobbly to begin with) which is we have timezones greater than +12 or -12. I hate timezones. With a passion. Signed: a programmer.
The world would be better if we just used UTC everywhere.
or Decimal Internet Time, which is way easier to do calculations with, easier to distinguish from local times, and is less eurocentric
Albeit arbitrary... if it's globally recognized that each new day begins as the sun crests the international date line, and the sun indisputably rises from the East, why would it not make sense?
Because time and direction are different metrics? West is a metric that only means anything in relation to something else in a straight line. It's a direction. West doesn't stop being west if you go too far. It's always west.