Daylight Savings Time

2025-10-23

---

My car has a digital clock, but it doesn't have a tablet or other smart controls. When I need to change the time, I have to input a complicated set of button presses into the radio. Of course, I always forget what that combination is, so in recent years, I've taken to simply leaving the clock on whatever time it's set at.

The time I've chosen to leave on the clock is standard time. Currently America uses daylight savings time for almost two thirds of the year, but I prefer standard time over daylight savings time.

My biggest reason for supporting standard time is that it more closely aligns with the natural progression of daylight. During standard time, the sun is at its zenith around noon, corresponding to the distinction of "midday." Sunrise and sunset times roughly mirror each other. To me, it makes more natural sense to link noontime to the middle of the astronomical day.

I also hate losing an hour of sleep once a year, which is what happens when the clocks "spring" forward for daylight savings time. It disrupts sleep schedules unnecessarily, makes it more difficult to get adequate rest, and overall makes us less healthy than we could be. It's also a huge hassle: when people discuss switching to permanent standard time or daylight savings time, the primary driver for those discussions is the desire to stop changing clocks, rather than the merits of choosing one time or another.

Switching to permanent standard time means the sun would rise earlier in the summer, according to the clocks. Many people would not be keen on seeing first daylight at 4 AM. But I would be willing to make that trade-off. For me, a good sleep schedule is to go to bed as soon after the sun sets as possible, and to wake up around the time of sunrise (or just earlier). That aligns with our natural circadian rhythms, which evolved over millions of years to align with the movement of the sun--the only significant source of light on Earth until relatively recently in human history. I think it would be good for all of us to go to bed earlier and try to wake up with the sun whenever we can.

---

[Last updated: 2025-10-23]