Why are there 24 hours in a day?

Summary

Summary of "Who Smarted?" Episode: "Why are there 24 hours in a day?"

Podcast Information:

• Title: Who Smarted? - Educational Podcast for Kids
• Host/Author: Atomic Entertainment / Starglow Media
• Release Date: June 6, 2025
• Description: "Who Smarted?" is a humorous and educational podcast designed to engage young minds with fun facts, trivia, and storytelling. Perfect for kids, parents, and educators, the show delves into topics like science and history, making learning an entertaining adventure.

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Introduction

The episode begins with the Host greeting listeners and posing a fundamental question about time: "Why are there 24 hours in a day?" (00:01) This intriguing query sets the stage for an exploration into the origins and evolution of timekeeping.

Understanding Time through Clocks

The Host playfully interacts with the audience, highlighting the confusion that arises when different individuals report varying times based on their clocks (00:01). This leads to the realization that timekeeping is a universal yet complex concept influenced by geographical and technological factors.

Host: "Who came up with the idea of dividing a day into 24 hours? Or an hour into 60 minutes? Or a minute into 60 seconds?" (00:01)

Early Methods of Timekeeping

Before the invention of clocks, ancient civilizations relied on natural indicators to gauge time. The Host encourages listeners to look up and observe the sun's movement during the day and the stars at night to understand time's passage (02:50).

Host: "Days were not divided up into hours like they are now. It was just more of a general sense of morning, midday, evening, and night." (02:50)

Ancient Egyptian Innovations

Approximately 3,500 years ago, the ancient Egyptians revolutionized timekeeping by introducing the sundial—the world's oldest timekeeping device still in use today (04:28). This invention allowed for the precise division of day and night into 24 equal parts.

Host: "The ancient Egyptians used the sundial to divide a day into equal parts, creating the 24-hour day." (04:28)

Why 24 Hours?

The choice of 24 hours stems from the Egyptian counting system. The Egyptians counted to twelve on one hand by counting the joints of four fingers, excluding the thumb, resulting in 12 units per half-day. Combining both halves gave them 24 hours.

Host: "The Egyptians used this counting method for all kinds of things. So dividing up a full day into two sets of 12 parts seemed only natural to them." (05:00)

Greek Contributions to Timekeeping

Building upon Egyptian methods, the ancient Greeks introduced further refinements to time division. They proposed dividing each hour into 60 minutes and each minute into 60 seconds, leveraging the number 60's divisibility (06:44).

Cleo: "We need to come up with a good number that can be easily divided by lots of other numbers." (07:21)

This system facilitated more precise time measurements and laid the groundwork for modern timekeeping.

Cleo: "Yes, yes, but let's pronounce it minute instead. Then we can divide these smaller parts into 60 even smaller parts and call them seconds." (07:52)

Integration into Daily Life

The establishment of standardized hours, minutes, and seconds allowed for consistent timekeeping across different regions, enhancing coordination and communication. This uniformity was crucial for the advancement of societies and the eventual development of mechanical clocks in the 1300s.

Host: "Even though the Greeks' proposal to standardize hours and divide them into 60 minutes and seconds revolutionized timekeeping, most people still used the varying hours for many more centuries." (08:06)

Conclusion

The episode concludes by emphasizing the enduring legacy of ancient timekeeping innovations. The 24-hour day, along with minutes and seconds, remains a testament to the ingenuity of early civilizations in their quest to measure and understand time.

Host: "So, dividing up a full day into two sets of 12 parts seemed only natural to them." (05:00)

Notable Quotes

• Host: "What do the numbers on a clock really mean?" (00:01)
• Cleo: "We need to come up with a good number that can be easily divided by lots of other numbers." (07:21)
• Host: "Clocks did not always exist. So how did people tell time before clocks?” (07:56)
• Cleo: "Yes, yes, but let's pronounce it minute instead. Then we can divide these smaller parts into 60 even smaller parts and call them seconds." (07:52)

Educational Insights

• Historical Evolution: The podcast traces the evolution of timekeeping from natural indicators to sophisticated mechanical and digital clocks.
• Mathematical Foundations: It highlights the significance of the number 12 and 60 in creating a divisible and practical time measurement system.
• Cultural Impact: The standardization of time has had profound effects on societal organization, commerce, and daily life.

Engaging Storytelling

Through dialogues between the Host, Co-Host, and characters like Cleo and Claudius, the episode presents complex historical and scientific concepts in an accessible and entertaining manner, making it easy for young listeners to grasp the origins of timekeeping.

Conclusion

"Who Smarted?" successfully demystifies the seemingly arbitrary division of a day into 24 hours by delving into ancient Egyptian and Greek innovations. By blending humor with educational content, the podcast fosters a deeper appreciation for the intricate systems that govern our daily lives.

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This summary provides an overview of the key discussions and insights from the "Who Smarted?" episode titled "Why are there 24 hours in a day?" Designed to inform and engage those who haven't listened, it captures the essence of the episode's exploration into the history and logic behind timekeeping.

Transcript

[Host]

Hey, gang, what time is it? Time for who Smarted? Nice. But what time is it? Time for another whiff of science. That's very clever. But seriously, can you tell me the time? Just look at a clock and read out the numbers you see. Hmm. I'm hearing a bunch of different answers, including snack time and crazy dancing time. But I'm also hearing a lot of different numbers. That's because not everybody's clock or watch is set to the exact same time. Some might be a little ahead or a little behind. Or depending on where you are in the world, it could be a totally different time. Come to think of it, what do the numbers on a clock really mean? Who came up with the idea of dividing a day into 24 hours? Or an hour into 60 minutes? Or a minute into 60 seconds? And what does AM and PM even mean? I guess you were right before. Who? Me? It is time for another big whiff of science on who smarted.

[Co-Host]

Who's smarted? Who's smart? Is it you? Is it me? Is it science?

[Host]

Or history?

[Co-Host]

Listen up, everyone. We make smarting lots of fun. But who's smart? And.

[Elio]

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[Host]

This is Elio of Earth. If any aliens are listening, come and.

[Elio]

Get me from Disney and Pixar.

[Host]

Yes, it's really happening.

[Elio]

He'll go where no one has gone before.

[Host]

Welcome to the community. What is this place? These are the lava tunnels, Lord, and I am not fireproof.

[Elio]

Disney and Pixar's Elio hated pg. Parental guidance suggested only in theaters. Tickets available now.

[Host]

Okay, all you listening, Take another look at the nearest clock. What time is it? You probably gave a different answer than before, right? Like a minute or so later. That's because you're always traveling through time. Think about what you're doing right now. Listening to who Smarted? The time you hit play happened in the past. And what you're hearing now is happening in the present. And the end of this episode will happen in the future. Of course, the part we just called the present is now the past. And that's basically how time works. Everything in the future eventually becomes the present, and the present is constantly becoming the past. And throughout all of this, the clock is keeping track. But guess what? Clocks did not always exist. Huh? So how did people tell time before clocks? Any ideas? No. Well, look up. This works better if you're outside. People used to guess the time of day by looking at the movement of the sun during the Day and the stars at night. Of course, days were not divided up into hours like they are now. It was just more of a general sense of morning, midday, evening and night. Until about 3,500 years ago, when the ancient Egyptians improved a device to tell time that's still being used today. Can you guess what that is? No. Well, let's head to ancient Egypt to find out.

[Cleo]

Hey, rams.

[Co-Host]

Hey, Cleo. Whatcha doin' Ah, just fishing in the Nile. It's lunchtime and I'm starving.

[Cleo]

But isn't it breakfast time?

[Co-Host]

Is it? Everything just kinda blends together. I'm tired of blinding my eyes, staring into the sun, trying to figure out what time it is. If only there was another way to use the sun to tell if it was breakfast time or lunchtime, or crazy dancing time.

[Cleo]

I have an idea. I'll take this stick and ram it into the ground. Then I'll draw a circle around it. Next, I'll draw some markings around the circle. There. Now the shadow of the stick will move along with the sun, pointing to a specific dime. With that, you can figure out when it's breakfast time every day.

[Co-Host]

That's amazing. What's it pointing to?

[Host]

Now?

[Cleo]

Another whiff of science.

[Host]

The ancient Egyptians are believed to be the first to divide a day into equal parts using the world's oldest timekeeping device, the sundial. Sundials are still used today. You may have seen one in a garden somewhere. With the sundial, the Egyptians developed the 24 hour day. But why 24? It may seem like a random number, but there's a good reason for it. 24 divided by 2 is 12. And Egyptians cut the day into two halves, daytime and nighttime, with each side having 12 parts. At the time, 12 was an important number for the Egyptians. And can you guess why? Could it be, A, the Egyptians have 12 pyramids, B, the Egyptians used to count to 12 on one hand? Or C, donuts come in boxes of 12, and the ancient Egyptians loved donuts. Got your answer. Well, there are actually more than a hundred pyramids in Egypt, and doughnuts weren't invented until 1847. So the answer, believe it or not, is B, that the Egyptians used to count to 12 on one hand. Huh. But how did the Egyptians count to 12 on one hand when no hand has 12 fingers? Mine does. Okay, but you're a mole. The human hand typically does not have 12 fingers. Ah, but take a look at your hands. With your palms facing you. Look at your four fingers and ignore your thumbs. See the lines made by your joints? Each of Your fingers is divided up into three parts by these lines. Now count up all the parts again, ignoring your thumbs. What do you get? 12.

[Cleo]

Whoa.

[Host]

Put both hands together and you have 24. The ancient Egyptians used this counting method for all kinds of things. So dividing up a full day into two sets of 12 parts seemed only natural to them. Those 24 parts would eventually be called hours, which comes from an ancient Greek word meaning season or part of the day. More than 2,000 years ago, the ancient Greeks also proposed the next breakthrough in timekeeping. Let's go check it out.

[Claudius]

Claudius, you're late. Were you up all night at a toga party?

[Cleo]

No, I forgot to adjust my sundial for wintertime.

[Claudius]

Ah. It does annoy me that winter daytime hours are shorter because winter has less sunlight. Why can't ours be the same length all the time?

[Cleo]

Hmm, good question. Maybe we can figure something out. For example, the same way you Hipparchus divided the globe into equal parts using lines called longitude and latitude. What if we divided the hours of the day into equal parts?

[Host]

Hmm.

[Claudius]

Keep talking.

[Cleo]

We need to come up with a good number that can be easily divided by lots of other numbers. Greek astronomers who have charted the night sky like the number 60 and 60 can be easily divided by 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 or 10. What if we cut up each hour into 60 smaller parts and then call them, um. What's a good word meaning small?

[Claudius]

Minute.

[Cleo]

Yes, yes, but let's pronounce it minute instead. Then we can divide these smaller parts into 60 even smaller parts and call them second minutes.

[Claudius]

Not bad, not bad. But how about instead of first minutes and second minutes, we'll just go with minutes and seconds? Much simpler that way.

[Cleo]

Brilliant as always, sir.

[Claudius]

Yes, thank you. Let's celebrate with a donut.

[Cleo]

Donuts? I don't think they've been invented yet.

[Claudius]

Someone's really got to get on that.

[Host]

Even though the Greeks proposal to standardize hours and divide them into 60 minutes and seconds revolutionized timekeeping, most people still used the varying hours for many more centuries. Then one invention changed all of that. The one whose noise is most associated with the clock. Can you guess what it is? The answer to that right after this 60 second break. Hey, parents Trusty here with something really smart for your smarty pants. I've got nieces, nephews and close family friends. Some homeschooled, some traditional school. And lately there's one tool they all seem to be using. Ixl. One of my nephews was really struggling with reading comprehension. His parents tried Ixl, and within a couple of weeks. He was not only keeping up, he was excited to read. Then my niece, who's super into math, started exploring topics way beyond her grade level. That's the beauty of ixl. It's flexible. Kids can move at their own pace in any subject, across any grade. A friend's daughter loves the instant feedback and little rewards. It's fun, not stressful. And the parents, they love how easy it is to find the exact topic they're covering that week. IXL is organized, saves them time, and actually helps the kids feel more confident. If you're homeschooling or just want to supplement what your child is learning in traditional school, IXL is a game changer. Get 20% [e-mail] smarted with the code smarted that's ixl.com smarted code smarted learning that's flexible, fun, and perfect for your smarty pants. That's IXL. This episode is brought to you by Squarespace so I'll be honest. I put off building our new website for way too long. I think part of me was waiting for the perfect moment or thought I needed to hire someone or take a design course or something. Total nonsense. Because then I tried Squarespace and yeah, I was hooked in an hour. Squarespace. Is this all in one platform that makes it ridiculously easy to bring an idea to life online, whether you're starting a business, launching a project, or just want to finally claim your little corner of the Internet. I used it to build a clean, professional site in a weekend. No coding, no overwhelm, just drag drop. Done. I used their Blueprint AI tool to start, and it generated a smart, customized layout just from a few questions about what we do. So if you've been waiting to launch your site, this is your sign. Head to squarespace.com smarted for a free trial and when you're ready to launch, use Code smarted to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain. Now back to WhoSmarted. So you've heard how the Egyptians and Greeks used the sundial to slice up the day, creating hours, minutes and seconds. But there's an itty bitty problem with the sundial. Can you think of what it is?

[Cadet]

Yep.

[Host]

It needs the sun to work to tell time on cloudy rainy days or at night. Ancient civilizations invented timepieces that used candles, oils, or water. They weren't very precise, and for hundreds of years, hours still varied in length as minutes and seconds were two too hard to measure. The first mechanical clocks, which introduced that famous tick tock sound were developed in the 1300s. With gears, weights and springs, these clocks created a precise measurement of time, with every hour measuring the same length. Over the next few centuries, mechanical clocks would start displaying minutes and seconds. Today, your alarm clock, microwave, cable box and smartphone tracks time electronically, sometimes with help from the Internet. These clocks show a digital number with the hour and minute and sometimes two letters, AM or pm. So what do those letters mean?

[Co-Host]

Awesome. Minutes?

[Host]

Power?

[Cleo]

Moons?

[Host]

Nope. AM and PM have to do with midday, the point in time when the sun is directly overhead and when there's no shadow on the sundial. The middle of 24 is 12, so that's why midday is at 12 o' clock or noon. AM and PM are abbreviations of words in Latin, the language of the ancient Romans from a region that is now called Italy. AM stands for the Latin words ante meridian, which means before midday, which is why the morning hours use am. PM stands for post meridian, which means after midday, which is why afternoon and evening hours are labeled pm. While many English speaking countries use AM and pm, much of the rest of the world relies on the 24 hour clock. So in those places, 1pm would actually be hour 13 and times like 3:30pm and 9:45pm are 15:30 and 21:45. The 24 hour clock is also called military time because it was adopted by military forces to avoid any confusion between between a.m. and p.m. times during battles, attack planning or even boot camp.

[Co-Host]

Cadets, I want you all to drop and give me 50 push ups.

[Cadet]

But sir, you said push up time is at seven.

[Co-Host]

My watch says seven now.

[Cadet]

But sir, your watch is a 12 hour clock and we go by military time. That means afternoon. You have to add 12 to the hours on your watch and say hundred when you mean zero minutes. So if it's 7pm it 1900 hours by military time, sir.

[Co-Host]

1900 hours? What are we supposed to do at 1900 hours?

[Host]

I have the schedule, sir. Well, it says here.

[Co-Host]

Speak Cadet, what time is it?

[Host]

It's crazy dancing time. Oh well, looks like it's time for all you listeners to join in on the dancing. I join in too, but I need to read the credits. An out of this World shout out to Zohara in the Blue Mountains, nsw Australia. I hear you listen to who smarted every day and still want more. Now that's what I call dedication. We love having you smart with us, smarty pants. This episode time was written by Dave Beaudry and voiced by Katie Lou Chastain Sheffield Chastain, Brandon Bayless, Adam Tex Davis, Charlotte Cohn Jason Williams and Jerry Colbert. Technical direction and sound design by Josh Hahn. WhoSmarted is recorded and mixed at the Relic Room studios, and our associate producer is Max Kamasky. The theme song is by Brian Suarez. Lyrics are written and performed by Adam Tex Davis. Who Smarted was created and produced by Adam Tex Davis and Jerry Colbert. This is an Atomic Entertainment production.

[Co-Host]

Who Smarted.