this post was submitted on 08 Sep 2023
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Standardization
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You’re absolutely correct. The second is an arbitrary length of time. If we built a new system today we should probably take the plank time as a basis and multiply it with a suitable number so that the scale is appropriate for humans. It still might not align neatly with days and years, which is a problem, but at least it would be prettier from a physics standpoint.
But then again, how pretty do the units even need to be as long as they’re easy to use. In that sense, second is good enough.
It’s also true that nowadays we have computers that can take care of these calculations, so having quirky units isn’t such a big problem any more. In fact, natural units probably aren’t that annoying now that computers can handle all the heavy lifting for us.