WEBVTT - The Seven Day Week, Part 1 0:00:03.040 --> 0:00:05.280 Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind, the production of 0:00:05.360 --> 0:00:14.760 My Heart Radio. Hey, welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind. 0:00:14.840 --> 0:00:17.880 My name is Robert Lamb, and I'm Joe McCormick and 0:00:17.960 --> 0:00:19.959 Rob Today, I wanted to start off by hitting you 0:00:20.000 --> 0:00:22.760 with one of my tenth grader thoughts. All right, let's happen. 0:00:23.239 --> 0:00:24.960 This is an idea I had in high school. I 0:00:25.000 --> 0:00:26.960 can't remember if I've ever talked about this with you 0:00:27.280 --> 0:00:31.000 or not. Maybe maybe maybe not, But anyway, I remember 0:00:31.760 --> 0:00:33.919 when I was in sophomore year of high school, I 0:00:33.960 --> 0:00:38.080 was sitting in a U S history class and I 0:00:38.120 --> 0:00:41.199 was suddenly hit with a notion. It was very much 0:00:41.200 --> 0:00:43.360 like a like a stoner thought, though of course I was. 0:00:43.400 --> 0:00:45.319 I was a very good boy, and I was very 0:00:45.320 --> 0:00:49.760 sober in class. But um my thought was, wait a second, 0:00:50.600 --> 0:00:56.200 why do we think about history in terms of multiples 0:00:56.520 --> 0:01:01.000 of ten years, so in terms of deck aids and 0:01:01.160 --> 0:01:05.200 centuries and I guess millennia, but primarily decades and centuries. 0:01:05.280 --> 0:01:08.960 Why are those like the units of time on which 0:01:09.080 --> 0:01:13.680 historical trends are judged to make sense or or be valid. 0:01:14.120 --> 0:01:17.360 And if we used a different base counting system, like 0:01:17.400 --> 0:01:20.319 if we didn't have ten fingers and thus didn't count 0:01:20.319 --> 0:01:23.679 with base ten? Would we think about history in a 0:01:23.680 --> 0:01:27.600 totally different way with different sort of groups of associations 0:01:27.640 --> 0:01:30.160 if it was like, you know, on the basis of 0:01:30.480 --> 0:01:35.160 sixty three year periods or or eighteen year periods or 0:01:35.200 --> 0:01:39.000 something like that. Yeah, like what what would the ninet 0:01:39.160 --> 0:01:42.280 seventies be without without decades? You know, how would we 0:01:42.360 --> 0:01:46.080 think about that time period? What would be the um 0:01:46.120 --> 0:01:48.520 you know, the barriers to it, and how would we 0:01:48.560 --> 0:01:51.400 package that up? And I guess I'm still prone to 0:01:51.880 --> 0:01:55.160 this kind of thinking because the idea that I started, 0:01:55.360 --> 0:01:59.840 uh getting getting really interested in, like last week was 0:02:00.080 --> 0:02:03.240 is another question basically along the same lines, which is like, 0:02:03.360 --> 0:02:08.120 how are we affected by the the time units that 0:02:08.160 --> 0:02:11.240 we use to organize our lives? And if those time 0:02:11.320 --> 0:02:15.040 units were actually different lengths of time, how different would 0:02:15.040 --> 0:02:18.119 our lives be? And this is going to lead into 0:02:18.400 --> 0:02:20.280 the subject that we're going to be looking at for 0:02:20.320 --> 0:02:22.760 the next couple of episodes at least who knows how 0:02:22.760 --> 0:02:27.959 many will go to But uh, but right, we're getting 0:02:27.960 --> 0:02:30.680 into the subject of the week, and I think this, 0:02:30.720 --> 0:02:34.240 how this one has really interesting peg because if you 0:02:34.240 --> 0:02:37.360 think about the major units of time that divide our 0:02:37.400 --> 0:02:41.240 lives from say like day length and above. So the 0:02:41.360 --> 0:02:43.920 day is, of course twenty four hours long, and it 0:02:44.040 --> 0:02:46.280 is roughly the time it takes the Earth to make 0:02:46.320 --> 0:02:50.360 one full rotation on its axis. But then you've also 0:02:50.440 --> 0:02:52.840 got the year. The year is of course, you know, 0:02:52.880 --> 0:02:55.480 it's three sixty five days, and this is roughly the 0:02:55.600 --> 0:02:58.120 time it takes the Earth to make one full orbit 0:02:58.160 --> 0:03:01.040 around the Sun. And then you've got the months, And 0:03:01.080 --> 0:03:05.120 the month also has an astronomical basis, this one a 0:03:05.120 --> 0:03:07.600 little more roughly than the other two. There there's a 0:03:07.639 --> 0:03:10.280 there's a larger difference. But you know, our months are 0:03:10.480 --> 0:03:13.960 roughly thirty days long, and it takes roughly thirty days 0:03:14.000 --> 0:03:17.079 for the Moon to complete one full orbit around the Earth. 0:03:17.120 --> 0:03:20.480 I think it's like twenty nine point five three days 0:03:20.600 --> 0:03:22.720 or something. And then of course we we make up 0:03:22.760 --> 0:03:25.040 for that with little adjustments, you know, different numbers of 0:03:25.120 --> 0:03:28.280 days and stuff like that. Yeah, and now at this 0:03:28.320 --> 0:03:31.639 point is probably worth remembering here for ever for everybody, 0:03:31.720 --> 0:03:36.600 that most ancient calendars were based on direct observation. So 0:03:37.000 --> 0:03:39.840 uh so, yeah, it makes total sense that these uh 0:03:40.200 --> 0:03:42.600 you know, a lot of these ideas about how we 0:03:42.640 --> 0:03:46.200 should divide out our time are based on what we're observing, 0:03:46.320 --> 0:03:48.800 saying the night sky. Sure, and there are somewhere. It's 0:03:48.800 --> 0:03:51.320 pretty much inevitable. I mean, like you, we kind of 0:03:51.360 --> 0:03:55.560 can't help but organize ourselves around day lengths, right, because 0:03:55.640 --> 0:03:57.680 like what time of day it is or time of 0:03:57.800 --> 0:04:00.760 night makes a dramatic difference on the way we interact 0:04:00.800 --> 0:04:03.560 with our environment because of things like temperature and light. 0:04:04.000 --> 0:04:06.839 So that's almost just totally imposed on us. We really 0:04:06.840 --> 0:04:09.840 have no choice but to live by days and nights. Uh. 0:04:09.960 --> 0:04:12.600 You could make the case that maybe months are different, 0:04:12.800 --> 0:04:16.719 but but you know, there's some natural rhythms that come 0:04:16.720 --> 0:04:19.760 with the lunar cycle, and uh, and and certainly there 0:04:19.800 --> 0:04:21.880 are things that come with the yearly cycle because of 0:04:21.920 --> 0:04:25.040 say like the rotations of harvests and the seasons and stuff. 0:04:26.040 --> 0:04:28.640 But then we come to the week. We look at 0:04:28.720 --> 0:04:31.360 look at the seven day week, and if you look 0:04:31.400 --> 0:04:33.760 for the seven day week and the stars and the 0:04:33.800 --> 0:04:36.960 planets or the movement of the earth, you come up 0:04:37.000 --> 0:04:41.840 with absolutely nothing. The closest I've seen is that some 0:04:41.880 --> 0:04:45.680 people have said, well, uh, the seven day week is 0:04:45.880 --> 0:04:50.880 a fairly rough quarterly division of the lunar months. So 0:04:50.920 --> 0:04:52.520 if you take the length of a month and you 0:04:52.560 --> 0:04:55.479 divide it by four, that gets you close to seven days. 0:04:55.520 --> 0:04:59.640 That's like the closest whole number. Uh. But but then again, 0:04:59.760 --> 0:05:01.919 like why would you do that, Like why would you 0:05:01.920 --> 0:05:04.520 not divide the month by five or divide the month 0:05:04.560 --> 0:05:07.159 by six or something else. So, so I don't think 0:05:07.520 --> 0:05:10.560 that the length of the week is really something that 0:05:10.640 --> 0:05:15.200 you can say naturally flows from anything that is physically 0:05:15.279 --> 0:05:17.880 true about the world. I think we'd have to say 0:05:17.880 --> 0:05:21.160 though there might be you know, historical, cultural, religious reasons 0:05:21.200 --> 0:05:24.960 that feed into it. It's it's a somewhat arbitrary length. 0:05:25.000 --> 0:05:28.040 It's based on culture, and it's a human invention. It's 0:05:28.080 --> 0:05:32.120 not just a a an approximation of something that's happening 0:05:32.120 --> 0:05:35.880 in the skies. Right and and I believe I believe 0:05:35.880 --> 0:05:38.960 all the evidence we we've looked at really back that up. 0:05:39.680 --> 0:05:43.279 Though it's always worth remembering that if you stray too 0:05:43.279 --> 0:05:48.479 far into the wilds of numerology, just about anything, it's possible, right. Sure. 0:05:49.120 --> 0:05:51.640 I'm always reminded of the bid and Um I forget 0:05:51.640 --> 0:05:54.200 which umberto echo work it was. It might have been 0:05:54.200 --> 0:05:56.599 fucos pendulum, it might have been one of his essays. 0:05:57.160 --> 0:06:00.880 Perhaps you remember this Joe where he's he's talking about 0:06:00.920 --> 0:06:04.360 like all the various numerology computations about the Great Pyramids 0:06:04.839 --> 0:06:07.719 and how those numbers relate to other aspects of life. 0:06:08.120 --> 0:06:10.800 And the example was made that you can also torture 0:06:10.839 --> 0:06:13.520 the numbers enough regarding I want to say, a phone 0:06:13.560 --> 0:06:16.960 booth or something, uh, something far more mundane compared to 0:06:16.960 --> 0:06:19.520 the Pyramids. But yeah, if you start getting wild with 0:06:19.560 --> 0:06:22.359 what numbers mean and so forth, then you can go 0:06:22.440 --> 0:06:24.720 crazy with that as well. Yeah. I think the way 0:06:24.760 --> 0:06:26.680 I'd put it is that if you look hard enough 0:06:26.720 --> 0:06:29.400 for patterns, you can find patterns in anything, and that 0:06:29.440 --> 0:06:32.599 includes numbers and like numerical relationships and say like the 0:06:32.680 --> 0:06:35.440 ratios of length and width of objects in the world, 0:06:35.600 --> 0:06:38.480 or the length of different periods of time within one 0:06:38.480 --> 0:06:41.080 another and stuff. Yeah, I mean, you can always find 0:06:41.120 --> 0:06:43.360 patterns if you look hard enough, and some people work 0:06:43.440 --> 0:06:47.640 really hard. But as far as meaningful patterns and meaningful connections, 0:06:48.279 --> 0:06:50.599 uh yeah, I think I think almost all the evidence 0:06:50.640 --> 0:06:54.200 we're looking at here today and the next episode, uh 0:06:54.240 --> 0:06:56.040 you know, comes back to the fact that Yes, seven 0:06:56.080 --> 0:06:58.359 seems to be this thing that is not written in 0:06:58.400 --> 0:07:02.000 the in the heavens, and and it isn't even like 0:07:02.080 --> 0:07:05.560 really written inside us either, but it's something that emerges, 0:07:05.880 --> 0:07:09.000 uh from other directions which we'll get into, right, So 0:07:09.120 --> 0:07:10.960 I don't know that that start me as just like 0:07:11.000 --> 0:07:16.000 a really interesting fact that our lives are guided by this, 0:07:16.000 --> 0:07:19.800 this seven day length of time, that we organize our 0:07:19.800 --> 0:07:23.160 lives into these blocks of seven days, and that so 0:07:23.280 --> 0:07:26.040 much what we do is based on the recurrence of 0:07:26.080 --> 0:07:28.880 those blocks and the timing of the days within those blocks. 0:07:29.120 --> 0:07:31.920 And yet it's not a necessary fact of nature. So 0:07:32.480 --> 0:07:35.600 what is the seven day week? Where does it come from? 0:07:36.200 --> 0:07:40.880 How culturally unique or culturally universal is it um? And 0:07:41.040 --> 0:07:42.800 what is it doing to us? Like how does it 0:07:42.840 --> 0:07:44.920 work on our brains? And how does it change the 0:07:44.960 --> 0:07:47.960 way we live? And it is hard to imagine, you know, 0:07:48.040 --> 0:07:50.320 certainly for us, it's it's hard to imagine living without 0:07:50.480 --> 0:07:54.280 the seven day week, uh, just because we're in it. 0:07:54.280 --> 0:07:58.400 It's kind of like trying to imagine recent history without decades. 0:07:58.520 --> 0:08:01.239 It's like it's just such a part of the fabric. 0:08:01.320 --> 0:08:04.680 It's the this grid that we've we've we've we've we've 0:08:04.760 --> 0:08:09.640 laid across reality. And it's just like, how how would 0:08:09.640 --> 0:08:13.080 we function if we didn't have Monday's, Tuesday's, Wednesday, Thursday's, Friday, 0:08:13.080 --> 0:08:18.600 Saturdays and Sundays. You can't take my Wednesdays away from me. Yeah, 0:08:18.600 --> 0:08:20.760 if we don't have the hump day, right, the magical 0:08:20.800 --> 0:08:23.480 hunt day, that is the day where our victory over 0:08:23.480 --> 0:08:26.560 the week becomes a parent on Tuesday. I guess you 0:08:26.600 --> 0:08:30.800 know that it just seems impossible. Well, so I want 0:08:30.840 --> 0:08:33.240 to say. One of the first things I read on 0:08:33.320 --> 0:08:35.800 this subject when when I was first getting interested in 0:08:35.880 --> 0:08:40.239 it last week, actually was an article in Eon magazine 0:08:40.360 --> 0:08:44.560 by a UC Berkeley professor of history named David Hankin, 0:08:44.720 --> 0:08:47.280 who has written on this subject, who has written on 0:08:47.360 --> 0:08:51.480 the artificiality of the week and it's and it's cultural 0:08:51.920 --> 0:08:55.319 precedents and effects. And he starts off this Eon article 0:08:55.840 --> 0:08:59.000 by mentioning something. So you may have noticed, I think, 0:08:59.160 --> 0:09:04.640 especially in but maybe more commonly over the last two years, 0:09:05.440 --> 0:09:09.160 a lot of kind of hack jokes on the internet, uh, 0:09:09.640 --> 0:09:13.360 made especially by the subset of people who had previously 0:09:13.440 --> 0:09:16.120 been working in an office but then we're lucky enough 0:09:16.160 --> 0:09:18.480 to be able to convert to working from home during 0:09:18.480 --> 0:09:21.760 the pandemic, And the joke was nobody knows what day 0:09:21.800 --> 0:09:24.640 it is, Like I can't keep track of days. Every 0:09:24.720 --> 0:09:28.160 day is the same, it's blurs. Day is the yuck 0:09:28.240 --> 0:09:31.760 yuck expression. Uh And and I noticed that this connects 0:09:31.800 --> 0:09:34.240 to things in some movies, like you remember there's a 0:09:34.280 --> 0:09:37.319 scene in The Big Lebowski where, um, where I think 0:09:37.360 --> 0:09:40.120 Jeff Bridge's landlord comes to him and is telling him 0:09:40.160 --> 0:09:42.120 what day something's gonna happen. Maybe is when he's gonna 0:09:42.160 --> 0:09:44.840 come see his dance recital or something, and uh and 0:09:44.880 --> 0:09:48.040 he says what day it is? And um uh And 0:09:48.120 --> 0:09:50.560 it's clear that you know that the dude does not 0:09:50.760 --> 0:09:52.640 know what day of the week it is. And this 0:09:52.720 --> 0:09:56.880 is like a standard uh deployment of this observation about 0:09:56.880 --> 0:09:59.679 a person. Somebody who doesn't know what day of the 0:09:59.679 --> 0:10:02.080 week it is is usually taken to be sort of 0:10:02.120 --> 0:10:09.760 disoriented or disconnected from society or maybe unproductive. Yeah yeah, um, 0:10:09.800 --> 0:10:11.960 And you know you can make that argument for the dude, 0:10:13.480 --> 0:10:16.400 But I don't know. For my own part. I would 0:10:16.440 --> 0:10:22.439 say there are rare moments, perhaps during say vacation or travel, 0:10:22.480 --> 0:10:24.760 where I might have to remind myself what day it is. 0:10:25.559 --> 0:10:29.040 More commonly, however, I'll find that if there's a disruption 0:10:29.040 --> 0:10:33.559 in the week, it may momentarially feel like today is 0:10:33.600 --> 0:10:36.079 a different day. You know, like, um, if it's a 0:10:36.120 --> 0:10:38.880 Monday on a three day weekend, then that Monday kind 0:10:38.880 --> 0:10:42.360 of feels like a Sunday. But these feelings generally don't 0:10:42.360 --> 0:10:45.640 hold up to even halfway you know, close scrutiny. You know, 0:10:45.640 --> 0:10:47.760 it's it's one of those things that immediately fades away. 0:10:48.240 --> 0:10:54.120 Um so yeah, I you certainly encounter it in media 0:10:54.200 --> 0:10:57.240 and you hear people make jokes about it, but generally 0:10:57.280 --> 0:11:00.360 I feel like the calendar mindset is not far away. Well. 0:11:00.400 --> 0:11:02.720 I mean, the fact that people were like posting on 0:11:02.720 --> 0:11:07.160 Twitter about this often enough in that it was a 0:11:07.200 --> 0:11:09.679 thing people, it was a trend people could observe, seem 0:11:09.760 --> 0:11:14.200 to mean something. And I think the standard assumption, the 0:11:14.240 --> 0:11:18.280 widely presumed explanation, was that telecommuting was to blame. This 0:11:18.360 --> 0:11:21.000 is because, oh, well, now a larger percentage of people 0:11:21.000 --> 0:11:23.880 are telecommuting, but you know, more people were telecommuting than 0:11:23.920 --> 0:11:28.160 had been before, and people who were freshly telecommuting, Uh, 0:11:28.600 --> 0:11:31.400 we're we're experiencing this. I don't know what day it 0:11:31.480 --> 0:11:35.040 is feeling as a result. But Hankin actually goes back 0:11:35.040 --> 0:11:38.320 against that and says that he doesn't see telecommuting as 0:11:38.360 --> 0:11:41.600 a as a very good explanation for people since of 0:11:41.640 --> 0:11:43.679 the days blurring together. And I have to say, as 0:11:43.760 --> 0:11:47.480 as somebody who often worked from home even before COVID, 0:11:48.440 --> 0:11:51.480 that has never been my experience of telecommuting, and I 0:11:51.480 --> 0:11:55.120 I also would be skeptical of that explanation. Yeah, I 0:11:55.520 --> 0:11:57.920 would agree. I mean, though part of that might be 0:11:58.120 --> 0:12:01.320 that we're typically I mean, I think we've always been 0:12:01.320 --> 0:12:04.240 part of a publication schedule, so uh, you know, there's 0:12:04.280 --> 0:12:07.480 always what day it is still matters even if you're 0:12:07.480 --> 0:12:10.319 not in office, at least in our line of work. Sure, 0:12:10.600 --> 0:12:12.360 but I would I would think that would generally hold 0:12:12.400 --> 0:12:15.800 true with a lot of different professions. Yeah. And the 0:12:15.800 --> 0:12:19.319 point that Hankin makes at least is that telecommuting really 0:12:19.920 --> 0:12:23.959 disrupts normal divisions of time within the day more than 0:12:24.000 --> 0:12:27.120 it does across the span of a week. Right, So, 0:12:27.240 --> 0:12:31.160 like it doesn't change usually which days of the week 0:12:31.280 --> 0:12:33.480 people were working. I mean, it might in some cases, 0:12:33.520 --> 0:12:36.000 but that's not generally understood to be how it worked. 0:12:36.240 --> 0:12:40.200 It would change like where you were working within the day. Um, 0:12:40.280 --> 0:12:42.760 And of course nobody was complaining about like not knowing 0:12:43.120 --> 0:12:46.400 what hour of the day it was. And it's also 0:12:46.480 --> 0:12:48.760 interesting that the line was not I don't know what 0:12:48.920 --> 0:12:51.240 day of the month it was, it was I don't 0:12:51.240 --> 0:12:54.240 know what day of the week it is. And ultimately 0:12:54.360 --> 0:12:58.160 the explanation that he gives is that quote weekly counts 0:12:58.160 --> 0:13:01.560 are reinforced by the habits and rituals of other people. 0:13:02.080 --> 0:13:05.360 When those habits and rituals were radically obscured or altered 0:13:05.400 --> 0:13:10.160 in the week, itself seemed to unravel. And I think 0:13:10.200 --> 0:13:12.800 I agree here. This seems likely to me that for 0:13:13.040 --> 0:13:15.080 people who felt this way, like I don't know what 0:13:15.160 --> 0:13:17.960 day of the week it is, I would suspect it 0:13:18.080 --> 0:13:21.600 probably had less to do with telecommuting and more to 0:13:21.640 --> 0:13:25.360 do with the disruption in schedules of other things that 0:13:25.440 --> 0:13:29.600 people would normally do at regular, recurring times throughout the week. 0:13:30.000 --> 0:13:34.440 So maybe for example, recurring social get togethers or classes 0:13:34.720 --> 0:13:38.640 or religious gatherings or going out to dinner on Saturday 0:13:38.720 --> 0:13:42.560 night or things like that. You know, people have pretty 0:13:42.640 --> 0:13:46.360 strong weekly rituals. Not everybody obviously, but lots of people do, 0:13:46.840 --> 0:13:50.280 and when when those things get interrupted, I think that 0:13:50.400 --> 0:13:54.480 probably has a strong effect on reckoning with the cycle itself. Yeah, 0:13:54.520 --> 0:13:56.839 I think that makes sense because obviously there are two. 0:13:56.880 --> 0:14:00.840 To a certain degree, many people were able to transition 0:14:01.160 --> 0:14:04.240 uh these things into the like the zoom age. They're 0:14:04.280 --> 0:14:07.319 able to uh, you know, do their game night online 0:14:07.400 --> 0:14:11.400 to to turn a particular in person social hour into 0:14:11.480 --> 0:14:14.960 a virtual social hour. But in other cases things simply 0:14:15.480 --> 0:14:20.440 uh went away, um you know, after school practices and 0:14:20.440 --> 0:14:23.760 so forth. You know, in many cases these just didn't 0:14:23.800 --> 0:14:26.320 happen for a year or more. You know, there's a 0:14:26.320 --> 0:14:29.400 totally different thing that I wonder about that. It makes 0:14:29.440 --> 0:14:32.800 me wonder if if um, confusing which day it is 0:14:32.840 --> 0:14:35.560 in the week has become maybe a little more common 0:14:35.600 --> 0:14:38.080 in recent years, and this would have nothing to do 0:14:38.120 --> 0:14:41.680 with the pandemic, but it would be um shifts in 0:14:42.000 --> 0:14:48.359 patterns of media consumption among people getting a lower percentage 0:14:48.400 --> 0:14:54.360 on average of their media from scheduled live broadcasts that 0:14:54.480 --> 0:14:57.480 are that occur at regular dates and days and times 0:14:57.520 --> 0:14:59.480 throughout a week, like you know, you know that the 0:14:59.520 --> 0:15:02.520 TV oh that you like comes on at this time 0:15:02.560 --> 0:15:06.880 on this day, and instead shifting towards more on demand 0:15:07.280 --> 0:15:12.120 uh consumption of media or just algorithmically supplied media entertainment, 0:15:12.360 --> 0:15:14.600 which is you know, always there waiting for you and 0:15:14.640 --> 0:15:17.760 always on rather than scheduled at particular days and times. 0:15:18.320 --> 0:15:22.600 M hm. So that sounds like a point in favor 0:15:22.720 --> 0:15:27.120 of what are they calling a now appointment television versus uh, 0:15:27.320 --> 0:15:30.760 like you know, just a binge streaming and so forth. Oh, 0:15:30.880 --> 0:15:33.480 finally it's Friday and I can watch this trash I've 0:15:33.480 --> 0:15:37.680 been waiting on. Well, you know, growing up very much 0:15:37.720 --> 0:15:40.640 in the TV age. I mean I remember that feeling. 0:15:41.120 --> 0:15:43.920 Then you know it's it's it's Friday or Saturday night. 0:15:43.960 --> 0:15:46.720 You know exactly you know what, Uh, you know what's 0:15:46.720 --> 0:15:48.880 going to be on television Sunday morning. You know, you 0:15:48.880 --> 0:15:50.840 know what's gonna be on then. Uh, you know there's 0:15:50.840 --> 0:15:54.040 a different character to whatever's on TV. And if you 0:15:54.120 --> 0:15:56.120 did not have a clock and did not have access 0:15:56.160 --> 0:15:59.080 to clock time, you could tell if you know what 0:15:59.120 --> 0:16:01.240 you're doing, you know what time it was just based 0:16:01.280 --> 0:16:06.120 on what's happening on NBC or what's happening on TBS, Uh, 0:16:06.200 --> 0:16:08.440 what what happens to be playing on MTV, that sort 0:16:08.440 --> 0:16:10.920 of thing. I'm not going to forget it Saturday because 0:16:10.960 --> 0:16:14.360 I know that that at one am on the USA network, 0:16:14.400 --> 0:16:18.680 I'm gonna get to watch Friday the thirteenth, Part eight. Yeah. Well, this, 0:16:18.840 --> 0:16:21.680 this is a leads to an interesting question that I 0:16:21.680 --> 0:16:24.520 don't think we did not We certainly did not prepare 0:16:24.560 --> 0:16:27.360 to answer. Are there any franchises that that have seven entries? 0:16:27.760 --> 0:16:30.560 Like an even seven? Oh? And then they've said definitely 0:16:30.600 --> 0:16:33.760 no more? Ever, right, don't any one for each day? 0:16:33.760 --> 0:16:36.000 And that's it. I don't know. Are we at transfer 0:16:36.080 --> 0:16:38.320 seven yet, I've just looked it up. No, we're at 0:16:38.320 --> 0:16:48.280 transfer six. So one more and then we're good. Okay. Well, 0:16:48.360 --> 0:16:52.720 so another question comes up though from this, which is, um, okay, 0:16:52.720 --> 0:16:56.480 so seven days is is not strictly speaking a a 0:16:56.600 --> 0:17:00.080 time period that we derive from astronomy or for a 0:17:00.080 --> 0:17:02.320 anything physical that happens in the world around us. It 0:17:02.360 --> 0:17:07.000 seems to be a cultural invention. Um. But but could 0:17:07.000 --> 0:17:10.520 it possibly be based in some other natural fact about 0:17:10.520 --> 0:17:12.919 the world other than say, you know, the moon or 0:17:12.960 --> 0:17:15.840 the sun or the Earth. Could could a period of 0:17:15.880 --> 0:17:20.119 seven days somehow lie within biology? Yeah? I was wondering 0:17:20.160 --> 0:17:22.680 about this as well. You know, is there anything that 0:17:22.760 --> 0:17:24.919 might connect the idea of a seven day week to 0:17:25.160 --> 0:17:30.000 the biological world, particularly to human biology? And I found 0:17:30.080 --> 0:17:33.359 uh an interesting and at times perplexing, at least to me. 0:17:33.480 --> 0:17:37.480 Paper flexing to me anyway. Uh. Paper that was published 0:17:37.520 --> 0:17:44.040 in ten in the journal Chronobiology International by Rheinberg at 0:17:44.080 --> 0:17:49.040 All titled seven Day Human Biological Rhythms An Expedition in 0:17:49.119 --> 0:17:54.520 search of their origin, synchronization, functional advantage, adaptive value and 0:17:54.600 --> 0:17:58.240 clinical relevance. This paper aims to look at the quote 0:17:58.320 --> 0:18:02.320 seven day demand ane of the biological time structure with 0:18:02.359 --> 0:18:05.919 special reference to human beings. Okay, so it seems like 0:18:05.960 --> 0:18:09.560 they're investigating exactly the question we just raised, like could 0:18:09.560 --> 0:18:11.919 there be any kind of rhythm within the body of 0:18:12.040 --> 0:18:14.960 things that tend to happen in cycles of seven days 0:18:15.040 --> 0:18:18.119 or so? Right? And uh? And you know, first of 0:18:18.119 --> 0:18:20.320 all they do say this is from the conclusions They 0:18:20.320 --> 0:18:23.840 stay quote neither cosmic nor earthborn signals seem to be 0:18:23.960 --> 0:18:26.920 of sufficient strength to give rise to the seven day 0:18:27.000 --> 0:18:30.879 rhythms of life forms of various degrees of complexity. All right, 0:18:31.000 --> 0:18:33.080 fair enough that that matches up with what we've said 0:18:33.119 --> 0:18:36.120 so far, particularly as far as the heavens go. However, 0:18:36.800 --> 0:18:40.600 they also conclude that the evidence quote motivates us to 0:18:40.680 --> 0:18:44.879 hypothesize weekly rhythms are endogenous in origin. So, in other words, 0:18:45.280 --> 0:18:48.439 these researchers still think that there is something about the 0:18:48.480 --> 0:18:52.359 power of seven that emerges from within us. So they 0:18:52.400 --> 0:18:55.400 admit that the seven day biological cycle is a little studied. 0:18:56.040 --> 0:19:00.000 But but they make a point of saying what does 0:19:00.080 --> 0:19:02.520 seemed to factor into various organisms, And they cite a 0:19:02.560 --> 0:19:06.480 list of examples, including things like laboratory rats, domestic horses, 0:19:06.880 --> 0:19:09.960 and seemingly to some degree, human beings. Though I should 0:19:09.960 --> 0:19:12.639 say that these examples, like for example, with the horse, 0:19:12.760 --> 0:19:15.560 the example is a study on seven day cycles in 0:19:15.640 --> 0:19:22.920 semen volume, sperm motility, and spermatozoa concentration. Uh, and not 0:19:22.920 --> 0:19:25.080 not to say that all all of them are sperm related, 0:19:25.160 --> 0:19:28.639 but you know, it's it's things related to various processes 0:19:28.680 --> 0:19:32.080 inside of biological system. Well, I guess if it's domestic 0:19:32.160 --> 0:19:36.320 horses and animals living within human environments, that would be 0:19:36.400 --> 0:19:40.240 a little curious whether any appearance seven day cycles could 0:19:40.280 --> 0:19:43.840 somehow be based on something that's changing within their environment 0:19:43.960 --> 0:19:47.000 on the basis of human and behavior, because humans live 0:19:47.040 --> 0:19:49.439 by seven day cycles, or not all humans do. But 0:19:49.920 --> 0:19:52.919 I'd imagine that the animals used in the study probably 0:19:52.920 --> 0:19:56.480 belong to humans that do right, and all scientists are humans. 0:19:57.000 --> 0:20:00.439 So um, yeah, this is definitely an area where I 0:20:00.440 --> 0:20:02.919 would I would love to read more on this topic 0:20:03.119 --> 0:20:06.040 and read some you know, some some work from other 0:20:06.119 --> 0:20:09.520 researchers as well. UM, I don't really know quite what 0:20:09.560 --> 0:20:11.960 to make of this paper because on one hand, I 0:20:11.960 --> 0:20:14.639 am not its intended audience, and I may be missing 0:20:14.680 --> 0:20:18.920 something important in their their arguments here, so that's always 0:20:18.920 --> 0:20:21.840 certainly a possibility. But I'm not sure how much stock 0:20:21.880 --> 0:20:24.040 I put in the concept that there is something about 0:20:24.080 --> 0:20:27.879 a seven day time period that emerges within us, because 0:20:27.920 --> 0:20:29.919 for starters, I'm not sure it really lines up with 0:20:29.960 --> 0:20:32.399 the history that we're we're going to be discussing in 0:20:32.400 --> 0:20:35.240 this episode. In the next uh, you know, seven becomes 0:20:35.240 --> 0:20:38.040 the standard and it wins out over other models, but 0:20:38.400 --> 0:20:40.919 I'm not sure it's because it matches something inside us. 0:20:40.960 --> 0:20:44.760 I think they're they're other stronger arguments to be made 0:20:44.760 --> 0:20:47.000 for other factors. Well, I don't know. Maybe we can 0:20:47.040 --> 0:20:49.199 revisit this paper later if we if we get some 0:20:49.240 --> 0:20:51.960 additional clarity on it. But but also maybe we can 0:20:52.359 --> 0:20:55.360 trudge out of the swamp of confusion, but by focusing 0:20:55.359 --> 0:20:57.760 on something a little more understandable in the moment, which 0:20:57.800 --> 0:21:01.320 is the question of Okay, just in basic functional terms, 0:21:01.600 --> 0:21:04.639 what does the week actually do? What do we use 0:21:04.880 --> 0:21:08.959 the seven day week for? Hinkin actually outlines four different 0:21:09.000 --> 0:21:12.520 things that he thinks the seven day week does, and 0:21:12.560 --> 0:21:14.800 so I want to go through these with you, rob Okay. 0:21:14.840 --> 0:21:18.880 So the first one would be categorizing days into different types. 0:21:19.119 --> 0:21:23.480 So the week organizes time into blocks of two fundamental 0:21:23.760 --> 0:21:28.080 kinds of days, week days and weekends, with the main 0:21:28.160 --> 0:21:32.280 distinctions between the two being, um, being the distinction between 0:21:32.320 --> 0:21:37.760 work and leisure and the distinction between mundane and sacred. Yeah, 0:21:37.840 --> 0:21:40.360 and you know, you see this reflect Like even if 0:21:40.440 --> 0:21:44.080 if you were, say, someone who does not work, maybe 0:21:44.080 --> 0:21:47.480 you're retired, or you have a particular work schedule that 0:21:47.600 --> 0:21:50.679 sets you apart from from many other people, Um, you 0:21:50.680 --> 0:21:53.760 still see it reflected, say in what sort of businesses 0:21:54.160 --> 0:21:58.119 are closed on the weekends, what sort of businesses are 0:21:58.160 --> 0:22:00.680 are going to be swamped on the weekend, and therefore 0:22:00.720 --> 0:22:03.159 it's better to go on a weekday. So even if 0:22:03.200 --> 0:22:07.480 the cycles don't don't at first seem to impact you personally, 0:22:07.600 --> 0:22:11.200 that they still probably do to some degree anyway, exactly. 0:22:11.240 --> 0:22:13.600 So that's one thing we do. We we sort days 0:22:13.600 --> 0:22:17.239 into different kinds of days, and there's usually mainly just 0:22:17.280 --> 0:22:19.960 two kinds, but you could imagine other schemes of of 0:22:20.359 --> 0:22:23.840 sorting days into different sort of buckets like that. Beyond that, 0:22:23.920 --> 0:22:26.840 I would say you could get more granular and and 0:22:26.880 --> 0:22:29.960 go to the second category, which is day individual ation, 0:22:30.480 --> 0:22:32.879 because of course we have weekdays and weekends, but also 0:22:33.000 --> 0:22:36.720 each day of the week is its own fundamental thing. Uh. 0:22:36.880 --> 0:22:39.840 So we all we know that Tuesdays are not exactly 0:22:39.880 --> 0:22:42.919 the same as Mondays, and Saturdays are not exactly the 0:22:42.960 --> 0:22:47.119