What makes up seconds

It helps to make observation and measurement consistent no matter what your experiment or your type of equipment. Because so much in science happens in a short amount of time, seconds have been used as the fundamental unit. In physics you will learn about meters per second. You may read about liters per seconds that would be a measure of the flow of a fluid. If you see a "per second" in the units you will be looking at the speed of something.

Smaller Than a Second Is there anything smaller than a second is? Sure there is. For units of time smaller than a second you need to know that we use the decimal system , not units of sixty. You see amounts smaller than a second in all sorts of sports and science activities.

How fast does someone run? How much time is left on the clock? You were going to do X, but then…at the last second …you changed your mind and did Y instead.

Maybe it was choosing the path less traveled instead of the wide road. Whatever the reason, mere seconds can be well spent and change lives forever. Have you ever stopped to consider how many seconds you have? If every second counts, then let's count the seconds we have.

For example, how many seconds do we have in a day? A month? A whole year? A wise man once said that there are 12 seconds in a year. January 2 nd , February 2 nd , March 2 nd …OK, you get the picture. But those aren't the seconds we're talking about! To figure out how many seconds there are in a year , we're going to need to know a little math. To convert a certain quantity to a different unit of measure, we need to figure out what is called the conversion factor.

To do this, we need to come up with a ratio — or fraction — that equals one. In the ratio , the conversion factor is a multiplier that gets applied to the larger unit to convert it into the smaller unit through multiplication. Sound confusing? Don't worry. A simple example will make things clear. When thinking about how many seconds there are in a year, let's first figure out the different units of measurement of time involved. We have the second , the minute , the hour , the day, the month and the year.

Let's start with the largest of these measures: the year. To convert years to the next smallest unit — the month — we have to know how many months are in a year. So, the conversion factor is If we want to know how many months are in 5 years, we just need to multiply the number of years by the conversion factor.

Easy enough, right? To figure out even smaller units, you can keep doing multiple conversions to smaller and smaller units.

Just make sure that the units you're using are all the same. For example, there are 24 hours in each day, but not all months have the same number of days. To convert one year to seconds, you'll need to skip using months and convert to days, hours, minutes and finally seconds. Each step of the way, you'll need to compute the conversion factor and then multiply. Here's what the conversion from one year to seconds would look like:.

So…drum roll, please…one year would equal times 24 times 60 times 60 seconds…or 31,, seconds! That's over 31 million seconds you have to spend over the next year. What will you do with YOUR seconds? Ready to put some of your precious seconds to good use? Check out these fun ways to spend quality time together as a family:. But I'm not the brightest bulb in the box A lot of us would take an entire year to count to 31,,but maybe not auctioneers!

Learn more about them in Who Talks the Fastest? Thanks for being a great Wonder Friend, cryptic! Actually, a year is Thanks for sharing this information, Norman! That is the precise answer which leads to Leap Day every 4 years. We're glad you stopped by Wonderopolis! It's great that you learned something new with us, Juliet! How many seconds were you expecting to be in a year?

Maybe we can figure out how many years that would be! Excellent reading so closely, Nia! We double-checked and indeed did intend "mere. It might be surprising, but it's true, Cole! How would you go about finding that answer? We'd love to hear your thoughts! Thanks for commenting, J! We hope you'll find out by doing the equation and timing yourself!

Let us know what you come up with. Hi, Wonder Friend! There's definitely a lot of seconds in a year. Great question, Wonder Friend! Based on what you learned from the Wonder, we encourage you to take a try at calculating that! We're glad this Wonder sparked your interest! There are a lot of seconds in a year! The Wonder tells us 31,, seconds!

Great question, Ermguy! Think about how many seconds are in a minute. How many times does 30 go into that number? Thanks for sharing, Tony! There are other time intervals such as the sideral day which vary slightly. We don't have that exact Wonder question, but you can submit it to the Wonder Bank! We're glad you came to Wonderopolis to find out, Sasha. We love hearing questions from our Wonder friends, and we're even more happy when we can answer them! There are a lot of seconds in a week, but not quite that many!

Hi, Dave! That's the curious question! We hope you read the Wonder closely to find out! Thanks for visiting Wonderopolis! We hope you explore many more Wonders! Thanks for joining the discussion, wendy! You're very close! A sideral day which is slightly slower than a regular day is 31,, That's a lot of seconds!

Thanks for your comment, Matthew! The shorter time period you mention is called a sideral day, which is the time it takes the Earth to make a full rotation with respect to distant stars. However, as Earth turns also around the Sun, it has to turn a little bit more each day to find the Sun at the same place. So, in relation to the Sun, one day equals 24 hours 86, seconds. Hi, Stacy Kim! We thought it was interesting, too. Thanks for joining the discussion and leaving a comment.

Hi Madelyn! You can divide that number by 12 and get your answer! What's the number you come up with? We'd love to hear your math! Nice work, Lover of Wondering! We like your style-- that was a great answer to our calendar Wonder!

Thanks for sharing your comment! Hehe, you've got us chuckling today, Patrick! Thanks for telling us how many seconds "2nd" are in a year! It's practice with time and multi-step equations! Great thinking! We agree, Jordan That's a LOT of seconds, isn't it, Tim?

Hi, John! Thank you for your comment! We're glad you learned something new about seconds, minutes and years today!

That's a LOT of seconds, isn't it? Thanks so much for commenting today, Jose! We are undergoing some spring clearing site maintenance and need to temporarily disable the commenting feature. Thanks for your patience.

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Follow Twitter Instagram Facebook. How many seconds are in a year? What is a conversion factor? What are some of the best ways to spend time together as a family? Tags: See All Tags conversion factor , count , day , equal , fraction , hour , measure , measurement , minute , month , multiplication , multiplier , quantity , ratio , second , time , unit , year. Wonder What's Next? Try It Out Ready to put some of your precious seconds to good use?

Check out these fun ways to spend quality time together as a family: Play some fun Backyard Games! Watch those seconds turn into minutes and then into hours as you play fun games with your friends and family members right in your own backyard. Time spent with friends and family is always time well spent, so find a game that you can all enjoy and play the day away!

Playing games isn't the only way to have a fun time with friends and family. Why not become tourists in your own city? Have you seen all there is to see in your local area? There always seem to be those little places that you never seem to get around to visiting. Find a new place to explore today. Or you could also make a family meal together! Have all family members think of their favorite food that they'd like to share with everyone else. Head out to the grocery store together and get all the supplies you'll need.

When you get home, turn on some music and get cooking in the kitchen. Enjoy your time together. The concept of fixed-length hours, however, did not originate until the Hellenistic period, when Greek astronomers began using such a system for their theoretical calculations.

Hipparchus, whose work primarily took place between and B. Despite this suggestion, laypeople continued to use seasonally varying hours for many centuries. Hours of fixed length became commonplace only after mechanical clocks first appeared in Europe during the 14th century. Hipparchus and other Greek astronomers employed astronomical techniques that were previously developed by the Babylonians, who resided in Mesopotamia.

The Babylonians made astronomical calculations in the sexagesimal base 60 system they inherited from the Sumerians, who developed it around B. Although it is unknown why 60 was chosen, it is notably convenient for expressing fractions, since 60 is the smallest number divisible by the first six counting numbers as well as by 10, 12, 15, 20 and Although it is no longer used for general computation, the sexagesimal system is still used to measure angles, geographic coordinates and time.

In fact, both the circular face of a clock and the sphere of a globe owe their divisions to a 4,year-old numeric system of the Babylonians. The Greek astronomer Eratosthenes who lived circa to B. A century later, Hipparchus normalized the lines of latitude, making them parallel and obedient to the earth's geometry.

He also devised a system of longitude lines that encompassed degrees and that ran north to south, from pole to pole. In his treatise Almagest circa A. Each degree was divided into 60 parts, each of which was again subdivided into 60 smaller parts.

The first division, partes minutae primae, or first minute, became known simply as the "minute. Minutes and seconds, however, were not used for everyday timekeeping until many centuries after the Almagest. Clock displays divided the hour into halves, thirds, quarters and sometimes even 12 parts, but never by In fact, the hour was not commonly understood to be the duration of 60 minutes.

It was not practical for the general public to consider minutes until the first mechanical clocks that displayed minutes appeared near the end of the 16th century. Even today, many clocks and wristwatches have a resolution of only one minute and do not display seconds. Thanks to the ancient civilizations that defined and preserved the divisions of time, modern society still conceives of a day of 24 hours, an hour of 60 minutes and a minute of 60 seconds.

Advances in the science of timekeeping, however, have changed how these units are defined. Seconds were once derived by dividing astronomical events into smaller parts, with the International System of Units SI at one time defining the second as a fraction of the mean solar day and later relating it to the tropical year.