When We Cease to Understand the World - Book Group June 2021 discussion thread

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McGoohan Jun 2021 12:29pm, 15 Jun 2021 49,645 posts	0 McGoohan This has put me in mind of when me and Liebling went to the Netherlands and stayed in a hotel near the cathedral in Haarlem. The cathedral clock chimed every hour, half hour, quarter hour and eighth hour! You know, for when you need to know it's seven and a half minutes past three. Fortunately if didn't go through the night, but the one in Utrecht did...
Hanneke Jun 2021 12:32pm, 15 Jun 2021 75,238 posts	0 Hanneke
McGoohan Jun 2021 12:36pm, 15 Jun 2021 49,647 posts	0 McGoohan Why do they do it Hann? WHY? Is it just to torture the tourists?
Hanneke Jun 2021 5:35pm, 15 Jun 2021 75,242 posts	0 Hanneke Especially to annoy you McG I think, at the time these clocks were made, it was a display of wealth, knowledge and power to be able to have such an accurate time machine...
Chrisull Jun 2021 5:49pm, 15 Jun 2021 17,829 posts	0 Chrisull Yep, if you've just travelled through a Schwarzchild singularity, you will want to know what time it is when you get out the other side, and for the last 300 years the Dutch have ensured exactly that. Just make sure you don't get crushed to the size of an atom on your trip through it though...
Hanneke Jun 2021 6:56pm, 15 Jun 2021 75,246 posts	0 Hanneke
Columba Jun 2021 10:16pm, 15 Jun 2021 21,126 posts	0 Columba Thank you for your reference to the cat, McG. Can't think how I missed it, but I do read in bed until I'm falling asleep so maybe I fell asleep at the beginning of that paragraph and in the morning picked up again from the end of the paragraph. I appreciate the book rather more after reading Chrisull's review (if it is a review). Interesting about the title. But can you travel through a singularity? I thought, if you fell into one, that was it; you would "softly and silently vanish away and never be heard of again" (Lewis Carroll, Hunting of the Snark)
Chrisull Jun 2021 10:18pm, 15 Jun 2021 17,833 posts	0 Chrisull Columba - I think that is more than likely :-).
westmoors Jun 2021 7:43am, 18 Jun 2021 5,163 posts	0 westmoors Finished this last weekend whilst away in the caravan. Not sure what to say about it. I'll read back through this thread to see what everyone else thinks.
westmoors Jun 2021 7:52am, 18 Jun 2021 5,164 posts	0 westmoors Great synopsis Chrisull.