As long time readers will know we've been working on this house down here for some time now. In fact, for such a time that we're getting to the very last bits of it: one more bathroom and kitchen to go in and we're done: or at least, we've got to start furnishing it.

One of the things I very much do want to have is one of these grandfather clocks. It's not just that they look good (like this example of the Hermle clocks) but also, as this blog post shows, because grandfather clocks are really the thing that ushered in the modern age.

There's two technical reasons for this. The first is that without a reliable method of telling the time it simply isn't possible to coordinate activities. When everyone is living a peasant life this isn't that much of a problem, but as soon as we start to have any larger scale form of cooperation then we need to be able to tell when this cooperation should happen.

The other technical point is that before the technology of clocks had advanced sufficiently, the only method known of having an accurate clock was to have a long pendulum: thus the actual shape of the grandfather clock itself. It simply needs the long cabinet because that's what you need to have the long pendulum and weights sytem that makes it accurate.

So it isn't that these clocks are simply good looking: it's that they're a reminder of the very thing which brought us this advanced civilisation we all enjoy so much. And those are the two reasons why I want to have one in my newly renovated house, right in the main living room, opposite the fireplace.