The Fluent Mind ESL Podcast Topic Talk | Daylight Savings Time
In this episode of The A to Z English Podcast, Xochitl and Jack discuss Daylight Savings Time in the United States.
Transcript:
00:00:02
Jack
Welcome to the A-Z English podcast. My name is Jack and I'm here with my co-host social. And today we are going to do a topic talk and the topic is daylight savings time in America. So. So. So what is daylight savings time?
00:00:23
Xochitl
Jack, my understanding is that not every country does daylight savings time. But here in America we do it and it's where every spring the time jumps forward an hour and every fall the time goes back an hour and it was intentionally meant to help conserve energy. It's been shown that it doesn't.
00:00:44
Xochitl
Help conserve energy, but what it does simply is that.
00:00:48
발표자
Right.
00:00:50
Xochitl
It kind of makes the days shorter in the winter and the days even longer in the summer, and this is a natural trend anyway, but it just kind of exacerbates that. So here in the US around 4:30 or five in the Midwest in the winter, you'll see the sun going down.
00:01:07
Jack
Yes.
00:01:07
Xochitl
And it's summer. Some may not go down until 9:00 PM, basically almost 9:00 PM so.
00:01:15
Jack
Yeah, I mean I I think the my understanding of it was it's it's a very old practice and it was meant to give farmers a little extra.
00:01:15
Xochitl
That's kind of.
00:01:29
Jack
Light, I suppose in the as they worked on the farm because we were mostly in agricultural country back then.
00:01:39
Jack
UM.
00:01:41
Jack
And so am I. Does that make sense to you? Is that is that something that it has to do with?
00:01:48
Xochitl
I think that it could definitely. I I do know that it was also.
00:01:54
Xochitl
Related to energy conservation.
00:01:56
Jack
OK.
00:01:57
Xochitl
So I think it's supposed to be like.
00:02:01
Xochitl
And it was, I think it was kind of supposed to encourage us to.
00:02:07
Xochitl
I don't know. I don't.
00:02:08
Xochitl
Know how that aspect is supposed to work? I'll be real, but.
00:02:11
Jack
Well, it it it, it gives you more natural light so that you didn't need to burn oil.
00:02:17
Jack
In the evenings, as as often as as much in the in the summer months or in the warmer months.
00:02:25
Xochitl
Yeah, I kind of thought that. But in the winter, it really makes everything like more depressing.
00:02:30
Jack
Yeah, I know, I know.
00:02:33
Xochitl
That's why it's summer. It's like you don't have any daylight. You get, like the sun doesn't start coming out. I guess it it comes up, but you're like in school or doing whatever and it's like barely out and you're in school or at work all day. And when you get off, this one's already gone.
00:02:53
Xochitl
Basically, so Midwest is anyway.
00:02:54
Jack
Right.
00:02:57
Jack
Yeah. I what? What are your feelings about my feelings of daylight savings time? Daylight savings time is that it's just it's an old practice that doesn't really belong anymore. What it does is really just confuses people. People are just late for work or early for work accidentally the day.
00:03:09
Xochitl
Yes.
00:03:17
Jack
After because they.
00:03:19
Xochitl
Yeah, my to have my aunt. She was early.
00:03:21
Jack
Yeah, you show up an hour early and you're like, where is everybody? And then you go like, ohh daylight savings time. It's only 8:00. It's not 9:00. Ohh. OK.
00:03:31
Jack
OK. Or you're late an hour because you're like ohh I I thought it was 9:00, but it's actually 10:00 now.
00:03:32
Xochitl
Yeah. And then close.
00:03:39
Xochitl
Yeah. For my generation, it doesn't happen so much because our technology, which is what we use to tell time, automatically switches.
00:03:47
발표자
That's true.
00:03:47
Xochitl
But so I don't even know. Like I don't even notice, especially I don't. I'm still I'm. I work as a freelancer, so I don't even really notice anymore. But with my aunt, it definitely affected her. And then it's like Gen. X and boomers and like, slightly older generations that still use.
00:04:04
Xochitl
Use like alarm clocks and you know, go by the actual digit or not digital. The actual manual clocks like on the kitchen or like in.
00:04:13
Xochitl
Their car and stuff.
00:04:15
Xochitl
UM, that's definitely that definitely usually affects them I.
00:04:18
Jack
Oh, that's for sure. My generation. Like I remember, you know, when I was in high school, they would, they would, you know, remind us. And the news would always remind people. Don't forget to set your clocks one hour forward and and then you have to.
00:04:36
Jack
You know, set your clock one hour forward so that your alarm goes off at the right time. Otherwise you're going to be late for school.
00:04:42
Jack
Cool.
00:04:44
Xochitl
Right.
00:04:45
Xochitl
I believe Mexico does daylight savings still, but like in a different kind of hour or like different time and only certain areas of Mexico do it like rural areas do not follow daylight saving time. So it makes it even more confusing.
00:05:00
Xochitl
UM, yeah, I think we should just abolish it because I don't think it's.
00:05:06
Xochitl
Really helpful anymore and most countries don't follow it right. It doesn't happen in Korea. Am I correct in saying that?
00:05:12
Jack
No, it doesn't happen in Korea. We don't have to deal with this at all. In in South Korea.
00:05:19
Jack
I I think the the purpose I'm just going to read here, what I've what I've found online. It says the primary goal of daylight savings time is to make better use of data.
00:05:29
Jack
The light during the longer days of summer, thereby reducing the need for artificial lighting in the evenings, which is exactly what you said.
00:05:39
Jack
It is believed to save energy and promote outdoor activities during the extended daylight hours, so it's mostly to benefit you in the summer the the, the, the summer times and and the spring.
00:05:53
Jack
Thing and in the winter, no one. No one cares, because it's already it's already getting dark early anyway, so.
00:06:02
Xochitl
Wait, everyone's indoors? People aren't like outside playing or whatever.
00:06:05
Jack
Yeah, yeah. I just remember growing up in Minnesota because it's quite far north. I would go to school and when I got out of school at 3330 or whatever, and then, you know, the sun was going down like it was.
00:06:21
발표자
Yeah.
00:06:22
Jack
It was so strange because it's almost you spent the whole all of the light.
00:06:28
Jack
Was while you were sitting in the school building. And then as soon as you go outside the the the sun is going down already. So it's it's basically time to go sit inside your house. I think we'd be better off just abolishing it like you said. And there's still plenty of light in the summer time. And there's so much artificial lighting.
00:06:48
Jack
Now anyway, and it's so much cheaper now because light bulbs are are energy efficient. I don't think it really saves that much energy to be honest.
00:07:01
Xochitl
Yeah. I also don't think it does either, because I think in the summer.
00:07:08
Xochitl
We're already.
00:07:09
Xochitl
We're we're just going to use as much energy as we use like people are going to be up on Netflix or whatever it's we don't really live in a world that that operates on outside time any longer. You know, we kind of go by our own time because technology is still available to you all hours of the day. So we don't really.
00:07:30
Xochitl
We don't use outdoors as much as we did before. I don't think so. It's not really like a.
00:07:36
Xochitl
Yeah, I don't know. It's not very necessary.
00:07:39
Jack
Yeah, our daily habits. Exactly. I'll, I'll. I'll read the controversy here. Daylight savings Time is a topic of debate with proponents. So people that agree with it argue that it saves energy, reduces traffic accidents and promotes outdoor activities. However, critics argue that the benefits are.
00:08:00
Jack
Minimal, very small or nonexistent, they don't exist at all, and that daylight savings transitions can disrupt sleep patterns.
00:08:10
Jack
And have negative effects on health and productivity, which that's where I tend to mean. I I agree with that. The second part of that.
00:08:19
Xochitl
I agree with it too. Yeah, alright. Listeners will let us know. What do you think about daylight savings? Is it something that you use in your country? I'm very unfamiliar about which country use it and which countries.
00:08:31
Xochitl
Don't, so I'm curious to know, and do you think it's a good idea? Why or why not shoot us a message at it? Is the English podcast@gmail.com leave a comment down below on our website at it is the English podcast.com and join our chat let's our groups to join the conversation and we'll see you guys.
00:08:49
Xochitl
Next time, bye bye.
00:08:51
Jack
Bye.
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