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Oh yes. A vital problem of the time was the determination of longitude at sea, and as you know, the Earth rotates 15 degrees in one hour. (360/24) That is (at the equator) 24 000mi / 24 = 1000 mi/h. (I'll stick with the units of the time).

Therefore 15 degrees = 1000 mi = 1 hour. And 1 degree = ~67 mi = 1 minute.

In other words, if your clock was accurate to 1 minute of time, you'd be uncertain within 67 miles of your longitude position. So timepieces were desired that could cut this error down to a few seconds of time.

Dava Sobel has a great history of these events of the time, Longitude, and I recommend you read it.

In short, even better determination of time than 1 minute was needed in the 1700s. And Harrison eventually supplied the need for Cook's voyages.

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