What are the units measurement usually used for clock speed?

Answer 1

That's a very intriguing question . . . one to which there's a fair chance that

you're not going to understand my answer.

"Speed" means how much progress something makes, in whatever it's trying to

do, during a unit of time. For a car, speed is the distance it covers in each unit of

time . . . miles per hour. For a DJ at a party, speed might be how many CDs he

plays in each unit of time . . . songs per hour. For a pasta machine, speed might

be the spaghetti it produces in each unit of time . . . feet per minute.

What is a clock trying to do ? It's trying to display a duration of time. Like, if the

clock says "2:35 PM", it's telling us that 2hours and 35minutes have passed since

noon. So the speed of a clock is always

(the amount of time it shows)/(the real amount of time)

Do you see that there's a common factor in the top and bottom of that fraction ?

Do you see that you can reduce the fraction to lower terms by canceling "time"

out of the numerator and denominator ? That's the first step in discussing

the'speed' of a clock, and it's the answer to your question about the 'units'.

When you reduce this fraction to its simplest form, what you have left is just a

naked number, with NO units. The speed of a clock is (time) divided by (time),

and that's just a numerical ratio, without units.

Now, let's go a little further. What do you want the speed of your clock to be ?

Do you want a clock that can run faster than any other clock ? I don't think so.

You want the speed of your clock to be exactly 1 hour per hour, 1 minute per

minute, 1 second per second, 1 day per day etc.

Now a little more math: What is 1 second/second, 1 day/day, or 1 minute/minute ?

Each of them is exactly ' 1.00000 '. That's the speed you want your clock to run.

If it's anything else, then either you get the clock adjusted or you discard it.

A clock that runs with any speed that's not ' 1 ' is a useless clock.

How exact does it need to be ? You'd be amazed. A clock that runs at 1.0007

instead of 1.0000 is 7 minutes wrong after 1 week, and you'd want to reset it.

So the answer to your question is:

-- The speed of a clock is dimensionless . . . it's a number without units.

-- That number is supposed to be ' 1 '. If it's not within (a few percent) OF (1 percent) of ' 1 ',

then the clock isn't much good.

Unless you're using the clock to control the motion of your telescope.

But that's another story.