Children ask, taz answers: If the day has 24 hours, where is the night?

Look at the calendar, Johannes. What date is today? Maybe October 3rd? This day, October 3rd, begins at midnight, at midnight. You're probably in bed there. Then the day lasts exactly 24 hours - breakfast, play, lunch, going out, dinner, brushing your teeth, going to bed, and then it's midnight again. These 24 hours are exactly the time it takes for the globe to rotate once. That's where the number comes from. Because we move with the earth, we don't even notice that it is rotating. It's like sitting on the train and not even noticing that it's moving.

But what we notice is that it gets lighter in the morning and darker again in the evening. This also has to do with the fact that the earth rotates. It is round and you are at a very specific point on the sphere. If it's night where you are, our spot has just turned away from the sun.

When we talk about a day, we often don't mean the entire 24 hours. We mean the time between sunrise, i.e. in the morning, and sunset, i.e. in the evening. When the sun is there we are awake, when it is not there we are asleep. This is our completely natural rhythm. That was already the case when we humans didn't yet build houses and cars. Day and night. Doesn't the day only have 12 hours and not 24 hours?

This text first appeared in wochentaz, our weekly newspaper from the left!

Every week, wochentaz is about the world as it is – and as it could be. A left-wing weekly newspaper with a voice, attitude and the special taz view of the world. New every Saturday at the kiosk and of course by subscription.

A word with multiple meanings - that happens often! For example, you say: The television is on. He doesn't move at all, like you do when you run.

People have determined that there is a 24-hour day. That was the end of the Middle Ages, when time was divided like this: from midnight to midnight in 24 portions called hours. You have to imagine: someone thought up things like this. You could have divided the day into just 6 long sections, started in the morning and called the sections Turfel. Then every day would now have 6 turfels.

The first mechanical clocks were built back in the Middle Ages. And it was easier to start the new day at night than at the time when the sun is at its highest and people have a lot to do. So because people in the Middle Ages decided that we should count all the hours, the day has 24 hours. And the night fits in with it.