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Short Wave

To Be DST, Or Not To Be. That Is The Question.

Short Wave

NPR

News, Life Sciences, Daily News, Astronomy, Nature, Science

4.7 β€’ 6.5K Ratings

πŸ—“οΈ 29 March 2022

⏱️ 13 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

This month, the U.S. Senate unanimously approved a bill to make daylight saving time permanent. Now sleep scientists are weighing in and are suggesting the opposite β€” that standard time might be a better choice. Correspondent Allison Aubrey talks to host Emily Kwong about the pros and cons of adopting permanent daylight saving time or year-round standard time.

You can follow Emily on Twitter @EmilyKwong1234 and Allison @AubreyNPR. Email Short Wave at ShortWave@NPR.org.

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Transcript

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0:00.0

You're listening to Shortwave from NPR.

0:05.6

So much of life is about trade-offs.

0:08.6

You give a little, you get a little.

0:10.6

And we've got a trade-off today that I sure have thoughts on.

0:14.5

Maybe you do too.

0:16.1

What about you, Allison Aubrey?

0:17.8

Yes, I've got some thoughts.

0:20.4

We're talking dear listeners about the twice yearly changing of the clocks.

0:24.5

Spring forward when daylight saving time begins and fall backward when it ends.

0:29.1

It may not sound like a big deal, but it turns out our bodies are a lot more sensitive

0:33.8

to time than most of us have ever realized.

0:37.1

And back in 2015, I spoke to this circadian scientist named Fred Turck at Northwestern

0:43.9

University about it.

0:44.9

Yeah, let's listen to some of that.

0:47.4

We've known for a long time about the master clock in our brains that synchronizes our

0:51.6

body to the 24 hour light dark cycle, but in recent years, scientists have made a pretty

0:56.8

cool discovery.

0:58.0

It turns out that we have different clocks in every organ.

1:01.8

Yes, there are clocks in all the cells of your body.

1:05.5

Wow, it's kind of stunning.

1:07.3

Yes, that is a discovery that's literally surprised, as I must say.

1:11.7

Turck says, think of all these clocks in our bodies as instruments or players in an orchestra.

...

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