Welcome to the MONAD app; A New Paradigm of Time.
The MONAD Calendar-Clock app is a Stage 2 prototype, meaning it’s not yet fully developed, but it is more advanced than your typical prototype. MONAD already has many useful and educational features, so you might as well get started using it. Start by watching the video below, then for more details you can read the rest of this page.
MONAD has four main Modes of operation (Helio, Geo, Astro & Event) and all four Modes have useful features that you can explore right now. While Astro & Event Mode feature a 2-dimensional Calendar-Clock face, Helio & Geo Modes feature a 3-dimensional Calendar-Clock face, ideal for exploring and studying planetary space-time. Helio Mode is how modern science conceives of the solar system, with the Sun at the Center and all the planets, including the Earth, orbiting the central Sun.
Heliocentric Programming Drives all the Activity of MONAD.
All of the programming of MONAD is based on a heliocentric (Sun-centered) model of the solar system, utilizing the Astronomical Algorithms of Jean Meeus to drive all the planetary activity. As the Earth orbits the Sun, it carries the celestial sphere (and the Earth-centered celestial coordinate system projected onto the celestial sphere) with it, always maintaining the same tilt angle of 66.5º of the Earth’s spin axis relative to the invariable (orbital) plane of the solar system. Like a gyroscope, the axis of Earth always maintains the same orientation in galactic space, even as the Earth orbits the Sun, due to the massive angular momentum of the spinning Earth.
The Sun-centered representative planetary dial (located in the invariable plane of the solar system) usefully compresses the size of the solar system (specifically the orbital pathways of the outer 5 planets beyond Mars) down to a more manageable size without compromising too much useful information about the location of the planets.
Both Helio and Geo Modes show the same underlying activity, just from different perspectives. Helio Mode is especially interesting in contrast to Geo Mode. I like to accelerate through time (using the main ‘Accelerate Time’ slider; slow, medium or fast, and then switch back and forth between Geo and Helio Modes. This transition is especially useful and interesting if you are studying the phenomena of retrograde motion of the planets. (It’s also useful to involve Astro Mode because there you can drag the hour hand, calendar band or zodiac band, and determine the precise moment when the planets appear to move retrograde. It’s very easy to observe the retrograde activity of Mercury and Venus in Astro Mode, but only in Helio Mode do you see why that retrograde activity is happening.) Then switch back to Geo Mode or Helio Mode to see it all in glorious 3-dimensional motion. Retrograde activity has a different mechanism for the inner planets (Mercury and Venus) than it does for the outer planets. I’ll make a video to demonstrate and explain more about all this soon.
The Geocentric Wholeness of Geo Mode.
In Astro and Event Modes (featuring a 2-dimensional Calendar-Clock face), the Earth’s equatorial plane (and the 24 hour number dial) is always fixed flat, parallel with the surface of the screen. This makes it possible to set up Drag Zones, where if you drag the Earth or Hour hand, this allows you to set the time. And if you drag the Calendar Band or Zodiac Band, this allows you to set the date. But with Helio and Geo Modes (featuring a 3-dimensional Calendar-Clock face), when you drag any part of the Calendar-Clock depicted on the screen, you change the orientation of the Calendar-Clock. This allows you the experience of “walking around” the Calendar-Clock, looking at it from any angle; from above or below, from almost any perspective. Set the Calendar-Clock in motion using the accelerator, then use the Drag feature to change the orientation.
Pinch the screen to zoom in, reverse pinch to zoom out. Spin (drag) the Calendar-Clock all the way around to check out the southern hemisphere. MONAD is a virtual orrery or dynamic model of the solar system that illustrates and predicts the relative positions and motions of the Sun, Moon planets and stars, at any time and date. MONAD provides you with the civil (digital) time and date usefully integrated with planetary time and date (the solar day, lunar month and seasonal year), framed by the actual astronomical and celestial events depicted on the celestial sphere.
At any moment in time, the phase of the Moon, the location of the Sun along the ecliptic and the location of the planets are all accurately placed relative to the celestial coordinate system of declination and right ascension. Every moment in time the MONAD Calendar-Clock app generates an appropriate astronomical or astrological chart, in 2 or 3 dimensions.
In Geo Mode, MONAD displays the Earth’s circle of illumination from the proper orientation; the Axial Perspective, with the Sun “fixed at 12” at the top of the dial. (Proper Perspective Changes Everything.) You can see clearly how the Earth’s circle of illumination changes in relation to the Earth’s spin axis over the course of a seasonal year, as the Sun seemingly slides back and forth, north and south on the Sun’s meridian or “Date Indicator,” and how the declination of the Sun (as it moves north and south away from the celestial equator = 0º declination) impacts the time of Sun rise and Sun set, and the proportion of night and day (displayed graphically and accurately on the Twilight Dial) for any location on the Earth and time of year.
There is so much more to time than just numbers on a dial and a couple of rotating hands. MONAD, the Planetary Calendar-Clock, tells both analog & digital, time & date, at a glance. But it helps to know what you’re looking at. Following are some of the basic features of the 3-dimensional MONAD Planetary Calendar-Clock:
The Time Zone Spanning Hour Hand.
Zoom in (reverse pinch the screen) and check out the time zone spanning hour hand (15º wide at the base) which marks your location on the planet. That little green sphere (head of a pin) at the base of the hour hand marks your exact longitude and latitude. The hour hand indicates your local (mean solar) time, pointing at one number after another on the 24 hour number dial as the Earth spins once a day relative to the Sun. (The Sun is fixed at 13 during Daylight Savings.) Check out Video #10 to find out more about the Hour Hand.
Find Your Unique Place in Planet-Centered Space.
Ordinarily the Hour Hand is set automatically by GPS, reflecting your current location on the globe. But you may want to experiment, see what time looks like all around the globe by moving the Hour Hand.
The Twilight Dial (where the 24 hour number dial turns from white to black) of MONAD shows the time of Sun rise and Sun set at any time of year, at any latitude. Adjusting the latitude slider displaces the hour hand north or south along one of the 24 prime meridians. This has an impact on the Twilight Dial, which shows the local time of Sun rise and Sun set. Especially around the time of the solstices, the closer the hour hand gets to the poles, the proportion of night and day (photoperiod) changes significantly.
Adjusting the longitude slider also has an impact on the Twilight Dial. You can shift the hour hand to any of the 24 different time zones. If you (represented by the green sphere at the base of the hour hand) are located away from the prime meridian at the center of the time zone-spanning hour hand, as much as 7.5º away from the prime meridian, this will significantly alter the (mean solar) time of Sun rise and Sun set.
The Importance of the Axial Perspective.
You’re used to thinking of the Earth as a spinning top, with the north axis “up” and the south axis “down.” MONAD encourages you to look at the Earth from an unusual orientation, along the spin axis. Unless you are looking from the side, you see either the north or south hemisphere of Earth, out to the equator. In the north hemisphere, the hour hand moves in a counter clockwise fashion, and the numbers on the 24 hour number dial also ascend in a counter clockwise direction. It’s opposite to the direction of a “normal” 1 – 12 clock face. If you really can’t stand the hour hand moving counter clockwise, you can always move to Australia, where the hour hand moves in a clockwise direction. Check out Video #6 to find out more about the Axial Perspective.
Reading the Calendar Band at a Glance.
In Geo Mode, the Sun seemingly moves back and forth (north and south) on a solar meridian or Date Indicator which is fixed at Noon, and the arrow head at the end of the Date Indicator points at the civil (digital) date marked along the calendar band.
Note that at midnight the Date Indicator points precisely at the line separating one day block from the next. Every 5th day of every month is marked with a dot; one dot for the 5th day, two dots for the 10th day of the month, etc. The Saturday and Sunday (weekend) day blocks are gray, creating a repeating 5:2 pattern, making it easy to tell the time and date at a glance. And of course leap years are accounted for automatically.
[The illustration shows a date of Monday, August 10. Check out Video #12 to find out more about the Calendar Band.]
There’s Magic In The Past/Future Gap.
A standard civil calendar contains either 365 or 366 days, starting Jan 1 and ending Dec 31. By comparison, the calendar band of MONAD always shows exactly one seasonal year’s worth of dates, or 365.24219 days, which is the average length of a seasonal year. The calendar band shows about 6 months of past dates (marked by the blue bracket) and 6 months of future dates (unmarked) on the other side of the dial.
The Past/Future Gap sign (fixed at midnight) is where the calendar band is being constantly consumed in one direction and created in the opposite direction. (Accelerate the Calendar-Clock and then zoom in for a close up view of the Gap to check it out.) The calendar band is dynamically changing all the time. No other calendar (or clock) comes close to matching the features of the MONAD Calendar-Clock. (Patented.)