science

Stopping the clock

Stopping the clock is a science topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Stopping the clock rather than just read about it. In short: Stopping the clock is a controversial practice in American and Canadian parliamentary procedure in which a legislature literally or notionally stops the clock (or moves the hands backwards), usually for the purpose of meeting a constitutional or statutory deadline. Riddick's Rules of Procedure notes, "The official clock is stopped by agreement of the 'powers that be' without any motion or announcement one minute bef…

Key takeaways

Stopping the clock belongs to science; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Stopping the clock to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Stopping the clock from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Stopping the clock is a controversial practice in American and Canadian parliamentary procedure in which a legislature literally or notionally stops the clock (or moves the hands backwards), usually for the purpose of meeting a constitutional or statutory deadline. Riddick's Rules of Procedure notes, "The official clock is stopped by agreement of the 'powers that be' without any motion or announcement one minute before the designated hour." Sometimes it is done to allow more time for lobbying or deal-making to obtain the necessary votes for one side to prevail on a measure. Some legislatures actually stop the clock, and others simply use it as a metaphor for continuing business after a time deadline has passed. Stopping the clock is also sometimes done for ceremonial purposes to ensure that both houses of a bicameral legislature adjourn simultaneously. The glossary of the Alabama State Legislature notes that the plug to the electric clock in the Senate or House chamber is sometimes pulled to allow the staff to complete the massive paper work required before sine die adjournment. Sometimes a legislature will even take a recess while the clock is stopped and then resume its work. The New York Legislature used to literally stop the clock at midnight on April 1 in order to pass the budget by the constitutional deadline, but eventually ended the practice and began simply disregarding the requirement. In 2004, it finally moved the deadline back to May 1. In a debate of the Legislative Assembly of Saskatchewan, it was noted that stopping the clock is done by tradition and with unanimous consent, when the Opposition agrees with the Government that valuable business can be done by extending the hours. In contrast, the speaker of the Illinois Legislature unilaterally stopped the clock at midnight on the last day of its session on June 30, 1988, to allow further debate before approving money to replace Comiskey Park, a decision that ultimately passed by one vote. Had this maneuver not been done, the White Sox presumably would have moved to Florida. Stadium consultant Marc Ganis noted, "As the clock struck down in St. Petersburg, they started popping champagne corks and didn't realize that the speaker of the house can literally stop the clock in Illinois. At the stroke of midnight, we got to 60 votes."

References

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Stopping the clock

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Stopping the clock claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In science, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Stopping the clock before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Stopping the clock ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Stopping the clock

In research: Stopping the clock appears in science research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Stopping the clock in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Stopping the clock is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics Law of Canada, Law of the United States, Legal doctrines and principles, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Stopping the clock outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Stopping the clock in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Stopping the clock means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Stopping the clock out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Stopping the clock in simple terms?

Why does Stopping the clock matter?

Because it connects several science ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Stopping the clock?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Stopping the clock.