On Tuesday, September 6, 2016 at 2:46:27 PM UTC+1, wrote:
On Tuesday, September 6, 2016 at 1:18:00 PM UTC+1, Gerald Kelleher wrote:
One of the great human advancements is predicting where Mercury is at a particular date and time

Indeed, well done Albert Einstein!

https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php...ion_of_Mercury

Einstein is of no consequence however Sir Isaac is in that his spiel was not defining time but rather dithering around with timekeeping and a clockwork solar system which fits inside the 24 hour system and the calendar system..

"Absolute time, in astronomy, is distinguished from relative, by the equation of time. For the natural days are truly unequal, though they are commonly considered as equal and used for a measure of time; astronomers correct this inequality for their more accurate deducing of the celestial motions...The necessity of which equation, for determining the times of a phænomenon, is evinced as well from the experiments of the pendulum clock, as by eclipses of the satellites of Jupiter." Principia

Quite amazing that the science fiction narrative of relativity ends in an unmoderated Usenet forum but there it is anyway. The upshot is that explaining the twin rotations behind the variations in the natural noon cycle and where it meshes with timekeeping has yet to make it into wider circulation but it has been explained here for a number of years.

If you can manage to convince yourself that Newton is not expressing the Equation of Time then good luck to you, you join many unimaginative like you in a forced fed narrative that is long since past its shelf life.