  After the initial suggestion by Zahnle and Walker (1987) that the torque
accelerating the spin rate of the Earth and produced by the heating of the
atmosphere by the Sun could counteract the braking lunir-solar gravitational
torque in the Precambrian, several authors have recently revisited this
hypothesis. In these studies, it is argued that the geological evidences of the
past spin state of the Earth play in favor of this atmospheric tidal locking of
the length of the day (LOD). In the present review of the recent literature, we
show that the drawn conclusions depend crucially on the consideration of the
stromatolite geological LOD estimates obtained by Pannella at 1.88 and 2.0 Ga,
which are subject to large uncertainties. When only the most robust
cyclostatigraphic estimates of the LOD are retained, the LOD locking hypothesis
is not supported. Moreover, the consideration of the published General
Circulation Model numerical simulations and of new analytical models for the
thermal atmospheric tides suggest that the atmospheric tidal resonance, which
is the crucial ingredient for the LOD locking in the Precambrian, was never of
sufficiently large amplitude to allow for this tidal LOD lock.

Earth and Planetary Astrophysics;Geophysics