Definition of Clockwise

While clockwise motion is a familiar and easily discernible phenomenon, defining 'clockwise' is not so easy. For example, 'a turn to the right' only applies to half the actual cases, i. e. to those originating in the upper hemisphere of a circle. Accordingly, 'a turn from the top to the right', as one dictionary formulates it, covers only half a hemisphere, and is, thus, even more inadequate. So, what seems at minimum to be required is something along the lines of 'any complete circuit, or any segment thereof', from the top to the right'. Still, from an obverse perspective, the motion that that describes will appear as counterclockwise. Perhaps, then, given that magnetic north and the location of the rising of the sun seemed fixed, independent of any observer, a definition of 'clockwise' in terms of a 'N-E-S-W direction of rotation' seems promising. However, that one is contingent on the happenstances of the magnetic field and of the regularity of the spinning of the earth. Thus, the applicability of even the compasswise definition to extra-terrestrial processes remains questionable, so an adequate definition of 'clockwise' remains lacking.