The other day this kid (15?) came up to me by Nando's and asked me the time and I was like "10 to 7" and she looked at me all confused and said "I don't understand that" so I said "6:50" and she said "thanks". Kids these days can't tell the time. London is over.
I'd make a point of continuing to use my favourite "five and twenty to.. or past.." and always describe 12:00 as noon.
Pet peeve: when they say "10am in the morning" or "2pm that afternoon". But I'm never clear what to put after 12 when you mean "noon" or "midnight".
“12 noon” or “12 midnight” usually does the trick. If you want to be picky, 12am is noon and 12pm is midnight but that’s best avoided because most of the world isn’t sure which is which either
I’m pretty sure it’s the other way around! 12pm is noon and 12am is midnight! But that may simply illustrate your point…
00:01 and 12:01 are definitely am and pm
The logic behind the general convention is that 12:00:01pm unambiguously refers to one second after noon, and likewise with 12:00:01am after midnight. So it is least complicated to keep the same label with similar timestamps at 12:00:00, even though technically neither makes sense in that instant.
This is why 12:00 hrs should be called noon. It is neither am nor pm by definition.
Correct, but human experience has still led to the convention. Even a millisecond past noon is 12:00:00.001pm. One can't perceive an exact instant, so the noon=12pm elision has become natural to many. Where precision is needed, like in law or transport, the problem is often avoided in other ways.
am = "ante meridiem" (before midday) pm = "post meridiem" (after midday). So one would think that either is wrong in the case of noon and both are correct in the case of midnight?
Sure, you could say that, but the convention of elision nonetheless evolved naturally for many, as it typically isn't practical to make a distinction between 12:00:00.000 and 12:00:00.001.
You’re right. I managed to get it wrong even though I know what it’s supposed to be.
I once told a UK friend it was 'quarter of', and he had no idea what that meant.
Well that means a quarter of a pound obv 🤦🏻♂️😂
Man, I need to stop trying to make jokes with Brits.
Definitely two nations divided by a common language
My kids don’t understand anything more complicated than one number followed by another. “Quarter past six? Oh you mean six fifteen.”
How are they reading analog clock faces? A lot of these expressions seem like ways of talking about that.
They basically can't do it, I know my kids can't. Why would they, when you think about it? They're raised on phones
Yep, exactly. We have an analog clock in the kitchen. They don't have a clue how to read it even though they were taught how to at school. Just no need to remember.
Wondering if this affects how people think about time. For me ten minutes *is* a 60-degree angle. How long a series of tasks takes is coded as pie slices of varying sizes which I mentally arrange in the pie dish.
Huh interesting. Yeah I dunno, their brains are just wired up differently I guess
They can't
Can confirm.
They should try Norwegian/Danish counting: “ten to half three” = 2.20.
🤯
Aaaaaah we’re on French course week and one of the exercises is to see if you can understand numbers in French - eg 8,983,740,202.
*quatre-vingt-dix* Too silly for francophone belgians is very silly indeed.
The Danish take this to extremes. Fifty is half sixty, seventy is half eighty and ninety is half a number that doesn’t exist. They also spell 60 and 80 wrong in 50 and 70 - 50=halvtreds, 60=tres, 70=halvfjerds, 80=firs.
🙃
In full, it goes: 5/10/quarter past [hour] 10/5 to half [next hour] half [next hour] 5/10 past half [next hour] quarter/10/5 to [next hour]
In Russian it's: 6 Then 6:05 is 'five of seven' 6:10 'ten of seven' etc 6:30 is 'half of seven' Then 6:35 is 'less seven, twenty-five' etc Nuts
That’s even worse - a kind of passive aggressive reminder that your life is sliding away hour by hour. Imagine if you turned 41 and they called it one of fifty.
Insanity
That's as bonkers as the German: "three-quarters three" means 2.45 (the logic being that the hour is 3/4 of the way towards 3)
But you got him! It was, of course 18:50
In all fairness someone in London once told me to meet them at "half 10" and I had no idea whether that was 9:30 (the objectively rational way to process such a phrase) or 10:30 (what I now understand this means, after enjoying a nice cappuccino and a pastry for an hour as I waited).
If we're being "objective", clearly "half 10" means 5… ;) *quickly ducks out of the way of all the furniture being thrown in my direction from multiple linguistic traditions*
See this is why I only accept stardate as a valid time reference.
Adopting this as my personal scheduling conceit
And in German it does mean a half hour before.
It’s five minutes to midnight for London
Americans also don’t understand this format which has led to baffling looks when I tell them it’s ’quarter to 4’
I’ll never understand how this is because there is an analog clock in every classroom
…that none of the kids look at.
Ten two seven? Just say 10:27!
😂
My son understands that, but it will be 6:48, and my wife will ask what time it is, and I'll say 10 to 7, and he will complain that its 6:48 not 6:50. He demands precision.
Good lad
Just say "half past the monkey's ass."
Try "a quarter after five" sometime.
They say this on the World Service too sometimes
Next time try “seven bells of the afternoon watch.” This was a maritime nation before woke.
"woke"? Seriously?
NO, not seriously. It was a joke.
Okay, got it. Text can lack tone. Thanks! 😊
That text did not lack time though. Unless you thought that "seven bells of the afternoon watch" was a serious suggestion...
Maybe. But isn't time an imaginary construct?
It is now, thanks to woke.
Damn. Two cups of coffee and I'm still not woke.
Alan. 😂
Gurnemanz: Du sieh'st, mein Sohn, zum Raum wird hier die Zeit. Parsifal, Act 1.
Didn’t Marx say time was invented by clock sellers?
Groucho said a lot of wacky things.
Boom boom tisch
Then explain to her why dog watches are curtailed
I just tell them it's almost Vespers
This is the experience of living in the US. Half past six short circuits brains.
small children asking strangers the time? what is this, a Dickens novel?
Ikr, it did cross my mind that I was about to get mugged TBF to the London Is Over brigade
My son always does American style - 18:50. (Though that’s how we say it here in Germany too).
I’ve always heard that referred to as “Military time”
Blimey, there are some real literalists on this site aren’t there? It’s not just Americans failing to understand British humour or irony, it’s a failure to detect any form of nuance in “text”. If something seems like an odd sentiment on here, do try using your imagination before getting “riled”.
Twas ever thus
I know that, since the days of Jack de Manio, radio presenters have had a complicated relationship with time, but I was interested to hear someone announce the time as '34 minutes past 6' the other morning. An interesting amalgam of two systems.
Grew up w phones as watches
"O, call back yesterday, bid time return"
I guess understanding “10 to 7” in analog time is like understanding “two-and-six” in old money for a pint of lager …
2 and 6, for a pint of lager? were you drinking champagne top? and also I don't think people lagered til at least 10 year after decimalisation, it was still exotic stuff
Maybe it was two-and-six for a packet of 20 … I’ll say cigarettes. 😉
Harp Lager, well established by decimalisation, methinks. Maybe only in Ireland?
Phones. That’s the issue.
I am going to start saying things like: ‘It’s five and twenty past’. And start smoking a briar.
He needed it to be in Shariah time format. All Khan’s fault. Etc etc
Just you wait, we’ll be using Arabic numerals before you know it!
my child did the same to me. I do not get this. Am I my parents when i said something was 'wicked' and they looked at me all agog?
She could tell time totally fine, she just didn’t understand your outdated way of speaking
Bit harsh tbh, it was a perfectly harmless interaction
You made the mistake of committing levity on Bluesky.
I agree, this definitely isn’t the end of London
I'm probably in a minority but I actually think this is kind of fine.
I still do the “horns” sign with my hands, holding to my head to ask colleagues whether they are on a call. This will cease making sense in the workplace v soon.
You can tweak the gesture just a little to make it look like a headset. Gamer kids understand that one.
The most shocking thing about this is that "got time?" wasn't directly followed by "give me your phone". Kids these days can't even mug properly.