Comment on Clock logic
BakerBagel@midwest.social 17 hours agoWhy are the 60 minutes in an hour but 24 hours in a day? What functional difference is there between tne 12 and 24 hour clock? Are you showing up to your friend’s dinner party at 6am because you weren’t sure what time they wanted to start dinner? Are you unsure if your picnic is supposed to be right after midday or the middle of the night? Maybe your friend wanted to meet up for coffee and a bagel when you normally go to bed instead of right before you head off for lunch
I asked why the am/pm system is apparently more convenient and consistent than the 24h system. I didn’t ask about 24h in a day and 60min in an hour.
What functional difference is there between tne 12 and 24 hour clock?
You need 2 numbers and 2 letters to accurately specify time in the 12h clock instead of just 2 numbers. Seems convenient to me.
You don’t need the am or pm 90% of the time because obviously a lunch date is happening sometime around noon, not midnight. A lunar eclipse or meteor shower isn’t visible while the sun is up, or a midnight snack isn’t happening in the middle of the day. Obviously if you are talking trains and flights, you need AM and PM. But people who are used to 12 hour time don’t want to figure out when 16:00 is, so they don’t.
Fun fact: Many countries use both systems actually.
For speaking, it’s quicker to say something like: “The party starts at 8” instead of “The party starts at 20 o’clock”.
For writing though, you would never use the 12 hour system.
If you know basic addition and you know how a 12 hour clock functions, then you know how a 24 hour clock functions. If you can’t figure it out, that doesn’t make it inconvenient, it just makes you incredibly stupid.
froh42@lemmy.world 3 hours ago
Because 12 and 60 are great numbers to divide. You can take a half of it, a third and a quarter and still get whole numbers.
Iirc the French did try decimal time at one time, it was not convenient.