Listen, it’s easier, especially when you work with scientific or industrial systems
are Americans really confused with 15:30?
No, it’s just a familiarity thing and not even rare. It’s like switching between metric and imperial units, if you’re used to seeing something in one format it can be jarring to switch it in your head at a moments notice. A lot of people in the US use 24 hr time if they have a job relating to documentation or if their working hours can cause confusion.
For example, I have a client that has to document received material and they are open from 04:00 - 22:00. They use the 24 hr format because it is common to receive material at both 04:00 and 16:00 and having to make an extra column to type am or pm on their logs is stupid and is just another opportunity to make a mistake.
It’s really not a big deal to anyone, if you get a job that uses it then you switch your phone and within a week or two it’s second nature. Every blue moon someone will notice that all your clocks are set to a 24 hr clock and someone might ask why or what you do to need it, but that’s it.
t’s like switching between metric and imperial units,
I’d wager the imperial/metric change would be harder than the 12/24 change.
Probably so, but it’s still just immersion. If you work in Celsius every day for 2 weeks you’ll be able to switch Celsius without an issue.
Only inasmuch as I have to count from 12 because I don’t have the built-in instinct for that time format.
You’d get that instinct within at most a week though.
If you see a two-digit number beginning with 1, drop the first number and subtract two from the second number. If your sum is negative, it’s that many hours before noon.
If your number begins with 2, do the same thing. If your number is negative, it’s that many hours before 10pm.
Anything to not subtract 12
I didn’t even know what that number says
One time I was on shrooms in the PMs and it was really hard to figure out what the time was. The literal digits and the concept of time itself at some point.
Otherwise, never had an issue.
Also, is 24hour time not default on most phones? Or did I do that and forget about it at some point, and it’s only me, never paying attention to the time on other people’s phones
what is that, like extra noon or something?
Nah, all you need is a little time to get used to it. It’s my default setting on most of my devices. Once you get used to it, it’s much easier to tell am vs pm at a glance, which is helpful when looking at timestamps (I work in IT, timestamps are important.)
I’m regularly looking at log timestamps and I still need a very brief half second to think about the time lol
Shouldn’t the system be storing timestamps in UTC anyway, and then displaying them in whatever localization settings you have?
I switched after being in a job where “meeting at 6” or “I’ll get in at 9” was 50/50 am or pm and I got sick of guessing and sometimes being 12 hours off.
Written as 1530, mostly only Americans who have been in the military and their friends will know what you mean.
15:30 they’ll know it’s a time.
And doctors, nurses, lab technicians, etc, plus anyone who can subtract twelve.
Yes, it angers and confuses them.
I think they see it as some kind of metric time, and therefore something to be avoided at all costs.
I grew up with a Betamax tape player under the family TV. It had a 24 hour clock and it was the timepiece in the house that was in the right spot to tell us all that it was bedtime. As a result I have an intuitive feel for the 24 hour clock. But if you haven’t used it regularly, which most ordinary Americans don’t, then yeah you just have to stop and do the arithmetic before you can connect 21:00 to your sense of time.
You know what fucks me up is that 21 has a “nine-ness” quality to it now that sometimes makes me mess up real math.
Hah I can believe that.
I’m not technically synaestehtic but I do have strong associations between numbers and colors, days of the week and colors.
Saturday has always been blue. Sunday is red. Number 4 is green, 3 is yellow, etc.
For a time I moved to an Islamic country where Friday is the holy day, not Sunday. So the weekends were Thursday-Friday and not Saturday-Sunday.
What was weird is that my red/blue associations with Saturday/Sunday shifted onto Thursday/Friday after a long time of living like this. And then I left that place and my associations shifted back.
The “nineness” of a thing, as you say, is hard to describe.
oh that’s easy. all multiples of three, you add their digits and the digits add up to three.
also if you’ve made a transposition error (179 instead of 197) you will be off by a multiple of 9.
sorry bookkeepers i just gave away your trade secret. the one.
They think it’s military time. I don’t know why because it doesn’t even read the same. Military would be something like thousand five hundred and thirty hours, we (people with 24h clocks) read it like fifteen thirty or three thirty in the afternoon, or even three thirty and omit the morning/afternoon part because it’s assumed from context.
which is such a stupid way to tell time.
why tf do they concatenate hours and minutes!!! they aren’t even the same units!!!
Not really true either, it’s often called military time as a colloquialism because people will know what you mean and it strangely feels more normal/easier to say than “Twenty Four Hour Clock.”
EDIT: Also for the nomenclature, I personally still refer to time in the 12 hr format when talking, but if for some reason I have to say the 24 hr format it depends on the number. I would also say fifteen thirty for 15:30, but I would say fifteen hundred for 15:00.
THAT’S 1530, PRIVATE!
NOW GIVE ME 20!20 factorial, of fuck
No, it’s just associated with military time and those who don’t have friends from across the pond don’t necessarily know that other countries use that time format.
Just kidding we’re all just stupid
It’s cause crayons that come in 24 packs taste better than the 12 packs
Dealing with dates and times in software will get you formatting using year-month-date and 24 hour time as the least possible chance for confusion.
Date-Month-Year makes more sense to me
Higher chance for it to be interpreted as Month-Date-Year than Year-Month-Date though
fuck timezones. fuck timezones so god damned hard.
everything should be UTC. period.
also, f daylights crazing time!
Someone can’t count past 12.
24hr analog watches are the real shit, though!
Had a good emulated one on my phone homescreen for a long time, but unfortunately app is not supported by newer versions of Android any more… :-(
I’ve been thinking for a while about getting a slow watch, a 24-hour watch that only has an hour hand
l like the idea, but I suspect it often might have the opposite effect as intended.
Imagine e.g. taking a quick glance at the watch to determine if you will still catch the bus - this would most likely result in you sprinting to the bus stop just to be on the safe side…
Wow, never knew that was a thing
Are you talking about a watch with 24 different numbers on it?
Are you talking about a watch with 24 different numbers on it?
Yes, arranged in a circle, 24 at the top, 12 at the bottom, lower part is day, upper part is night.
App also had a daylight indication shading depending on local sunrise/sunset.
Loved it!
When it was super critical I wake or not get paid while working in remote areas, you only have to set your alarm to the wrong am/pm once to change to 24 hour time
if I eat crayons and let another guy fuck my wife am I larping? would it be stolen valor
Can’t larp as an American soldier without raping someone
Don’t want the payroll people confuse the night shift with the morning shift. It’s purely an economical arrangement. Besides I ain’t even American.
Well I’m glad to be an actual us army veteran so I can unapologetically use the 24-hour format, which is easier & makes more sense than the 12-hour format.
I do this because I kept setting AM alarms to PM and missing them. We are not the same.
My sleep schedule is shit. I set everything to 24 hours so that I don’t wake up at 8 PM and think that I’m late for my work at 8 AM.
I started because I used to follow a 28-hour day and would wake up at 6:30, look out the window, and wonder “Which 6:30 though?”
Smash cut to me in college, freaking out, and rushing across campus because I woke up late for my final, and then wondering why it was so dark at 3:30 PM. Even better was when I later actually slept through my final.
American 24-hour user here. Its just a lot easier to calculate time intervals and tell the time from a quick glance with 24-hour time.
What is that image getting across to me? Is that from a film or something?
It can be a benefit for night shift folks because that can really start to mess with your head. A digital watch can be a big help too.
