the word "noon"

Frances   Friday, April 22, 2005, 04:45 GMT
Joel and Jim - I think NZ will be first to be a republic. I think NZ by nature elects more liberal/innovative governments than OZ. NZ by nature seems more independent in its thinking/philosophies and less reliant on alliances.

Jim - the reason why Aussies voted republic was because the pre-set republican model that was placed to them and not the initial question that should have been put: "Do you want a republic". In given time and with the right model in place, it is more likely that it is going to happen than not. However, I am not sure that it will happen in the near future, I think people are complacent going down the Howard line.
Frances   Friday, April 22, 2005, 04:53 GMT
By the way, those interested,

"noon" comes from "nona hora", Latin for the ninth hour, which was 3pm in the Roman Days. So I guess 6am was the start of the Roman day back then ...
Joel   Friday, April 22, 2005, 06:18 GMT
Thankyou and sorry to the rest for taking you guys on a detour off the topic well we back on track.
Jim   Friday, April 22, 2005, 08:36 GMT
Frances,

Yeah, that's why I wrote "one republican proposal" (which isn't really much of a description, I'd have to admit). It is Howard's fault for not asking "Do you want a republic?" but "Do you want this kind of republic?" I'm kind of apathetic about the whole deal though: is it even worth the expense of a referendum? P'haps I'm complacent but I've had enough of the Howard line.

Anyway back to "noon" & a tricky question for ya. How can "12 pm" or "12 am" mean anything at all when the "m" stands for "noon"? I avoid those expressions.
Frances   Friday, April 22, 2005, 08:41 GMT
Jim - My understanding was that the "m" in am and pm is meridiem, where meridies - latin for midday, and meridiem is just a midpoint.

Anyway lets stick clear of the republic, I don't want to have this post archived.
JJM   Friday, April 22, 2005, 21:29 GMT
Latin lesson.

"meridies" - noon; midday

Hence

"ante meridiem" (a.m.) - before midday

"post meridiem" (p.m.) - after midday

"meridies" becomes "meridiem" because the prepositions "ante" and "post" require the direct object (accusative) form.
Lazar   Friday, April 22, 2005, 23:30 GMT
Maybe they associate "noon" with Westerns, as in "high noon". :-)
Joe   Saturday, April 23, 2005, 00:29 GMT
I'm from Scotland and I never use the word ''noon''. It sounds very strange to me.

Jim,

AM and PM, or is that A.M. and P.M. (which is correct? Do you know Jim?) are seen on digital clocks here in Scotland and so I use those terms mainly because I'm use to seeing them on my clocks.

P.S.

Jim,

I don't think that ''pm'' and ''am'' (what you wrote) are the correct ways to write those abbreviations, especially since ''am'' is already an existing word meaning the first person present of ''be'' and because they're abbreviations and abbreviations are usually written in capital letters.

I was surprised that there were places where ''noon'' didn't sound antiquated. I've heard the word used on television many times by Americans.
KESS   Saturday, April 23, 2005, 00:44 GMT
this is the official FORMAL spelling:

12 00 = twelve hundred hours
Chamonix   Saturday, April 23, 2005, 16:57 GMT
I think I heard Amish saying "midday", but I am not 100% sure.
JJM   Sunday, April 24, 2005, 11:14 GMT
How "am" and "pm" are correctly written depends entirely on what your views of the period/full stop in abbreviations are. I personally never use these but write "am" or "pm." It's hardly likely that "am" will be confused with "am" in "I am." Context will take care of that.

We don't confuse "wind" in "wind the clock" with its homograph in "the strong wind blew."

There is NO agreed formal spelling for 1200 - and why would you write it in full anyway?
Chamonix   Sunday, April 24, 2005, 12:55 GMT
"How "am" and "pm" are correctly written"
JJM,

Those are acronyms and they are supposed to be written with capital letters.
Deborah   Sunday, April 24, 2005, 13:29 GMT
All the law firms I've worked for (in San Francisco) use "a.m." and "p.m." All of these firms base their style on the Chicago Manual of Style, which is the foremost reference for writing style in the US. (I'm only guessing that this is what the Manual recommends, based on the fact that it is the form so many law firms use.)
JJM   Sunday, April 24, 2005, 21:21 GMT
As I said, how "am" and "pm" are correctly written depends entirely on what your views of the period/full stop in abbreviations are.
Kirk   Sunday, April 24, 2005, 22:16 GMT
Yeah, writing "12 am" or "12 pm" as Jim did is a very common way of doing it, and I highly doubt there are confusions between the verb "am" and the expression used for time (and of course in the spoken language they sound completely different anyway). I personally don't like the look of capitalized "12 AM," etc., but some people do write it that way. As Deborah said, "12 a.m." is common, as well.

But, of course, in the spoken language, at least here we're more likely just to say "noon" or "midnight." I rarely say "midday," unless I'm saying something like "the midday sun is stronger today than normal." Something I've noticed is that here in America we're much more likely to give the exact time or close to it, as compared to the whole "quarter to" "half past" expressions that I often hear in British speech. If someone asks me what time it is, I'll look at my watch (or, more appropriately, my cellphone) and say "nine thirty-two," never "around half-past nine." Similarly, 9:15 is always "nine fifteen" as I say it, never "a quarter past nine." I probably shouldn't speak for all Americans but it does seem more common to do this here in American speech than in British speech.