Is 12PM noon or midnight? ... and why?

Answer 1

There is no logic in the 12 hour system AM PM, AM stands for ANTE MERIDIAN, and PM for POST MERIDIAN, so at noon the meridian is above your head is not before nor after, if you think Morning and Night then 12 AM is noon if you think 12:30 afternoon the meridian has passed so it should be 12:30 PM so during daytime 12:00 is AM and 12:01 one minute later is PM, looks weird, when writing programs when you enter 12:00 they ask you night or day, Microsoft excel thinks 12:00 PM is noon.

Answer 2

Is 12pm Noon

Answer 3

It's Midnight

Answer 4

Part of my job is writing construction contracts. The industry does not use the terms "12 a.m." or "12 p.m." We specify "Noon" or "Midnight" to prevent any misinterpretation. For military and some government contracts, we use the 24-hour system, where Noon is 12:00 and Midnight is 24:00.

At home, If I want to record a TV program that ends at Midnight, I set the recorder for 11:59 p.m. to ensure that the recorder does not get confused.

Answer 5

Well, logically, numbers should start at 1 or 0. Thus 1am in the early morning should logically end at 12am (noon). But 12pm is noon. Confusing ain''t it?

Answer 6

You don't always have the opportunity to insert "noon" or "midnight." In many instances you may be faced with a simple choice of "AM" or "PM". The simple answer is 12AM is midnight and 12PM is noon. Nobody really cares about the post-meridiem and ante-meridiem garbage. For arguments sake, one "plank" (smallest measure of time) after the meridiem you are officially in the PM. Since most events relating to time are referring to the start or beginning then you would logically have to say 12PM for a noon start and of course 12AM for a midnight start.

Answer 7

I disagree with almost all of the above. Noon has always been 12 AM until the confusion in very recent years, with the advent of compterised clocks, digitised timetables & the rest. The last second of the morning (AM) is still before the first second of the afternoon (PM). Had we suggested at school, that 12 noon was PM and midnight was AM, we'd have been laughed at by both teacher and classmates, as it would have beeen clear we'd missed the principle completely. The same mistakes led to the millennium being celebrated a year early, at the stroke of midnight on 31 Dec 1999, instead of a year later, when the last year of the first millennium was finally complete. Trying to explain the noon "problem" (where did all this confusion come from? - there never used to be any!) for those who didn't learn it correctly at school would necessitate realising that there isn't a point between AM and PM, even though we call it noon. It has to be one or the other - and obviously the very last second of the morning, as the clocks ticks 12, is still AM - and the next second, as it ticks 12.00.01, is PM. Twelve o'clock isn't in between - it's still the morning! I really can't see where all the misunderstandig comes from - it never used to be an issue at all. So 12 midnight is undoubtedly PM. Computers should fit the clock, not the other way round.

Answer 8

According to Yahoo 12pm is noon and they know everything.
To verify add an event to your Yahoo Calendar and schedule a start or end time.
When doing so a pop-up will appear to select the time. 12:00pm appears at the noon location in the list. There you have it; Yahoo has spoken.

Answer 9

AM stands for Ante meridiem which is Latin for before noon. PM stands for Post meridiem which is Latin for after noon.

Clearly 12PM is twelve hours after noon and 12AM is twelve hours before noon, both of which are midnight.

It is, therefore best to use the terms noon and midnight to avoid confusion.

The next problem, of course is "midnight of which day?", the one ending or the one starting. A really good solution to the confusion is, never start anything at midnight. Always start something one minute before or one minute after midnight and avoid the confusion.

Answer 10

12:00 noon is 12:00 M , 11:59 before noon is 11:59 am ., and 12:01 after noon is 12:01 pm , because M means meridian and meridian is an imaginary line called meridian "0" or Greenwich , this meridian mark 12:00 noon , all points on the surface of the earth that are below this meridian from pole to pole meet 12:00 noon. the meridian of Greenwich or "0" is static means that meridian "0" does not move with the rotation of the earth if you look at our planet from the sun the rotation of the earth is from left to right the line in the center of the earth from north to south points on the surface of the earth that are to the left of the line or the meridian "0" are on time AM when the rotation of the earth moves these points to the right side of the meridian they change to PM time, when these points of the planet are just beneath the meridian of Greenwich or "0" this is marking the time 12:00 noon or 12:00 M. it is noon because the imaginary line is always facing the planet earth and the sun

Answer 11

12 noon is neither a.m. nor p.m.

To avoid confusion, the correct designation for twelve o'clock is 12 noon or 12 midnight. Alternatively, the twenty-four-hour-clock system may be used.

The abbreviation a.m. stands for ante-meridiem (before the Sun has crossed the line) and p.m. for post-meridiem (after the Sun has crossed the line). At 12 noon, the Sun is at its highest point in the sky and directly over the meridian. It is therefore neither "ante-" nor "post-".


now this is just me...not the article...but in real life when someone says 12 pm...then mean noon...12 am is midnight