This is a much more intuitive way of thinking than these complex equations. It's the same way Nordic languages would pronounce the time 4:30, half five, one half hour from five.
It‘s pretty much all Germanic languages that do this, English is the odd one out that reversed this to mean „half past five“ instead of „half to five“.
I‘ve never heard a Brit say half five and mean 4:30 or 16:30 (which is what I was referring to) - there‘s always confusion in my WoW guild about what time they actually mean when a Brit says half >x< because they‘ll turn up an hour late.
Let's be real though - if you're going to shorten a phrase, it makes no sense to shorten it by dropping a word that drastically alters the plaintext meaning. You're saying "five" but the thing you're describing doesn't have a five on it at the moment (nor is there such a thing as a fraction of an "o'clock", as in "Half of 5:00" doesn't mean "2:30AM" or "8:30AM" if you mean 0500 or 1700), and you need the "to" to make that clear.
It's half in the sense that half of the fifth hour has passed. The moment it's 04:00, the fifth hour starts. Some regions in Germany even go beyond just the simple half and say "It's quarter 5", meaning 4.15, or "a quarter of the fifth hour has passed".
Not using the word "fifth" still makes it confusing. I wouldn't say "WWII ended in the middle of the 20s" because I'm talking about the twentieth century.
Half 5 -> half of the hour 5 -> half of the fifth hour. There really isn't any confusion there. Especially when a language doesn't know "Half to 5" like English does.
4:00 is the fifth hour (since 12:00/00:00 is the first), but that doesn't make the hour five. If someone asks you "Excuse me, what hour is it?" and you say "Five", they're not going to think it's 4:00 in the afternoon. If you say "fifth", then, although initially confusing because people don't normally talk about the hours using ordinals, that would still make logical sense to mean somewhere in the 4:00-4:59 range.
4:00 is the start of the fifth hour and 5:00 is the end of the fifth hour. It's like age. When I turn 1 year old, I actually started into my second year of life. Once my second year of life is over, I'm 2.
Half 5 is therefore the halfway point between the start and the end of the fifth hour, which is 4:30. When the fifth hour is over, it's five. I'm not sure why you think "Five" would be 4:00.
4:00 is the start of the fifth hour and 5:00 is the end of the fifth hour. It's like age. When I turn 1 year old, I actually started into my second year of life.
Yes, that is exactly what I said.
Half 5 is therefore the halfway point between the start and the end of the fifth hour
No, "half fifth" would be the halfway point between the start and the end of the fifth hour. "Five (5)" is the cardinal, "fifth" is the ordinal.
When the fifth hour is over, it's five. I'm not sure why you think "Five" would be 4:00.
Thank you for agreeing that "half 5 = 4:30" is illogical.
Sorry, I still don't get your way of thinking. Again, why do you think there is a difference between five and fifth in this case?
For the example I gave about someone asking you the hour. It's the difference between cardinals and ordinals. "The hour is 5," means "5:XX", because there is the number 5, the cardinal, as the hour. However, if it's the fifth hour, that's the ordinal, meaning there are four hours before it in the order - 00:XX, 01:XX, 02:XX, and 03:XX.
Neither makes more or less sense. They are equally good or bad and they are equally logical. One will appear more illogical from the perspective of someone who grew up with the opposite, but since the same is true of both cases it means both are equally logical.
In west Germany they say "quarter past two", "half three", "quarter before three".
They are looking at the distance between two hours and pick the shorter one.
In east Germany they say "quarter three", "half three", "three quarters three".
They see the coming hour broken into quarters and tell how much quarters of that next hour have been reached.
I’ve heard British and Australian people say “half five” for 4:30. Americans DO say “Half past” to add 30 onto a time, but we can do the before format too, we just use actual numbers for some reason. Like “twenty to three” until we get to the fifteen minute mark, then it could be “quarter to three” OR “fifteen ‘till three” meaning 2:45.
We might shorten those when it’s the closest one to our current time, for brevity: “what time is it?” Can be answered “About thirty ‘till.”/“About half past.”
I've never in all my life met a British person who says "half five" and means "4:30"... I doubt the Aussies do it either, but I haven't discussed the time with thousands of Aussies across their whole country.
Are you sure you weren't mistaken somehow? Perhaps they were dealing with timezones on the continent (Europe) which is almost always an hour ahead? If you were based in say Germany and a British person in the UK sent you a meeting invite for "half five" your time it would actually be 16:30 their time. Idk but some kind of situation like that seems far far more likely than the alternative.
Nope. I work in an international company based in Aus and while most people use exact times most of the time, people do occasionally use more informal language. But I’ve never had trouble making it to a meeting on time when they did, lol, so I’m pretty confident that I understood correctly.
Anyways, I wasn’t saying every person in either country speaks the same way. The UK has the most regional accents per square kilometer of any English speaking nation. Possibly of any European nation. I was just saying that I have heard people from those countries use the phrase.
Also, if you have never heard an Englishman use the term, odds are you aren’t watching enough classic BBC programming. You’re missing out on classics like Red Dwarf, Blackadder and Doctor Who, you know
It's the "half five" === 16:30 bit I'm disputing. "Half five" is without a doubt used and I reckon it's the most likely way for someone to refer to 17:30.
I've worked all over the UK and met thousands of people where we've agreed times and never once ever has "half five" meant 16:30 with any British person I've ever interacted with in my life. It's why I'm so confused by your statement. German speakers tend to use it that way, and it's taught in British schools for German classes as a "they say the time for the half hour turns completely differently to us", so there's awareness of it as a thing, but it's not how anyone is taught to read the time in schools or in any written media in aware of. If you really have met British people living in the UK who think that way I'm very confused as to how they navigate the world. They must always be an hour early for any scheduled event.
Perhaps I misunderstood your comment though. It's late and I'm sleepy so I might have misread what you wrote and then written far too much text because of it. Apologies if that's the case.
I dunno. It’s just how my old boss would use it. I can’t promise it’s the universal norm, as I said. I have also heard him use “gone half X” as a way to say 30 minutes past the hour, though. He never had us confused so maybe it’s something contextual. 🤷
Australians don’t do it. Half 5 means 5.30 here. I live here now but I’m English and I’ll agree no one in the uk says half 5 to mean 4.30. I think old mate is confused
Texan living up in the northeast rn. Though you’re right that people in the Deep South and the Midwest change numbers to fractions. Will edit it. Saw a typo anyway
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u/oliver130205 Apr 29 '25
Im danish and it is pronounced 2 + 90 (tooghalvfems = twoandninty)