Argument at Work - Any offers??
 

Is Midnight the start or the end of the day?

ie At 23:55 on 10th March - 5 minutes later would it be Midnight on the 10th March or the 11th March?

Any thoughts

March 11th really, but most people when making an appointment would go for March 10th

It's the next day I think.

Think of it using a 24 hour clock.

March 1st 23:59
March 2nd 0:00

agreed, its technically 00:00 on the 11th (rather than 24:00 on the 10th)

Day begins at 00:00:00 and ends at 23:59:59

What about the time between 23:59:59 and 00:00:00?

Day begins *and* ends at 00:00:00

Just because the explaination above was given to a granularity of one second doesn't mean that there is a missing second! The time between 23:59:59.9999999 (etc.) and 00:00:00 is infinitessimally small so as to be negligeable.

Those long winter nights..... :D

As an aside, my microwave appears to work on the 25-hour clock. At 23:59 it ticks round to 24:00, then 24:01 etc to 24:59

Well, it amuses me!

Sounds like something you bought from Derrick Trotter :D

Maybe it's setup for Mars? It's day (or Sol) is 24hrs 39mins...

Following your reasoning, 23:59:59.9999999 can be considered as 0:00:00. Therefore each day both starts and ends at 0:00:00.

Cant do both .....................
Day starts at 00:00:0000000000000000000000000000000000000 old day finished just before.

When?

What is the gap between 0:00:000000000000000000 and the end of the previous day? None. What's 00:00:00000000000000 minus zero? 0:00:00000000

No it doesnt, because by the time you have got to EXACTLY 00:00 you are already on a different day!!!

at the end of the day................its always midnight lol

I agree. However, if you accept that there's no gap between the end of the previous day and the beginning of the next - it follows that 0:00 must be both the end of the previous day and the beginning of the next.

If you want proof that 23:59:59.999999 recurring is the same as 0:00:00 I can provide it

Go on then....

I'll save you the trouble then... were you going to use:

1/3 = .33333...

2/3 = .66666

1/3 + 2/3 = 1

therefore:

0.33333... + 0.66666... = .999999...

therefore:

1 = .99999...

?

;)

Is there a site on the net which would give the deffinite answer and the proof, so i can take it to work??

Has GMT got a site

If so, it is not relevent to this example because we have made a demarkation, a transition point between 2 days.

The definition of that transition is when the 23:... hours changes to 00:... hours.

Any time prior to 00:00 hours MUST by definition begin with 23:... and therefore must be the previous day.

I'm not talking about a prior time. What I'm saying is that the same instant the next day starts, is the same instant the previous day ends.

No I wasn't going to use that proof - but it is getting off the point a bit. Here's mine. :D

x = 0.99 recurring
10x = 9.99 recurring

10x - x = 9.99 recurring - 0.99 recurring

10x - x = 9.99 recurring - 0.99 recurring
9x = ( 9 + 0.99 recurring ) - 0.99 recurring
9x = 9 + 0.99 recurring - 0.99 recurring
9x = 9
x = 1

Its down to definition. I will concede that the day starts at zero hours and ends when 24 hours have elapsed, however I will not concede that the day ends at the time of day known as 00:00! :D

So Felix, you havn't owned up to what your thoughts are!...

:)

My thoughts are that midnight is 00:00 by definition

Therefore 00:00 must mark the start point of the next day

Hence midnight is the start of the next day

Wouldn't mind some technical site or top proffesor type bloke to put something in writing so i can take it to work

So my word isn't good enough? :mad:

;)

Definition is the key word here. The Gregorian calendar, which we all use, defines midnight as the start of the day.

from a US Navy site

Link

Set you windows clock to 23:59 and then watch the date change a minute later

So if I ask you to meet me at midnight on the 10th do you turn up at 2359 on the 9th or do you turn up at 2359 on the 10th, jeez confused myself there :)
At work it is fairly common to put a shift that finishes at midnight on the same day as 2400Hrs and a shift that starts at midnight and runs into the next day as starting at 0000Hrs,
Gary

Midnight is the mid point of the night (6pm to 6am) hence the term MID-night as it happens in the MIDdle point of the night. The term Midnight was not given as to mean the start of a new day only the mid point of the night. In fact a new day does not start at Midnight but at the first measurable point after that which has transpired as being known as midnight ;)
Therefore Midnight should be used in the context of being attached to the day that the night started in, so it would be logical to express midnight as the end of one day date calculating period and not the start of another day.