Normally idioms are language specific, but number of hours and days are the same.

  • zlatiah@lemmy.world
    5·
    2 months ago

    I have actually never heard anyone say it this way specifically where I grew up… so technically the answer is “no”?

    I tried to dug around and found a Reddit post saying this:

    “The Oxford English Dictionary (OED) defines the term as “twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week; constantly”. It lists its first reference to 24/7 to be from a 1983 story in the US magazine Sports Illustrated in which Louisiana State University player Jerry Reynolds describes his jump shot in just such a way: 24-7-365.”

    So this might be a fairly new idiom? Which would explain why it’s not really a thing in a lot of cultures… but I assume they have their ways of referring to this.

    number of hours and days are the same

    Ok akktually Japan has a rather interesting 30-hour day thing in the context of businesses… but jokes aside, the 24-hour, 7-day week system is indeed quite universal

      • zlatiah@lemmy.world
        2·
        2 months ago

        East Asia; again, never heard anyone refer to “24/7” specifically (ok maybe at more hipster places that try to imitate American businesses?)… There might be a similar idiom for it but I genuinely couldn’t think of any off the top of my head

  • Björn Tantau@swg-empire.de
    612·
    2 months ago

    Number of days in a week (or the existence of weeks at all) aren’t universal, though. And technically not even hours.

    Only the length of the day, year and moon cycle are universal (or earthiversal).

    • kersploosh@sh.itjust.works
      33·
      2 months ago

      Your first point is technically correct, but 24-hour days and 7-day weeks are a de facto global standard at this point in history. There are outliers, like the Javanese 5-day week or the experimental 5-day Soviet calendar, but they are few and far between.