How A Jiffy Became A Real Unit Of Time

HELP SUPPORT NAME EXPLAIN ON PATREON: / nameexplain
TIKTOK: / nameexplain
INSTAGRAM: / nameexplainyt
FACEBOOK: / 248812236869988
TWITTER: / nameexplainyt
BOOK: bit.ly/originofnames
MERCH: teespring.com/stores/name-exp...
Thank you to all my Patrons for supporting the channel!
HELP SUPPORT NAME EXPLAIN ON PATREON: / nameexplain
TIKTOK: / nameexplain
INSTAGRAM: / nameexplainyt
FACEBOOK: / 248812236869988
TWITTER: / nameexplainyt
BOOK: bit.ly/originofnames
MERCH: teespring.com/stores/name-exp...
Thank you to all my Patrons for supporting the channel!

Пікірлер: 135

  • @NameExplain
    @NameExplain2 жыл бұрын

    Is there a word like jiffy, meaning a short undetermined amount of time, in your language? And if so what is it?

  • @marienkijne

    @marienkijne

    2 жыл бұрын

    Dutch = ogenblikje (diminutive of ogenblik), meaning blink of an eye, is most common to say when you'll be right back

  • @josh-gt9fm

    @josh-gt9fm

    2 жыл бұрын

    “now in a minute” is the welsh-english equivalent. basically means that you intend to do something, but not in the near future. i.e. “i’ll do the washing up now in a minute.”

  • @parabolaaaaa4919

    @parabolaaaaa4919

    2 жыл бұрын

    splitsecond

  • @The0Stroy

    @The0Stroy

    2 жыл бұрын

    In Polish diminutives of both minute and second (minutka, sekundka) both mean undetermined short amount of time. But what most remind me word jiffy is word "blyskawiczny" - it doesn't mean amount of time but is adjective meaning "instant" or "done on spot" and similarly to "jiffy" is connected to lightning - "blyskawica" in Polish. There is also word for determined amount of time that I never seen equivalent in English - kwadrans - from Latin "quadra" - one-fourth - meaning 1/4 of hour - 15 minutes. When comes to unspecified time - also word "zaraz" I interesting as it means "soon - but in short period of time" - so you can say that something will happen "zaraz" - it mean it will happen in few minutes maximum.

  • @highpath4776

    @highpath4776

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@josh-gt9fm Thats slightly different , and dont recall it being in use when I was in wales but I like it. Jiffy to me implies the length of time to achieve the task, not the time before the task is started.

  • @eshep71
    @eshep712 жыл бұрын

    This reminds me of George Carlin. "Whats quicker? A jiffy or a flash? I think there 2 flashes in a jiffy, myself. But who knows how many Jiffies there are in 2 shakes of a lambs tail."

  • @GamingGardevoir

    @GamingGardevoir

    2 жыл бұрын

    The man who asked the real questions: “how often are you truly fine _and_ dandy?”

  • @eshep71

    @eshep71

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@GamingGardevoir one time, but no one asked me how I was

  • @screwyourhandle

    @screwyourhandle

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@GamingGardevoir I prefer to interpret "fine" as "sensitive and discriminating" and "dandy" as "characteristic of a fashionable man." So I can still be fine and dandy even though I'm miserable and hate everything.

  • @emilyelizabethbuchanan998

    @emilyelizabethbuchanan998

    9 ай бұрын

    That reminds me of the scene in "White Christmas", when Bing Crosby is asking someone over the phone how much something will cost, then says "Wow". Another character asks him "How much is Wow?" and he answers, "Somewhere between "Ouch!" and "Boing!".

  • @SuprousOxide
    @SuprousOxide2 жыл бұрын

    More often use "a minute" or "a second", or just "a sec", for the unspecified short amount of time, even though those are actually very well defined amounts of time.

  • @phs125

    @phs125

    2 жыл бұрын

    Yea, in My language also, We use "a minute" or "a moment"

  • @_Silly

    @_Silly

    2 жыл бұрын

    Yes I barely hear the word "jiffy" but I hear and say "A second" "A minute" " A sec " quite a lot

  • @captainyulef5845

    @captainyulef5845

    2 жыл бұрын

    I always use 'a sec'

  • @sdspivey
    @sdspivey2 жыл бұрын

    The smallest unit of time I know of is a light-Ångström. The time it takes light to go across one Ångström.

  • @Bacopa68

    @Bacopa68

    2 жыл бұрын

    Plank time light path is smaller.

  • @yarone5960

    @yarone5960

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@Bacopa68 Plank time is the smallest possible unit of time, the time it takes light to cross a plank length (which is the smallest possible length)

  • @BLAngel1
    @BLAngel12 жыл бұрын

    My favorite unit of time is a New York Minute. The definition I've heard as the amount of time between when the traffic light turned green and when then the guy behind you honked his horn.

  • @captainyulef5845

    @captainyulef5845

    2 жыл бұрын

    Is this real or a joke? I really can't tell...

  • @imaginox9
    @imaginox92 жыл бұрын

    We need to get Matto here

  • @jaysonvancouofficial6100

    @jaysonvancouofficial6100

    2 жыл бұрын

    finally, I've scrolled this far to find a chatto 😂

  • @brianedwards7142
    @brianedwards71422 жыл бұрын

    We have a Jiffy Lube downunder. We also have the infamous jiffy pot: a compressed peat pellet with a fine textile covering. By placing it in water it will swell into a germination pot a bit bigger than a golf ball so that, for example a teenage boy (or girl) could germinate seeds on their windowsill very easily. The whole thing is planted out at the second pair of true leaves. Jiffy seems the sort of word Bertie Wooster would use.

  • @itslydiabxtch
    @itslydiabxtch2 жыл бұрын

    If this was requested, I need to know if they are a fan of a certain Australian snake

  • @NevermindHDx

    @NevermindHDx

    2 жыл бұрын

    If so, are they able to tie their shoes?

  • @itslydiabxtch

    @itslydiabxtch

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@NevermindHDx Yes, but they can't afford sleeves

  • @_Silly

    @_Silly

    2 жыл бұрын

    Frank

  • @omegaO_O

    @omegaO_O

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@NevermindHDx do they know something about something?

  • @NevermindHDx

    @NevermindHDx

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@omegaO_O An important question yet to be answered.

  • @kevinmartin7760
    @kevinmartin77602 жыл бұрын

    Jiffy Pop popcorn has existed since before microwaves. It comes ready to pop on the stovetop or campfire in an aluminum foil pan with a pleated foil cover that can expand as the corn pops, ending up looking like a chef's hat.

  • @Bacopa68

    @Bacopa68

    2 жыл бұрын

    Yeah, you put it on a gas stove, and the pleated foil cover expanded into a serviceable bowl in the shape of a chef's hat.

  • @pharmesq
    @pharmesq2 жыл бұрын

    The use of a jiffy as a specific unit of time reminds me of other unusual units of measure, such as a "barn" (as in 'you couldn't hit the broadside of a barn") and closely related units of "outhouse" and "shed" used in nuclear physics.

  • @highpath4776

    @highpath4776

    2 жыл бұрын

    Large amount of personal things (or a haul of monetary loot) a Shedful.

  • @veggiet2009
    @veggiet20092 жыл бұрын

    Pretty sure "ticks" referred to ticks of a clock way before computers existed

  • @highpath4776

    @highpath4776

    2 жыл бұрын

    And possibly before that, two verification marks, maybe on wages for stone masons - the cutter and the finisher or similar trades or tasks,

  • @JeremyWS
    @JeremyWS2 жыл бұрын

    A Jiffy is a word that I use from time to time. I like this video. Keep up the good work. "Jiff" is the name of a brand of peanut butter here in the USA. I use that brand of peanut butter a lot.

  • @trien30

    @trien30

    2 жыл бұрын

    Peanut butter brand is spelled Jif, not Jiff.

  • @JeremyWS

    @JeremyWS

    2 жыл бұрын

    @@trien30 : I looked it up and you are right, I did spell it wrong. But I do use the peanut butter.

  • @christopherdeclan1486
    @christopherdeclan14862 жыл бұрын

    did you know that a jiffy is a real unit of time!???

  • @samwill7259
    @samwill72592 жыл бұрын

    Choosy moms choose...JIF-fy

  • @mozquiff1155
    @mozquiff11552 жыл бұрын

    Those of us of a certain vintage will recall that Jiffy was a brand of condoms, bringing a whole new meaning to "see you in a jiffy"...

  • @highpath4776

    @highpath4776

    2 жыл бұрын

    Which makes me wonder that was where the phrase became more popular from ? (I'll have it done in a Jiffy). But why call those padded envelopes Jiffy Bags (what was the company thinking of !)

  • @Keelsman
    @Keelsman2 жыл бұрын

    Loved this! Thanks for another curious and greatly amusing video 🥰 Just to tease - 7:49 "astromoner" misnomer 🤣

  • @PakBallandSami
    @PakBallandSami2 жыл бұрын

    UTC Coordinated Universal Time is since 1960 the underlying world standard time for most modern metric times, splitting a day and a night into 24 hours, each of 60 minutes with 60 seconds in each, and adjusted once in a while with leap seconds.

  • @Ishan.khanna
    @Ishan.khanna2 жыл бұрын

    This vid broke view counters

  • @michaelturner2806
    @michaelturner28062 жыл бұрын

    Less of a word, but more of a regional idiom popular in the southern US, is "two shakes of a lamb's tail". Similar idioms like 'before you can say [a word or phrase]' are neat, ie 'I'll be back before you can say Jack Robinson'. But that can divert into a discussion of tons of interesting phrases, while your focus seems to be on single words.

  • @Benni777
    @Benni7772 жыл бұрын

    I’ve also heard the phrase, “be back in a jiff” being used before. Must be a faster way of saying, “be back in a jiffy.” ☺️

  • @Benni777

    @Benni777

    2 жыл бұрын

    Speaking of “jif,” you also forgot the brains “Jif,” the peanut butter brand. ☺️

  • @benthomason3307
    @benthomason33072 жыл бұрын

    I absolutely love the Jiffy character you drew.

  • @ArchiIux
    @ArchiIux2 жыл бұрын

    Did you know a jiffy is an actual measurement of time?

  • @RosyMiranto
    @RosyMiranto2 жыл бұрын

    *happy DarkViperAU noise*

  • @PakBallandSami
    @PakBallandSami2 жыл бұрын

    this is such an interesting topic time keeping is a really important peat of our life especially in the modern world it is also very to learn about some lesser know unites of time becuase it have us batter understand how we got how we hot to this point plus i really like the art style great video man

  • @TheProfProfessor
    @TheProfProfessor2 жыл бұрын

    This might just be a family thing from one outback town in NSW but “directly” is one that I favour

  • @PakBallandSami
    @PakBallandSami2 жыл бұрын

    my favorite unit of time is the roman time divided the time from sun rise to sunset in 12 hours, so the length varied over year locally, and with the latitude, and the night was split into 4 watches.

  • @floris3239
    @floris32392 жыл бұрын

    In Dutch you have the expression "bliksemsnel" which means as fast as lightning and used in the same way as jiffy.

  • @saurabhbagai5982
    @saurabhbagai59822 жыл бұрын

    My favorite video yet

  • @gyorokpeter
    @gyorokpeter2 жыл бұрын

    As a foreign learner of English I didn't actually hear about this word until it started appearing all over the place in ads in London. It's the name of another "within 10 minutes" grocery delivery company, of which there are many right now.

  • @danielleporter1829
    @danielleporter18292 жыл бұрын

    Jiffy is also a brand of boxed, multiflavored muffin mix , most popular, cornbread mix in the US. We also have Jiffy Lube oil change places stateside.

  • @raynitaylor1912
    @raynitaylor19122 жыл бұрын

    Well, my understanding was that the old Analogs had Roman numerals. The number 4 in numerals is IV. The I use to be both a J and Y. So JV > Jivvy > Jiffy. The 4 on the clock is 4 seconds or 20 minutes. So to me a jiffy was ⅓ an hour. With multiple jiffies referring to a multiple of 4 seconds.

  • @matthewhenthorn3343
    @matthewhenthorn33432 жыл бұрын

    my physics teacher once said i'll be back in a minute and I timed him. he was about one minute 30 seconds. surely a moment would have been a better term for him to use.

  • @eflinneflinn
    @eflinneflinn2 жыл бұрын

    In Commodore 64 BASIC, a Jiffy is 1/60th of a second, the smallest interval that BASIC can resolve.

  • @phs125
    @phs1252 жыл бұрын

    Some time references in my language With some special situations, "He forgets it by the time his tail reaches the place of his head" (goldfish memory) "He won't be done until the female cat says meow" (long time) "He doesn't wake up until sun hits his bum" (very late) "It won't be done until the zodiac transition after tomorrow comes" (never)

  • @RedSkylinex60
    @RedSkylinex602 жыл бұрын

    This will take a loooooooooong time.

  • @alittlepeaceandkarma
    @alittlepeaceandkarma2 жыл бұрын

    Most people say "I'm going for a slash, or a piss" where I live.

  • @thomaswade3072
    @thomaswade3072 Жыл бұрын

    "Hot minute" is the longer standing phrase over "hot second".

  • @wendychavez5348
    @wendychavez53482 жыл бұрын

    Wow, all of this is to technical for my overloaded brain! Thank you for your exhaustive research!

  • @ToastGreeting
    @ToastGreeting2 жыл бұрын

    Normal people: It'll be done in a jiffy! *5 mins later*. Done Gilbert Lewis: Done It will be done in a jiffy.

  • @trien30
    @trien302 жыл бұрын

    I was thinking about Jiffy Lube or Jif peanut butter. Heard about "In a jiffy" a very long time ago.

  • @chucksallstar89
    @chucksallstar89 Жыл бұрын

    In Austrian German: "A Oitzerl". It's like a jiffy

  • @Not_Aran8276
    @Not_Aran8276 Жыл бұрын

    A dude from Australia that can't afford sleeves, owns a Lexus, also states that "Cougars were never in mission" as well as have purchased a $702 Burger from McDonald's in the past, should have watched this

  • @sams3015
    @sams30152 жыл бұрын

    That Simpsons clip made me laugh an unreasonable amount

  • @herschelwright4663
    @herschelwright46632 жыл бұрын

    Jiffy Park and Jiffy Dump on Seinfeld.

  • @stapuft
    @stapuft2 жыл бұрын

    "two ticks" comes from actual clocks, not computer clocks, actual clocks "tick" once per second" so "two ticks" is the same as "two seconds", whcih is actually a "short unspecified amount of time" as no one who says that LITERALLY means "two seconds" they just mean, "quickly"

  • @zaco-km3su
    @zaco-km3su2 жыл бұрын

    If the word jiffy means the time light travels in vacuum for a specific distance (1 cm or the distance equal to the length of a proton) that is a reference back to its origin.

  • @leehaseley2164
    @leehaseley21642 жыл бұрын

    In the northern Thai Lanna language "gam diew" would mean jiffy. It refers to a single handful.

  • @VictorLima-mv4ni
    @VictorLima-mv4ni2 жыл бұрын

    VarpDikerUN

  • @HalfEye79
    @HalfEye792 жыл бұрын

    So, thieve's cant is like the "Gaunersprache". From this language, one word is widely known. The word is "Kohldampf", which literally means "cabbage-steam". When my information is correct it is a compound of the word "Kohler", which means "hunger", and "Dampf" which also means "hunger". So "Kohldampf" means "hunger-hunger". That fits the usage. Because you say, that you have "Kohldampf", when you are very hungry.

  • @myrddinemrys1332

    @myrddinemrys1332

    2 жыл бұрын

    It's rather like Cockney Rhyming Slang, another language from England designed to confound the authorities. For example 'apples and pairs' means 'stairs'.

  • @highpath4776

    @highpath4776

    2 жыл бұрын

    Filthy Dirty

  • @Bacopa68

    @Bacopa68

    2 жыл бұрын

    There are multiple examples of cryptolects. Rhyming slang of London is well known. The Polari spoken by gay men over a larger area of SE England is probably the most developed English cryptolect. "Jive" variants of AAVE in the US were cryptic to white folks up north, but fairly understandable to Southern white people who speak an informal dialect not that different from AAVE.

  • @Brettski_1234
    @Brettski_12342 жыл бұрын

    I use the term I'll be back in a jiffy all the time 🤣

  • @Leofwine
    @Leofwine2 жыл бұрын

    I thought a “jiffy” meant “one half frame of video, or one sixtieth of a second”. Which is what I heard in this old video about computer animation (at 42:35): kzread.info/dash/bejne/mI11yJOPYL2sc7g.html

  • @AllieThePrettyGator
    @AllieThePrettyGator2 жыл бұрын

    Jiffy is just a old phrase

  • @anerdwithaswitch9686
    @anerdwithaswitch96862 жыл бұрын

    It's probably because of my background as a physics major, but personally I don't find zeptoseconds and other short units of time of the same ilk to be that unusual. The second is an SI unit, after all, and yocto-, zepto-, atto-, femto-, pico-, nano-, micro-, and mili- are all metric prefixes. It's actually probably less common for people to use large prefixes for time. You don't really hear people talking about kiloseconds or megaseconds.

  • @johnrigler8858
    @johnrigler8858 Жыл бұрын

    When I was a little boy, I invented a unit of time. I insisted that 100mulacows= 1 second! I don't how I came up with that, but I remember telling my parents that I would take out the garbage in 30 mulacows!

  • @makouras
    @makouras2 жыл бұрын

    That clock ticking in the background...

  • @lolman533
    @lolman5332 жыл бұрын

    10:56 shouldn't it be "I used to be somebody"?

  • @seanchadwick9036
    @seanchadwick90362 жыл бұрын

    In the USA, Jiffy, is also the name of a brand peanut butter.

  • @highpath4776
    @highpath47762 жыл бұрын

    So why was Jif ( Cream cleaner for kitchen and bathroom surfaces) renamed Cif ?

  • @mikearndt8210
    @mikearndt82102 жыл бұрын

    my favorite is that a moment is technically 90 seconds meaning there are 45 moments in a minute

  • @stapuft
    @stapuft2 жыл бұрын

    okay, "thieves cant" is a "rhyming slang" .....so....my question is HWAT friggin synonym of lightning are they using, that rhymes with jiffy?

  • @philipcollier7805
    @philipcollier7805 Жыл бұрын

    At 07:50 did the narrator say, "astromoner" ??? Funny.

  • @ckl9390
    @ckl9390Ай бұрын

    I thought a Jiffy was specifically 1/60th of a second.

  • @cockneyse
    @cockneyse2 жыл бұрын

    I think your speaking definitely about maths and science gets you into all sorts of problems .... And actually different fields often use the same term for varying things or various terms for the same one... The symbol for imaginary numbers for example... "I" or "j"

  • @DJPJ.
    @DJPJ.2 жыл бұрын

    When you showed the Simpsons clip at the start, i thought the word Abe used for time was just some nonsenceisal word he for he came up with.

  • @KentoKei
    @KentoKei2 жыл бұрын

    Who else was being driven insane with the ticking of the clock in the background?

  • @WhizzKid2012

    @WhizzKid2012

    8 ай бұрын

    I didnt even notice it. What i hate is NativLang vids where every five seconds they say "shshsh". This made me unsub

  • @tabletopwarrior
    @tabletopwarrior2 жыл бұрын

    Jiffy character is like Popeyes Jeep character.

  • @duncandewar9885
    @duncandewar98852 жыл бұрын

    I use moment to mean a minute and a half... usually as "a couple of moments" or 3 minutes

  • @tennesseedarby5319
    @tennesseedarby53192 жыл бұрын

    I’d heard that quarantine came from French “quarantaine” or “forty-ish,” which itself referred to the forty days Jesus spent in the desert resisting the temptation of sin

  • @Tone720
    @Tone7202 жыл бұрын

    How many Jiffies can you carry in a Jiffy Bag then?

  • @theBestInvertebrate
    @theBestInvertebrate Жыл бұрын

    I've heard jiffy can refer to 1/60th of a second, no clue if that is actually a thing though.

  • @burner555
    @burner5555 ай бұрын

    Why are I & II and V & VI so spaced out on the clock

  • @DrepaChorusTCG
    @DrepaChorusTCG2 жыл бұрын

    honestly i prefer the ~33.3picosec definition as it lines up with the etymology of a jiffy, but the doesn't matter

  • @baddeneenlarney5506
    @baddeneenlarney55062 жыл бұрын

    In South Africa we have a jiffy bag. It's a black plastic garbage bag

  • @highpath4776

    @highpath4776

    2 жыл бұрын

    its a brown padded envelope in the UK

  • @xCYKS
    @xCYKS Жыл бұрын

    Did you know

  • @lp-xl9ld
    @lp-xl9ld2 жыл бұрын

    it's miLLisecond (two l's)

  • @Ayy_Doll_Fiddler
    @Ayy_Doll_Fiddler2 жыл бұрын

    Wait! Jiffy is an actual unit for time? So it's not just an IFV driver's lingo?

  • @ahscott2001
    @ahscott20012 жыл бұрын

    I always thought that a fortnight was 12 days.

  • @JamesChen1
    @JamesChen12 жыл бұрын

    hello

  • @FluffyEmmy1116
    @FluffyEmmy11162 жыл бұрын

    Jiffy was the name my aunt's orange cat that I always assumed was named after Jiffy peanut butter until my cousin told me it never existed. Eventually, I found out about the Mandella Effect and my aunt confirmed she doesn't remeber the peanut butter ever existing.

  • @player17wastaken

    @player17wastaken

    Жыл бұрын

    There's a brand of peanut butter called Jif Edit: spelt there's as they're

  • @FluffyEmmy1116

    @FluffyEmmy1116

    Жыл бұрын

    @@player17wastaken Thank you, Captain Obvious.

  • @player17wastaken

    @player17wastaken

    Жыл бұрын

    @@FluffyEmmy1116 based on your comment it seemed that you didn't know that

  • @FluffyEmmy1116

    @FluffyEmmy1116

    Жыл бұрын

    @@player17wastaken Yeah, I've know about Jif for a long time, but I've known about Jiffy for longer, so 🤷

  • @veggiet2009
    @veggiet20092 жыл бұрын

    So wait, "Pig Latin" is sometimes used by parents to try to hide certain pieces of language from young kids that are already learning basic english... so would that put it in the "cant" family of slang????

  • @TheBismrk

    @TheBismrk

    2 жыл бұрын

    I would assume that "Pig Latin" would be some sort of a cipher or code since, if you know the cipher, it can be decoded without a dictionary

  • @monowarabegum9851

    @monowarabegum9851

    2 жыл бұрын

    Ood-gay o-tay ow-knay

  • @highpath4776
    @highpath47762 жыл бұрын

    Cant = as in InCantation, or (Jewish mainly music leader Cantor).

  • @ARCtheCartoonMaster
    @ARCtheCartoonMaster8 ай бұрын

    Huh... I was taught that "jiffy" meant a centisecond (i.e. one-hundredth of a second).

  • @AdwinLauYuTan
    @AdwinLauYuTan2 жыл бұрын

    It should be spelt 'giffy' to hammer home how GIF is pronounced.

  • @CatherineKimport
    @CatherineKimport2 жыл бұрын

    Please don't ever put a ticking clock audio track in another video again

  • @I.____.....__...__
    @I.____.....__...__2 жыл бұрын

    - 1:15 What's a "milisecond" [sic]? - The connection between "jiffy" and lightning might be from Cockney rhyming slang. 🤔 - Jiffies are the unit of time between frames in animated GIFs in the GIF89a format, denoting 1/10th of a second. (It's also more proof of the correct pronunciation of GIF.)

  • @omatic_opulis9876
    @omatic_opulis98762 жыл бұрын

    yffij

  • @_Silly
    @_Silly2 жыл бұрын

    I hate the background music

  • @highpath4776

    @highpath4776

    2 жыл бұрын

    tick tick water torture

  • @Vodhin
    @Vodhin2 жыл бұрын

    **Sigh** ..."Classrooms all _around_ the globe," not "Across." The Earth is NOT flat, nor does it have only two classrooms across from each other...

  • @clabood
    @clabood2 жыл бұрын

    In Australia we have a cleaning product called Jif. It is made by Unilever however it looks like it called Cif in other countries. en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cif

  • @gijskramer1702
    @gijskramer17022 жыл бұрын

    @DarkviperAU