Random Poll Time! (That's what she said!)
 

Ok, random poll... at what cutoff time do you stop saying TODAY and switch to TONIGHT. For example... "I'll meet you at 5 o'clock today" or "I'll meet you at 10 tonight"

Lack of 'evening' fail.

More on point, I generally don't use today and tonight unless someones pointedly asks for disambiguation.

ie, - 'I know you said 5, but is it 5 today or 5 tomorrow.'

And yes, I generally converse assuming a date and time are sufficient. ie, if you aren't about the current day, the standard is, say, 'next week on Wednesday the 20th somewhere around 5 p.m.'

If push came shove, though, I'd say

Dawn - from whatever your sunrise time and 1/2 hours thereafter.
Morning - end of Dawn to Noon
Afternoon - Noon to 4 or 5 p.m.
Evening - p.m. [ie, start of local 'evening' news] to end of daylight

Maybe there should add in 'Dusk.'

Night - full dark to dawn.

I think for me, 'tonight' starts when most people get off work, so around 5.

It's for a program... I figure it's fine to just say Today or Tonight... instead of "in the morning" / "morning" / "afternoon" /"evening" etc etc

So, if you were to meet someone out at 5:15pm.. you'd say "Meet me at 5:15 TONIGHT"? Interesting... I am starting to think 6pm may be a consensus cutoff.

I think most people are going to respond with their typical dinner time. Mine is 7PM.

5pm

When it gets dark.

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I think I would. However, I never have social interaction, so I'm not sure.

Though I personally think of it as being more like 5pm, I think 6pm makes more sense. That makes a nice symmetrical day:

6am-noon = morning
noon-6pm = afternoon
6pm-midnight = evening (aka tonight)
midnight-6am = overnight

I was wrong.

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Sweet, I think I'm going with 6pm

There is no clear line between these two.

Today can go up to midnight.
Tonight can begin as soon as 5:00 PM.

yeah, that's why it was hard for me to draw a line in the code I am writing. With the feedback here though, it seems 6pm is my best bet.