In order for most people in the world to experience daylight at the same hours on a clock, time zones were invented because the Earth is in different positions relative to the sun at the same actual time (when it's night in New York, it's daytime in Hong Kong, for example). Because people have a hard time accepting that 3pm can be in the middle of the night, we developed time zones. Each time zone is roughly 1/24 of the Earth's circumference wide (at the relevant latitude). So, when you compare noon in New York to noon in Western Indiana, you are both talking the time when the sun is highest in the sky, rather than one of you seeing it slightly lower.