The year of whose lord?

[Erinome]

My son and I were watching a documentary about the history of Greece. He's really into that sort of thing right now. He asked me what B.C. and A.D. meant.

When I told him, he got really angry. I don't blame him!

I read the wiki page about A.D. and B.C., and it's just bullshit. Jews, Muslims, Buddhists, Hindus, Atheists, everyone is currently living in "The year of our lord" 2012??? Seriously?!

That's why I love my kids, because before he asked, I wasn't mad about it. It was just something I sort of accepted. Now my wheels are turning.

Does this piss off anyone else? I mean, I'm not exactly up in arms about it, but it's fucking annoying to me.

[Minimalist]

All calendars are dating conventions, Alei. The Jews claim that it is the year 5772...which would put them back in the 4th millenium BC which is just horseshit. Oddly, the Jews then write 5772 in Arabic numbers which ought to piss someone off!

As far as the bullshit calendar of the xtians goes, my only complaint is that the assholes even got that wrong. Dionysius Exiguus ( Dennis the short.... I think the other monks were making fun of his dick) messed up by 5 years. It should really be 2017 but the asswipe forgot the 4 years that Augustus ruled as Octavian Caesar and he forgot the year "0."

[Oldandeasilyconfused]

@Min,plus nobody actually knows when Jesus was born*.The most common ESTIMATES vary between 4 and 7 BCE.


*assuming he existed at all.

[Erinome]

Is there any conventional dating system that makes sense?

[Minimalist]

Not that I know of.

@ Pad. Of course. It's faulty math based on faulty myth.

[cratehorus]

The oldest calendar in the world, is the Yoruba calendar, from Southwestern Nigeria, the current year is 10,054, New Year's Day was June 4th

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yoruba_calendar

[Annik]

The oldest calendar in the world, is the Yoruba calendar, from Southwestern Nigeria, the current year is 10,054, New Year's Day was June 4th

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yoruba_calendar

Thanks for sharing this. This is really, really interesting.


Sidenote: Has anyone seen the documentary Tree of Iron?

[Drich]

My son and I were watching a documentary about the history of Greece. He's really into that sort of thing right now. He asked me what B.C. and A.D. meant.

When I told him, he got really angry. I don't blame him!

I read the wiki page about A.D. and B.C., and it's just bullshit. Jews, Muslims, Buddhists, Hindus, Atheists, everyone is currently living in "The year of our lord" 2012??? Seriously?!

That's why I love my kids, because before he asked, I wasn't mad about it. It was just something I sort of accepted. Now my wheels are turning.

Does this piss off anyone else? I mean, I'm not exactly up in arms about it, but it's fucking annoying to me.

That is why you people have changed it to "Common Era and Before the Common Era." CE and BCE which corresponds to the exact dates known now.

BTW
We know Christ to have been born between 4 and 6 BC because Herod the Great died in 4 BC. That means the monk or preist who set this time table got the math wrong to begin with. Even so if one is still using BC or AD it denotes their faith in God. So either you were watching a Christian produced film or you were watching a really old documentry (Pre 2000)

[jonb]

Is there any conventional dating system that makes sense?

In Cambodia under the Khmer Rouge they set a year Zero, which could be said to be accurate, but actually no system is accurate, even the actual time on the world differs from that produced by atomic clocks because of variations in the orbit of the earth, we live in a relative universe after all. The ancient Roman calendar was so inaccurate it is impossible to accurately date anything before the Julian or was it Gregorian calender came in, also there were riots in England, in the eighteenth century when the calender changed and people didn't like the idea of loosing ten days.That change did not happen in Eastern Europe as the orthodox church does not use the popes calender. In the French revolution they set up a calender with a year of !000 days a month of 100 days and a week of ten days but it was useless because it did not match the seasons.

Also Arabic numbers are the numbers we all use and they originated in Hindu India, not with the Arabs.

Actually I don't worry about AD/BC. Think of it this way its history, once people were forced to think made up things that were unsubstantiated, and now we have grown out of it. What better place for a bit of history to be stuck into than a calender.
Also July is named after Julius Caesar, August Named after Augustus Caesar. Incidentally these emperors wanted long months of 31 days so they robed February which is why it is so short.
The Islamic Calender is set by the moon and is a better system for working out time in tropical countries that do not, or hardly change in day length. The christian calender is set by the sun, so is better at predicting seasons and day length. The Ancient Celts had a reasonable calender which did both, but was complex, similar to what I have been loosely told of the Hindu calender, The ancient Germans had a calender that every so often they stuck an extra month in called Fogmoon. I do not know much about the east.
But whatever way you cut it there will be inconsistencies, leap years, and leap seconds which many computer companies try to get removed as it makes their programming so much more difficult. Also the earth seams to be gradually slowing down, so even if you set up a new way of measuring time over a few thousand years it would become out of kilter, and need rebalancing. So live with the fossils of the past, it shows how time has moved on.

[Minimalist]

We know Christ to have been born between 4 and 6 BC because Herod the Great died in 4 BC.

Oh, but your other gospel shtihead "Luke" puts it after 6 AD ( when Quirinius was governor of Syria.

Another of those contradictions which you guys hate so.