Posts: 6120
Threads: 64
Joined: June 5, 2013
Reputation:
65
Where would you restart the calendar?
February 24, 2015 at 1:41 pm
For the Jews, the years are counted from the year of the creation of the world, so this year is 5775.
Muslims would say Year 1 is the year Mohammed emigrated from Mecca to Medina, so we are in year 1436 of the Muslim calendar.
The Mayans began their calendar in our year 3114 BC, which makes it year 5129 according to their calendar; or year 3 of the "new" cycle.
The Chinese calendar, legend has it, was created in the year 2637 BCE (according to the Gregorian Calendar) which makes this year 4713 of the Chinese calendar.
Prior to the adoption of the Gregorian Calendar, the Western world used the Julian Calendar to mark the passage of time, with year 1 being the year of the founding of Rome.
In 1582 Pope Gregory XIII issued a papal bull decreeing that, because errors of the Julian Calendar had crept in, 11 days should be dropped from the calendar, he (or his peeps) shall realignd the calendar with the equinoxes and solstices, and then did some bible generation-counting mumbo-jumbo and decreed that Year 1 would be the year Christ was born, with BC and AD delineating before and after this moment.
(Nowadays, the scholarly community has been moving away from the AD/BC delineation to BCE and CE (Before Common Era and Common Era), but you may as well keep the AD/BC markers because Year 1 hasn't moved. #petpeeve)
We are clearly in a different era than that of our ancestors, medieval or ancient. This is an age of modernism, of science, and of technology. I can see, in the future, restarting the calendar again when we get to the point where space travel is common, an era of interplanetary space flight, of terraforming, of colonization of other planets. I can conceive of Year 1 of the space flight era being the launch of the first manmade satellite to orbit the Earth (year 1 would be our current year 1957), or even the year we first put a human on the moon (1969). Perhaps the next era will be the era of AI, with year 1 being the year humans created the first "thinking" machine, or the year humans built the first self-replicating artificial life form, however future humans define that.
So my question is:
If YOU were put in charge of "restarting" the calendar for this era, what year would you choose as your Year 1 and why?
Teenaged X-Files obsession + Bermuda Triangle episode + Self-led school research project = Atheist.
Posts: 6946
Threads: 26
Joined: April 28, 2012
Reputation:
83
RE: Where would you restart the calendar?
February 24, 2015 at 1:47 pm
Interesting thought, but I wouldn't reset the calendar simply because I don't think it would serve any practical purpose.
If forced to make a choice I would make 1970 year 1; Jimi Hendrix left the party and I joined it.
Posts: 9176
Threads: 76
Joined: November 21, 2013
Reputation:
40
RE: Where would you restart the calendar?
February 24, 2015 at 1:49 pm
Restart the calendar from the day President Washington took office! Umurica! Frick Yeah!
Posts: 10470
Threads: 165
Joined: May 29, 2013
Reputation:
53
RE: Where would you restart the calendar?
February 24, 2015 at 2:01 pm
I'm mixed. I'm not sure I'd want to live in the year "1". I'm just used to a bigger number. I suppose I could always tack on 1000 for that purpose, though, and just have this be 1001, the first year of my wishing to have a new calendar. And have every month have 30 days. I don't care if eventually it would snow in June.
"For me, it is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring." - Carl Sagan
Posts: 5492
Threads: 53
Joined: September 4, 2014
Reputation:
55
RE: Where would you restart the calendar?
February 24, 2015 at 2:01 pm
Populating other planets would seem a good reset point. Can you imagine visiting family- resetting not just watches, but days, weeks, and years. The first colonies would have to keep track of earth time just for their birthdays.
I can't remember where this verse is from, I think it got removed from canon:
"I don't hang around with mostly men because I'm gay. It's because men are better than women. Better trained, better equipped...better. Just better! I'm not gay."
For context, this is the previous verse:
"Hi Jesus" -robvalue
Posts: 15351
Threads: 118
Joined: January 13, 2014
Reputation:
117
RE: Where would you restart the calendar?
February 24, 2015 at 2:14 pm
Lol, the logic, rational minded side of me wants to spoil the game and say, "why would we restart the calendar, it would only create confusion and would have no practical benefit." 
But I'll play along. 
I think the most defining point in the Common Era that could be seen as a major transition would be the invention of the internet. There could be a whole other debate as to when that year is, but I would venture 1982, when TCP/IP was standardized and what we know as the internet started.
Now would 1982 be year 0? Or year 1?
I'll go with year 0. That would make it year 32 AG (Al Gore.) And everything before what was 1982 would be BAG (Before Al Gore.)
"There remain four irreducible objections to religious faith: that it wholly misrepresents the origins of man and the cosmos, that because of this original error it manages to combine the maximum servility with the maximum of solipsism, that it is both the result and the cause of dangerous sexual repression, and that it is ultimately grounded on wish-thinking." ~Christopher Hitchens, god is not Great
PM me your email address to join the Slack chat! I'll give you a taco(or five) if you join! --->There's an app and everything!<---
Posts: 30129
Threads: 304
Joined: April 18, 2014
Reputation:
92
RE: Where would you restart the calendar?
February 24, 2015 at 2:18 pm
If you are all going to the bother of reseting the calendar, this is the right day to start the new one.
January 1, 4713 BC,
The granting of a pardon is an imputation of guilt, and the acceptance a confession of it.
Posts: 6946
Threads: 26
Joined: April 28, 2012
Reputation:
83
RE: Where would you restart the calendar?
February 24, 2015 at 2:24 pm
(February 24, 2015 at 2:14 pm)SteelCurtain Wrote: Now would 1982 be year 0? Or year 1?
I'll go with year 0. That would make it year 32 AG (Al Gore.) And everything before what was 1982 would be BAG (Before Al Gore.)
Ayn Rand died in 1982. I shudder at the thought of unintended consequences. In the future others will be having the same conversation on how to reset the calendar after starting to recover from 2000 years of unmitigated disaster foisted on the world by the cult of Rand.
Posts: 2985
Threads: 29
Joined: October 26, 2014
Reputation:
31
RE: Where would you restart the calendar?
February 24, 2015 at 2:40 pm
I'd restart it at the beginning of the universe.
You know...
Last Thursday.
How will we know, when the morning comes, we are still human? - 2D
Don't worry, my friend. If this be the end, then so shall it be.
Posts: 6120
Threads: 64
Joined: June 5, 2013
Reputation:
65
RE: Where would you restart the calendar?
February 24, 2015 at 2:45 pm
(February 24, 2015 at 1:47 pm)Cato Wrote: Interesting thought, but I wouldn't reset the calendar simply because I don't think it would serve any practical purpose.
I'm not talking practical, I'm talking hypothetical. 
(February 24, 2015 at 2:01 pm)c172 Wrote: I'm mixed. I'm not sure I'd want to live in the year "1". I'm just used to a bigger number. I suppose I could always tack on 1000 for that purpose, though, and just have this be 1001, the first year of my wishing to have a new calendar. And have every month have 30 days. I don't care if eventually it would snow in June.
The year you choose wouldn't have to be this year, it could be the year WW1 started (which would make this year 101), the year of the first known human writing (which would make this year +/-5615-ish), the year modern industrialization began (which would make this year +/-200-ish), etc.
(February 24, 2015 at 2:14 pm)SteelCurtain Wrote: Lol, the logic, rational minded side of me wants to spoil the game and say, "why would we restart the calendar, it would only create confusion and would have no practical benefit."
But I'll play along.
Thank you. 
Quote:I think the most defining point in the Common Era that could be seen as a major transition would be the invention of the internet. There could be a whole other debate as to when that year is, but I would venture 1982, when TCP/IP was standardized and what we know as the internet started.
Now would 1982 be year 0? Or year 1?
I'll go with year 0. That would make it year 32 AG (Al Gore.) And everything before what was 1982 would be BAG (Before Al Gore.)
The internet is an extremely defining moment in history. That would be a good year to restart the calendar.
Year 0 wouldn't exist, though, it would be a naught year, a nothing year, the absence of a year... Wouldn't switching calendar years mean going from 1981 AD to Year 1 AG?
It's interesting that you're all grabbing on to pretty recent (20th century) events, though.
Teenaged X-Files obsession + Bermuda Triangle episode + Self-led school research project = Atheist.
|
