If not Anno Domini, what?

Post by **goodboyCerberus** » Mon Mar 01, 2010 4:19 am

Disclaimer: This is more of a game than anything else, you'll see. I'm personally fine with AD and don't think CE is much of an improvement.

In measuring the passage of years, the designation Common Era is really just another name for Anno Domini - "In the year of our Lord". If you had the power to reform this system and see it generally accepted, what event would you propose for this designation to reference?

Suggestions will be added to the poll.

ADDENDUM

(Oops, adding more choices resets the vote. I won't do this too often in the future.)

This round's winner was...

The following options have been added:

Star Date ("SD") - uh...
Software timekeeping Epoch ("SE") - 110 years ago
Newton's Principia is published ("NP") - 323 years ago
Invention of Iron Swords ("FeS") - c. 2810 years ago
Since that Sargon dude ("FS") - 4280
Creation (...has widely been considered as a bad move; "BM") - 8014 years ago

Post by **pcCoder** » Mon Mar 01, 2010 4:49 am

Time used as epoch commonly in computers: midnight UTC time, January 1, 1900, making the current year 110.

Post by **Mephistopheles** » Mon Mar 01, 2010 4:51 am

I'd love for it to be based on the invention of cheese, but I don't think such a revolution would go smoothly. Sure, C.E. is just a renaming of A.D. which is a pretty meaningless standard for those who don't believe in Xian mythology, but it seems the best method for now.

Maybe, like the Celsius scale and the metric system, the rest of the world will slowly start using a different, more objective system. And eventually abandon B.C./A.D./B.C.E./B.C. altogether. And America will be the only country in the world that still uses that system because we're too stupid to understand such complex things as reason.

Post by **virphen** » Mon Mar 01, 2010 4:58 am

Surely it has to be the creation of the universe by that god bloke in... 6004 BC or something?

Post by **Svartalf** » Mon Mar 01, 2010 5:52 pm

What was that use of bollocks that happened back in 1382?

Myself, I'd go well bby founding history from the crowning of Sargon of Akkad, so we now are in 4280 From Sargon.

Post by **Godless Libertarian** » Mon Mar 01, 2010 6:07 pm

Star Date

Post by **Gawdzilla Sama** » Mon Mar 01, 2010 6:22 pm

Invention of the first weapon of mass destruction, the iron sword.

Post by **Rogut** » Mon Mar 01, 2010 6:30 pm

Start in what is (in the Current calendar) 1687 - the year Newton published Principia, formalizing the scientific method (building on the work of others, of course, but a key point nonetheless). This can be seen as the birth of modern science.

Rog

Post by **Svartalf** » Mon Mar 01, 2010 6:33 pm

Gawdzilla wrote:Invention of the first weapon of mass destruction, the iron sword.

Why define the iron sword as the first WMD? isn't a good old stone axe quite as useful and able to kill as many people (if you don't count the progress of body armor in)?

Post by **Elessarina** » Mon Mar 01, 2010 7:09 pm

goodboyCerberus wrote: Suggestions will be added to the poll.

If that was the first recorded "use of bollocks".. how on earth did we all get here and who REALLY built the pyramids?

Post by **Dr. Kwaltz** » Mon Mar 01, 2010 11:28 pm

We are currently in the year 1 ABO...

ABO - Anno Barack Obama

Post by **Dr. Kwaltz** » Mon Mar 01, 2010 11:30 pm

virphen wrote:Surely it has to be the creation of the universe by that god bloke in... 6004 BC or something?

So, does that mean we are in the year 8014 ABF?

ABF - Anno Big Fuckup?

Post by **goodboyCerberus** » Tue Mar 02, 2010 12:38 am

Dr. Kwaltz wrote:We are currently in the year 1 ABO...

ABO - Anno Barack Obama

Vetoed.

One of the first recorded uses of bollocks (according to Wikipedia

), or its Old English predecessor in this case, was in John Wycliffe's Bible, written in AD 1382 (or, Invention of Cheese + 9382). It appears in Leviticus 22:24:

Al beeste, that ... kitt and taken a wey the ballokes is, ye shulen not offre to the Lord...

The most complete version I could find (after a quick Google search) didn't have it, which just goes to show much the Bible changed during cycles of transcription and editorializing.

Ye schulen not offre to the Lord ony beeste, whose priuy membris ben brokun, ethir brisid, ether kit, and takun awey, and outerli ye schulen not do these thingis in youre lond.

Translated in the New International Version:

You must not offer to the LORD an animal whose testicles are bruised, crushed, torn or cut. You must not do this in your own land,

Post by **goodboyCerberus** » Tue Mar 02, 2010 12:51 am

Elessarina wrote:If that was the first recorded "use of bollocks".. how on earth did we all get here and who REALLY built the pyramids?

You win again, with your damn semantics.

Website · Post by **Ameri Boi** » Sun Mar 07, 2010 11:03 am

I voted "Creation" or as otherwise put it "bad move"

I guess I just love rubbing the "bad move" part in a theist's face.

(<---- WHEN THE FUCK DID WE GET THAT SMILEY?! IT ROCKS!)

rationalia.com

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