Eurasia or not

[MajGenl.Meade]

I just don't believe in Eurasia - it's a cruel philosophy, like Eurogenics. Putting all those nice Indian, Malaysian, Chinese people etc. to sleep just because they are suffering a little is not at all a good thing to do. The USA and France both tried it in Vietnam - didn't work. The Russians just want to get back at Chechnya. No, let 'em live out their petty lives from day to day, that's what I say. Better to dig a big ditch and end the speculation. The sea oh the sea, thank God for the sea. Long may it stay 'tween Eurasia and me. As long as it does we've a sure guarantee, the wogs won't be courting our daughters.

[liberty]

It is just a little something I stumbled across and was curious what you all would make of it.

General, I am not sure what to make of it either; they could just be a collection of crack pots. Just because a group of countries occupy the same continents doesn’t mean they naturally belong in the same federation, alliance or empire. It strikes me as the kind of thinking that Hitler would employ.


At least their geography is correct.

[Scooter]

I consider this "CE" "BCE" business to be nothing but petty PC crapola, so I treat it the same way I treat all petty PC Crapola...

I ignore it...

It'll be a cold day in hell before I use either of those designations.

Then I'm sure you consider this to be the beginning of the year 2018 and consider those who call it 2014 to be engaging in "PC crapola" (because we all know that not even Christians consider Jesus to have been born in what you would call the year 1 AD, but rather in 4 BC.

The fact that the BC/AD designations are ridiculous even from a Christian viewpoint make the case for the use of BCE/CE better than any argument from "inclusiveness" ever could. It's simply moronic to claim that Jesus arrived on this earth four years before he arrived on earth, which is what BC/AD dating literally says.

[Lord Jim]

The fact that the BC/AD designations are ridiculous even from a Christian viewpoint make the case for the use of BCE/CE better than any argument from "inclusiveness" ever could. It's simply moronic to claim that Jesus arrived on this earth four years before he arrived on earth, which is what BC/AD dating literally says.

Frankly I could care less about the historical accuracy...

What's "ridiculous" "moronic" and "pure pc crapola" is to abolish a designation system that has worked perfectly well for more than a millennium without any compelling reason.

[Scooter]

Who said anything about abolishing any system? The dating remains exactly the same, and even in those circumstances where the BCE/CE designations are most commonly used (historical/anthropological/archaeological academic publications), stylistic authorities say that either BC/AD or BCE/CE are equally acceptable.

So remind again what the objection is?

[Econoline]

Jim, did you read my earlier post? Though the Latin term "Anno Domini" might have been invented in 525, when Dionysius Exiguus miscalculated the birth year of Jesus, the English term "Before Christ" obviously came much later--and the term "Common Era" has a long and distinguished history of its own, dating back to 1615. The alternative and equivalent term "Christian Era", which Meade prefers, apparently has an even longer history--back to at least 1584 in Latin ("aerae christianae") and at least 1652 in English.

P.S. What Scooter said.

[Crackpot]

What purpose does the name change serve? It's just changing the call outs for an existing system for measuring time. Yes I know not everyone is Christian but neither is everyone follow the old Norse, Roman or mythran religions. If you want to come up with A new dating system figure out your own starting date and go from there that's what the Romans Jews Christians Mayans etc. did. Renaming an existing calendar frankly smacks of an attempt to sanitize history of the wide ranging effect that the former had on the world.

[Econoline]

My point--well, part of it, anyway--was that the terminology has changed over the years anyway (unless you still speak Latin?) so why not just go with the flow? (Especially since the term "Christian Era" has been used interchangeably with "Anno Domini" for well over three centuries.)

ETA: I still like the term "Vulgar Era" but that's just me and my sophomoric sense of humor.

[Joe Guy]

How often does anyone need to use BC or AD? I can't remember the last time I did.

I don't care how it is used as long as I know what is being said.

Also, Jesus isn't here to complain and he's the only one who has the right to....

[Scooter]

What purpose does the name change serve?

Why don't you go back in time 400 years or so and ask those who started doing it?

Yes I know not everyone is Christian but neither is everyone follow the old Norse, Roman or mythran religions.

First, the names of the days of the week and the months of the year don't cross cultural boundaries the way that yearly dating is now intended to. Even within Europe, the days of the week in the Romance languages do not carry any of the same origins as in the Germanic languages.

Second, if someone doesn't like the fact that the days of the week or the months of the year reflect ancient religions to which they have no connection, there is NOTHING stopping them from proposing an alternative to see if it catches on, just as someone first proposed hundreds of years ago with BCE/CE dating.

If you want to come up with A new dating system figure out your own starting date and go from there

So what then, Christianity OWNS the fucking calendar, and no one can propose any modification that makes it more acceptable to a broader range of people unless they come up with something COMPLETELY different? When are you and your fucking sense of Christian superiority going to get over yourself?

Renaming an existing calendar frankly smacks of an attempt to sanitize history of the wide ranging effect that the former had on the world.

Is anyone forcing you to use it? Is anyone putting a gun to your head and forcing you to read works that use it?

You're not pissed off because someone has done it. You're pissed off because it has caught on, because you see that as some sort of slight against Christianity. Newsflash, the 2000 year old superstitions you choose to hang onto don't figure into the thought processes of the rest of the world anywhere near as much as you wish they would.

[Crackpot]

Ooh someone's getting snippy. Can't come up with a coherent argument so you start insulting and swearing? Yes Christianity like it or not owns the time they start their calendar want one for a common era? I have two ideas for a rational starting point.

1 the death of Alexander the earliest point in which what was the known world knew each-other
2 the end of the conquest of the Americas the point in which the vast majority of the world made a common age.

The only reason BCE/CE dating caught on is that it uses the BC/AD timeline.

Oh and as the days of the week go yeah you're right the Romance languages ditch the Norse and just stick with the romance/mythran

[Scooter]

Can't come up with a coherent argument so you start insulting and swearing?

As opposed to "I don't like it, so no one should be able to do it," which is the sum total of the argument against it.

Yes Christianity like it or not owns the time they start their calendar

Wow....just...wow.

have two ideas for a rational starting point.

1 the death of Alexander the earliest point in which what was the known world knew each-other
2 the end of the conquest of the Americas the point in which the vast majority of the world made a common age.

Once again, if someone wants to do that, they are free to go ahead and try. If someone wants to use Star Trek dating they can do that too. But somehow changing a couple of labels that were never accurate to begin with is the ultimate blasphemy among sins against the calendar that can never be contemplated.

And you say Christianity owns the dating system, when it doesn't even make sense from the point of view of Christian history. A calendar using the birth of Jesus as its reference point dates that birth as 4 BC. Are you really so invested in your ownership of the calendar that you don't care if it portrays Christianity as a religion that is too incompetent to count properly? Doesn't say much for any of the other things Christianity holds to be true if they could make such a stupid mistake in such an elementary concept.

The only reason BCE/CE dating caught on is that it uses the BC/AD timeline.

Yes, it used the timeline already in common use (hence, "Common Era") and used a terminology that those outside of the Christian world could feel comfortable with using if they so chose, without telling anyone that it was no longer appropriate to use BC/AD if they so chose. So once again, remind me what the objection is.

Oh and as the days of the week go yeah you're right the Romance languages ditch the Norse and just stick with the romance/mythran

I never said anything of the sort. Now who is just making shit up to avoid addressing what was actually said?

Oh my, I said "shit". I guess that means you can pretend that the rest of what I posted doesn't exist, and that I supposedly have no argument once again.

[Crackpot]

Your argument boils down to historical revisionism is ok as long as it's old historical revisionism. I just checked " the protocols of the elders of Zion" is over 100 years old now so does that mean it's time to give it another look or do we have to stick it in the drawer for a few more years yet?

[Scooter]

Your argument boils down to historical revisionism is ok as long as it's old historical revisionism.

What does that even mean? What "historical revisionism" is going on? The term "common era" is being used precisely because it acknowledges a dating system that is already in common use. How is that revisionism?

I just checked " the protocols of the elders of Zion" is over 100 years old now so does that mean it's time to give it another look or do we have to stick it in the drawer for a few more years yet?

WTF? Are you high? Maybe it's time to sleep off whatever it is, because you have stopped even attempting to make sense.

[Scooter]

Do you know what, I just went way too far with this last night by getting way too personal. This entire controversy completely baffles me, and that came out in the worst way in my responses, and I apologize.

[Rick]

Do you know what, I just went way too far with this last night by getting way too personal. This entire controversy completely baffles me, and that came out in the worst way in my responses, and I apologize.

Wow! I commend you

[Lord Jim]

Ditto

[oldr_n_wsr]

Me three.

If it makes people feel better I propose
BCE = Before Common Era = Before Christian Era
CE = Common Era = Christian Era.


But I will still use BC and AD as that is what I am used to (while I have used BC, I do not use AD very often, if at all).

[Crackpot]

Just got back to reading this and thank you for apologizing Scooter though in good conscience I must also apologize for needling you. When the mood strikes me I sometimes (unfortunately) take pleasure in pushing peoples buttons and I was definitely doing that saturday night.

but to make my point clearer:

Yes it is in common use but to rename it "Common Era" strips the context of why it is in common use. Like it or not the dating system we use is because of the primacy of the the Catholic Church over much of the last two millenniums for good and bad. And in my opinion changing the name separates us from that history. At worst doing so echoes some of the worst cultural crimes the Catholic church committed to our collective history the systematic co-opting and sanitizing of "unpopular" history to suit current cultural ideals.

[Sue U]

Imagine the first New Year's Day after Christ was born (at point 0). What did they call that exactly (not that they did; but imagine it)?

We called it "Rosh Ha-Shanah," and it still comes every year on the first of Tishrei. Duh.

As for CE/BCE, the disciplines that most require use of a continuous dating system (history, archeology, anthropology) are not the exclusive province of European Christians, and the use of this recent Western scheme of calendar dating is a convenience, owing to its wide adoption as a conventional reference to ease international business and communications. Almost all scholarly publications throughout the 20th Century and into the 21st have used the CE/BCE designation rather than AD/BC, which itself had been in common use for only a tiny fraction of recorded history, and only among a tiny minority of the world's population. Significantly, fields that require a longer time scale for dating (geology, astronomy, paleontology, evolutionary biology) generally use the convention of "mya" (i.e., "million years ago"), since at that level of description any particular year or thousand is virtually irrelevant. Egyptologists use a system of kingdoms and dynasties to mark time, starting from the earliest dynastic period known.

For those like Jim and Crackpot, why aren't you enraged by the usurpation of the Julian calendar by the Gregorian? The Julian calendar was the worldwide standard for more than 1500 years. For that matter, why aren't you still counting years as "AUC," from the founding of Rome? Was that not the start of the "Western" civilization you so prize? And after all, without Rome there could have been no Jesus in the first place, n'est-ce pas?