Date: Sun, 5 Dec 1999 13:59:05 -0500 From: Greg Lehey <grog@mojave.sitaranetworks.com> To: jack <jack@germanium.xtalwind.net>, David Greenman <dg@root.com> Cc: "Kenneth D. Merry" <ken@kdm.org>, "G. Adam Stanislav" <adam@whizkidtech.net>, freebsd-chat@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: New Millenium (was: So, what do we call the 00's?) Message-ID: <19991205135905.63795@mojave.sitaranetworks.com> In-Reply-To: <Pine.BSF.4.21.9912041159420.21855-100000@germanium.xtalwind.net>; from jack on Sat, Dec 04, 1999 at 12:29:46PM -0500 References: <199912040737.XAA08969@implode.root.com> <Pine.BSF.4.21.9912041159420.21855-100000@germanium.xtalwind.net>
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On Saturday, 4 December 1999 at 12:29:46 -0500, jack wrote: > On Dec 3 David Greenman wrote: > >> I've heard this argument before (about years starting at 1), but I think >> it is wrong. > > The US Naval Observatory and the Royal Observatory Greenwich > don's share your view. :) > >> From www.usno.navy.mil/millennium/whenis.html > > mil*len*ni*um \ \ n, pl -nia or -niums: a period of 1000 years > > The end of the second millennium and the beginning of the third > will be reached on January 1, 2001. This date is based on the now > globally recognized Gregorian calendar, the initial epoch of > which was established by the sixth-century scholar Dionysius > Exiguus, who was compiling a table of dates of Easter. Rather > than starting with the year zero, years in this calendar begin > with the date January 1, 1 Anno Domini (AD). Consequently, the > next millennium does not begin until January 1, 2001 AD. OK. I've come to generally accept this opinion. Let's look at a few more: When is the turn of the century? By the same logic, that's also in 2001. When is the beginning of the next decade? By the same logic, that's also in 2001. How much is a billion? Look up any non-American dictionary more than 40 years old, and you'll find it's 1,000,000,000,000. American usage has prevailed even in English-speaking countries, but in German or French (and, I suspect, in most other European languages), it's still 1,000,000,000,000. Do I need to explain the last example? Greg -- Finger grog@lemis.com for PGP public key See complete headers for address and phone numbers To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-chat" in the body of the message
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