www.conservapedia.com

[Phil]

Originally Posted by Clodfobble

As I recall, Julius Caesar added "July" and Augustus added "August," right?

quite so.

[Phil]

Originally Posted by bluesdave

You are correct that the concept of BC and AD came out of Christianity, and that there is a certain level of insanity in trying to manipulate our time-line, but some method of independent dating was needed. At the time that the idea of BC and AD was put forward, no one had an "earliest" starting date (yes, I know, several were "calculated"). Different societies and religions had (and still have), their own calendars, and starting dates. I am not a Christian, though I believe most strongly that Jesus lived, and was a great man.

Historians for centuries have accepted year one AD as a starting point to move forward, and this coincidently gives year one BC a starting point moving backwards, that has no artificial limit. So being tied to some calendar that starts at 1, but does not recognise anything before that date, would be like tying our hands behind our back.

It does not matter that the Christian method was adopted. It does not matter that Jesus was likely born somewhere between 4 BC and 7 BC. The BC/AD system has worked. Personally, I would prefer to stick to BC/AD rather than BCE/CE, but as I said previously, historians decided that the old terminology was offensive to too many people, so they changed it.

BTW, I started this thread saying that the conservapedia worries me. I do not support it in *any* way. My concerns with Wikipedia are that entries can be added and modified by anyone, regardess of the validity of what they write. The "editors" are just random people on the Net. There is no vetting of their knowledge or experience. Jim Wales admitted this in an NPR interview some weeks ago.

i agree, but there is also evidence that the time-line has also been cocked up by historians who misunderstood the Egyptian dynasties and as a result lost a few hundred years. i dont know the details of it, but i was interested in Egyptology for a while.

i'm an atheist, but i also agree that Jesus did exist, was not the son of god, but was a cool character i would have liked to have known.

[Griff]

Government types are just compelled to fool with time.

[Griff]

Bluesdave, I missed something back there. What was your beef with wolf's and/or wikipedia's version of the labelling of dates?

[Phil]

all governments are warmongers.

there is no such thing as "in the public interest" : politicians pursue their own agendas.

the national health service in the UK is suffering due to Thatcher bringing in the Nuclear War Strategist from the cold war (forget his name) to overhaul the service and set targets and performance criteria etc. to be achieved by any means.

the colour of skin doesnt matter to me ; the person and their culture does.

kids should be seen and not heard.

[wolf]

Given the simple linearity of the BC/AD system, I'll stick with it, rather than something on the order of "In the fifth month of the third year of the Reign of Elizabeth II ..." Dating based on monarchs gets very confusing, very quickly.

[bluesdave]

Originally Posted by Griff

Bluesdave, I missed something back there. What was your beef with wolf's and/or wikipedia's version of the labelling of dates?

I thought that Wolf was saying that the Wikipedia said that both BCE, and CE were after 1 AD, but now that I have re-read her post I realise that she is talking about the placement of the letters AD and BC, relative to the date.

BTW, I don't recall seeing AD placed before the date. As far as I recall it is always after the date, just like BC, so you would say 2007 AD. Note that I am *not* an historian, I just have an interest in history, so I could be wrong. I have a heap of history books. I will have a look through some of them later in the day.

Originally Posted by Phil

all governments are warmongers.

there is no such thing as "in the public interest" : politicians pursue their own agendas.

the national health service in the UK is suffering due to Thatcher bringing in the Nuclear War Strategist from the cold war (forget his name) to overhaul the service and set targets and performance criteria etc. to be achieved by any means.

the colour of skin doesnt matter to me ; the person and their culture does.

kids should be seen and not heard.

Was this meant for the unpopular op thread?
I've done this before.

[Phil]

Originally Posted by rkzenrage

Was this meant for the unpopular op thread?
I've done this before.

whoops!

[bluesdave]

I was wrong. I have flicked through several of my books on Ancient Egypt, and they all place the AD before the year. My apologies to Wolf.

My interest in Ancient Egypt really decreases after the end of the New Kingdom, so I am used to reading BC and BCE, not that this gives me any excuse.

[bluesdave]

I just checked with the Oxford dictionary, and here is a snippet:

— USAGE ad is normally written in small capitals and should be placed before the numerals, as in ad 375. However, when the date is spelled out, it is normal to write the third century ad.

That last bit could explain the confusion.

[Happy Monkey]

It's almost enough to make me wonder if Andy Schlafly is a Poe (Poe's law - religious fundamentalism):

Originally Posted by Conservapedia

The theory of relativity is a mathematical system that allows no exceptions. It is heavily promoted by liberals who like its encouragement of relativism and its tendency to mislead people in how they view the world.

[Urbane Guerrilla]

The only reason it's "almost," HM, is that you are willing to remain deceived about conservatism, in spite of all I can do showing off our smarts and our ability to get at the heart of things. Calling it "conservapedia" when it's more nearly "yahoopedia" suffices to deceive some, and reinforce their shallow, specious views about anyone to the right of Woodrow Wilson. Need that include you? Christ almighty -- why?!

Something very few Dwellars consistently understand is that anti-scientism is not a good litmus test either for Conservatives or for Christians. It is primarily an indication that somebody didn't get any science to speak of, or couldn't handle the amount he did. The lack of understanding calls, as always, your degree of enlightenment into sharp question.

For just one unconsidered assumption, is it necessary to reject evolutionary theory to see truthful things in Genesis? Is the converse necessary? Neither is: consider when Genesis was written and who it was written for -- a people who hardly had writing, let alone any science whatsoever, and it was written for the first time in the Bronze Age. That's damned early. And Genesis can be read from an evolutionary viewpoint and taking inspiration from evolutionary understanding too -- try it for yourself if you are constitutionally indisposed to accepting UG's words on their face; if you can show you understand it better than UG does, good for you. (Now UG better lay off the third person -- his hair's thinning enough as it is.) The remarkable thing is not the details that Genesis got wrong, but the quite-a-few details Genesis got right.

"Let there be light." How's that for a poetic, yet simple, reference to a Big Bang? Sure, the inspiration for the thought came from late in Dark Star, and I can't deny it, but really! The worst you can say of it is it's concise.

[Urbane Guerrilla]

Minuscule-letter AD? First I've heard of it, and it seems to me infelicitous. Writing it out in full in lowercase seems happier. It is an abbreviation, and are not abbreviations usually capitalized?

Wow -- Resurrect-o-Thread. Guess ideas spring forever green if they're deep enough.

[Happy Monkey]

"Let there be light" is as far as it gets before it gets everything else wrong (even while still in "day" one - day and night before planets? What does that even mean?). But I guess you could call everything else details.