ANST - Re: Calendars

[Joel Schumacher]

> > The year numbering scheme that was developed around A.D. 300 was
> > worked out by a Roman fellow whose name just dropped out of my head.

> j'lynn yeates wrote:
> "Julian" dates perhaps ????  (g)

> Crandal wrote:
> No the Julian thing has to do with a base year and day scheme. I read
> about it in the Farmer's Almanac but do not have a copy. You add some
> number to the year and day of the year to get a standard identifier. I
> think astronomers use it, mostly.
> Caesar invented the leap year thing in late BC (?? 50 ??) to account for
> the extra 1/4 day. Pope Gregory fixed it and said not leap year on
> century years because 1/4 is not quite right. (15?? AD)

This calendar was introduced by Julius (as in Caesar) in 45 BC.  Julian
refers to being from Julius.

And yes, the term julian is also used to refer to the system of counting
days based on their position in the year.  Jan 1 being 1, Dec 31 being
365 (in a non-leap year).  This is convenient for computers and other
fields where you may want to quickly calculate how many days between two
dates.  If you quickly need to know how many days it is from July 10
(day 191) to Nov 3 (day 307), you don't have to count how many days are
remaining in July, how many days in Aug, Sep, Oct, etc.  You just subtract:
307 - 191 = 116.  I could see how astronomers might use it.  You see
something every x number of days and want to predict when it's going to
happen again.  Let's say you see a meteor orbiting Jupiter every 116 days
and last saw it on July 10 (191).  191 + 116 is 307 (Nov 3).  So, I can
observe it again on Nov 3.

> j'lynn yeates wrote:
> was always taught that the cartesian system origionated at zero ... a 
> person is born and a year later celebrates their "first" birthday 
> (birthday "one"), thus their birthdate was "zero", thus since 
> by custom we measure our mundane secular/religious calander by a 
> mythic / semi-historical  figures b'day, then that b'day would be 
> year zero, hence the millenium happens 1999:23:59:59.. + 0000:00:00:01..

Well, I've always been taught that there was no zero year. It went from
1BC to 1AD.  So, 0001:00:00:01 + 2000:00:00:00 = 2001:00:00:01 - the start
of the new, third, millineum and 21st century.

And, not all things start at zero (as our calendar).  Babylonians would
count the "ascension year" of a new king as their first reignal year,
where other cultures started counting the first year of reign after a
year had passed.

So, if Ulf was Babylonian, he'd never get past year 1 in the SCA, not 0.

> > [not parsec - that's a measure of distance, Hans Solo]

When asked whether his ship (coincidentally named the "Millenium" Falcon)
was fast, Han Solo replied something like "she made the Kessel run in 12
parsecs, is that fast enough for you?" Being that:
    velocity = distance / time
Saying it did the Kessel run (a distance) in 12 parsecs, parsecs must
be a unit of time.  To say parsecs is a distance would be like somebody
asking is your car fast?  "Well, it made a trip from Dallas to Houston
in 240 miles - That fast enough for you?"


> 'wolf yeates wrote:
> any excuse / reason for a suitably decadent party is a good thing ... 

Agreed.  The millenium is nothing more than one (of many) calendars
rolling over to a new year that happens to have more 0's than we've seen
in a while.  There's nothing special or magical about it.  I laugh at
all the people who predict distaster because of this.  (Except
programmers and they really do have a valid reason for it).

It's all a matter of point-of-view.  What about the other calendars?  The
Jewish Calendar is, I forget, maybe in the year 5000's.  The Chinese new
year starts some time in mid-January, doesn't it?  Even our own calendar
has been adjusted.  In 1752, we removed 11 days from Sep 2 to Sep 14.
This same adjustment didn't happen until 1918 in Russia.

So time measurement all depends on your point of view.

For anybody who wants some interesting historical facts about our
calendar and those of others, check out the Calendar FAQ at:

   http://www.pip.dknet.dk/~pip10160/calendar.html

__________________________________________________________________________
Joel Schumacher                        JCPenney Co. - UNIX Network Systems
jschumac at uns-dv1.jcpenney.com          12700 Park Central Pl
(972) 591-7543                         Dallas TX  75251
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