Stop using B.C.E. and C.E. you cretins!

[Evie]

"Christ" is still a title of religious significance.

It began that way, but I would argue that by this point it serves more as a name, or otherwise an identifier of the historical figure, Jesus of Nazareth, than as a religious title that's in any sort of dispute.

"Messiah", or "Lord", are, however, contentious terms.

 

[Takhisis]

"Christ" is still a title of religious significance.

Then people should stop saying 'Oh my God', shouldn't they?

 

[hobbsyoyo]

You're right, in so far as you CAN get rid of legacy code if you can persuade the people in charge of the budget to pay for what it takes. In most actual cases this is usually somewhere between almost impossible and completely impossible.

Define the scenarios where this is true. I think (barring your forethcoming correction) that if you extend this analogy beyond any arbitrarily narrow set of circumstances, it falls apart.

Take all the code running on all the Windows XP machines in offices around the world for instance. That code is vital to many business, government and other ventures. And it will all soon be replaced by Windows 7 or 8.

 

[Traitorfish]

Agreed. Our calendar is based on a Christian reckoning, it's a fact and using a different abbreviation doesn't change that. Deal with it, people.

Surely the adoption of BCE/CE shows that people are dealing with it, in that they're quite happy to use a calendar of Christian origin, and reconcile it with their own sensibilities by tweaking the terminology a little. If they weren't dealing with it, they'd advocate for a wholly alternative calendar.

Old school is the best school!

I don't know, a regnal calendar doesn't seem like it work very well in a country where the head of state can't sit for more than eight years.

 

[emzie]

As Richard Dawkins said, I'm culturally a Christian. I have no problem with BC / AD dating systems. Nor with Christmas.

 

[Leifmk]

Define the scenarios where this is true.

Oh, I'm not talking about slightly outdated versions of commercial and widely distributed software. I'm talking about proper legacy systems -- big damn unique and idiosyncratic tailor-made systems, decades old, often written in quite obscure languages. Such systems exist in more places than you'd think and they are generally completely indispensable (or they wouldn't still have been around after 10 years, never mind 20 or 40). Developing such a system usually cost tens or hundreds of programmer-years, spread over a period of decades. Developing a replacement would cost -- if not an equal amount, then something on the same order of magnitude.

 

[Traitorfish]

As Richard Dawkins said, I'm culturally a Christian. I have no problem with BC / AD dating systems. Nor with Christmas.

Papist.

 

[hobbsyoyo]

Papist.

I like christmas. But I'm an atheist. Am I also a secret papist?

 

[Traitorfish]

Atheists are especially papist.

 

[emzie]

Christmas is awesome. It's family and gifts and feasts. I don't give a damn about where it came from, I give a damn about what it's come to mean.

 

[say1988]

Oh, I'm not talking about slightly outdated versions of commercial and widely distributed software. I'm talking about proper legacy systems -- big damn unique and idiosyncratic tailor-made systems, decades old, often written in quite obscure languages. Such systems exist in more places than you'd think and they are generally completely indispensable (or they wouldn't still have been around after 10 years, never mind 20 or 40). Developing such a system usually cost tens or hundreds of programmer-years, spread over a period of decades. Developing a replacement would cost -- if not an equal amount, then something on the same order of magnitude.

Not to mention that designing such new systems often turns into a giant clusterfark, almost always going horrifyingly overbudget and ending up with only a fraction of the functionality intended (which can leave the legacy system in use alongside the new one). And that ignores those that get cancelled entirely because of failures and resistance to change.

Just talking to people that have worked on a new system from either side and it should scare you.

 

[hobbsyoyo]

Atheists are especially papist.

But why?

 

[Evie]

Christmas is awesome. It's family and gifts and feasts. I don't give a damn about where it came from, I give a damn about what it's come to mean.

That pretty much sums my feeling on Christmas. A holiday isn't important because of how it started, but because of what it means to you.

 

[Traitorfish]

But why?

Well, think about it: an atheist is the opposite of a Christian, right? And who's more Christian than Protestants? Nobody! And who's less Protestant than the Pope? Again, nobody! So, logically, atheism and papism are the same thing.

 

[bhsup]

Christmas is awesome. It's family and gifts and feasts. I don't give a damn about where it came from, I give a damn about what it's come to mean.

I can legitimately call you a Republican now, but alas I cannot find the Bloom County cartoon that backs my claim.

 

[Valka D'Ur]

Not that 15000BP for year zero would be all that practical, but it would remove the need to use before and after a certain, arbitrary, date. Since geological time scales are usually BP anyway.

We always used BP (Before Present) in my anthropology and geography classes.

B.C.E. and C.E. are pretty stupid simply because they just based it on the same as B.C. and A.D. so really what's the point? That B.C. and A.D. reference Christ? Well, so do BCE and CE since that's what they're based on.

I once got into an argument over A.D. with somebody for a really dumb reason (her dumb reason, not mine). I was introducing her to the TV series "I, Claudius" (because she was a Patrick Stewart fan and he played Sejanus)... and for some insane reason she thought that Augustus was Emperor throughout all of Jesus' lifetime. Turns out she thought that A.D. means "After Death" - as in after the Crucifixion. It took a LOT of explaining on my part to prove to her that she was mistaken, and that the Crucifixion happened during the reign of Tiberius, and that Jesus' life wasn't all crammed into the timespan between 1 BC and 1 AD.

Columbian Exchange is a good one.

The what?

EDIT3: I'd much rather move the official start of a new calendar year. I mean, why is it in the middle of winter, splitting it between two years? It makes no sense. A new year should start on the 1st of March.

I hope you realize that March 1 is still winter in quite a few parts of the world.

Face it, if God had wanted us to us BC and AD, he'd have made it less completely ambiguous as to whether Jesus was born before 4 BC or after 7 AD

Or he would have taught the Apostles to read and count properly.

 

[Traitorfish]

The what?

Fancy name for Columbus landing in the Americas and the ensuing environmental and cultural exchange.

 

[hobbsyoyo]

Fancy name for Columbus landing in the Americas and the ensuing environmental and cultural exchange.

It was a world changing event, biologically, socially, politically, etc. The biological exchange and it's subsequent impact on world events can't be overemphasized.

 

[Valka D'Ur]

Ah. AKA the beginning of the cultural genocide of the people who were here first, in other words.

Personally, I don't think that's worth celebrating at all, let alone changing the calendar for it.

 

[hobbsyoyo]

Ah. AKA the beginning of the cultural genocide of the people who were here first, in other words.

Personally, I don't think that's worth celebrating at all, let alone changing the calendar for it.

There is that. But the exchange denotes something even greater in scope than that. I hope you understand the distinction. It also is a neutral label, not one that's meant to be seen as good or bad. It just was.