For Christ's sake: AD and BC ruled out of date for national curriculum.

[cleanhippie]

CHRISTIANS are outraged that the birth of Jesus Christ will no longer be cited when recording dates under the new national history curriculum.

High school students will not use the terms BC (Before Christ) and AD (Anno Domini) when referencing dates.

Although history dates won't change, with textbooks still using the birth of Christ as the change point, they will use the neutral terms BCE (Before Common Era), BP (Before Present) and CE (Common Era).

Read more: http://www.news.com.au/national/for-christs-sake-ad-and-bc-ruled-out-of-date-for-national-curriculum/story-e6frfkvr-1226127965607#ixzz1Wo3DEow6

[liberal N proud]

1. I would care to bet that 90% of Christians can't tell what AD means

[Fumesucker]

3. I wouldn't take you up on that bet..

In this year of our Lord 2011..

[RaleighNCDUer]

13. Well, it's obvious.

BC means 'Before Christ" and AD means "After Death".

And the 30 odd years between them nobody talks about.

[liberal N proud]

21. That would probably be the standard answer

[LeftishBrit]

16. As a child, I thought it stood for 'After David'. I knew that Christ and David were both in the

Bible, and was a bit hazy about the chronology.

[rug]

25. After Dawkins?

Before Christopher?

As long as they don't call today the sixteenth day of Fructidor.

[backscatter712]

27. I know the correct answer...

but as I'm an atheist, I'm not giving it away...

[Deep13]

46. That's when your kid won't pay attention at school. nt

[Fumesucker]

2. Before anyone has an aneurysm, this is Australia I believe... n/t

[SpankMe]

5. The whole scientific community is going to this.

It will likely occur in U.S. schools at some point, too.

I am for it. Get religion out of science.

[Fumesucker]

7. I'm familiar with the terms and have been for decades..

Try using them in much of the USA and you're going to get huge pushback..

[hlthe2b]

4. I gather this is just in Australia?

I don't get the use of BP... It would have been nice if the article actually defined these terms (though I am certainly aware of BCE and CE)....

Frankly, makes no difference to me, either way, but will certainly confuse a lot of people...

[frazzled]

8. No, it's increasingly widely used here in US

College Boards uses it, as does the Smithsonian Inst., Norton Anthology of Literature, etc. (see my post below)

[Nihil]

31. CE/BCE are fairly global but the use of BP (although also global) is inappropriate here

BP = Before Present

This is a useful reference in the context of dating artifacts or objects
but buggerall use in "replacing" AD/BC as a framework as the value for
any specific point of reference will change every year!

:silly:

CE/BCE are getting to be fairly common across the English-speaking world
but even more common than stating "CE" is to retain the year value and simply
don't give the reference (i.e., instead of saying "2011 AD" or "AD 2011"
they just say "2011" with the implication that it is the current era so that
the AD fans interpret it as "AD 2011" whilst the CE fans take it as "2011 CE").

That also maps well when adjusting the year zero between different systems:
e.g., Haaretz gives both date formats "Tue, September 06, 2011 Elul 7, 5771".

(He says, writing this on Tuesday, September 06, AL 6011 ... :evilgrin: )

[frazzled]

6. Good move

We Jews have been using BCE and CE for since the 19th century. The only proviso is that students should be well advised that these refer to what was previously termed BC and AD, since they will still encounter those terms widely in the literature.

According to a Wikipedia entry the BCE and CE notation is gaining widespread use: the Smithsonian Institution uses it, as does the World Almanac. The College Board uses it on its history tests, as does the Norton Anthology of Literature.

[trotsky]

9. Agreed.

Would love to see this be the standard. Insensitive to all non-Christians to continue using "AD".

[dmallind]

10. About fucking time - serious academics have used CE for decades

Part of understanding that the world includes those who do not recognize a Christ, and those who do not call him "Domine".

The coomon era simply reflects the cultural dominance of those societies that use the dating system.

[LibertyLover]

11. I'm used to this from reading archaeological reports

and since I'm not Christian it doesn't bother me in the least. I do however sometimes read Biblical Archaeology magazine and particularly enjoy the 'cancel my subscription' letters. The magazine has a policy of not changing how the authors of their articles reference dates, so some still use the older AD and BC and some use the modern BCE or BP and CE. More idiots than you would believe write letters to cancel their subscriptions because they read an article and it used the new dating tags and their faith is outraged. Oy.

[JackintheGreen]

12. Yet time is still christo-centric

When does the "common era" start? Immediately upon the reputed birth of Jesus. What is BCE? Any time before he was born.

A rose by any other name, and all that. They get their panties all in a wad, but chronology is still rooted in christian worldview.

[RaleighNCDUer]

14. Except that is not true.

The best estimates, based on biblical and Roman records, judging by events in the reigns of Augustus and Herod, is that Jesus (if he existed at all) was born in 3 BCE, and was executed in 29 CE.

[Silent3]

17. Regardless of the accuracy of the dates...

...however, the current calendar was motivated by Christian beliefs. If the 1 AD date is wrong for the birth of Jesus (or meaningless because Jesus isn't a real person) it's not because some non-Christian standard was used.

[JackintheGreen]

19. Thank you, Silent3

I do not disagree with Raleigh, but such responses complete miss both the point and the spirit of my own. Giving the benefit of the doubt, responses like Raleigh's are motivated by the desire to underscore the factual inconsistencies of a faith-based worldview, but the fact remains that MOST christians don't give a flying fuck that most scholars agree that Jesus was REALLY born in 3 BCE. MOST of the world does not accept that Jesus was the son of god, yet most of the world - at least for official functions - recognizes a dating system that is Christo-centric.

[darkstar3]

29. That's what you get when there are centuries of Western history

where you had to be a priest in order to engage in formal study.

[backscatter712]

28. You've got to love features chosen for legacy compatibility.

Since everyone's grown up with the Julian calendar, there's no reason to switch the zero year without a huge justification.

But they're absolutely right in at least deemphasizing the mythology and switching to BCE and CE notation.

[Silent3]

15. I can't get too excited about this either way

I mildly prefer BCE/CE over BC/AD, but considering that the numbering of the years is based on Christian beliefs, regardless of the era abbreviations used, we're dealing with a pretty entrenched bias for something that's going to be a fairly arbitrary standard regardless.

The names of the days of the week are all based on various Germanic, Anglo-Saxon, and Roman gods. I can live with that.

When I say "goodbye" to someone, I'm using a contraction of "God be (or go) with you". I can live with that too.

[laconicsax]

18. There's nothing common about the common era.

Calling the point when Jesus was allegedly born the start of a new, "common" era is offensive and disgusting. It assumes both a universal acceptance of Christianity and the historicity of its mythos.

It is no different than BC and AD.

[Silent3]

20. The "common" era *is* commonly in use

For business and governmental purposes, the world nearly universally uses the Gregorian calendar these days. The Christian cultural core for the calendar might not be common, but the practical usage of that calendar is very common.

[trotsky]

22. Yeah, like you said in post #15.

Not crazy about the idea either way, but it's a calendar that is so ingrained in our daily lives (not to mention our computer programs) that trying to dictate a new reference point is just a practical impossibility.

[Silent3]

24. If we're talking about software-based dates...

...we could make 1970 the new Year 0, and then use a negative sign without any BC/AD-like abbreviations tacked on at all.

Or maybe BUE/UE for Before Unix Era/Unix Era. :)

We'd definitely have to keep the Year 0, however, instead of maintaining the arithmetic mess of two year 1s in a row.

[LeftishBrit]

26. Agree.

[laconicsax]

33. I don't contest the common usage of the calendar.

IMO, changing AD to CE is an overt capitulation. It's one thing to say that AD stands for Anno Domini, know the origin of that, and why we use it but it's altogether different to pretend that the miscalculated date of a fictional event started a globally common era.

The first is acceding to tradition, the second is accepting a religious narrative under the guise of rejecting it.

[dmallind]

23. But it is also irrevocably entrenched in human culture

Yes other societies have different dating systems, albeit often of limited use even within them (a comedian whose name I can't remember right now - Dara O' Briain maybe - does a bit where he talks to Jewish audience members and asks them what the year is in the Hebrew calendar; they rarely even know). But just as the lingua franca of global trade and science is English, because of the historical dominance of societies using it, the Gregorian calendar is universally known and understood.

Sure it's still based on the mythical birth of a questionably real religious figure (incorrectly calculated), but today's name is based on an equally nonhistorical Scandinavian/Germanic godddess. One bothers me no more than the other. But just as it would be crass and silly to call Friday "the day holy to our Queen of the Gods Freyja" it's crass and silly to talk about the "year of our Lord 2011". We don't have to upend the entire historical reference of humanity to change the number to something else (based on what? To go completely unbiased it would have to be the origin of homo sapiens or the formation of earth - both questionably fixed and open to revision) to get rid of the overt reference to the bias. Eventually then it wil become as inoffensive to non-Christians as Friday is to non-Norse Pagans.

[Deep13]

35. Well, I just see it as the calendar that is in common use.

The "era" being the era of that calendar. If there were any support for it, I can certainly see picking the date of the oldest known civilization or writing sample and starting there.

[laconicsax]

36. Except the calendar didn't come into use until nearly 1600 years later.

By your metric, the 'common era' started in 1582, which is close to my preferred starting year of 1610.

I think we're kidding ourselves by pretending that CE means anything other than "Christian Era."

[Deep13]

39. Right, the calendar acknowledges the era used first...

...by Christian Europeans and then adopted by much of the rest of the world. Common Era, Christian Era, they are both accurate. Again, I don't mind acknowledging that Christianity exists as long as I don't have affirm its myths just by writing the date.

So what's the significance of 1610? Galileo? Kepler?

[laconicsax]

40. By having the birth of Jesus be the start of a common era, you are affirming the myths.

1610 is when Galileo observed the moons of Jupiter and realized that ours wasn't the only world in the universes--our view of the universe forever changed.

[Deep13]

43. Yes, that's pretty significant.

Personally, I would make the start the founding of Sumer, the earliest known city state. Galileo is to recent for me. Too many negative number dates before it. The crusades would be around 400 bce. The Norman conquest 554 bce. Alexander beat Darius in 1944 b.c.e. Well that would be negative anyway.

[cleanhippie]

44. Sorry to intrude...

I liked the idea of using 1610 for the reasons outlined, but I think I like this one a bit more. Sumer could be characterized as the point where we, as humans, started to "get it" or had an "awakening", in the sense that we had a realization that there was more to it than mere survival. Organizing ourselves to have a better existence became important.

BCE would then describe the period of the earth when there was no one around to even know what an "era" was.

:shrug:

Thats my two cents. Sorry to butt in...

[Deep13]

45. It's not a private conversation.

Feel free.

:hi:

[laconicsax]

47. I dislike that for two reasons.

We don't know if an earlier civilization existed elsewhere.

We don't have a good date for the founding.

I see 1610 as a good choice for the start of a modern era. There's simply something about the first time that our universe grew beyond what had been known for millenia.

[cleanhippie]

51. You both have good arguments, I'm glad I'm not the one who has to decide...

[LeftishBrit]

50. Ideally...

I would date the 'era' from the first written text; the move from prehistory to history. I think this was around 2600 BC, in Sumerian; though written words and symbols predated that. However, by the nature of such things, we don't have an *exact* date for it.

Alternatively, one could take the invention of the printing press, c. 1439.

[frogmarch]

30. I've used

BCE, BP and CE for years.

Darn, the poll was closed at the link. The outraged persecuted Christians won.

[Critters2]

32. I went to a Christian seminary, and we always used "BCE" and "CE".

We understood them to mean "of the common era" and "before the common era". We never used BC or AD.

[Deep13]

34. Yup, a lot of people use that calendar who are not Christians...

...and who do not want to affirm the divinity of Jesus every time they right a date.

[laconicsax]

37. By using "common era," they affirm the Christian mythos.

[Deep13]

38. Well, I don't mind admitting that there is a Christian mythos.

As long as I don't have to attest to the veracity of its myths.

[laconicsax]

41. You attest to the veracity by accepting one as a historical event of global significance. n/t

[Deep13]

42. No, I accept the reality that most people use that calendar.

That being the case, it is a lot less confusing to just call it something else that to redo every date that historians and people generally already know. The start date has to be somewhere. Granted, I wish it were earlier just because it is a little confusing to figure negative dates. But the rise of Christianity is a historical event of global significance even if its foundational myths are not based on fact.

[laconicsax]

48. Then it should start in 325.

A real event that had real significance is immeasurably better than a mythological event of religious significance.

[Deep13]

52. Actually, that would be a good line to draw...

...between the end of classical civilization and the beginning of medieval civ., at least in Europe and the Middle East anyway. Of course it wasn't really that abrupt. And, like the Gregorian calendar, it perpetuates Euro centrism. But Christianity was institutionalized at Nicea, it existed before then.

[laconicsax]

53. The argument could be made that it was the start of the Christian era.

Similar to how the US existed before it became a superpower.

[deacon_sephiroth]

49. This made my morning.

I feel like the world just grew up a little bit. I feel a TINY bit more satisfied with living in the yr 2011. No flying car for me, no soilent green, no talking brains in jars and all that other fun stuff I was promised.... but at least we're slowly getting over the events of 2000 years ago that STILL hold us back.

[Lucian]

54. Good.

Those needed to change.

I haven't used BC and AD in years.