Re: Representable date range: experiment results
Re: Representable date range: experiment results
- Subject: Re: Representable date range: experiment results
- From: "Mark J. Reed" <email@hidden>
- Date: Fri, 21 Oct 2005 21:05:01 -0400
On 10/21/05,
Nigel Garvey <
email@hidden> wrote:
>Ah, but there *is* a relationship there. If zero as a number - and more
>importantly, the concept of negative numbers - had been known (in Europe) at
>the time that Little Dennis established AD counting in the 500s, there would
>have been no need for the Venerable Bede to come up with the BC system later
>on. There would have already been a natural way to refer to years before 1
>AD: the year before 1 would be 0, the year before that -1, etc.
Dionysus's aim was to modify the Roman practice still in use at the time
(numbering the years of an emperor's reign) and to produce a calendar
based on his best estimate for year of Christ's birth. There were
calendars from previous eras that could be used to refer to years before
that. The point of a calendar was (and largely still is) to label years,
months, and days in some kind of context. The ability to calculate the
interval between events in different contexts would have interested only
a few. Bede too would have been more interested in relating things to
Christ's time than in implementing a through numbering system where
Christ's coming was just handy point on a continuum. What either of them
would have done had they known about zero and negative numbers is a
modern conceit.
You misunderstand. I am not trying to claim that I know what
Denis would have done had he known about zero and negative
numbers. I'm saying that if those concepts had been established
at the time, there would have been no need for him to do anything
different. He could still not be explicit about how to treat
numbers prior to 1 AD; there would still not be any need for the Bede
to come along a few hundred years later and come up with a new
system. The means of referring to prior years would have been
implicit in the fact that they were numbered.
Basically, I'm saying that if Dennis the Little developed his system
today, or for that matter, if modern chronologists came up with a new
era for general civil use, that the year before year 1 of that era
would be 0, not -1, nor 1 of some backwards-counting version of the
same era.
--
Mark J. Reed <
email@hidden>
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