Here we go again

Ok, I think I've sorted out my E-mail program. My subjects tell me that
RHUL E-mail acounts were being nice and displaying my message with minimal
loss of format. But I gather some of the other members with non-RHUL
accounts had severe problems with recieving the announce...indeed I have
seen what Asan got and it looks very nasty. So here we go again, 3rd time
lucky. If there is still a formatting problem then please someone let me
know...after all I use this computer for all anounces and if someone can't
read my mail then I can only fix it if someone tells me. Ok then:

RETRANSMISSION OF IFIS ANNOUNCE REGARDING THIS WEEKS FILM

gReetingS

H A P P Y N E W M I L L I E N N I U M

It is with great pleasure and pride that I welcome you back for the new
Millennium and announce that our MM inaugural film shall be:

South Park Bigger, Longer and Uncut (US, 1999, Cert. R, Dir. Trey Parker,
Distributor: Paramount)
Thursday 13 January 2000, 7pm MLT

Welcome back one and all. This millennium, may all you dreams come true and
may each and every dream you have be more fantastic than last. May you all
walk on moonbeams and rainbows and leave stardust in your wake whilst others
stare on in awe at you. Happy MM :o)

Look out for my publicity revue coming around 12 January giving you all the
stuff you need to know about forthcoming events et. al. vis-a-vis IFIS. One
other thing I want to announce is that I have decided in line with the new
Millennium and all, to promote myself from King to Emperor. Hence I am now
Emperor Ant. 1st. Thank you for you congratulations in advance, I feel
honoured with my new title.


Anthony Beschizza
The moment that you stepped into the room you took my breath away.

In article <000001bf5d35$223aec40$902b893e@>, "Anthony Beschizza" <ant@> wrote:
Almost OK. There is only one problem - it seems to be talking about "the new
millenium" a year early.
[...]


Simple counting lessons available on request.


Simon

---
"This too is meaningless, a chasing after the wind" -Ecclesiastes 4:16

simon@ | Not affiliated to any religion
simon@ | Not affiliated to any politics
H (+44/0)1784 431998 | Not affiliated to any ideology
M (+44/0)7967 109779 (GMT/BST) | What does that make me?

<ant@> wrote:
Thankyou Simon.
As a quick clue to get you started, a century contains 100 years
and a millenium contains 1000 years, not 99 and 999 respectively.
Chris Lyth (clyth@)
...................................................
Candy
is dandy.
But liquor
is quicker.

Ogden Nash

Chris Lyth wrote:
Hmm, I'm curious. How do you know that people weren't celebrating
the start of the new millenium in year 0? They certainly were
back in 1000.

Could it be that the date system hadn't even been invented then?

It's frame of reference is completely screwed anyway. The estimates
of Christ's birth range from 7 BC to around 12 AD. Even if they
got the year right, the month is definitely wrong, you don't watch
your flocks in the middle of December.

So what's to stop us celebrating a millenium that runs from 1BC through
to 999AD? An overwhelming desire to be smarter than everyone else?

Adam

----- Original Message -----
From: Adam Hattrell <adamh@>
To: <chat@>
Sent: Thursday, January 13, 2000 2:45 PM
Subject: Re: Here we go again
There was no year 0. :-)
True
also true. But it doesn't change the fact that a millenium contains more
than 999 years.
The same thing that stops us celebrating a millenium that starts in 10BC and
ends in 990AD.
We weren't born then.
The fact I know how to count. As do Steve, Nick, Chris T and Simon giving
just a quick glance
back at recent mails.

Chris Lyth. (clyth@)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
-------
I am a very concientious man. When I throw rocks at
seagulls, I leave no tern unstoned.
Ogden Nash

chris lyth wrote:
Conceded, what does that have to do with the following point?
Excellent, I await the pearl of wisdom that falls from your mouth...
...Ahh. Well in that case I also wasn't born in either 1900 or 1901.
So I guess I can't celebrate the new millenium at all. Darn.
I rest my case.
Ah now if we're going to conduct this discusion on democratic principles,
that's fine and dandy. I hereby, declare myself the winner off the
back of an overwhelming vote of around 50 million people.

Laters,

Adam

On Fri, 14 Jan 2000, Adam Hattrell wrote:
But how many of those 50 mil were having a party for the sake of having a
party? I think you'll find that next year just as many people will be
partying - in fact probably more.

Chris

---

christ@ #include <stddisclaimer.h> http://www.instituteofcorrection.org.uk/

"So this is really me? A no-style gimbo with teeth druids could use as a
place of worship" - Duaine Dibley (Red Dwarf - "Back to Reality")

yay! two parties, that's what I've planned to do!!!!
double the alcohol intake!
Charlotte

I have one thing to say about all this nit picking over when the
millenium
really is - STOP HARRASSING ME WITH IT! The bottom line is that
none
of you really know and that's the way it's going to stay, unless
someone's
happened to have invented time travel. All this mathematical talk
about
dates and numbers is giving me a headache. I get even more violent
when
I have headaches.

Now is that all settled then?

Kerry

No - I think we can run with this one for a while yet before we really
unpack the flame throwers .......

Does anyone know at what point people started counting from the estimated
year of Christ's birth ?

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
Philip Ayres
payres@
www.netcomuk.co.uk/~payres
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

On Fri, 14 Jan 2000, Philip Ayres wrote:
"You wouldn't let it lie..."
About 1980 years before I was born? *8)

Chris

---

christ@ #include <stddisclaimer.h> http://www.instituteofcorrection.org.uk/

"So this is really me? A no-style gimbo with teeth druids could use as a
place of worship" - Duaine Dibley (Red Dwarf - "Back to Reality")

estimated
Although a significant figure in the Jewish nation during his lifetime I
doubt they'd have gone "Lets reorganise the calendar so we can start
counting from when that preacher blokie from Nazareth was born". Roman
system would have been by year of emperor's reign. So when did they start
saying "it's been xx years since Jesus was born ?" (The smart alec who says
20 is in for a decking ....)

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
Philip Ayres
payres@
www.netcomuk.co.uk/~payres
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

20! Now that's for talking about all this infernal millenium
business. (You can TRY to deck me Phil. Good luck, you'll need it.) :-)

----- Original Message -----
From: Philip Ayres <payres@>
To: <chat@>
Sent: Friday, January 14, 2000 12:45 PM
Subject: Re: Here we go again
Let me see. It would have to be at a time when Christanity was the major
religion in a
large area of the world. That gives a delay of a couple of centuries.
Aha, my intelligent wife just researched and quoted the following

'Beginning the Christian era with the date of the incarnation was suggested
by Dionysus
Exiguus in the 6th Century, and in due course adopted throughout
Christendom.
Calculations began from 25th March AD1 the supposed date of the
annunciation,
which was taken as New Years day. The Gregorian calendar restored the
beginning of
the year to 1 Jan.'

So yes the system is not accurate, but if we start it with year 1, (I don't
know anyone
who seriously starts to count to 10 with the number 0) then the 2000th year
would be
2000. The 3rd millenium would start with 2001.


Chris Lyth. (clyth@)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
-------
I am a very concientious man. When I throw rocks at
seagulls, I leave no tern unstoned.
Ogden Nash

Okay, so we're all agreed that the real Millenium only starts at the
end of this year. So why the hell is everyone arguing about somthingthey
all agree on?!

Is that possible?

Adam

Oh yes, absolutely. You've only seen me being friendly, Adam dear. I do
seem to be getting that little headache now, since some people seem to have
had problems understanding my previous e-mail on this subject and WILL NOT
SHUT UP ABOUT THE GOD DAMNED MILLENIUM!!!!!!!!!!!! (And to all those smart
alecks out there - don't even THINK about bringing any more religion into
it!!!). There now, that's a bit better.

By the way Adam, well done on the sword play. One to watch, I'd say.

Kerry

have
Without meaning to sound offensive here (really - if I do, sorry - I like
you but I disagree), but it seems clear to me that a fair number of people
on this list *do* want to keep discussing this (for the record, I'm not one
of them - I said my bit and I'm leaving it at that unless anybody directly
comments on something I said, in which case I'll consider responding) and
shouting at those who are talking purely because you're not interested is a
bit harsh.

If you really don't like it just try hitting "delete" on any messages with
this subject, or even just "next", so that if somebody doesn't change the
subject and sends something else, you can check back. Oh, and if you feel
like frothing at me about any of these comments, don't do it on this list -
have a chat on thursday instead...
This bit could have been directed at me, so I'll respond to the comment -
what I said was about nomenclature and definition, not religion. About how
the generally accepted definition could be used to clarify the argument. I
also prefer not to bring up religion in a mailing list, as the following
bloodbath is never pleasant.

---

Adrian Long / Eggwhite / Jacobine
http://www.subliminal.demon.co.uk/
http://www.brunel.ac.uk/~dtpgaml/

Yes, but it's fun.
Don't worry, Adrian, it wasn't a comment aimed at you. It was aimed at
anybody feeling awkward enough to take me up on it.

Kerry

Ahh... Trolling... That would explain it.

I would also like to point out, as a small aside, however, that before the
message you posted on the topic today, the last MM post was on sunday. It
would appear that the discussion had stopped, and that you started it all
off again yourself... damn you!
(froth froth froth!)

as another aside, does anybody hereabouts put "X-Troll" flags in their
headers, or is that unique to other lists I'm on...?

---

Adrian Long / Eggwhite / Jacobine
http://www.subliminal.demon.co.uk/
http://www.brunel.ac.uk/~dtpgaml/

In article <8EE7845D871BD311B0E900E0292A08260253C238@>, Drummond K <K.Drummond@> wrote:
Well, we have an excellent time-communication system called library
archives. Looking at newspapers for 1901 is all it takes.

Admittedly this time-communication system only works one way - which is less
good for things like betting on horses. But for noting things like "when
100 years goes by" it's fine.
Ooh ... violence! Oo-er mistress! Will you be bringing the whip and the
snakeskin dress again? :-)



Simon

---
"This too is meaningless, a chasing after the wind" -Ecclesiastes 4:16

simon@ | Not affiliated to any religion
simon@ | Not affiliated to any politics
H (+44/0)1784 431998 | Not affiliated to any ideology
M (+44/0)7967 109779 (GMT/BST) | What does that make me?

Yes, Simon, but that still doesn't answer the question that everyone seems
to be asking (except for myself): When is the real Millenium. Since our
calender system is not entirely accurate and is also but one of many.
Kerry
Hmm. quoting the Bible - should I be getting worried?

Hi Kerry. Still talking about the millenium, I see.
(Does anyone know how to do a hiding smiley?)

In article <8EE7845D871BD311B0E900E0292A08260253C23C@>, Drummond K <K.Drummond@> wrote:
Our calendar system is internally self-consistent. The millenium should
coincide with the century - leaving the last year of the twentieth century
in the third millenium is *messy*. And the twenty-first century should be
celebrated 100 years after the twentieth century was celebrated.

As for "not entirely accurate", and "one of many", all the calendars seem to
be linked to some sort of religion. There has been quite a lot of fuss
amonng the chattering classes, with the churches claiming that in the blind
rush to get as pissed as possible, Jesus has been forgotten.

Since the God-botherers seem to have had their own special way of
celebrating the millenium (mainly consisting of running around screaming
about the End of the World), and this dimension to the celebration has
actually made it to the mainstream media, (as in "End of Days", to pick a
random example), I'd say the God-botherers have had their fifteen seconds of
fame too. Had I wanted to travel to see "the millenium celebrations", I
would have thought that the venue of choice was Jerusalem - they have had
"King David"s, "John the Baptists" and other assorted messiahs turning up
all year. They've even taken to calling it "Jerusalem Syndrome". For a
people-watcher, it sounded like a real safari.

It does rather leave the staid old CofE rather left out, though. Is this a
bad thing? Discuss...
<flirt>
The leather suit you had on last night was rather fetching. And singularly
appropriate to the character.
</flirt>

The question is, should I look around for a pale blue robe? And if I do,
will attendance at my campaigns fall off?
Maybe. It worries the JWs, as I am one of their few victims who has
actually *read* it. :-)

It also causes brain-failure among Usenet God-botherers, as some assume I am
Christian when I quote the Bible, and some notice that I am not when they
read "not affiliated to any religion". They then wonder why the
blankety-blank I might be quoting the Bible if I am not a Christian.

In truth, I quote Ecclesiastes because it's a good book (as opposed to a
"Good Book".) It's full of darkness and futility, and the transitory nature
of life - a sort of "Book of Goth", if you like. Try it - you'll see what I
mean.

For once, though, it's not in the IFIS library. Although there is a
collection of short stories called "A Rose for Ecclesiastes", by Roger
Zelazny.


Simon

---
"This too is meaningless, a chasing after the wind" -Ecclesiastes 4:16

simon@ | Not affiliated to any religion
simon@ | Not affiliated to any politics
H (+44/0)1784 431998 | Not affiliated to any ideology
M (+44/0)7967 109779 (GMT/BST) | What does that make me?

Why thank you, kind Sir. Annika enjoyed herself immensely, and yes, Ron is
right. Blood is easier to wipe off leather - if you do it fast enough. All
this flirting - I wear leather for one night and I suddenly have a whole
platoon of admirers flirting with me. Hmmm, I could get used to this.
Clare, you know that little leather vest...
Since I'm not an experienced role player, I haven't really got a
clue what all those lovely blue robes signify. I gather from the reactions
of others that it is something not entirely wholesome and nice. Guess I'll
have to adopt Annika's policy of 'be very polite to your enemies, even when
you're liquifying their poor dear little brains'. By the way, what in all
hell is Doctor Exotic trying to do to us? I think Annika might be prepared
to forgive him, considering the fact that his - well, whatever it was he
did - turned into a rather fortutious (? - For now.) thingy. She got to
blow up a Satyr (I'm sorry, but if he puts a large rent in her armour, she's
bound to get a little bit annoyed) and talk to a unicorn (Women don't count,
huh?...Innterressstingggggg.), not to mention ride one. She nearly decided
to go off with him when he left the party with all those blue robey people,
just for the hell of it (you know what she's like).
Heh, heh, heh, heh, hehhh.
Haven't really read Ecclesiastes, but like Jeremiah.

By the way, thanks for taking up the rant. It's an open invitation,
anyone. Religion, you know. This could get very messy. What fun.

Kerry (Troll)

On Fri, 21 Jan 2000, Drummond K wrote:
Well what do you expect when you introduce an attractive woman into a
society that consisted mostly of men up until recently.

And I believe it was also a full moon last night(?) - thats bound to bring
out the animal in us *woof*.

Chris, the Irish Setter.
PS Any similarities between myself and a certain golden apple bearing greek
named Paris, are purely circumstantial and should be put down to an healthy
over active imagination and feminine jealously *8).

---

christ@ #include <stddisclaimer.h> http://www.instituteofcorrection.org.uk/

"So this is really me? A no-style gimbo with teeth druids could use as a
place of worship" - Duaine Dibley (Red Dwarf - "Back to Reality")

There'll be more - all the IT folks will be out partying next year as most
of the ones I know here were either in lovely data centres, offices or at
home (due to managers panicking that the cell phone and pager network might
go down - comments along the lines of "Hey, how about using carrier pigeons
to communicate with people?" was one of the ones we had floating around!).

through
Unless you have learned to time travel without telling us. you did not
celebrate
anything in the year 1000, 990, 999 or any time 1000 or so years ago.
The third millenium begins next year. Not this year. Mathematical fact. No
amount of
sarcasm can change it.
If you choose to side with stupidity it is your choice. Please do not tell
me
that I am stupid for not agreeing with you.
Wasn't there a greek fellow who said something about it not mattering about
being in a minority of one. everyone else is not suddenly right.

Chris Lyth. (clyth@)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
-------
I am a very concientious man. When I throw rocks at
seagulls, I leave no tern unstoned.
Ogden Nash

Not sure about the greek bloke, but there's something along the same
lines in Orwell's 1984: "sanity is not statistical," ie. you can be one
against the millions and still be right......
- Jen

And I seem to recall that Greenwich Observatory website advertised here told
me Herod died in the year -4, so that rather screws things up for us. If
Herod launched his Jesus man-hunt from beyond the grave, he was more
impressive than I thought.

So the Christian purist millenium was years ago.
The Mathematical purist millenium is next year.

I quite liked the idea of celebrating the 1000th anniversary of the
four-digit year. Celebrating a clean-looking date, with zeros in it. In
1970, they said "Oh, it's the end of the 60s, and the start of the 70s" in
1990 they said "The 80s are over" so in 2000 we can say "The 1900s are
over!"

Sounds splendid to me.

On a Sci-Fi note, of course, we've got one year to do all the things we've
not managed from "2001 A Space Odyssey" yet.

On a Fantasy note, we've got people saying "Nostradamus forsaw the fireworks
coming from the sky". The end of the world really is coming.

And on a common-sense note, it feels much like it did last year.

Dominic

"Spontaneity has its time and its place."

Mucked up alreday - wasn't TMA1 unearthed in 1998 in the book ?

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
Philip Ayres
payres@
www.netcomuk.co.uk/~payres
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

(SLAP!)

No no no no.

I wasn't treating it as a work of absolute prophecy. I just meant all the
things of a technological nature we've not managed yet, such as suspended
animation, and self-aware computers. Can they lipread yet?


Dominic

"The secret to creativity is knowing how to hide your sources."
[Albert Einstein (1879-1955)]

Yourself or me ?
Arthur's better than many at predicting such things. Didn't he come up
with the idea of geosynchronus comms satellites long before they happened ?
OK Yes so sus ann, lunar bases, manned missions to Mars and Jupiter. I
think there is a passage in the authors notes to 2061 where he speculates on
how far back Challenger did put back the space program ....

As for computers lip reading - is this easier than voice recognition ? All
the computer has to do is recognise the motions the lips make - A machine
vision group problem surely ? (Jaffa cake anyone ? :-) )

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
Philip Ayres
payres@
www.netcomuk.co.uk/~payres
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Not to mention the fact that even using generally accepted times (as opposed
to the actual times), if you're going to be celebrating the aniversary of
Christ's birth, you should be doing it on 25th december, not the first of
january. The fact that most evidence points to him being born somewhere
around september anyway just confuses the issue even further...
we've
Now we get onto the joys of "Space: Last Year" and "Next Year: A Space
Oddessy"...
Probably could if somebody sat down and tried to make them. I don't think
it's something that's thought about very often...
All
> the computer has to do is recognise the motions the lips make - A machine
Not quite so simple. Or rather, it may be if you only wanted the computer
to read the lips of one test subject who had their head clamped in the same
position and orientation and never changed hairstyle or plucked their
eyebrows (normally cause problems in facial recognition) or decided to wear
a different lipstick (problems in identifying boundaries of lips) and always
ensured that the light levels are identical each time they spoke, etc...
etc... I could go on for days... To put it bluntly, even working out where
somebody's head is and where they're facing from a moving image in realtime
is hard enough... then working out where their mouth is and what it's doing
whilst it's doing it is quite... tricky. Doing the lipreading part itself
is simple pattern recognition with a bit of postprocessing. Doing the
preprocessing would be utterly hideous unless you didn't mind having to wait
an age for the translation of what you said...

Eeek. I'll shut up now...

---

Adrian Long / Eggwhite / Jacobine
http://www.subliminal.demon.co.uk/
http://www.brunel.ac.uk/~dtpgaml/

In article <387DE4FE.B5CD353B@>, Adam Hattrell <adamh@> wrote:
The information is not quite that readily available. Chroniclers were thin
on the ground around 1000AD, (which is why it's called "the Dark Ages",) and
most normal folks counted the date as "the Xth year of (say) Edward's
Reign". But walk to a library and look at papers for 1900 and 1901 - the
start of the Twentieth Century was celebrated in 1901. At least one
national newspaper reproduced its 1900 front page, and so proved it.

But then in 1900 the people in charge weren't so terrified of appearing
educated in front of the Great Unwashed. This is the age where TV like
"Ali G" celebrates racist stereotypes and stupidity.
Well, Herod died in 4BC, which rather knocks that one on the head. Little
Dennis got his sums wrong, that's all. Nobody's going to adjust the
calendar to make it 2008 because some guy over 1500 years ago got Christ's
birthday wrong.

Interestingly, one of the candidates for the Star of Bethlehem is a
supernova in Aquila in 8BC. And by some curious coincidence there was a
supernova in Aquila this Christmas. "And the star is moving somewhere and
the Time is nearly here ..." etc. Kill the Trolls!!!
There is nothing to stop you celebrating your personal millenium starting in
26BC (or whenever), and claiming to be a Millenium Baby. But The Third
Millenium is going to count from 1AD. Nothing else makes sense.

I'd love not to be smarter than everyone else. But people are stupid, and
that rather spoils it. :-(

By way of compensation, the "millenium celebrations" were paid for with
Lottery funds - a tax for people who can't count. So there is some justice
in it all, I guess. You will also notice that the Government are calling
this "the Millenium Year". Which is rather cunning - a way to be populist
without actually being wrong. It would be a fatal mistake for them to
actually demonstrate that they can count. The meeja would tear them to
pieces. Welcome to the Age of Stupidity. Smart people not welcome!

As it is, they instead demonstrated that they cannot organise a pissup in a
brewery. Or at least they were prepared to leave the meeja bosses standing
in the cold with everyone else. Big mistake! Maybe next year they'll get
the Millenium Celebrations right.


ObSF: someone else got their millenium dates right, too - ever wonder why
the film and book are called "2001"? The reason is because Clarke and
Kubrick could *count* - and because SF, in general, is a celebration of
intelligence. SF is also stuffed with dire warnings about the forthcoming
Age of Stupidity - which as you might observe could be considered to start
1st January 2000.

More "soma", anyone?


Simon

---
"This too is meaningless, a chasing after the wind" -Ecclesiastes 4:16

simon@ | Not affiliated to any religion
simon@ | Not affiliated to any politics
H (+44/0)1784 431998 | Not affiliated to any ideology
M (+44/0)7967 109779 (GMT/BST) | What does that make me?

simon@ wrote:
As a complete side note, I think you've missed the point with Ali G.
He's not exactly celebrating stupidity as ridiculing it. Personally
I'm suprised the man is still alive after his coverage of gangs in
the Bronx. I guess he was confidant that they wouldn't "get it"
either. A braver man than I.
Not really. The point is that the particular date picked is
plain wrong. You haven't exactly refuted that.
Then I guess you concede the point that a millenium is merely a 1000
years passed some arbitary point in time?
At the last count, it wasn't my personal millenium. To hazard a guess
I'd say 90% of the country were celebrating it with me. I'll pass
on the title of Millenium Baby, I don't think it really suits me!
I deny it. Counting from year 0 makes sense. The fact that the Roman's
didn't see fit to include one in their funky calander is the problem.
Given that they didn't we have the choice of counting from one year on
either side. For a fair old while, people chose to count from one
side. Now they don't. That choice doesn't reflect in a poor eduction,
the avarage man in the street could certainly explain the problem to
you. I posit that the change reflects the common man choosing to shelve
a outdated and useless convention, for a more convenient one. The march of
progress - long live the new Millenium.
Indeed. Used up all that bottled water and tins of food yet?
Sig material I suspect.

Laters,

Adam

In article <387F0A76.C3C43A48@>, Adam Hattrell <adamh@> wrote:
The people he interviews are generally "softer" targets than that. His
"interviews" are completely pointless: they don't inform, and they are
frankly too predictable to entertain.

If he's ridiculing anything as stupid, it is black culture. Where I come
from, that isn't a very nice thing to do.

"...moron shall speak unto moron..."
I've ignored it. The calendar is a system, not a number. This year is 2000
because last year was 1999. When Christ was born is, frankly, irrelevent.

By the same token, 2001 will be the start of the 21st Century because 1901
was the start of the Twentieth. "Century" = "100 years". It's not very
hard, you know.
Yes.

*The* Millenium, on the other hand, is fixed to the reference point of our
calendar: 1AD. I'm sorry to hear that you are willing to use populism as an
alternative to logic, but I am not prepared to follow your Gadarene example.

Your argument seems to boil down to "wahay! I'm saying the same thing as
everyone else so I must be right!" Are you willing to agree that this is
the essence of your argument?

Then, since I consider this argument contemptible, I will be happy to
consider you not worth further effort, and the discussion will be over.
I will then stop making you feel uncomfortable by raising the possibility
that not everyone says the same as you. The word "millenium" can be
abandoned for the rest of the year, and everyone will be happy.

Shall we do that?
It's not a problem, it's just the system.

I guess you don't maintain code for a living. Or if you do, you're not very
good at it. People make assumptions (like "we will start a calendar from
1AD") and people who come later work within those assumptions.

The alternative isn't "progress", it's either "ignorance" or "a waste of
time".
So giving the Twentieth Century only 99 years gives what advantage?

The answer is "none". It's not "progress". It's monkeying with a perfectly
adequate system in order to not appear too well educated.

You obviously don't mix with the common man so much. You might try meeting
the people you glorify a bit more. Or are we going to come over all New
Labour, and claim to be an expert on Public Opinion while actually ignoring
it?

Contemptible, contemptible.
We're using them up at the normal rate. All we did was bought the stuff
we'd normally buy a bit early. We didn't buy anything we wouldn't normally
buy. Like the lottery, it's a question of risk against cost. The tiny cost
(less than six months interest on the cost of a few tins) was reasonable
considering what we were insuring against (the tiny possibility of going
hungry for a few weeks). Sensible management includes making minimum effort
to cover future risks. I'd say we did that. Do the cost-benefit analysis
yourself. Or better yet, get someone who can count to help you out with it.

I'd be interested to know what value you place on having food and clean
water. I'd make it quite high, if I were you.

As it turned out, it was good having stuff in the house, because we spent a
while too ill to shop, when the "millenium bug" came around and gave us flu.
Very possibly. When I wrote it I was going for irony - I didn't expect
someone here to embrace such a thing. But to quote Heinlein, "Never
underestimate the power of human stupidity."


Here's another one - this time by Douglas Adams:-

Slartibartfast: "I'd far rather be happy than right any day."
Arthur: "And are you?"
Slartibartfast: "No. That's where it all falls down of course."
Arthur: "Pity. It sounded like quite a good lifestyle otherwise."

I'm sure we can draw our own morals. Especially if we read the next
chapter. (Chapter 31 of "The Hitch-hikers Guide to the Galaxy", for the
SF-challenged among you.) It's got the mice in it.

And Yes, It's In The IFIS Library.


Simon

---
"This too is meaningless, a chasing after the wind" -Ecclesiastes 4:16

simon@ | Not affiliated to any religion
simon@ | Not affiliated to any politics
H (+44/0)1784 431998 | Not affiliated to any ideology
M (+44/0)7967 109779 (GMT/BST) | What does that make me?

I've enjoyed reading this thread, it's certainly been a fun one.

Contention seems to arises from:

The Millennium started at 1 AD due to there not being a 0 AD.

Fair point, but couldn't an equally valid argument be that most
people simply refer to 0 AD as 1 BC due to convention?

Being that a calendar is simply a mathematical tool for
marking time, anyone who can easily swap between
negative centigrade and positive kelvin can then easily
equate 3 BC with -2 AD.

Neither BC or -AD are invalid mathematical arguments for
marking time, therefore any marking of the start of the
first millennium is based on your choice of pure AD or
BC/AD, or the Jewish calendar, or the chinese or in essence
your point of view.

Saying that someone is stupid for not having your point of
view is the first step to a less nicer world.

While we're quoting Douglas Adams, when asked what he though
about when the start of the millennium was he replied that
he didn't care but liked the idea of two excuses for a pissup.

Right i'll shut up now,

Darren

covers everything. Can we all shut up now, because my Inbox is glowing red >
hot, and my Deleted Items tray has more letters in it that any two Post >
Office sorting offices that you care to mention. Also, I'd just like to
inject a > point of practicality - who cares anyway? Whilst haggling over
minor points > is all good and well, the bottom line is that this is a
perfect excuse for two > parties (as if we needed one), so, as students,
confusion over the millennium > is all to the good. Long may it continue
(just not on IFIS chat).

That's Darren of Bob. Newly reunited with an email account. And a pleasure
to have him back with us it is. Do say hello to the Mrs for us Darren.....


=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
Philip Ayres
payres@
www.netcomuk.co.uk/~payres
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

I agree.

When you start thinking about what AD stands for it starts to make more
sense... The (supposed) year of christ's birth is 1AD, or 1 Anno Domini,
meaning "first year of our lord" (ish - don't go all silly quoting latin at
me, that's a practical meaning derived through vague interpreted
translation)... Which is why there's no year zero, because you didn't have
a "Zero-th year of our lord". Going by the current calendar, we are
currently in the 2000th year of our lord - which is to say that the 2000th
year hasn't finished yet, so we've had 1999 and a bit years of our lord so
far. 2000AD is the end of one millennium, not the start of another, simply
because we haven't had 2000 full AD years yet... we've had 1999AD years (and
a bit) and one BC year...

---

Adrian, etc...

Yes, and substituted with Millennium. The correct spelling.

Adam

Oh no, Adam! They've got you too!!!!!

No, I'm sick of all this business too. It's just that I'm utterly pedantic
about spellings.

Adam