Ok here's how you work out time. When an hour goes by does time go from 59 minutes to 01 minute? No it goes from 59 minutes to 00 minutes. Also....There was a 0 A.D. If you think about it ....if there was no 0 A.D. why do we have the year 2000 A.D.....why don't we just go from 1999 to 2001? And last....the first millinuim was 1000 because A.D. time started at 0 A.D. If the millinuim did start on 2001 then that would be 1001 years and not 1000 ( 1000A.D. - 0 A.D. = 1000A.D.)( 1001A.D. - 0A.D. = 1001 A.D. ) Well I know this may have been confusing but if you think logically, 2000 is the start of the new millinuim, not 2001.

- Derrick

Yes, but the Romans never had a numeral for zero. That's why they skipped from BC 1 to AD 1.

Your logic is only slightly flawed in that year numbering was set up in the 5th century AD. not by the romans

it was made by a roman monk you dimwit read the whole fake article

Your comment shows how ignorant you are of history. Not only did the Western Roman Empire not fall until the 5th century AD (about AD 425, if I remeber correctly), Roman culture (including numbers) lived on for several centuries, under the rule of the Eastern Roman (Byzantine)Empire and the new nations of western Europe.

It wasn't until the Arabs began excersizing influence on Europe that Christians began to understand the number zero. Thus, in the 5th century, no one in Europe was smart enough to use zero.

Close... the Roman Empire fell in 476 AD.

The WESTERN part of the roman empire fell in 476, the EASTERN half did not fall until 1453 to the Ottoman turks. so he was roman.

Yeah, that's what I meant... the western half fell in 476... the eastern part lived on as the Byzantine Empire.

Oh, yeah. Well, I'm ignorant of history, too. But it just strengthens the case I was making.

There was a year "1" because people traditionally started counting with 1. Not zero!

I'd also like to say that the numbering system is completely arbitrary and like I said, wasn't even conceived of before A.D. 562! It's never been important to the Church exactly /when/ Jesus was born (it wasn't on 25 December, I'll tell you that!), just that he /was/ born.

Whether or not you believe he was born doesn't matter, either. Fact is, some Roman monk with no concept of zero made this up and it became popular.

As for your logic, it's flawed because the year-numbering system was invented way before modern clocks and stuff. I believe that noon was when the sun was overhead, and everything else was generally figured from that. Seconds are, you know, a very recent invention anyhow.

I understand the logic of why the millennium begins in 2001 and I agree with you. I'm getting a good laugh at all the people who are trying to dispute the facts.

Just for the sake or argument, however, I'd like to point something out. Up until the general theory of relativity was discovered, the concept of absolute time was widely believed. This means that the entire universe has the same measure of time. With the work of Albert Einstein, we now know that to be false. There is no absolute time. An example of this is time slows down with accelleration. This has been tested and shown to be true. If you don't believe it, do read Stephen Hawking's "A Brief History of Time" for an explanation. My point is that the year 2000 and the millennium are essentially meaningless because there is no absolute measure of time.

...unless our clocks measured time AND space in some new space x time unit.

Yeah, it's called the speed of light :)
space / time

What?

You're confusing Special and General relativity. You should review your physics.

Theoritically, I believe that traveling at the speed of light is the limit of space travel where you are traveling through complete space, and no time.

Except that light doesn't travel instantly.

That's why it's theoretical. It has been shown for some time now, that the speed of light radiation varies through different medium.

In Islamic calendar we are in 1420!

There have had to been a 0A.D.! Oh well....your probably right and I'm wrong. Congratulations, you have prooven me wrong!

- Derrick

It doesn't matter if there was or wasn't a year 0. The fact is, when that Roman monk figured out the modern calendar, he didn't start with year 0, he started with 1. Besides people who were alive back then in year 1/0 (whatever) didn't know that it was year 1/0 (whatever). That's just how we date the past now, people living in Rome and Greece didn't say happy 1000 B.C everybody.

People in the B.C. era didn't know that they were living in B.C. at the time.

Okay, I'm sorry, but this is just wrong. I'm not going to explain why because 1)people already have 2)it would take more time and 3)I just shouldn't have to. This 2000/2001 thing isn't based on what you think it should be, or what the mass public thinks it is. If we said something is true just because people think it is in a majority, we'd have some pretty f***ed up laws of nature/physics/whatever.
The new century/millenium starts in 2001 whether you like it or not. It's a new month, it's a new day, it's a new year, it's not a new millenium.
-chris

Or a new century/decade...

Problem. There is a representation for the year 2000: MM. You're thinking places and digits here.

Good call. Another way to put it is with an abacus. On an abacus, there is no zero, unless you count it as the absence of markers. Adding with an abacus is analogous to adding Roman numerals. They didn't start adding digits until the Arabs influenced them. Have you ever tried to add Roman numerals? It's a different form of adding.

~ferich

A millenium is a thousand years. Thus, the first millenium INCLUDED the year 1000. Thus, the second millenium started at 1001. It INCLUDES the year 2000, otherwise, the millenium would only be 999 years. If the second millenium includes the year 2000, then obviously the third millenium can't start until 2001, and it will continue THROUGH the year 3000. Then the fourth starts at 3001, et cetera...

Unless it is important to your religion, there is no significance to the millenium though, so all this is pointless. For other peoples (others than my own, at least), the year is totally different. The Japanese year is something like 600 less or so (or more?) than ours. The Jewish year is somewhere around 5400 I think, but I'm not sure. My point is, this year is not something 'special', nor will 2001 be just because it is the first year of the next millenium, because it is just a counting system. It might as well be the year 8567, it would still be the same year. We are all just tacking some great significance on a number that is totally arbitrary and really doesn't mean much (unless you are a twenty-year old computer, then you're just incredibly confused right now...)

Funny thing is, it isn't important in ANY religion. The inventor of the system was Christian, but the system itself is not important to the Christian Church. The Church knows that we don't know when Jesus was born, and it's never been important.

Like many of us have said, if the world were going to end 2000 years after the birth of Christ, it surely would have ended three or four years ago--possibly more.

Dennis the Short wasn't accurate when he calculated (he couldn't have been!), so the entire system is arbitrary. /When/ Christ was born isn't the point--the way the Roman monk decided to number years is.

You're a dumbass too. I didn't want to do this, but If I must...

1. The zero character had been around for a long time. However, the NUMBER zero did not exist until after the dark ages. Thus, you could have a year 2000 but NO year zero.
2. You need typing lessons. I am starting to believe that almost everyone I meet online has some kind of learning disability. Even a dead person could spell better than about 80% of the fools on the internet.
3. I'm gonna go prematurely bald 'cause I have to stand on my head so that people like you can KISS MY ASS!

-TI-Prym remote drone 187-32167-0Hffffff