posted
Wow. Just... wow. Who knew people could be so profoundly stupid? I mean, on their Homosexuality page, their "sources" are laughably biased and disreputable.
I'm sorry, but linking to an article that takes a small study that has results showing there may not be a genetic component to homosexuality on a site attempting to debunk evolution isn't going to convince me you're right, and that it's all a choice.
I'm half-hoping this is just a big joke.
Posts: 208 | Registered: Jun 2005
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I have no problem using the Christian calendar. I would have no problem with using a non-Christian calendar. The only calendar I have a problem with is a hypocritical one, which is what BCE/CE is.
It is not at all hypocritical for people of non-Christian religions to object to using "The Year of the Lord" (Anno Domini, or AD) in reference to the birth of Jesus when they do not consider him "the Lord." And I have no problem using a convention that allows people not to say/write something that conflicts with their beliefs while not creating the chaos that attempting to switch to a new system of dating would. I use A.D. in religious settings and C.E. in interfaith or accademic settings. It's a pretty simple way to acknowledge the beliefs of others and certainly no reason to get your knickers in a knot.
Posts: 9866 | Registered: Apr 2002
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quote:Originally posted by Annie: I wonder if they'll get sued for using Wikipedia's graphics.
AFAIK, MediaWiki (the engine that powers Wikipedia) and the art that is associated with it is freely licensed. In fact, I've downloaded it and setup a copy at work to store internal documentation. I do not think that there is any worry in that regard.
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posted
I think CE's OK. But referring to it as "Common Era" is silly. 1 AD (or 1 CE) doesn't mark the birth of commonness.
And, on the other side, Christians are happy to refer to January and Thursday, despite not wanting to worship Janus and Thor. Some haven't been: you can see replacements for month names like "twelvemonth" in Emily Dickinson's poetry. However, since the advent of Stargate SG-1, everybody's cool with Thor.
Posts: 1877 | Registered: Apr 2005
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quote:I think CE's OK. But referring to it as "Common Era" is silly. 1 AD (or 1 CE) doesn't mark the birth of commonness.
I think you misunderstand the use of Common in that phrase. It is reference not to the era, but to a commonly accepted zero point.
Posts: 10177 | Registered: Apr 2001
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posted
Yes, and that "zero point" is the birth of Christ. You can call it "the Year of Our Lord", you can call it the "Common Era", or you can call it "the Age of the Sea Cucumber", but none of that changes the fact that the calendar is based on the supposed birthdate of Jesus Christ.
I wouldn't have a problem using "Common Era" if they found some other event to start it from. But the attempt to be politically correct and say we're using a non-faith-specific calendar which is still based on the birth of Jesus Christ is what I find hypocritical.
They haven't changed anything but the initials; it's as purely superficial an attempt at "fixing" the "problem" of a faith-based calendar as you could possibly ask for. They want to rid the calendar of its religious implications, but they don't want to actually do anything toward that end. So they just say, "Gee, well, the year 1 has nothing to do with Jesus, it's just the start of the Common Era."
And what event marked the start of the "Common Era"? The birth of Jesus. Congratulations, O politically correct ones. You've accomplished exactly nothing.
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posted
Perhaps you should ask the "politically correct ones" whether they feel better about C.E. than A.D. before concluding that there's no semantic difference, just because you don't perceive one.
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posted
I'm not much interested in how they "feel" about it. I could insist on using "Age of the Sea Cucumber" because I like how it makes me feel all squishy inside, but that doesn't mean you'd take me seriously and accept "ASC" as a viable replacement for "AD".
Or perhaps you, personally, would. I don't know. But the vast majority of people, at least, would not, because they'd recognize it for the nonsense it is.
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Why is it nonsense? We've commonly agreed that we're going to start our calendar with 1 A.D. We know that changing the numbers on the calendar is a pain in the butt. We also know that "A.D." is a fairly offensive descriptor.
Heck, we ALSO know that most Christian theologians do not believe that Christ was born in the year claimed.
So by keeping the number and changing the descriptor, we acknowledge that we're sharing a common start point while simultaneously stripping that start point of the declaration. It doesn't make the choice of start point any less offensive to those people who're determined to be offended by Western civilization, but it acknowledges that we as a society have moved past the need to rub Christianity in people's faces -- and perhaps even acknowledges that we may have gotten Christ's birthday wrong. It's an improvement in all categories it impacts.
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
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quote:Yes, and that "zero point" is the birth of Christ.
It's actually not, you know. And I'm not saying that in the "Jesus wasn't born in 0 A.D." sense.
Scales need zero points. There has to be some choice, even one made randomly. A dating system referring to the purported birth of one specific religions deity isn't a particularly good one to use in a secular or multi-faith context. So, a new one was needed. However, it doesn't really make sense to add all the extra work to translate dates from the common format that they were in, so a good zero point would be the same as the previously used one.
It's not starting based from the birth of Christ, but rather based on the zero point of a commonly dating system that is unsuitable for this purpose. It really doesn't matter what the basis for what the referenced zero point was. That doesn't enter into the other system.
Posts: 10177 | Registered: Apr 2001
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posted
Verily: Instead of "The Year of the Lord", I suppose non-Christians could use "The Year of the Supposed Lord of Some But Not All of the Christian Peoples" changing AD to TYSLSBNACP or whatever the acronym is for the Latin equivalent. This of course would make writing dates a bit longer than just C.E.
But seriously, the whole C.E. thing just seems to be a quick fix for people who don't have or recognize "the Lord" but still want to use compatible dates. It doesn't seem to be as big a deal as the Conservapedia or you make it out to be.
Posts: 7593 | Registered: Sep 2006
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quote:Originally posted by mr_porteiro_head: Yup. The moon moving away from the earth contradicts the theory of gravity no more than me climbing the stairs does.
You can climb stairs? I can only go down them. Posts: 9945 | Registered: Sep 2002
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quote:Instead of "The Year of the Lord", I suppose non-Christians could use "The Year of the Supposed Lord of Some But Not All of the Christian Peoples" changing AD to TYSLSBNACP or whatever the acronym is for the Latin equivalent. This of course would make writing dates a bit longer than just C.E.
Or they could just acknowledge that "BC" and "AD" are traditional and stop pretending it's so offensive to use them. As was pointed out earlier, nobody complains that we use "January" and "Wednesday". Nobody says that pagan beliefs are being forced on them because we have months named after Roman gods and days named after Germanic ones.
Of course, to try to remove pagan influences would be religious intolerance, wouldn't it. But to try to remove Christian influences is perfectly fine, because everyone knows Christianity is evil and therefore any references to Jesus are automatically oppressive.
Here's an idea: let's all just stop complaining about it and accept the fact that the calendar we use in the English-speaking world takes names from a variety of religious sources. We have weekdays named after Norse/Anglo-Saxon divinities, months named after Greco-Roman divinities, and years based on a Christian divinity. It's diverse. That's supposed to be a good thing.
Okay, so we don't have any references to Muhammad or Buddha or Amaterasu or Ahura Mazda or Kokopelli or Quetzalcoatl or whatever. Our calendar doesn't represent all the possible religious systems in the world. But it represents the ones that had the most influence in shaping the Anglophonic civilization in its earliest days, so it's full of tradition that goes back to the roots of our civilization. I really don't see what's offensive about that. And I say that as someone who does not worship Janus or Odin or Jesus Christ.
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When I refer to Notre Dame Cathedral, I am not literally saying that I consider the Virgin Mary to be in any way my Lady. Similarly, when I say AD, I am not literally saying that I consider Christ to be my Lord. I am simply acknowledging the traditional convention.
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posted
Don't be ridiculous, Tom. I don't think anyone really thinks "I'm pledging allegiance to Jesus when I write 'AD.'" Plus, I doubt you'd be any happier if we used AJC instead.
Posts: 9945 | Registered: Sep 2002
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quote:I don't think anyone really thinks "I'm pledging allegiance to Jesus when I write 'AD.'"
Have you asked? "Year of Our Lord" is pretty unambiguous; if the Jewish calendar didn't already exist, I know a number of Jews who would refuse to use "A.D." for precisely this reason.
While I'm not particularly keen on "AJC," I do think it's better than "AD." Of course, "CE" is better than either.
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
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quote:I don't think anyone really thinks "I'm pledging allegiance to Jesus when I write 'AD.'"
Have you asked?
No, because it's never before crossed my mind. And even now that you've brought it up, it still seems like an unreasonable position to me. First off, calling someone "lord" is not the same as swearing allegiance to that person. A name or title is not an oath, and a feeling of subordination is not allegiance.
Secondly, arguing from etymology is a linguistic fallacy. Just because a word or phrase originally meant one thing doesn't mean that it still does or should mean that thing. If "AD" still actually meant "anno domini" or "year of the lord," they would be easily interchangeable, and this is not the case. I doubt most English speakers would find "2007 year of the lord" or "twenty-first century year of the lord" to be grammatical.
And finally, I don't really buy it when you say that you'd have less of a problem with "AJC"—or at least, I don't think you're being consistent. After all, "Christ" means "annointed one," so using "AJC" would presumably be the same as confessing that Jesus is your savior.
Posts: 9945 | Registered: Sep 2002
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quote:Originally posted by dkw: It is not at all hypocritical for people of non-Christian religions to object to using "The Year of the Lord" (Anno Domini, or AD) in reference to the birth of Jesus when they do not consider him "the Lord." And I have no problem using a convention that allows people not to say/write something that conflicts with their beliefs while not creating the chaos that attempting to switch to a new system of dating would. I use A.D. in religious settings and C.E. in interfaith or accademic settings. It's a pretty simple way to acknowledge the beliefs of others and certainly no reason to get your knickers in a knot.
quote:Originally posted by TomDavidson: Have you asked? "Year of Our Lord" is pretty unambiguous; if the Jewish calendar didn't already exist, I know a number of Jews who would refuse to use "A.D." for precisely this reason.
posted
I am not a believer in the ancient greek gods. Can we therefore change all the names of all the planets? To have planets named after some other religion's gods is extremely offensive and seriously damages my religious freedom, after all.
Let's just change everything so that no historical religious references are in any name of anything. That way we can all be happy! Posts: 8120 | Registered: Jul 2000
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Latin doesn't use articles, although there is a word for "your." It is usually attached in the translation, but it doesn't have to be there. Domini also does not have to refer to Christ - it can also be translated as master or leader.
You can argue with it all you want, but don't add more to than has to be there. And calling it obviously offensive is stretching it quite a bit.
Posts: 26077 | Registered: Mar 2000
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quote:That appears to have been addressed already.
Not for those people who believe that writing the name of a god is pledging allegiance to that God. How could such a person send their children to public schools, where they will be forced to write "Mercury" or something like that?
Of course, such a person's position would be totally unreasonable - but no more unreasonable than thinking that writing "A.D." is a pledge to Jesus.
I'd say we should either kowtow to ALL unreasonable people, or none of them and limit our corrections to only reasonable offenses.
quote:[Tresopax, did you just edit that post? *curious]
Ah yes, now I know what you were refering to. I did edit the weekdays bit out because I saw it had already been brought up.
And now I have edited this post as well.... Stop replying before I have time to see if what I am saying makes any sense! Posts: 8120 | Registered: Jul 2000
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posted
katharina, was the "our" context understood in the original Latin use? I seem to recall it having been something which was translated that way because of the meaning in context, and that meaning (which was originally there) was retained.
I think this was a case of words doing more duty in one context, requiring more words to do the same duty in translation. Regardless, it is certainly a part of the standard translation now, isn't it? A professional Latin translator wouldn't appropriately translate "anno domini" as "in the year of leader," as in the original (and current) context, that wouldn't best capture the full meaning in context.
Just like "he's so hot!" (with reference to a movie star) wouldn't be appropriately translated into something like "he has a great deal of kinetic energy generated by the movement of particles at the atomic or molecular level." In one context, that might have been a good translation, but in this context, it doesn't capture the original meaning well at all. In fact, it obscures it.
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posted
If that's what you want to hear, no wonder you are not listening to what they are actually saying.
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posted
Kat, I'd submit that "in the year of the master" isn't much of an improvement. In fact, possibly the only actual interpretation that might remove the offensive nature of the date would be "in the year of someone else's leader," and I think that's a bit of a stretch.
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
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posted
What if you think of it as "the year of the beginner of this era"? It could be that as well.
CT: I don't know much (anyting, really) about midevil Latin, so I can't say where that standard English translation came in. I don't think it really matters, though - if we are messing around with words and meanings and taking things hyperliterally anyway, then A.D. is still okay.
Posts: 26077 | Registered: Mar 2000
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quote:After all, "Christ" means "annointed one," so using "AJC" would presumably be the same as confessing that Jesus is your savior.
Nah. Not really. He was called Christ. Like I said, there's a difference between a name and a title.
------
quote:What if you think of it as "the year of the beginner of this era"? It could be that as well.
I think the intent of the phrase is obviously not meant to be "the year of the beginner of the era," and it's a bit much to ask people to select such a non-obvious interpretation. By contrast, I think that's precisely what "C.E." actually means in practice.
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
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quote:Originally posted by Tresopax: I'd say we should either kowtow to ALL unreasonable people, or none of them and limit our corrections to only reasonable offenses.
This hinges on a standard definition of "unreasonable," which I think is far from settled. I'm also pretty sure that the Principle of Charity would be helpful in assessing the claims of others, but I understand that has suffered from a dearth of support lately.
quote:And now I have edited this post as well.... Stop replying before I have time to see if what I am saying makes any sense!
posted
Both sides are asking something that is a bit much but still within the bounds of reason.
I'm just saying that if you want to be hyperliteral and careful, you can do that with an alternative translation of A.D. as easily as inventing a new codification and asking everyone else to switch to it.
Calling using A.D. as a system a pledge of allegiance to the Savior is even more of a stretch. Looks like there is going to be a stretch no matter what.
Posts: 26077 | Registered: Mar 2000
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posted
By the way, while we are on this subject... I should be offended by C.E. too. After all, I believe in a 4 billion year old earth. Hence, the era before year one is way way more "common" than the era after it.
Posts: 8120 | Registered: Jul 2000
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quote:Originally posted by katharina: CT: I don't know much (anyting, really) about midevil Latin, so I can't say where that standard English translation came in. I don't think it really matters, though - if we are messing around with words and meanings and taking things hyperliterally anyway, then A.D. is still okay.
I'm not sure those who prefer CE to AD are objecting on the grounds of hyperliteralness without respect to context.
But this isn't much of a sticking point to me. I use BCE and CE when I need a modifier because they are standard usages in my fields, and I don't have good reason not to. I was just curious about the translation point because I did Latin translation for a good bit of my life (in my academic world, working from original texts -- not as a profession, more as a dilettante).
Posts: 14017 | Registered: May 2000
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quote:Calling using A.D. as a system a pledge of allegiance to the Savior is even more of a stretch.
I don't see why; the phrase specifically implies that there is a common "lord" shared by the society in question. And like I said, I know many, many non-Christians -- particularly people of other religions, who have more powerful reasons than atheists do to be bothered by it -- who refuse to use A.D. for that reason.
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
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quote:Originally posted by Tresopax: By the way, while we are on this subject... I should be offended by C.E. too. After all, I believe in a 4 billion year old earth. Hence, the era before year one is way way more "common" than the era after it.
The dearth continues, alas. *wry look
Posts: 14017 | Registered: May 2000
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posted
I use CE and BCE in academic circles when other people care, and A.D. in all other contexts. I figure it's like a British spelling - depends on who the audience is. Since I don't think using A.D. is a demonstration of faith or belief, I have no particular objections to NOT using A.D.
I wonder if that's partly from being in a minority religion most of my life? I do not expect those around me to support me in my beliefs.
Posts: 26077 | Registered: Mar 2000
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posted
I don't think I expect others to support me in my personal beliefs. I do, however, make a habit of granting small changes to others on the basis of symbolic importance that resonates with them, even if not with me.
Actually, I've often wondered if that's more a dismissive attitude than a respectful one. "Sure, fine, no problem, makes no difference to me" can be quite, hmmmm, "dismissive" is probably the right word. To make less of by making no big deal of.
Posts: 14017 | Registered: May 2000
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quote:I wonder if that's partly from being in a minority religion most of my life? I do not expect those around me to support me in my beliefs.
There's a difference between asking someone to support your beliefs and being asked to support a belief you don't share. "A.D." does the latter. I suspect, despite your minority status, that you have only rarely been asked to endorse a religious belief that you don't yourself hold; Mormons still observe most Christian rituals.
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
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posted
I don't think we are required to make a big deal out of things that other people think are a big deal. It's like...pictures of grandchildren. I am fine with with adorable pictures of grandchildren being strewn about someone's office, but I don't think I'm required to comment on them when I visit them in said office. They love the pictures; I don't care. That's okay.
Tom: You're wrong about that, but I don't feel like arguing it. I know my own experiences.
Posts: 26077 | Registered: Mar 2000
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quote:Originally posted by ClaudiaTherese: I don't think I expect others to support me in my personal beliefs. I do, however, make a habit of granting small changes to others on the basis of symbolic importance that resonates with them, even if not with me.
Actually, I've often wondered if that's more a dismissive attitude than a respectful one. "Sure, fine, no problem, makes no difference to me" can be quite, hmmmm, "dismissive" is probably the right word. To make less of by making no big deal of.
I think it is because you place more importance on the comfort of other people than on holding on to trivial traditions. I think that's lovely. (Does that count as support for your Charitable thingy?)
Posts: 11187 | Registered: Sep 2005
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posted
Hey, that's entirely possible. I don't know your experiences. That said, I can't think of a single common American practice that doesn't violate the Word of Wisdom that Mormons don't share -- and share the premise of, as well.
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
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posted
Um....Am I allowed to ask for help? Because I'm really thinking, here, and can't come up with one. I'm assuming it's not something really esoteric, like "Mormons may not register for a watercraft license...?"
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
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posted
*laugh* Okay. However, I want to say that I really, really, really do not want to get into an argument over my experiences. They and my take on them are not up for debate.
The culture I live is in profound disagreement with the standards of my religion for sexual behavior.
Posts: 26077 | Registered: Mar 2000
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quote:Nah. Not really. He was called Christ. Like I said, there's a difference between a name and a title.
Right. And "Christ" was a title. It was a Greek word meaning "Anointed One", and was used as a translation of the word "messiah". Jesus of Nazareth is called "Christ" because his followers believe he was the Messiah. It was not his name.
I have to say that I find it too much of a stretch to claim that "Anno Domini", in the context of the Gregorian calendar, could mean anything like "the year of the leader" or "the year of the beginner of this era". First of all, "dominus" means "lord", not "beginner of an era". Secondly, we know where the "Anno Domini" system came from, and we know exactly whom they were referring to and what they meant by it.
That said, I still think that actually being offended by the use of "AD" indicates nothing so much as a determination to be offended by something. Simply saying "AD" is not the same thing as saying "I pledge allegiance to Jesus Christ, my Lord and Savior". I use "AD" all the time, and I do not pledge allegiance to Jesus of Nazareth. He is not my Lord. But simply saying "AD" is not declaring that he is.
Like I said before, I have no qualms about calling Notre Dame Cathedral by its name; "Notre Dame" is French for "Our Lady", and that is a reference to the Virgin Mary. But simply calling that cathedral by its name is not the same thing as pledging allegiance to the Virgin Mary. It's simply using the proper name of the cathedral. Saying "AD" is not the same thing as pledging allegiance to Jesus of Nazareth. It's simply using the traditional name of the era. It's the calendar commonly in use in our society. Your soul is not at stake here.
To put it another way, if your belief system--whether that's a religion or a total lack of religion--is so shaky that it can be threatened by a calendar, then the calendar is not the real issue.
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