(no subject)

[theweaselking]

When Dr. Hans-Ulrich Niemitz introduces his paper on the "phantom time hypothesis," he kindly asks his readers to be patient, benevolent, and open to radically new ideas, because his claims are highly unconventional. This is because his paper is suggesting three difficult-to-believe propositions: 1) Hundreds of years ago, our calendar was polluted with 297 years which never occurred; 2) this is not the year 2005, but rather 1708; and 3) The purveyors of this hypothesis are not crackpots.

Comments

[johan-g.livejournal.com]

Gah. I spent a couple of weeks arguing with a similar idiot, this one an Orthodox Jew, about additional years having been inserted into the calendar. In the end, I had completely demolished his arguments, and he was, of course, not even slightly dissuaded. Only "strengthened" in his faith. Makes me wish "phantom time" exists, it does. I could put those weeks to better use.

Btw, comedy gold in the comments:

I KNOW this man is wrong due to Bible Prophecy. As a Jehovah's Witness,

I stopped reading there.

[catlin.livejournal.com]

Hmm.. The theory is an interesting one, realistically. Our calender is based on an artificial construct. It is not like our calender is based on when the world was made, thus it is very possible over the centuries it has become off. Not at all sure it is off any specific amount, but hey.

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

It would be interesting to see how it reconciles with the other calendars of the world.

(Meh. The entire discussion is really irrelevant. I personally think starting a new calendar based on Sputnik or the first moon landing would make much more sense - the real issue would be *converting* everything.)

[catlin.livejournal.com]

And more fun too. I like Sputnik. Base our calender on a puppy.

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

Pretty much. It's up to you if you'd put the official start on Oct 4 for Sputnik I or November 3 for Laika, as you could set New Year's Day to be the first artificial satellite or the first earth creature to orbit the earth. You could go even further and state that Gagarin Day was Day 1, Year 1, I suppose, but that's less fun.