Source
r/atheism•
AdamAtlas

Counting years from the publication of the Novum Organum instead of the alleged birth of the alleged Christ

I recently learned that Max More once proposed replacing the BC/AD year numbering scheme with PNO — "post Novum Organum", the number of years since the publication (in AD 1620) of Francis Bacon's Novum Organum Scientiarum, which first set out an empirical experimental method in systematic detail.

So the year now beginning would be 391 PNO. I really like this idea — the beginning of science, or at least a not-too-arbitrarily chosen point symbolic thereof, seems far more worthy as a reference point for dates than the beginning of Christianity.

Any thoughts on this?

Posted Jan 3, 2011, 11:32 PM UTC

46
CtrlCthenV•

In A deepness in the sky they used Unix time and started counting from the second Neil Armstrong set his foot on the moon. Always thought that would be a cool idea.

2
pyxlated•

It would be extremely difficult to get anyone to agree with. Most secularists just use C.E. (Common Era) to avoid confusion.

1
wonderfuldog•

And - people in non-Christian countries around the world use the CE dates, just to avoid confusion.

2
MiracleDrug•

Are we to change the names of the week because they refer to ancient gods? At this point the counting is mostly out of convenience. Maybe if some paradigm-shifting event were to occur (contact with aliens, a singularity) the count should be restarted, but until then it would just represent a massive overhaul of our calendar system (which is present in basically all areas of life and business) for a symbolic victory.

Maybe first try getting Americans to accept the metric system.

1
AdamAtlasOP•

To be clear, I do not pretend that this has any hope of catching on in the wider world — I was just thinking that it would be cool if it became widely used (or at least recognizable) within online atheist/secularist communities, etc. Not as super serious business, not as though we're seriously indignant about the origin point used in the conventional calendar; just as a kind of secret handshake, and a recognition that if we're to use any point more arbitrary than the Big Bang to start our calendar, it may as well be a historical period when things started looking up instead of one where something went seriously wrong.

1
[deleted]•

The ability to change calendar systems has generally been possessed only by absolute rulers who could kill people who opposed their whims. In the (welcome) absence of such people in the democratic world, the system would be just about impossible to change.

1