Song of the Century
 

What was the greatest song of last century?

Bohemian Rapsody by Queen gets my vote!

im pretty sure i stated LAST century, which would be the 20th century...

way to go Mike, not reading the important details of the sentence...figures :p


Smells like Teen Spirit or Free Bird get my vote

But it depends on how you look at it. This very century could be the LAST century, if we're all destoryed before the century is up.

But that hasn't happened, yet so we can't officially say that until it does happen. ;)

Ok back on topic

Oh come on, everyone already knows the planet will be dead by the end of this century. You don't see people asking was the best song of the NEXT century is do you? Exactly, because it will never exisit. So thus, this is the LAST century.

Probably...but it hasn't happened yet, so it isn't the last century...

Uh.. anyway... how about this. January 1, 1900 A.D. -> December, 31 1999 A.D.

There.

:rolleyes:

I wouldn't be able to choose just one song...

That century ended on December 31, 2000.

The 21st century started on Januart 1, 2001.

Brandon - you're slippin. Get your facts straight. :D :rolleyes:

I never said I was specifying the 20th century. I was just picking two arbitrary dates, to cover the 1900's. :D

But.. as i said earlier ... 'anyway'...

I wouldn't be able to choose just one song...

Both Bohemian Rapsody and Smells like Teen Spirit would get my vote for their musical influence and cuz' they're just really good.

But if you were to say musician i would have to go with Hendrix.

George Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue or Louis Armstrong's What A Wonderful World.

I'd have to go with Brandon in that I couldn't really name just one as "best song of the century," but two songs that come to mind are Black Magic Woman, by Santana, and Sympathy for the Devil, by The Rolling Stones.

<edit>I am a stupid, stupid, stupid person.</edit>

Re: Song of the Century
 

My vote goes to I hope you dance by Lee Ann Womack.

I would have voted for a wierd al or queen, but I just got done listening to our camerata (select chours) sing this while they practiced for the seniors graduation.

Jim, I think you mean Sympathy for the Devil ;)

...still a good song by any other name, though. Unless they called it Horace. Then, maybe, it'd have been a little less good.

That one along with just about every other Pink Floyd song out there.

Eric

I will say "anything by the Beatles"

GAH

I can't believe I made that mistake. I am very embarrassed, right now. "Symphony"?

Oh well, at least I'm consistently misspelling crucial words... (sorry Kristina)

B.G. - Bling Bling (LOL!!)

I don't know if I can pick one...

Proally Darude - Sandstorm or Alice DeeJay-Got to get away

Go Techno!

Peanut Butter Jelly Time!!! :p

I think that everyone made a mistake because people didn't start the calendar saying year 1 because that would mean that one year has already passed. They would start at 0. Therefore, a hundred years, including that first year, would bring you to the one hundred year mark or the end of Dec. 31, 100. Two thousand years after the begining of the counting would be Dec. 31, 1999 and the next set would start at Jan. 1, 2000. In other words, a millenium is a thousand years. The end of the first millenium would be the mark between Dec 31, 999 and Jan. 1, 1000. The mark at the end of the second would be between Dec. 31, 1999 and Jan. 1, 2000. 2001 just means that we have completed the first year after the new millenium, not the begining of the new millenium.

Agh wern't we over this problem already?

It wasn't really clear. Now maybe I just missed it. I might even be wrong about the whole thing, but I was arguing with my brother over the same issue just recently. If I am wrong, then I have to listen to my brother tell me that I think I know everything.

I quit.

Brandon - I'm sorry for correcting you. Please except my humble apologies.

I'm done... :D

Does that mean that I am right?

Nope. Sorry.

lol
for being a thread about the song of the century it should've been called what are the exact dates of the start and end of the century? :p

The United States Government says that the 20th century began January 1, 1901 and ended December 31, 2000, since there is no year zero, it cannot be January 1, 1900 to December 31, 1999.

So all Americans have to deal with that. Im not sure what the Canadian Government thinks though...


Thats all the proof I need ;)

According to the Hebrew Calendar, this is the year 5765, (I think) which would mean that 5,765 years have passed since they began counting. If this is the year 2003, then that should mean that 2,003 years have passed since they starting counting. The way that all of you are saying, it would mean that the year 2003 is 2,002 years after they began counting. That doesn't make sense.

No. It makes perfect sense. They started counting with year one, and year one was NOT 1 year after they began counting!

As with most math things, a helpful trick I've found is to simplify the problem imensely, so here's two different ways to do it:

1. Let's try to count a decade: starting at year 1, we need to go through ten years, so we get 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 all as part of the same decade. Thus, the second decade starts with year 11. The same logic can be applied to millenia.


2. Let's analyze a week (Sunday-Saturday for this example). Numbering the days, we get Sunday=1, Monday=2, Tues=3, etc. Just because Sunday is 1 doesn't mean that 1 day has been completed already--it means that we are in the middle of the first day. Thus, the start of day 2 marks the completion of 1 whole day. Expanding this to the millenium thing, the start of 2001 thus marks the completion of 2000 years, meaning two whole millenia have passed and we are starting into the third.

--Rob

A-men to that! :p

I understand what everyone is saying, but they shouldn't have done it that way.

Now, the question: how does anyone really know that they "started with year one?" It makes logical sense to start with one, not zero, but can anyone really know for sure that they did?

I don't agree. I think that it makes logical sense that they may have started counting days, not knowing that they would later be counting years. After a few years, they said, "Since the number of days is so large, let's start counting sets of 365 days, or years, since it takes that long for the Earth to revolve around the sun." This way, they could have started with year zero, but, at the time, they wouldn't have called it year zero.

That, of course, implies that the number 0 existed at the time. As far as numbers go, zero is a relatively new addition to Western Mathematics, being introduced sometime in the middle ages despite the fact that both the Babylonians and the Mayans may have developed it earlier. This poses a problem as the Julian calender (on which the modern-day Gregorian is based) existed long before that.

Conclusion: The century went from 1901-2000 (with the new one starting with 2001) and that's the only way it could have been.

This is not westerm mathematics, it was in Europe. Also, they didn't need a number zero. They just said, "This is day 365 and soon, the number will be very large. The Earth just completed another pass around the sun so lets count that." Therefore, that was year zero even though they didn't call it zero. So, it doesn't matter whether they had the number zero or not.

Europe is considered to be "Western." When people talk about "Western Civilization" and such, they typically mean Europe, and as you move later on, the European colonies (i.e. North and South America).

Well, I'm still looking for an authoritative clear unambiguous historical statement regarding this. It seems to be common knowledge, and everyone seems to assume it. But having said that, here are a few links that bolster my case:

Try this Julian Date Converter. You will note that if you try putting zero into the year field, it says "There is no year 0 in the Julian system!" Also note that this site appears to have some authority, since it belongs to the U.S. Naval Observatory which is the official timekeeper of the United States Government.

I don't know what Claus Tøndering's credentials are, but his Calendar FAQ seems to be quite comprehensive. He also clearly states "There is no year 0" He does note however, that "... astronomers frequently use another way of numbering the years BC. Instead of 1 BC they use 0, instead of 2 BC they use -1, instead of 3 BC they use -2, etc." (You have to remember though, that those astronomers have their heads in the clouds, and ignore customary civil conventions when it suits their needs.:D )

I am giving up. If someone wants to take my place and continue arguing that the current millennium started in the year 2000 and not 2001, go ahead. Just remember, and we can begin arguing this also, you can learn more by questioning what is known. For example, (you probably already know this) people in the Middle Ages didn't take over the governments because they didn't question anything. Whether this idea is actually true, I have no idea, but it might be a good idea to question that.

Just to continue the argument... :D

My point is not that the calendar we inherited is the best possible, just that the calendar we received has no year zero.

There are a couple of improvements I would make if it were up to me to design a new calendar:

• I would use something like what the astronomers do in their calculations -- with positive numbered years, year zero, and negative numbered years before that.
• There would be 13 equal length months with an "intercalary" day to make 365 days per year.

And if I think about it longer, I might come up with more.

Wow! :ahh: All I can say is Go Greg!! :D :cool: