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NerdyKeith's avatar

What is your viewpoint of the usage of CE & BCE (as alternatives to BC & AD)?

Asked by NerdyKeith (5489points) February 27th, 2016

CE = Common Era

BCE = Before Common Era

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19 Answers

Espiritus_Corvus's avatar

I had to convert back in college in the early seventies or my papers wouldn’t be accepted. Been using BCE/CE every since.

Seek's avatar

It certainly makes more sense than the “anno Domini” system. Year of who’s Lord?

Tropical_Willie's avatar

MEH, no big thing.

tinyfaery's avatar

In most fields of study they are now standard and not an alternative.

Cruiser's avatar

Makes me want to grab the nearest thing crunch it up into a ball and throw it to my dog to chew on. I just got a resume from a gentleman in Saudi Arabia who is on the Islamic calendar where he references his work history of working for so and so company from 1429 – 1433.

Espiritus_Corvus's avatar

^^Umm… when in Rome… That’s good advice.

SavoirFaire's avatar

I use BCE and CE because the style guide for my field has started to call for them. Otherwise, I don’t care.

ibstubro's avatar

I think AD and BC will reign as long as America is the superpower.

American’s are too lazy to change and might makes right.
Make America Great Again!

JLeslie's avatar

Makes more sense to use CE and BCE, but I’m fine seeing it written the old way, it doesn’t upset me. I don’t feel like every document has to be changed over, or that people who still use AD and BC have to catch up and change.

Buttonstc's avatar

It really doesn’t matter to me.

janbb's avatar

As a Jew, I’ve been used to that usage for years. No new thing to me, nor is the other way offensive.

Cruiser's avatar

@Espiritus_Corvus I hope I did not give you a wrong impression there. I am trying to set up a rep agency for my company in Saudi Arabia/UAE and I have never before crossed paths with the Islamic Calendar and only meant to express my surprise of the drastic difference in our calendar and theirs and the necessity to have to try and convert his years to our years. Again something I have never had to do…kinda like bumping heads with the metric system for the first time

stanleybmanly's avatar

Makes no difference to me.

Stinley's avatar

I care about it about as much as I care that the measurement of a foot is the size of a long dead king’s foot. It’s just a measurement

Espiritus_Corvus's avatar

@Cruiser Not all. I was serious. (I should have written “Duh” instead of “Umm”). When I go to a foreign country, I adapt, as much as possible, to their customs—short of beheading and throwing acid in people’s faces—and even make an honest effort to pick up their language. It’s a sign of respect as a guest and provides me with a more thorough learning experience. I have little patience with people who come to my country and don’t do the same. When I’m in a foreign country that I am in agreement with politically and in a place where they are singing their national anthem, I’ll even salute their flag in the customary civilian way by placing my hand over my heart and show some respect. I did that in Sweden, but not in Poland under the Soviets. Doing this in no way makes me less an American, it only adds to who I am and it makes friends.

And when I see something that works, that can solve a problem that we Americans may have or make our lives more convenient—like the Gustav toilet in Sweden, or the way they monitor and police their welfare system to prevent abuse and waste—I promote the hell out of it. We are a young country and there is plenty of wiggle room in the American society for cultural assimilation, but if someone really wants to live there, they cannot expect to be successful if they insist on asserting their own culture into ours. If it works and is practical, the Americans will assimilate it on their own. If it’s too soon, too radical for us, impractical or abhorrent, we will not. In this respect, we are just like everybody else.

Espiritus_Corvus's avatar

@Cruiser I see that you are recruiting for workers in their territory. Yeah, you will have to learn their way in order to be successful. I thought you were talking about a Saudi who was seeking work in the U.S. In that case it is they who must adapt.

Cruiser's avatar

@Espiritus_Corvus I feel the same way you do about customs and apparently this gentleman has no intention of providing time and dates familiar to us. His liaison here in the US made it clear to me I would have to navigate our negotiations with this minor inconvenience.

yankeetooter's avatar

I go by Shire reckoning myself… Wait! Doesn’t everybody?

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