question about dark age dates...

[Rawled Demha]

i assume the dates for this section 500-1500 to be because up to 500 rome was in the process of disintegrating, and christian dynasties were in the process of forming.

i remember reading somewhere that newton once showed the universe to be a few hundred years younger than widely assumed - which would take the 500AD much closer to 0.

however, i have as yet been unable to procure his reasoning for such a claim, and so can only be forced to assume he was mistaken. but i dont like assuming things, and was wondering, nay more hoping somebody here would be able to help me?

 

[Lenny]

Depending on where you look, the dates for the Dark Ages change.

However, most places agree that the Dark Ages started with the fall of the Western Roman Empire in 476AD (the Eastern half didn't collapse until the 1460s), and lasted until the beginning of the Renaissance in the 1500s.

Is there anything in particular that you're looking at in relation to the Dark Ages? Things like Medicine, or War, or Technology?

 

[Birol]

What does the age of the universe have to do with the split between BC and AD?

 

[Rawled Demha]

its pretty tricky to explain, so bear with me if im not coherent :s its more of an idea i have than any real issue... it might even be flawed, in which case i hope someone will show me where my reasoning falls apart...

newton claimed that the universe was older than the successive adding of the calendars used previously by people would imply. eg, if we take the age of the christian calendar, and add it to a known figure of another, older calendar, say the jewish and so on, we should have some sort of vague idea of the age of the universe?

In other words, he said that we had added a few hundred years to our time. i dont know anything serious about gregorian calendars, but im pretty sure that the change from it to our modern one does not account for 400 extra years.

i dunno if this explains what im thinking, but, hey, i tried.

 

[Birol]

It doesn't sound like Newton was using any proper scientific method to arrive at that date. First, it presumes a couple of things:

1. That human culture began at the same time as the universe was created. If we get into this discussion, we're getting into a creationist/evolutionist debate and I'm not certain how Chronicles feels about such things.
2. That no culture or calendar preceded the Jewish calendar (or whatever system Newton used.) It is possible that there was a dating method prior to the Jewish calendar that was lost to history.
3. It ignores more modern scientific developments, such as carbon dating.
4. It's very Christian-centric and, as mentioned in item 2, ignores cultures which pre-dated the Judeo-Christian mythos.

The point is, the shift from BC/AD, the dating of calendars, or the hypothesis you mention don't really have any bearing on the age of the universe, so much as they have a bearing written human history.

 

[Sparks the Knave]

with soil/oxygen dating, scientists have a pretty good grasp of time frames accurately for thousands or years back, and have been able to match man made objects and even the dead to their near exact year, so i think some added years are out of the question, at least not that 'close' to our current time. I dare say the older you go the more grey it would become though.