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Why isn't the new year on the winter solstice? (2018)

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Re: Why isn't the new year on the winter solstice? (2018)

#41

Post by jameshart »

yen223 wrote: post #40
jameshart wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think one of the most remarkable things about calendars is the endurance of ‘weeks’. For thousands of years, across civilizations, we’ve been counting off cycles of seven days, presumably successfully keeping in synch with one another, leading to the broad agreement across billions of humans that today is a Sunday.

This is true. Especially considering a "week" isn't tied to any specific astronomical phenomenon, unlike the day, month or year. Maybe it succeeded because it's not tied to an astronomical phenomenon, and so we aren't tempted to botch it with "leap days" and whatnot.

It is a lunar phase-cycle, roughly. Lunar phases last between 6 and 8 days, with a full 4-phase cycle taking about 29.5 days

Re: Why isn't the new year on the winter solstice? (2018)

#42

Post by fsckboy »

mcdonje wrote: post #26
foruhar wrote: post #21

Iran (and some neighbors) starts the new year on the Spring Equinox, the first day of spring. It’s named Now Ruz which translates to new day. Kinda makes sense to kick off the year at spring. It’s also pretty precise give that it’s an astronomical event. It dates back to at least Zoroastrian times (15th century BCE). All the equinoxes and solstices are celebrated there. The winter solstice is named Yalda Night, which…

I like that. I'm in favor of a calendar that works that way. The spring equinox does make a lot of sense. It's when plants start growing again where most people live in the northern hemisphere. The southern hemisphere seasons being the opposite of the north actually makes an equinox more equitable choice for a global calendar start/end point than a solstice.

"dec"ember used to be the 10th month which puts old new years at the beginning of march, a few weeks before the equinox. also, i haven't even noodled this in my head much but I think it works out in which direction it slips the date (hmmm maybe not), but it wasn't till Pope Gregory that it was realized there was a 100 year non leap year problem serious enough to impact the calendar.

Re: Why isn't the new year on the winter solstice? (2018)

#43

Post by Astraco »

Dolototo wrote: post #15

Would be awesome if more would start celebrating the winter solstice again instead of Christmas. It would unite us more and based on science and not on some arbitrary thoughts. So in the spirit of it: happy winter solstice everyone! (I know I'm 2 days late)

Celebrate whatever you want and let everyone else enjoy their thing.

Re: Why isn't the new year on the winter solstice? (2018)

#44

Post by fomine3 »

mijkal wrote: post #33

> Then they got lazy and just numbered the months. * Chinese et al have entered the chat This pattern is fairly common around the world. It's amusing to me that in the Western world, the original Latin designations are off by two as we moved the start month but never adjusted the corresponding month numbers (so DECember (10) = 12, etc).

And the tm_mon starts from 0

Re: Why isn't the new year on the winter solstice? (2018)

#45

Post by scotty79 »

thriftwy wrote: post #25
gardenhedge wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of advantages... Such as?

You can divide year into halves, thirds and quarters. You do not have to negotiate boundaries every time.

It's funny how rarely thirds of a year come up. I can't recall a single thing for which they are used

Re: Why isn't the new year on the winter solstice? (2018)

#46

Post by Dolototo »

Astraco wrote: post #43
Dolototo wrote: post #15

Would be awesome if more would start celebrating the winter solstice again instead of Christmas. It would unite us more and based on science and not on some arbitrary thoughts. So in the spirit of it: happy winter solstice everyone! (I know I'm 2 days late)

Celebrate whatever you want and let everyone else enjoy their thing.

[flagged]

Re: Why isn't the new year on the winter solstice? (2018)

#47

Post by Aicy »

aebtebeten wrote: post #5

The way I heard it, the move from Mar to Jan was not for political reasons, but for tax reasons. Spring makes sense for starting a new year; rebirth and all that. But it's lousy as the start of a tax year: who's to say whether all the new animals in the herds got born last year, and are already taxable, or this year, and are not? Start your tax year in the middle of winter, however, (like astronomers used to switch d…

That's amusing since the UK tax year runs from April to April

Re: Why isn't the new year on the winter solstice? (2018)

#48

Post by skissane »

scotty79 wrote: post #45
thriftwy wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can divide year into halves, thirds and quarters. You do not have to negotiate boundaries every time.

It's funny how rarely thirds of a year come up. I can't recall a single thing for which they are used

Some universities divide the academic year into two semesters, others divide it into three trimesters. It also sometimes happens that, within the same university, some programs use one and others use the other-at my alma mater, only a minority of graduate programs used trimesters, every else was semesters.

Re: Why isn't the new year on the winter solstice? (2018)

#49

Post by Tepix »

icegreentea2 wrote: post #12

Not placing new years on the solstice directly gives you the opportunity to get the solstice kick off an interval of festivals/celebration culminating in a new years celebration. Ancient people (just like us) certainly enjoyed having multi days of festivals/holidays strung together. The choice of putting the astronomical point at the start or end of the period seems pretty arbitrary (for example, Chinese New Years st…

> The choice of putting the astronomical point at the start or end of the period seems pretty arbitrary

Arbitrary? I find it to be highly logical.

Re: Why isn't the new year on the winter solstice? (2018)

#50

Post by argiopetech »

matthewdgreen wrote: post #19
argiopetech wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nit: There were no ancient "scientists". People who studied what we now call scientific fields of inquiry were called natural philosophers until the late 1800s. As for the solar year, none of the other planets (which the sun and moon were considered, along with Venus, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn) have an obvious correlation with our orbit, so I'd imagine they just considered this the dance of the heavens.

There have always been scientists, at least since the first human formulated a hypothesis about nature and tested that hypothesis with observation or experiment. The term “natural philosopher” is much younger than the science of astronomy, which dates back to pre-agricultural history.

Alternatively, "There have always been natural philosophers, at least since the first human formulated a hypothesis about nature and tested that hypothesis with observation or experiment. The term “scientist” is much younger than the philosophy of astronomy, which dates back to pre-agricultural history."

It's an ill-formed argument either way, but since "science" (c. 1834AD) is a newer term than "φυσιολόγο" (c. 350BC), I'm going to argue my rewrite is the more accurate.

I'd also argue that the study of the stars was more religious than scientific, at least prior to Thales of Miletus (who, as far as we know, was the first epistomologist).

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