21st Century, I am confused

[warpig1]

We are in the 21st century, right? Which is, say, from the year 2000 to 2099.

If that is the case why do we call 1960 to 1969 the sixties?

If the 'century' rule was used then would they not be the seventies or vice versa for centuries?

confused,
warpig1

[aristotle]

You are confusing two totally different concepts.
The first century was from 1-99, second from 100-199 and so on. Hence the 21st century being from 2000 to 2099.
The Sixties refers to any year which has the word sixty as part of its number.

[warpig1]

Thanks aristotle, never knew that.

[Octavius]

If you used the 'century' rule (if there is such a thing) for the 1960s then it would be, the 20th Century.

[warpig1]

Yep Octavius I understand it now, also I just called it the century rule as couldn't think of anything else appropriate but I do realise it is not a rule.

[Pippa68]

We are in the noughties now :o)

[reinganum]

Your forefathers would not have agreed. I have in my possession two or three newspapers dated 31 December 1900, and they all refer to the issue as being the last issue of the nineteenth century. So the twentieth century began on 1 January 1901 and consequently the 21st began on 1 January 2001.

There was no year 0. The year which we refer to as 1BC was followed immediately by 1AD (in historical references). Astronomers use a different numbering system, in order to make calculations easier.

Labels such as the twenties, sixties, etc. are usually used in a style context and often refer to part of the decade only and might even overlap into the next decade (or from the previous one); for instance, what is popularly meant by the sixties usually only refers to the period (about) 1963-70, since stylistically and culturally the early part of the 1960s is indistiguishable from the late 1950s.

[Octavius]

Well thats if you conform to the astronomical year numbering or the ISO 8601 standard, both of which precede Year 1 with Year 0.

Many of us don't! Which is why we all celebrated the new millenium at New Years eve partes across the land on 31st December 1999!

[spudqueen]

Octavius - you celebrated the 'numbers going round' (like on a car mileometer) on December 31st 1999 - just like I did. I also celebrated the arrival of a new millenium on December 31st 2000.

[yassa]

Time is an abstract concept....

[Peter Pedant]

yeah and the 1500s in Italian - same time different place, folks - is referred to as the '500 or quinquecento. The seventeenth century - or should that be sigolo ? - is therefore quite logically the seicento


[Warpig - I feel that some of these answers to a reasonable question are not designed to hlep you}

[chakka35]

O gawd, I thought w'd finished with this mindlessness some years ago when the world insisted on celebrating the new century and millennium a year early. Commonsense tells you that centuries go like cloakroom tickets: 1-100, 101-200, 201-300 and so on. Obviously 20 centuries are not complete until the end of the 2000th year i.e. December 31st 2000. This century and millennium started on January 1 2001. AD0 is nonsense.