Talk:0/Archive 1

The comment that modern languages use zero-indexing is somewhat misleading, because it isn't because of technical merits, but because of the popularity of C. It's no problem for the compiler to convert the one-indexing preferred by humans (or indeed most any indexing) to the zero-indexing used in the machine code. However, since C used zero-indexing and became so popular, most programmers are used to it. That's probably the reason it's used in most later languages.

"The year zero does not exist. Instead there is a "zero point" in time between the years [1 B.C.]? and 1."

What?

Yes, I think we should remove this rather obscure interpretation until someone can provided an authoritative justification for it. - MMGB

But it is correct that in our current system of timekeeping, the year following 1 B.C. was 1 C.E., isn't it? --AxelBoldt

Yes. The reasoning about a zero point is incorrect, though. The reason there is no zero year is that, as I'm sure Axel can confirm, zero hadn't been invented yet when this calendar system was made. The way I prefer to think of it is using the same logic as call 19XX "the twentieth century". We are simply in the 2001st year.--BlackGriffen

I'm not sure whether zero had been invented yet, since I don't know when people started to use the BC/CE method of labeling years. Anybody? --AxelBoldt

BCE CE didn't come in to use until the 20th century (might have been used earlier, but it seems to be an invention of political correctness). Let's see:

" The Gregorian calendar is the one commonly used today. It was proposed by Aloysius Lilius, a physician from Naples, and adopted by Pope Gregory XIII in accordance with instructions from the Council of Trent (1545-1563) to correct for errors in the older Julian Calendar. It was decreed by Pope Gregory XIII in a papal bull in February 1582." from http://www.geocities.com/CapeCanaveral/Lab/7671/gregory.htm

Not really authoratative, but it seems accurate enough. I thought that the calendar had been proposed earlier, in which case there would be no ambiguity. Had the Europeans learned of zero and the arabic number system by then?--BlackGriffen

No, thats the calendar. The system of chronology (the numbering of years) is separate from the calendar. Our current system of chronology dates back to Dionysius Exiguus (or however you spell him), c. 500 CE. Back then, awareness of the number zero was rather lacking, since people used Roman numerals, which lack a symbol for zero. By 1582 CE, by contrast, the number zero was well established (people increasingly used Hindu-Arabic numberals), but as I said, thats the calendar, not the system of chronology. -- SJK

This is not the case. There is no year 0 not because 0 hadn't been invented, but because years are ordinal numbers, not cardinal ones. The year 1 was the first year of the C.E. Year 2 was the second, 1999 was the 1,999th, etc. Year 2 BCE was the second-last year BCE, year 1 was the last, etc.

For support, we may turn to the French Revolutionary Calendar. Did they call their first year 0? Of course not; they called it 1. (Well, I.) And this was well after the invention of 0.

There's no year 0 for the same reason there's no 0th of January or 0th month. Anyway, Cecil Adams of the Straight Dope did a brilliant exposé on the whole mess more than ten years ago - it may be available at [1].- montréalais

The Zeroeth Symphony

I don't want to step on the toes of the learned Wikipedians working on WikiProject Numbers, but I want to bring to their attention a little tidbit on the number zero: while the ordinal zeroeth is rarely used, there is one instance of it in classical music. The composer Anton Bruckner regarded his early Symphony in D minor to be unworthy of including in the canon of his works, and he wrote 'gilt nicht' on the score and a circle with a crossbar, intending it to mean "invalid". But posthumously, this work came about to be known as Symphony No. 0 in D minor, even though it was actually written after Symphony No. 1 in C minor. There's an even earlier Symphony in F minor of Bruckner's that is sometimes called No. 00. Del arte 21:56, 16 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Very interesting. I've added this to zeroth. 4pq1injbok 03:52, 3 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Someone needs to clarify here or in null about the computer defintion of zero as not being "empty" or "void" like null is. In computer terms, if I am not mistaken 0+x=x while null+x=null. Right?

Zero in Mathematics

I don't like the comment that "x/0 is also the definition for infinity". This requires thinking of infinity as a number, which generally isn't done because it makes arithmetic messy (what is 0×∞? what is ∞+∞?) Having said that, ∞ is viewed as a number in the Extended complex plane. In any case it doesn't seem to make sense that this is the "definition" for infinity. There are different definitions for infinity in Mathematics used for different purposes, and each must be defined very carefully.