Is 2020 a new decade or not?!

[Utterlybutterly8]

Can someone help settle this for me please? I popped round to a neighbour’s house last night for a quick drink before midnight. We were talking about 2020 and I said that I couldn’t believe we were entering a whole new decade, or something along those lines. One of the other guests said that it’s not actually a new decade and won’t be until 2021. I’ve never heard this before so was a bit confused - 2020 is the start of a new decade isn’t it? I’ve noticed some of the papers are referring to it as such. AIBU to think he was wrong?

Well, it's the end of a decade, and if it is the end of one, it must be th beginning of another.
We just havent made it to the first milestone yet
Next year will be the end of the first milestone
Your friend is only right if we count whole years only. But years are subdivided into months, weeks,.days hours, minutes and seconds, so that, one second after midnight the new minute, hour, day, week, month, year and decade had begun
Your friend is a semantically challenged idiot

Well the century started with 2000, not 2001

Nope! The new century and new millennium DID start in 2001!

The beginning of the 20th century was celebrated in 1901.

A century is 100 years. The 1st century was the years 1-100; the 2nd was 101-200.... the 20th was 1901-2000; the 21st is 2001-2100.

Well, it's the end of a decade

Every year is the end of a decade. Every day is the end of a decade because a decade is just any ten years. It's still not the end of the old calendar decade because there was no year 0 as explained

But also said it really doesn't matter. Celebrating it is all arbitrary anyway.

@80sMum Thank you!

Just to reiterate, for the OP: if your neighbour's friend is referring to the end of the 202nd decade and the beginning of the 203rd, he is correct. But I have never heard anyone speak of decades in this way. I would have asked him which decade he thinks we are in.

I understand about the no year zero point, but this doesn’t matter. For historical purposes, the year 1960 is classed as “the 60s” and so on.

By

Not sure what happened there?

Surely we’re in the first year of the decade? When a baby is born, we don’t start counting their age in years until they are 1 but they still exist until then. They are in their first year so their life has begun.

I know what I mean!!!

Technically it is 2021 iirr.

But in real life everyone always does it from the 0 year.

However you will come across some people who always want to remind you it isn't til 2021

It's a new decade, can't tell me otherwise- I will die on this hill

Wish I'd never read this 😂 gonna be arguing with everyone all day now lmao.

I assumed it was a new decade but I get the logic... When you count you count in up to 10 with 10 being the last
So therefore the year ending in a multiple of 10 is the last of that 'set'

1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10

I think its easier though to just go along with it is a new decade, the 20s. That won't stop me wanting to explain the shit out of this to everyone at family dinner today though!

Every year is the end of a decade.

Kind of proves my point about semantically challenged idiots tbh. Of course every year is the end of A decade but the end of THE decade is popularly accepted to be a year that ends with 0. Everyone knows it, but some people, in love with their own smart-arsery just love to argue about it

Time is a journey. We are on the journey from the end of one point in time, through the beginning of another, to its end, on repeat until we come to our end
At which point some dickhead will argue about whether or not we actually died on the first day of month or the second

Well the terms before Christ and anno domini were not introduced until 525 anno domini so 525 years after the event of 'time starting'.

They decided that year was the year 525 and we have gone from there. It doesn't matter these days anyway because after the 90's happened, everything just blended to be the same! We no longer have notable decades anymore. We had the 50's, 60's, 70's, 80's and 90's that were full of trends and ways of dressing and people can fondly say they were brought up in those decades. Now though, there's nothing notable happening is there? Quirky groups of people are vanishing, it's a shame really. Don't get me started on the music now either, barely anything original

Just as long as people stop calling it 'the roaring 20s'. They were the 1920s and so named because of the events. That decade has gone. You can't just name a decade because it sounds good.

I can see this one irritating me a lot

hazell42 you seem bizarrely angry about this.

It isn't the end of the decade for another year. First decade = 1-10 so the end of 10 and start of 11 was the start of the 2nd decade. Extrapolated to 2011-2020 being the current decade and the next one starting 2021.

I am quite happy to continue to reason that out and you're not going to change my mind but I'm also quite relaxed about it!

I remember having this same argument in 1999 when we were supposedly heading towards the new millennium starting on 01 Jan 2000 ....

Now I'm older and less inclined to argue the toss about such matters So if people want to say this is a new decade, let them. It's not worth it.

I need to go back to bed 🤣

@DappledThings so what do you call this current decade (the one that started in 2011)? I often hear people referring to the 2010s but that decade logically must have started in 2010?

Wouldn't you agree there is a difference between "the 1980s" (a ten year period having years all beginning with "eighty", and "the 20th century" (implying that we are counting 100 year periods since some epochal event)?

some people, in love with their own smart-arsery just love to argue about it

My DH unfortunately

what do you call this current decade (the one that started in 2011

Not sure I've ever referred to it by a name. But yes I totally agree with:
there is a difference between "the 1980s" (a ten year period having years all beginning with "eighty", and "the 20th century" (implying that we are counting 100 year periods since some epochal event)
I would agree "the 80s" refers to 1980-1989 which is a ten year period, aka a decade. Still means the new calendar decade didn't start till 1991

It isn't the end of the decade for another year. First decade = 1-10 so the end of 10 and start of 11 was the start of the 2nd decade. Extrapolated to 2011-2020 being the current decade and the next one starting 2021

But we HAVE started the year 2021? Once we get to 2020 then the 2020th year has happened and we have counted it? And now we are in the 2021st year? Just like we are in the 21st century?

They made a mistake when they called the first year- “year 1”. It should have been year zero. Oh well. We can forgive them. Today is the start of a new decade.

"I would agree "the 80s" refers to 1980-1989" so we have just entered a new decade which will likely be referred to as "the 20s". It's true that the 203rd decade of the calendar doesn't start until next year, but I have never heard anyone use these terms, unlike with centuries.

"Once we get to 2020 then the 2020th year has happened" No because there was no year 0. The year 1 was the first year, and it wasn't until the year 2 started that the first year had happened (retrospectively, as our calendar was not used back then).

But we HAVE started the year 2021
No. When year 1 was finished the first year was finished because there's no year 0.

It's not like pregnancy weeks where when you are 27+1 you are in the 28th week. That works like that because there is a week 0. You start at 0 then 0+1. But the calendar started at 1 not 0!

As there was never a Year 0, the calendar was determined by a monk, Dionysius Exiguus in 525, so the new decade starts in 2021, just as the hysteria about 2000 was wrong, it should have been 2001.