New Millennium? Not!(confusion over the beginning of Western calendar)

On December 31, the world will go bonkers celebrating what many people believe to be' the new millennium.

The world will be wrong. It's not a new millennium after all.

Blame some of the confusion on Dennis the Diminutive. In 526 A.D., this medieval monk started the system of counting years from Christ's birth. Because the Romans didn't have a zero, he started with 1. At the end of one year, the count went to 2, and so on. As a result, 2000 years won't elapse until January 1, 2001.

But Dennis also goofed on the start date. Many biblical scholars now believe Jesus was actually born in 6 or 7 B.C. (meaning Christ was born Before Christ. Go figure.) Besides which, although most of the world now marches to the beat of our Gregorian calendar, many cultures don't (see below). So when the clock...