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By adding a whole day every four years, we’re adding too much: after four years we only have 0.9688 day left over, not 1.0 day. That difference is 0.0312 day, or about 45 minutes. That means every four years we still have about three quarters of an hour to account for. Over time, that’ll build up, and the calendar will be off again. Enter Pope Gregory XIII, who reformed the calendar again in 1582. He decreed that every 100th year (to make it simple, years ending in 00) would not be a leap year, so no leap day would be added. There are 25 leap days in a century, so this method removes 25 x 0.0312 = 0.78 day, and the calendar syncs up a little bit better in the long run—but again, not exactly. Using this algorithm, every 100 years the calendar will run 1 – 0.78 = 0.22 day behind. That adds up, too! So as part of his papal bull, Pope Gregory XIII also declared that every 400th year would once again acquire a leap day. By then there’s an extra 4 x 0.22 = 0.88 day, so adding one day gets us decently close to catching up with Earth’s irritatingly nonintegral annual-diurnal ratio. That’s the rule we use now. Every fourth year, meaning every year whose number is evenly divisible by 4, is a leap year and is granted an extra day—that is, except for every 100 years, when we skip the leap day, except for every 400 years, when we reverse the rule and add a leap day once again. So the years 1700, 1800 and 1900 were not leap years. The year 2000 was because even though it’s divisible evenly by 100, it’s also evenly divisible by 400. The year 2100 will not be a leap year, but the year 2400 will be, and so on
originally posted by: Terpene
a reply to: stonerwilliam
Also if you turn 36 years today, I'd like to congratulate you to your 8th birthday...
originally posted by: stonerwilliam
I love watching their faces when I give them the same back when it is their birthday in August, there's your birthday and Xmas present