[ApplegateRanch]

No, it's done so that scholars and researchers can use a common frame of reference in research. Different religions (cultures) have different calenders. In the Muslim and Jewish calenders it's not 2004, they measure from different starting dates. So it makes a lot more sense to have a common neutral frame of reference that everyone can use regardless of their religion.

...which just happens to have the same starting point as AD/BC.

IF that were the real reason, then a 'neutral', but equally earth shattering, starting point would have been picked...say, August 6, 1945.

[null and void]

IF that were the real reason, then a 'neutral', but equally earth shattering, starting point would have been picked...say, August 6, 1945.

Too recent. We'd have to be dealing with all those pesky negative years.

It might make more sense to pick the earliest known date. IIRC, this was a battle interrupted by a solar eclipse wayyyy back when...