Do you think I use made-up numbers as ornamentation in my
messages? When you see that I have written "2000 years",
please consider the possibility that I really mean "2000 years".
2) Why does anybody care? That number was only very
tangentially related to the point I was making. Even if
the number had been off by an order of magnitude, or even
two orders of magnitude, that wouldn't have changed the
conclusion.
If this number really is of burning importance, you can
check it yourself. Take a look at the ways in which e.g.
Aristotle used the word "θεωρία", 2300+ years ago. This
is easier than you might have guessed, thanks to http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/cgi-bin/resolveform
That site is pretty nifty. The search engine, the dictionaries,
the ancient documents, and the English translations are linked
together in intelligent ways.