From cowan@ccil.org Sun Jul 30 21:47:10 2000 Return-Path: Received: (qmail 31932 invoked from network); 31 Jul 2000 04:47:10 -0000 Received: from unknown (10.1.10.27) by m2.onelist.org with QMQP; 31 Jul 2000 04:47:10 -0000 Received: from unknown (HELO locke.ccil.org) (192.190.237.102) by mta1 with SMTP; 31 Jul 2000 04:47:10 -0000 Received: from localhost (cowan@localhost) by locke.ccil.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with SMTP id BAA03513; Mon, 31 Jul 2000 01:30:56 -0400 (EDT) Date: Mon, 31 Jul 2000 01:30:54 -0400 (EDT) To: Pierre Abbat Cc: lojban@egroups.com Subject: Re: [lojban] force and pressure In-Reply-To: <0007291919420H.00887@neofelis> Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII X-eGroups-From: John Cowan From: John Cowan On Sat, 29 Jul 2000, Pierre Abbat wrote: > >What about units like the Newton? I remember we discussed this > >before. One possibility was to make it up from kg.m/s2, but that > >gets ugly very soon. The other way is of course fu'ivla, so > >I would say {klanrniutoni}, {klanrpaskali}, {klanrvolti}, and > >so on. Not very pretty, but better than lujvo. > > Why do fu'ivla have to be based on a gismu? They don't, but using a gismu prefix makes it easy to generate well-formed fu'ivla. > I think it makes sense when > distinguishing between kulnrfarsi and bangrfarsi, or between tricrplumu and > grutrplumu. But for words that mean only one thing, I don't see the point. I > think we should use other parts of fu'ivla space. It's a tricky question, though. "Newton" in English means not only kg m s^-2, but also a kind of cookie. So we could have klanrniutoni and nanbrniutoni. > There is at least one dimensionness (?) that corresponds to two different > quantities. The dot product of a newton and a meter is a joule of energy; the > cross product is a newton-meter of torque. There are worse cases than this. The output rate of a lumber factory can naturally be measured in m sec^-1, but that is not a velocity! Similarly, fuel consumption (of a vehicle) is measured in l km^-1, but is not an area, even though "liter" has dimensions proportional to m^3. Paint coverage is measured in l m^-2, which is not a length. Furthermore, clock accuracy is sec sec^-1, grade (of a railway) is km km^-1, and concentration is kg kg^-1, but these are not interchangeable even though they are all technically "dimensionless". (These examples due to William Kent.) > There are dynes and ergs. There are also dunes in ergs, but if I went there, > I'd be deserting you. Arrgh. -- John Cowan cowan@ccil.org C'est la` pourtant que se livre le sens du dire, de ce que, s'y conjuguant le nyania qui bruit des sexes en compagnie, il supplee a ce qu'entre eux, de rapport nyait pas. -- Jacques Lacan, "L'Etourdit"