Changing bathroom extractor fan from timed to standard - terminate live?

[EFLImpudence]

I obviously don't know what you would regard as 'unnecessary', but the fact is that a high proportion of proper medical terminology (and also terminology in many other disciplines, including science and engineering one) consists of Latin (or sometimes Greek) words.

Exactly, so a slight error by Joe Public could, not unreasonably unbeknown to him, mean something completely different.

Well, you could start with very common ones like "heart attack" and "stroke".

Not being medical, I don't really know what you mean.
I presume you mean they are not an attack nor a stroke in the accepted meaning of the words but if I called a heart attack a stroke that would just be wrong and would be corrected - when someone realised the mistake.

The trouble with the "new examples you make up" (as with the two you quote) is that they are plain silly, and clearly need to be corrected,

Yes, of course they are silly but that's how these things start - and so would have been the errors that you now accept because you are so used to them.

because they involve 'making up' for something a 'new word (or words)' that already means something totally different.

So did many of the words we now use.

On the other hand, if you referred to pulmonary embolism as, say, "lung artery blockage", I would understand and may well not even both to 'correct' you.

Yes, but what if I had mistakenly called it a 'cerebral hemorrhage'. You would not correct me because you wouldn't have known I was wrong.

 

[EFLImpudence]

[ predictive text, I presume ... modifiable/notifiable ]

I rest my case.

 

[JohnD]

I prefer to say "mains voltage" and "12v" (or whatever)

it prevents the pedants quibbling.

UK mains in an ordinary house is either about 240v or about 230v depending whether you mean actual or nominal, so that gives opportunity for quibbling as well. Rarely I say "415v" even though the supply in my commercial premises really is 400v, because the people I might say it to know what I really mean.

A vehicle battery is rarely really at 12v, but people know I mean "not a 6v or a 24v" which is near enough.

 

[JohnW2]

Exactly, so a slight error by Joe Public could, not unreasonably unbeknown to him, mean something completely different.

Sure, but that's true of any words in any context - and I'm nit sure what it has got to do with the word beibg Latin!

I presume you mean they are not an attack nor a stroke in the accepted meaning of the words ...

No, I didn't mean that. I meant that if you look in the index of a medical textbook you probably will not find either "heart attack" or "stroke", unless they are being referenced to indicate that they are 'colloquial' terms for medical conditions. What you will find is "myocardial infarction" (the 'correct' term for common type of "heart attack") and "cerebrovascular accident" (or CVA) (the 'correct' term for a 'stroke').

... but if I called a heart attack a stroke that would just be wrong and would be corrected - when someone realised the mistake.

Of course, but that would be just plain wrong, since they are two totally different things. It's not the same as calling a myocardial infarction a heart attack - which are just two different terms which different groups of people use to refer to the same thing.

So did many of the words we now use.

I would say that it's very unusual for a word to start being used to have a new meaning whilst it is still needed/used to mean something different (i.e. creation of an ambiguity) - even though that does seem to have happened in electrical circles (dare I mention transformers and lamps?!).

Yes, but what if I had mistakenly called it a 'cerebral hemorrhage'. You would not correct me because you wouldn't have known I was wrong.

True, but this is surely getting silly. If you use a perfectly credible word/phrase (correct terminology for something), but are just plain wrong, then there's no way that I could know (from just the words) that it was wrong and needed correction. If I told you that I had been out and bought a "double socket", there's no way that you could know (unless I saw it) that what I had actually bought was a 2-gang switch! ... so, similarly, if you told me that someone had had a 'cerebral haemorrhage', I would have no reason to think you were wrong (hence correct you) unless I saw the person and it was apparent that what they had suffered was actually pulmonary embolism.

Kind Regards, John

 

[JohnW2]

I prefer to say "mains voltage" and "12v" (or whatever) ...it prevents the pedants quibbling

So, usually, would I.

The important issue is surely that a lot (quite possibly a majority) of the general public regard "low voltage" as being something which generally represents no threat to life - and that's one of the main things that worries me about the "pedants quibbling".

Kind Regards, John

 

[EFLImpudence]

I see no difference in people calling a pulmonary embolism a cerebral hemorrhage because they don't actually know what the words mean, and
calling a G5.3 an MR16 because they don't know what the 'words' mean.

It's just that you have become used to that mistake because so many people make it that you assume you know what they mean.

That does not mean that we should not correct them in an effort to educate them.

 

[JohnD]

"pulmonary" has a particular meaning. It is not a word in common usage to mean a foot or an elbow.

"Low" "Medium" and "High" in common usage are relative terms. An arbitrary decision that they should correspond with certain numbers cannot be expected to be understood by the 70 million.

 

[EFLImpudence]

240 is low relative to 11,000.

No one is saying that it should be understood innately, but if never informed they will never know.

Isn't education supposed to be a good thing? If they want to do electics ...

 

[JohnD]

240 is high compared to 6.

11,000 is low compared to 400,000

 

[EFLImpudence]

Your views on this matter would seem to be incongruous with your crusades on the GD forum.

 

[ban-all-sheds]

I see no difference in people calling a pulmonary embolism a cerebral hemorrhage because they don't actually know what the words mean, and
calling a G5.3 an MR16 because they don't know what the 'words' mean.

Again, not a good example.

"pulmonary embolism" and "cerebral hæmorrhage" are not two distinct symptoms of the same medical condition. "G5.3" & "MR16" are (can easily be) two distinct features of the same bulb. Or lamp.

 

[ban-all-sheds]

For those not sure, low voltage is 50-1000v.

Who says?

 

[JohnW2]

I see no difference in people calling a pulmonary embolism a cerebral hemorrhage because they don't actually know what the words mean, and calling a G5.3 an MR16 because they don't know what the 'words' mean. ... It's just that you have become used to that mistake because so many people make it that you assume you know what they mean.

As BAS has said, I think they are two totally different situations.

If people had started using "MR24" to refer to MR16 bulbs/lamps, or "B22" to refer to GU5.3 bulbs/lamps, then I think that would be more analogous to your medical example - i.e. 'totally wrong', and not an error that would be perpetuated by others and come to be commonplace.

Furthermore, and more to the point in terms of the original context of this discussion, such errors are very different from a situation in which the 'error' (not regarding mains voltage as "low voltage") has been 'almost universal' amongst English-speaking people for a very long time.

Kind Regards, John

 

[JohnW2]

Who says?

Quite so. Although scousespark has cited the IEC definition, he does not appear to have a correct understanding of the IEC definition of "low voltage".

 

[EFLImpudence]

Ok, but that's the point - you think everybody being wrong (if that is true), and you have become used to it, makes it right. I disagree.

There must have been a time when only 49% were wrong and weren't corrected.

Perhaps, I don't know, a majority of people think spiders are insects. Even if everyone did, it would still be wrong.