Re: unnatural languages

"Herman" == Herman Rubin <hrubin@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> writes:

Herman> One is unlikely to get the technical vocabulary in the
Herman> normal course of learning a language. For example, in a
Herman> paper on efficient methods for multiple precision
Herman> arithmetic, I got hung up on "Einheit". I could reject
Herman> many uses of "oneness"; I did not know that it was used in
Herman> German works on rings for "unit", which has nothing to do
Herman> with "one", despite the English word being based on the
Herman> Latin for "one".

"Einheit" means "unity". You can find this word in things like
national anthems or slogans. (Doesn't the 2-Euro coins from Germany
have this word on the rim?)

And "unity" is just "oneness" expressed with Latin-based roots. It
has everything to do with "one". Poor English speakers, who have to
learn the Latin root "uni" just to speak English, instead of using the
native word "one" in those places. Why would "oneness" look strange,
but "unity" so familiar?



--
Lee Sau Dan 李守敦 ~{@nJX6X~}

E-mail: danlee@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Home page: http://www.informatik.uni-freiburg.de/~danlee
.

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