"Superstring theory (sometimes just called string theory) has as its basic premise the belief that the four fundamental forces of nature (gravity, electromagnetism, and strong and weak nuclear forces), as well as all matter are simply different manifestations of a single essence. This essence, the material making up all energy and matter, is thought to consist of tiny (a hundred billion billion times smaller than the nucleus of an atom) vibrating strings that exist in a multi- dimensional (10 or 26 dimensions) hyperspace. The extra dimensions (beyond the ones we recognize: three spatial dimensions and time) are thought to be compactified, or curled up, into tiny pockets inside observable space. The particular vibrations of the strings within this multidimensional hyperspace are thought to correspond to particles that form the basis of everything - all matter and energy - in existence."
What, may I ask, is wrong with "compressed" or even "compacted"?
What, may I ask, is wrong with "compressed" or even "compacted"?
MaxQ, I agree that it's pretty yucky as a word, but being a physicist, I know that often a word is invented or altered because it takes on a very specific meaning, one which the original word doesn quite work for, or is unclear because there's already a specific physical meaning to the original word. I don't have my nuclear physics books here with me (since I am now in physical oceanography) and googling it just produced a lot of papers by people who obviously already knew what it meant.
It seems to have something to do with compact spaces. I knew this definition of a compact space four years ago when I took a metric spaces class but it's gone now. Anyway, I'm basing this on two lines I found on the web somewhere, if you have a space which isn't compact, and you add an element which makes it compact, then you've compactified it.
Anyway, physics/math people don't follow the same rules everyone else does when making words to describe something new. You kind of get used to it when you're there.
A space X is compact if each covering by open sets contains finitely many open sets which cover.
You see, this is a slippery slope. I used to know what "covering" means and how you "cover" a space, but no longer. Sorry. If I look that up there will be something else which I need to look up...
Anyway, physics/math people don't follow the same rules everyone else does when making words to describe something new. You kind of get used to it when you're there.
From So Long and Thanks for All the Fish the following seems to match the behaviour you describe: "I'm afraid I can't comment on the name Rain God at this present time, and we are calling him an example of a Spontaneous Para- Causal Meteorological Phenomenon."
"Can you tell us what that means?"
"I'm not altogether sure. Let's be straight here. If we find something we can't understand we like to call it something you can't understand, or indeed pronounce. I mean if we just let you go around calling him a Rain God, then that suggests that you know something we don't, and I'm afraid we couldn't have that.
"No, first we have to call it something which says it's ours, not yours, then we set about finding some way of proving it's not what you said it is, but something we say it is.
"And if it turns out that you're right, you'll still be wrong, because we will simply call him a ... er `Supernormal ...' - not paranormal or supernatural because you think you know what those mean now, no, a `Supernormal Incremental Precipitation Inducer'. We'll probably want to shove a `Quasi' in there somewhere to protect ourselves. Rain God! Huh, never heard such nonsense in my life.
BTW, I love the Hitchhiker's books and read them about once a year.
But I take issue with this... If we find something we can't understand we like to call it something you can't understand, or indeed pronounce.
I don't think the superstring guys are unable to understand compact spaces (I mean, I myself understood them somewhat, at one time). They are just using the most accurate word they know of to describe something they observe.
Oceanography example: advecting means something is being dragged along with a current. If you had to write "The current dragged the zooplankton westward" every time you were talking about it, it would quickly become fabulously annoying, plus it sounds like the zooplankton are resisting being dragged (like a dog on a leash), which isn't true, because they just float in the water and follow it wherever it goes. Much better to say "The zooplankton were advected westward with the current." Much more accurate.
I hate it when non-scientists accuse us of using "jargon", because it's only jargon if you don't know the words. Just like the Latin nuts on the Board - I don't think it's jargon when they talk about nominative and other cases, I just accept that I don't understand enough about Latin grammar to follow what they're saying.
I don't know, Bean. It's one thing to create nouns and verbs by giving definite explainations of what each concept entails, but when one starts creating verbs without any hint of why it's necessary and with no definition, then it just leads to opacitationalization, doesn't it? I don't care who wrote it be it a physicist or a gardener, it's wrong, it's Bushonics. We here don't know that 'jargon' nor does any other person on this planet (those at the end of the universe on the other hand are well enlightened). This word offers no new or further extrapolated meaning; thumbs down.
All knowledge must come before the court of language and be judged.
when one starts creating verbs without any hint of why it's necessary and with no definition, then it just leads to opacitationalization, doesn't it?
They're not talking to us. They're talking to each other. If they know what they're talking about, let them talk any way they please. If you have to take four years worth of courses just to understand the concept they're talking about and then lose a handle on it because you're not involved in it on a day to day basis then the least you can do is let them have their own vocabulary.
As for MaxQ's incisive quote, to wit: Let's be straight here. If we find something we can't understand we like to call it something you can't understand, or indeed pronounce.
This is a very good attitude to have with respect to any myth. If we make a myth too simple we might start to thinking that we understand what's going on. The myth is nothing more than a handle that allows us to relate to an imperfectly understood Reality. If we start thinking that it is understandable we start to thinking that it is the Truth and that anyone who doesn't understand that Truth is somehow of a lower class and therefore to be despised.
All knowledge must come before the court of language and be judged.
It has, but this isn't the court of language for physics or math words. What do you know about compact spaces? It's the people who use the word who accept it or discard it, and they have accepted compactify to mean make compact. To me, to compact (verb) means to squish, which isn't very mathematical, and isn't quite what they mean. So they need to use compactify. And when you make it into a past tense, it becomes compactified.
Most standard scientific words, even simple ones, are not in a typical dictionary. For example, in math and science, linearize = to make linear. And I don't mean "make straight" or "straighten out" because linear has a precise definition. You don't want to lose that definition when you turn it into a verb, so linear has to be the base of the verb, and you have linearize.
I have tons of other examples which are possibly awkward but are the most compact way of expressing something: radially (in a radial direction, that is, outward or inward from the centre, as opposed to tangentially), dimensionalize (to make a set of equations dimensional), upwelling (the welling up of water from lower depths to shallower depths), compositing (to make a composite data set), convecting (the act of convection), advecting (the act of advection), insolation (amount of solar radiation)...the list of non-recognized words goes on and on. (This was just from a quick spell-check of my last few term papers.)
If everyone in the field uses these words in a certain accepted pattern, with conjugations and pluralizations that are tacitly agreed upon, that makes them words, in much the same way as any other word becomes accepted as a word!
I hate it when non-scientists accuse us of using "jargon", because it's only jargon if you don't know the words.
Any specialized occupation has the same problem. Words are used to describe specific, often complex, processes or concepts, and because the words are not part of the everyday lexicon, they are dismissed as jargon. Some occupations seem to have an affection for jargon beyond its usefulness, but I venture that most use the words as the necessary tools that they are.
My father, a mechanic by trade, once launched into a critique of legalese and asked me why lawyers had to make up words so that other people couldn't understand them. I responded by pointing out to him that most of the tools and equipment he used were unfamiliar to me, and that I might as well criticize him for having a specific word for that funny-piece-of-metal-with-a-handle-on-it which non-mechanics did not understand. If he and Geoff got into a discussion of truck engines, it would all go right over my head.
Not to point fingers here, but if you think us physicist types are bad, just take a look at some of the social science jargon.
Jargon has its place, but if you are addressing an audience with members who are not in your field you must make adjustments or you are not going to be an effective communicator. If a colleague asks me what's happening with the weather he will get a much different, and longer, explanation than my wife would.
In the Miscellany thread "Good old guy" is the following:
J.W.v.Goethe : Roughly translated: "He who speaks no foreign language, does not know his mother tongue"
and it seems appropriate to this fascinating discussion, too. As we progress and learn we absorb the "jargon" of various fields into the everyday language. We begin to understand the applications that come to us from the adventurers who are now investigating new phenomena. The names of all those now rarified things will become part of the language as our children and children's children become as familiar with these now-esoteric fields as we are with how to drive a car.
All language about "specialist" topics is jargon - whether it's the words used, or the way in which they are used - until the usage becomes common knowledge.
Most educated people now know something about my second field, economics. So, if I say that the economy is in equilibrium, 1. today I'd be lying, and 2. most people will understand, in general terms, what I mean. I hope. But that wasn't a "standard" meaning of the word even 30 years ago.
To moan that all language must be understandable to all listeners is a very socialistic attitude which drags everything down to the lowest common denominator. Nothing progresses under those conditions. So while, if I saw "compactified" used in prose which was not related to superstring theory I might go "aargh!", I wouldn't make the same assumption if I was reading "New Scientist" or (God forbid) a text on nuclear physics. If I was interested enough, I'd go and find out what was meant by it, since, on the whole, physicists use rather precise language to describe their field.
Interestingly enough, I note that no one has challenged our old bean's use of "superstring" which is as jargonistic as all get out!
PS, SpellShredder doesn't like "superstring", it thinks that it's jargon. It suggests that I should use "superuser" instead which, of course, isn't, is it?
Thanks, Bean for your eloquent defence of jargon. I have no problem at all with specialists using specialist language, especially when it gives the proudly omnascient a chance to poke fun. Speaking strictly from my own point of view as a semi-evolved simian, I do think that in the context I saw it used, a non-technical newsletter designed for lay consumption, some consideration ought to have been given to linguistic aesthetics. In that instance, using "compacted" would not have compromised the clairty of communication, and would have been a lot less uglified, resulting in greater happification for me. It's physics, Jim, but not as we know it.
Good, Bean! Anyway, to exactly define what a compact space is, it is necessary a small course in Topology, so to have the correct definitions of topological space, open and closed set, and so on... and also, the usage of these words is NOT the usual one, for example, OPEN does not mean NOT CLOSED. So, I don't hope that it is really possible to explain the meaning of TO COMPACTIFY to everyone, unless giving some confused - and maybe even partially wrong - idea..
Speaking strictly from my own point of view as a semi-evolved simian, I do think that in the context I saw it used, a non-technical newsletter designed for lay consumption, some consideration ought to have been given to linguistic aesthetics.
Yes, I often get the feeling that when this stuff is re-hashed for the mass media, the reporters spout stuff back form news releases that they don't understand...they can't easily replace words because they're not sure what the heck they mean! That's too bad, because a good science reporter would be able to rephrase things so that everyone could understand. And there are good science reporters out there!
That's too bad, because a good science reporter would be able to rephrase things so that everyone could understand. And there are good science reporters out there!
Oh, dear Bean, thank you for that last sentence. Some of us do try very hard to understand and report accurately. Too often competent young reporters get discouraged by being tarred by the "gossip press" brush.
jargons It is regrettable, but jargons have been with us since the tower of Babel and will no doubt be like the poor.
I have to say that I can not get greatly exercised over the existence of specialized vocabularies in various disciplines, trades, societies, etc. Those who are involved in a particular field or study, trade, or society, need to be able to communicate in very precise terms with others in the same, and each needs to know exactly what the other is talking about. Definition and mutual understanding of terms is the first step in communication. If a word with a precise technical meaning is not available, then it is necessary to re-tool an existing word, use an existing word with a special meaning, or invent a new word. It may be unfortunate if a specialized vocabulary, not understood by an outsider, develops, but what if it does? It serves its purpose for those who use it and if outsiders want to know what the nuclear physicists, the coopers, or the Freemasons are talking about, let them study that field and learn the mysteries, just as the members had to do. Of course, there is no excuse for deliberate verbal mystification, which used to be practiced in former times to keep out the rabble, or to keep out competition, but I really don't think much of that goes on anymore, except maybe by social workers and others in like fields.
As a tongue in cheek suggestion, there ought to be a science dictionary, with each word having definitions numbered, so that "compacted" could have a list of numbered definitions, with,say, number 12 having the meaning needed by the superstring people. Then compacted12 would have the meaning currently assigned to "compactified".
I was going to say that you made a very good post and that I agreed with it, until I got down to the part about social workers. Was that a dig, my friend? 'S'ok if it is--I'll just have to marshal some arguments... +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Can I just point out that the entire passage is complete gibberish from beginning to end. It has the journalist's inky thumbprint all over it. No scientist could write that. The word "compactified" is the only clear part of it, because at least that is obviously a technical term that has some definite meaning.
It wouldn't last the first three minutes submitted to a science journal. Science writing is clear, grammatically transparent, and easy to see the structure of: "We analysed the X using Y. We found it had Z with W. Further U revealed V." -- Where perhaps X = "nuclear resonance magnetic spectroscopy", but that's okay, that's some technical term lack of understanding of which doesn't impede understanding of the text as a whole.
Whereas this (with all those explanations in brackets) about the whole shooting match and shebang (with all the hard words taken out and replaced by vague hand-waving so you know exactly what they're talking about), with its piling-up of the belief that here is a premise of some abstract idea of another generalization that some people think (we could put another bracketed clause in here to point out that by this stage you no longer have any idea of who is claiming or believing what), with its multitude of nested (including bracketed) clauses, shows a reckless disregard of every maxim -- every principle that good writers observe (such as not interrupting themselves constantly) -- that there is.
And what is wrong with the word compactified? We have rectified, vilified, intensified. We have intensification and rectification. Compactification seems to me to be the ordinary and natural word for the process of rendering something compact.
There is, I suppose, a word 'compaction', but that has images of large dustcarts eating cardboard boxes: I'd prefer a new coinage, for clarity. Compaction might falsely give images of gravitational compaction, as in a neutron star: in fact it might even already be in use in that context, now that I think of it. Yes, neutron matter is compacted, topological spaces are compactified.*
As for verbs, we have both 'compact' and 'compactify'. Certainly, all other things being equal, it's a tenet of good usage to prefer the shorter word to the longer. But the existence of 'compactification' means that analogy weighs on the side of 'compactify'. And preference for short words is a very bad principle if it's made to outweigh all other considerations.
It's a natural formation, in accordance with English usage, whose structure is transparent, whose meaning is clear, which violates no logic, and presents no phonetic awkwardness. It is useful in its context, and makes it clearer. I can't see anything wrong with such words.
* Assuming the word does have any relation to the topological process of furnishing with a finite covering of open sets. I haven't heard of that in the context of string theory. It would be amusing if the word was just a journalist's error after all.
* Assuming the word does have any relation to the topological process of furnishing with a finite covering of open sets. I haven't heard of that in the context of string theory. It would be amusing if the word was just a journalist's error after all.
When I Googled it, all my hits were scientific papers and topology tutorials, not news articles. So the people in string theory really do seem to use it among themselves. (You could check with emanuela to be sure.)
What's wrong? Cut it out! It achieves exactly the inverse of its apparently flimsy meaning and lengthens the word from which it stems. There's a difference between the verbs in N.W. example too: 'to compact' > compactified 'to ???????' > rectified
As for ugly MQ, yep, your damn right, it is just that, and will therefore feature in my up-coming essay 'How Science Abuses Language'. I'm all for the coinage of new language in order to better understand and explain the world around us, but come on, let's add a tad more interest. This word can be registered as bona fide and will just go to prove the your average science buff has not one iota of imagination. Still thumbs down.
i ran across the word "argot" in an article on mcveigh this morning, and had to atomicize it. the context was "And the 19 children buried in smoldering debris? He called them “collateral damage” — military argot for civilian deaths in a military strike."
somehow i've never seen this word before... is it totally interchangeable with 'jargon'? and how do you all pronounce it: AR-goe or ARget?
argot has the shading of 'secretive', or willful intent to obfuscate, in addition to 'insider'. both pronunciations are common, as it is americanized French.
I think that to compact and to compactify are not synonymous. If you compact something you will obtain something smaller. There are a lot of ways to compactify a set A, and you usually obtain a new set bigger than the previous one . The biggest compactification is the so called Stone- Cech compactification.
no, it's just my standard gibberish, akin to googling an unknown by using www.google.com; atomica is a tremendously useful one-click reference tool available at http://www.atomica.com. with Atomica installed, all you have to do is alt-click on any word you see on your screen, even in a java applet, and a small Atomica screen pops up with the word's definition, as well as thesaurus, antonym, weblink, and other capabilities.
argot vs. jargon My take is that argot starts off as slang and becomes a sort of private language amongst certain groups over a wide spectrum. Victor Hugo devoted a whole book to the subject in Les Misérables. The rhyming slang we have often seen discussed in AWAD is a kind of argot. That it is often used by criminals gets it into the secretive area noted.
just go to prove the your average science buff has not one iota of imagination.
C'mon belligerentyouth, now you're just being plain offensive.
I have plenty of imagination, and so do most scientists I know. Most of my scientist friends are great musicians and cooks, we love the outdoors, go out and drink beer together, discuss life, the universe, and everything, have conversations filled with bad science puns, lie on the grass and stare at the clouds, ride our bikes...And I can invent a perfectly good word when I need one, just like most people can (and do)!
If you still think that all scientists are geeky-looking guys with pocket protectors and no social skills, you're living in a dream world. So don't insult all of us based on your outdated stereotype!
Please note, I wrote 'your average science buff'. Bean, I'm interested in science too, o.k. I subscribe to Scientific American, I have spoken to physicists at length about CERN and I even read a book by S. Hawking. I'm sure your a stand-up, out-doorsy guy and that your pyhsics friends are likewise; therefore I herewith rescind my hasty comments based on my loathing of this science neologism, which, in many respects epitomises the struggle between old, and familiar language, and the perpetual spiral of formation as exemplified (hold me!) by this creation, which if accepted by peers may one day become standard language. Either way, I wouldn't touch it with a barge pole, particle physicist or not.
In his weekly New York Times column "On Language" last Sunday, William Safire gives his specialist [sic] readers a chance to fulminate against the slings and arrows of outrageous usage. Serendipitous that it coincides chronologically with this thread - mere coincidence?
Herewith an example, on the misuse of "epicenter":
>>The geophysicist Joseph D. Sides adds, "Writers should be advised that epi- no more intensifies the meaning of center than does pen- intensify the meaning of ultimate." .... Sides defines epicenter as "the point on the surface of the earth vertically above the center of an earthquake, the quake's 'hypocenter.' " It is also, he says, "the point on the earth's surface vertically below the atmospheric detonation of a bomb, the 'hypercenter' of the explosion." He finds "misuse of the offending term attributable to spurious erudition on the part of the writers combined with scientific illiteracy on the part of copy editors." <<
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way of expressing something: radially (in a radial direction, that is, outward or inward from the centre, as opposed to tangentially), dimensionalize (to make a set of equations dimensional), upwelling (the welling up of water from lower depths to shallower depths), compositing (to make a composite data set), convecting (the act of convection), advecting (the act of advection), insolation (amount of solar radiation)...the list of non-recognized words goes on and on. (This was just from a quick spell-check of my last few term papers.)
