Loké Posted January 13, 2004 Share Posted January 13, 2004 Why the hell do you say 'Math'? Aluminum I can understand- That's aluminuim's 'real' name so fair enough. But 'math'? It's 'maths' dammit! After all, addition is a mathmatical proccess, so when you refer to all of them it should be maths. ....and it's easier to say. So why the hell do you do it? Link to comment
Rusalka Posted January 13, 2004 Share Posted January 13, 2004 The word Math is an abriviation of Mathmatics. Instead of saying the whole long word we just use the first part, and as there is no 's' after the 'th' we don't see the reason in putting one there. At least that's my theory. Link to comment
CamDawg Posted January 13, 2004 Share Posted January 13, 2004 You may as well ask why we talk with a funny accent or insist on misspelling "humour" and "theatre" and use funny words like "elevator." For me personally I think of math as a concept, not necessarily a process. As such, it sounds odd to me to use "maths." As a side note, I love the British pronounciation of aluminum (al-you-min-ee-um). The first time I heard it, I didn't understand what they were talking about until they mentioned using it for soft drink cans. Link to comment
Bri Posted January 13, 2004 Author Share Posted January 13, 2004 Heh, as if the British are much better. I mean, look at Gloucester...but its pronounced 'Gloster' Link to comment
Loké Posted January 13, 2004 Share Posted January 13, 2004 Heh, as if the British are much better. I mean, look at Gloucester...but its pronounced 'Gloster' Well *that*'s because it's a danish [iIRC] word, or derived from danish. England has been conquered by at least five different people who have settled. Link to comment
Bri Posted January 13, 2004 Author Share Posted January 13, 2004 Heh, as if the British are much better. I mean, look at Gloucester...but its pronounced 'Gloster' Well *that*'s because it's a danish [iIRC] word, or derived from danish. England has been conquered by at least five different people who have settled. That may be so, but don't forget that the Angles, Saxons, and Jutes were also of Germanic origin, placing them linguistically in the same family as the Danes. Nor should we forget that the Normans that invaded also came from Germanic stock...(Yes, I know some will say, 'But they are of Scandinavian origin...heh...still Germanic stock). Link to comment
BigRob Posted January 14, 2004 Share Posted January 14, 2004 The odd thing to me is the recent alterations to old words, like humour into humor. Did someone just decide, you know, I think we should drop that "u"? I can understand things like lift/elevator, because they're words for relatively new inventions. And I was always under the impression that aluminium was the actual name of the metal, given that lots of metals end with "ium" and few end with "num". Link to comment
CamDawg Posted January 14, 2004 Share Posted January 14, 2004 Aluminium/aluminum is another variation between British and American English; the different spelling also accounts for the different pronounciations. You're correct in that -ium is the proper suffix though the (i) is optional AFAIK. I believe the base word is alumina, though not 100%. My linguistics classes were some time ago. Link to comment
Loké Posted January 14, 2004 Share Posted January 14, 2004 Aluminium/aluminum is another variation between British and American English; the different spelling also accounts for the different pronounciations. You're correct in that -ium is the proper suffix though the (i) is optional AFAIK. I believe the base word is alumina, though not 100%. My linguistics classes were some time ago. No, Aluminum is the porper name for aluminuim. They [americans] deceided to revert back to the orignial name. Aluminuim is the end result of mishearings and shoddy pronunciation presumabley. And IRT Bri: You're point? That just proves my point. English is a mixture of different languages. Hence many words do one thing and a word with very similer spelling does another. Thing of raise and raze. Link to comment
Bri Posted January 14, 2004 Author Share Posted January 14, 2004 Loke the point was that you pointed out that it seemed weird for Americans to do something, and the British to do another.  Heh, to me, it seems that it would be best to first make sure one's own language makes sense before picking on another ;-) You tried to blame it on the Danish, and sure that's the origin, but its not like the Brits have gone back to try and make everything logical in their linguistic backyard. Link to comment
Userunfriendly Posted January 14, 2004 Share Posted January 14, 2004 I vote for esperanto!!! Link to comment
CamDawg Posted January 14, 2004 Share Posted January 14, 2004 Ah, if only someone could translate Delainy into Esperanto... Link to comment
BigRob Posted January 15, 2004 Share Posted January 15, 2004 Ah, si si si! yawhol, oui! Strangely, the French (well, their government) are worried about pollution of their language with English, but so much of the English language is composed of French loan words. I find that amusing.  Link to comment
Bri Posted January 15, 2004 Author Share Posted January 15, 2004 So, what you are saying is that we should take France to the World Court for giving us words like boudoir and lingerie and menage a trois...hmm...okay maybe not those words ;-) Link to comment
Userunfriendly Posted January 15, 2004 Share Posted January 15, 2004 The word Math is an abriviation of Mathmatics. Instead of saying the whole long word we just use the first part, and as there is no 's' after the 'th' we don't see the reason in putting one there. At least that's my theory. its interesting that americans tend to abbreviate words, whereas german tends to pile words together to get bigger and bigger words... Link to comment
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