Techspeak and Vulgate
Aug. 2nd, 2010 08:48 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
stoutfellowIt's not uncommon for words or phrases which originated as technical terms to pass into the common language - or, conversely, for common words to be given uncommon technical meanings. (The word "normal" has six or eight different meanings in mathematics, depending on which branch you're working in; none of them has much resemblance to the usual meaning.) If you're a specialist in some technical field, it probably grates to hear terms from that field being used - possibly misused - in the common language.
For the most part, I think that anger is probably misplaced. To take a typical example, I've often heard complaints about the use of "quantum jump", since a true quantum jump is (roughly speaking) a small discontinuity, and the common use generally refers to a large and sudden change. But, really, what would you expect? What makes "quantum jump" intriguing is the discontinuity, not the small size, and so it's that quality that get taken for a metaphorical ride. As long as the word isn't being used in a technical context, I don't see any reason to complain.
"Exponential" is, perhaps, a little different; in mathematics, it doesn't just mean "very rapid", but rather "very rapid" in a specific way and to a specific degree. The common usage really doesn't serve any novel purpose (unlike "quantum jump"), and I'm inclined to think it's used more for pretension than for any other reason. Still, I'm not inclined to make a big deal of it.
However... If you're using a technical term in a technical context you really should make an attempt to use it in the technically correct sense. I bring this up because, in the first trilogy of the atevi series, C. J. Cherryh repeatedly commits a blunder, using the terms "positive curvature" and "negative curvature". The distinction she's trying to make is between life on a spaceship (with the ground rising or flat in all directions) and on a planet (with the ground, speaking largely, dropping off in all directions). It's a useful distinction, but it's not what's meant by "positive/negative curvature". To a mathematician, both of those situations involve positive curvature: the top of a hill and the bottom of a valley are both positively curved. Negative curvature requires that the surface curve oppositely in different directions - up in some, down in others, as at a mountain pass.
Cherryh is by training an anthropologist, not a mathematician, and her mistake is an easy one to make. It still grates me more than a little.
For the most part, I think that anger is probably misplaced. To take a typical example, I've often heard complaints about the use of "quantum jump", since a true quantum jump is (roughly speaking) a small discontinuity, and the common use generally refers to a large and sudden change. But, really, what would you expect? What makes "quantum jump" intriguing is the discontinuity, not the small size, and so it's that quality that get taken for a metaphorical ride. As long as the word isn't being used in a technical context, I don't see any reason to complain.
"Exponential" is, perhaps, a little different; in mathematics, it doesn't just mean "very rapid", but rather "very rapid" in a specific way and to a specific degree. The common usage really doesn't serve any novel purpose (unlike "quantum jump"), and I'm inclined to think it's used more for pretension than for any other reason. Still, I'm not inclined to make a big deal of it.
However... If you're using a technical term in a technical context you really should make an attempt to use it in the technically correct sense. I bring this up because, in the first trilogy of the atevi series, C. J. Cherryh repeatedly commits a blunder, using the terms "positive curvature" and "negative curvature". The distinction she's trying to make is between life on a spaceship (with the ground rising or flat in all directions) and on a planet (with the ground, speaking largely, dropping off in all directions). It's a useful distinction, but it's not what's meant by "positive/negative curvature". To a mathematician, both of those situations involve positive curvature: the top of a hill and the bottom of a valley are both positively curved. Negative curvature requires that the surface curve oppositely in different directions - up in some, down in others, as at a mountain pass.
Cherryh is by training an anthropologist, not a mathematician, and her mistake is an easy one to make. It still grates me more than a little.
