the sound of Hindu holy sound Aum

http://www.spiritsound.com/aum.html

In the Sanskrit tradition, this sound is called "Anahata Nada," the "Unstruck Sound." Literally, this means "the sound that is not made by two things striking together." The point of this particular distinction is that all ordinary audible sounds are made by at least two elements: bow and string...

Joseph Campbell likens this unstruck vibration to the humming of an electrical transformer, or the (to our ears) unheard hummings of atoms and molecules.

And the ancients say that the audible sound which most resembles this unstruck sound is the syllable OM. Tradition has it that this ancient mantra is composed of four elements: the first three are vocal sounds: A, U, and M. The fourth sound, unheard, is the silence which begins and ends the audible sound, the silence which surrounds it.

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http://apathintotheworld.wordpress.com/2010/09/19/joseph-campbell-explanation-of-om/
It is written AUM start in the back of the mouth – A – and then u – you fill the mouth and M closes at the mouth. And you pronounce it properly all vowel sounds are in that pronunciation. Constanants are regarded simply as interruptions of OM, and thus all words are fragments of OM, as all images are fragments of the form of forms. All things are just reflections and so OM is just a symbol. A symbolic sound that puts you in touch with that throbbing being that is the universe.

This is called the 4 element syllable:

A – the birth

U – the coming into being

M – the dissolution

the fourth element is the silence out of which it comes, and back into which it goes, and which underlies it.

Now my life is the A-U-M but there is a silence that underlies it, and that is what we would call the immortal.

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D - hmm, looks like my scheme to teach English diphthongs to Spanish ESL students. I suspect the Spanish diphthongs glide through the territory of English-only vowels.

Spanish has six falling diphthongs and eight rising diphthongs. While many diphthongs are historically the result of a recategorization of vowel sequences (hiatus) as diphthongs, there is still lexical contrast between diphthongs and hiatus.[39] There are also some lexical items that vary amongst speakers and dialects between hiatus and diphthong: words like biólogo ('biologist')... (wiki)

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D - just started watching a series of video lessons on linguistics.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_McWhorter

D - he wrote a number of books on Black English and Creoles.
His lessons are highly accessible. He uses simple, everyday language to explain the subject. I already learned a few things, such as the names of funky IPA phonetic letters.

end of Canada's penny. on obsolete coins. # systems

In Canada, we are finally phasing out the penny. I have always used coins of value 1,5, 10 and 25 cents of value. More recently, we introduced 1 and 2 dollar coins.
But this was not always the # basis for change.

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Great Britain and the United Kingdom Main article: Shilling (British coin)
The common currency created in 1707 by Article 16 of the Articles of Union continued in use until decimalisation in 1971. Before decimalisation, there were 20 shillings per pound and 12 pence per shilling, and thus there were 240 pence in a pound. Three coins denominated in multiple shillings were also in circulation at this time. They were:

the florin, two shillings (2/-), which adopted the value of 10 new pence (10p) at decimalisation;
the half-crown, two shillings and sixpence (2/6) or one-eighth of a pound, which was abolished at decimalisation;
the crown (five shillings), the highest denominated non-bullion UK coin in circulation at decimalisation (in practice, crowns were commemorative coins not used in everyday transactions).
At decimalisation, the shilling coin was superseded by the new five-pence piece, which initially was of identical size and weight and had the same value, and inherited the shilling's slang name of a bob.

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D - we moderns don't feel like 12x20=240 makes a logical basis for a currency system, but it was considered acceptable, once upon a time.
I just want to point out how easy it is to assume that our modern math and measurement system is the only one that can work.

For example, imagine a # system based on hexadecimal, with #s 1 to 8 A small and 'capital letter' version - or my hexadecimally based binary system - could use it.
But why hexadecimal?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hexadecimal
...the primary use of hexadecimal notation is a human-friendly representation of binary-coded values in computing...
It uses sixteen distinct symbols, most often the symbols 0–9 to represent values zero to nine, and A, B, C, D, E, F (or alternatively a–f) to represent values ten to fifteen.
One hexadecimal digit represents a nibble, which is half of an octet (8 bits).
Alfred B. Taylor used "senidenary" in his mid 19th century work on alternative number bases, although he rejected base 16 because of its "incommodious number of digits.
Hexadecimal is sometimes used in programmer jokes because some words can be formed using hexadecimal digits. Some of these words are "dead", "beef", "babe", and with appropriate substitutions "c0ffee". (Found in Java, C++ in references.)

(D - it, too found traditional use in a measurement system.)

Use in Chinese cultureThe traditional Chinese units of weight were base-16. For example, one jīn (斤) (approximately 256 grams) in the old system equals sixteen liǎng (兩) (16g).

And England.
http://home.clara.net/brianp/weights.html
avoirdupois weights 16 drams = 1 ounce
16 ounces = 1 pound
The avoirdupois pound is the pound in general use today. As its name implies, it was intended to be used for weighing heavy goods. This pound is of 7000 grains, and is split into 16 ounces (each, therefore of 437.5 grains). Each ounce is divided into 16 drams (which my calculator makes of 27.34375 grains each - much more fun than metric isn't it?).

D - makes you wonder if we would have used 14 then 8 base # systems if we had 1 less finger per hand...
D - also makes me wonder about any possible benefit of a 8 or 16 base system, given their compatibility with a power-of-2 approach. For computer memory, for example.

The kilobyte (symbol: kB) is a multiple of the unit byte for digital information. Although the prefix kilo- means 1000, the term kilobyte and symbol kB or KB have historically been used to refer to either 1024 bytes or 1000 bytes, dependent upon context, in the fields of computer science and information technology.

D - a way to denote a 2 or 10 base system would be very useful.
For that matter, a simple way to substitute ANY # to indicate the prefix base would suffice.
In this system:
1) 1000 would be 10 to power 3
2) 1,024 would be (um, 2,4,8,16,32,64,128,256,512, 1024)2 to power 10.
D - I had considered short forms of prefix/ unit names for the purpose of rapid tactical communication. Kilo-metre, for example, could retain the essential KI-lo and MET-re parts to form ki-mets. Of course, we just use "clicks" to address this deficiency.

cost of illiteracy. Globish critique

http://www.japantoday.com/category/national/view/illiteracy-costs-japans-economy-87-78-billion-world-literacy-foundation

(D - the G&M this weekend claimed that a single PERCENT of increased literacy is worth $34 BILLION to Canada.)

A new report released on Thursday shows the social and economic impact of literacy to Japan is $87.78 billion.

The report, from the World Literacy Foundation, shows that more than 800 million people across the world lack the basic reading and writing skills needed to accomplish simple tasks such as reading a medicine label or filling out a job application, costing the global economy more than $1.19 trillion a year.

“The Economic and Social Cost of Illiteracy” looks at the cost of illiteracy in emerging and developing countries, as well as the cost of functional illiteracy in the developed world. It shows more than one in five people across the globe can’t read or write, and more than 100 million children don’t go to school each day.

The report’s co-author Andrew Kay says Japan needs to do more to make serious in-roads to addressing the level of illiteracy in the country.

Often, the end result of low literacy levels is trapping people in a cycle of poverty, poor health, limited employment opportunities, reduced income potential and low productivity in businesses

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D - I was watching a video on Globish. In the tradition of Ogden, the author claims only 1500 words can serve the needs of international business.
This controlled language (a subset of Standard English)

Globish is a subset of the English language formalized by Jean-Paul Nerriere.[1] It uses a subset of standard English grammar, and a list of 1500 English words. Nerriere claims it is "not a language" in and of itself,[2] but rather it is the common ground that non-native English speakers adopt in the context of international business. (Wiki)

Criticisms:

- According to CIA's "World Factbook", native English speakers represent only 4.68% of the world population.
- Globish is criticized because the systemic principles for its elaboration are nowhere explained.

D - my critism is as follows. While it may render ESL as spoken easier for a native English speaker to understand (more regular, less mistakes), Globish will NOT render spoken Standard English any easier to understand in return.
In fact, the (false) expectation of regular rules and single ways to say things in English will lead them astray. A native English speaker will not be clearly understood when he responds to fairly understood Globish by an ESL speaker.
Globish also ignores certain integral and unremovable elements of English that will be difficult for foreign speakers. Reforms (or a revolt) of sufficient radicalness to address these concerns would render such a "Globish Plus" difficult to understand for a Standard English speaker. Examples include a broad selection of phonemes (about 40), as well as complex consonant clusters and the use of vowel diphthongs, as well as an elaborate syllable stress system.
Here we see the conundrum of attempting to reform an existing natural language that was NOT rationally designed from carefully selected core principles. The speakers of cultural and national Englishes find it either unacceptable to learn a "lite" more limited version of English to communicate with ESLers (English as Second Language), or find limiting their usage of possible ways to express ideas in English as difficult as simply learning a new IAL (aux-lang - auxiliary language) in the first place! A simple example of this would be as follows:
1) we posit that our special "English Lite" can only use the terms "more" or "less" to denote comparative terms.
2) E.g. we cannot use the terms "bigger", "smaller", "better" or "worse" now.
3) I.e. we must use the terms "more big" and "more good" instead.
How long before the Standard English speaker stops concentrating on HOW to say an idea, and defaults to Standard English as they fixate on WHAT they wish to say?
This is only 1 of a great many factors such a speaker of "lite" English would need to keep in mind.

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D - this seems to be the most complete listing of it. I was hard pressed to find written examples of Globish.

http://www.earthhealing.info/SIGLOBSH07_2.htm

The listing of my 1,500 basic "Globish" words (black-underlined) is quite similar to the existing Internet Globish listing (in bold letters). Some 195 words that have been added (++) (underlined), and 195 words that have been combined, removed or substituted by existing words are in bold (--). When the two listings are the same, the word is made bold and underlined (XX). When words are combined (e.g. with + in) or are forms of a basic stem (e.g., inform and "information"), we include both under one heading.

ACT -s, -ual, -ually, -ed, -ing Activity lack of {on, up, with}
of doing "Action"
-- [Actor] lack of Inactivity
++ Active Activity
-- [Activist]
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D - note that activist if derived from "ACTIVe" and not just "ACT".
Contrast with a term I pick randomly, Marxist.
Contrast with made up terms such as countryist and whiteist.
What Sapir said still applies.
" Anyone who takes the trouble to examine these examples carefully will soon see that behind a superficial appearance of simplicity there is concealed a perfect hornet's nest of bizarre and arbitrary usages. "
D - explicitly acknowledging what complexity is actually required for overt clarity is better than hiding behind the mock simplicity of a nat-lang (natural languuage).

D - while pondering how simple English could be made, I came up with the following 2 examples for a "lite" version.
1) YOUR. Your XYZ. the XYZ of you. Ergo, replace "your" with "of you". Also, "of" is quite vague, and does not clearly denote possession.

1. (used to indicate distance or direction from, separation, deprivation, etc.): within a mile of the church; south of Omaha; to be robbed of one's money.
2. (used to indicate derivation, origin, or source): a man of good family; the plays of Shakespeare; a piece of cake.
3. (used to indicate cause, motive, occasion, or reason): to die of hunger.
4. (used to indicate material, component parts, substance, or contents): a dress of silk; an apartment of three rooms; a book of poems; a package of cheese.
5. (used to indicate apposition or identity): Is that idiot of a salesman calling again?


2) QUICKLY. With quickness. This suffers from the fact that quick - an adjective- is the simplest form, while in many English words, the adjective is not the more basic form.

D - in summary, an attempt to rationalize an existing natural language, in this case English, rapidly suffers from a lack of mutual intelligibility with native speakers if it gets more than just superficially reformed.

plants named in English now, not Latin

Plant DNA speaks English, identifies new species

The important changes to the way scientists name new plants that took effect on 1 January 2012 included the fall of the so-called Latin requirement - a stipulation that descriptions or diagnoses of new species had to be in Latin.

The new rules make it possible to take full advantage of an ongoing revolution in how botanists and mycologists verify that a particular species is indeed new to science: Many studies now routinely include the sequencing of short DNA regions that will amplify easily, even when the DNA comes from old specimens.

Such "barcoding" sequences can be used to confirm a suspected new species as long as related species that already have a scientific name are also being sequenced for the same DNA stretch.

There is no standard Latin vocabulary for describing DNA barcoding, yet in English, there is.
In an article in the open access journal PhytoKeys, botanists Natalia Filipowicz (Medical University of Gdańsk), Michael Nee (New York Botanical Garden), and Susanne Renner (University of Munich), now provide the first English-language diagnosis of a new species that relies exclusively on DNA data.

Their publication of a new species in the Solanaceae genus Brunfelsia also includes a traditional morphology-based description and pictures of the plant, but the researchers trust that "molecular diagnoses" will become a standard feature in future taxon descriptions.

The DNA sequences generated for the study have all been deposited in the public database GenBank, enabling other researchers to make use of them.

do dolphins use language

http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20120322-will-we-ever-talk-to-animals

The idea of talking to dolphins has a long and chequered history. It was widely publicised in the 1960s by John Lilly, who argued that dolphins have such large brains that they must be extremely intelligent and have a natural language.

(D - or process plenty of sensory data.)

. “He said that in a few years, we will have established complex dialogue with them,” says Justin Gregg from the Dolphin Communication Project. “And he was saying that every few years.”

Lilly was right about dolphin intelligence, but not dolphin language. A true language involves small elements that combine into larger chains, to convey complex, and sometimes abstract, information. And there is no good evidence that dolphins have that, despite their rich repertoire of whistles and clicks...

Each individual has its own “signature whistle” which might act like a name. Developed in the first year of life, dolphins use these whistles as badges of identity, and may modulate them to reflect motivation and mood. This year, a study showed that when wild dolphins meet, one member of each group exchanges signature whistles.

But beyond this, dolphin chat is still largely mysterious.

(D - or they simply have distinctive voices. I do not need to name myself on a telephone.)

shared sri lankan word causes conflict.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/arts/books/a-reading-series-tries-to-heal-the-aftermath-of-war-with-words/article2376948/

Nadesan remembered a phrase from Tamil-language news reports about the 25-year-long civil war that ravaged the island nation: Samadhana pechchu vaarthaigal, or peace talks. He wanted a word found in both Sinhalese and Tamil, the languages spoken by the two ethnic communities in conflict in Sri Lanka, and Samadhana seemed an innocuous choice.

However, the reaction from some of his Sri Lankan Tamil friends, “moderate people, who grew up in Colombo and come from privileged backgrounds,” was unexpected.

“It sounded very Sinhalese to them; they thought I was bending over backwards for the Sinhalese,” says Nadesan. “I explained to them that Samadhana is actually a Sanskrit word.”

It’s this type of mistrust that Nadesan hopes to address through the inaugural Samadhana Benefit Reading Series that kicks off in Toronto on Thursday with readings from Sri Lankan-Canadian novelists...

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D - a newly designed language lacks a body of artistic fiction made in it.
It also lacks a historical link to any particular cultural group.
But sometimes that is a very good thing.

Literal Lucy for denote vs connote

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http://www.physorg.com/news/2012-03-literal-lucy-distinguish-contextual.html

Literal Lucy to the rescue: A new way to distinguish between literal meaning and contextual meaning
Washington, DC – A new linguistic study of how individuals interpret various types of utterances sheds more light on how literal and contextual meaning are distinguished. The study, "A novel empirical paradigm for distinguishing between What is Said and What is Implicated," to be published in the March 2012 issue of the scholarly journal Language, is authored by Ryan Doran, Gregory Ward, Meredith Larson, Yaron McNabb, and Rachel E. Baker, a team of linguists based at Northwestern University. A preprint version is available online at: http://lsadc.org/info/documents/2012/press-releases/doran-et-al.pdf

Within linguistics and philosophy, two types of utterance meaning have traditionally been distinguished: semantic meaning, based on the literal meaning of the words themselves, and pragmatic meaning, based on how the sentence is used in a particular context. Over the past decade, there has been an explosion of empirical work exploring the line between these two types of meaning. However, few researchers have explored whether and under what conditions speakers can reliably isolate semantic meaning from pragmatic meaning. The new study by the Northwestern researchers does just this.

Using a novel paradigm in which participants assume the point of view of a literal-minded third person, Literal Lucy, the researchers tested whether speakers were able to tease apart semantic meaning from pragmatic meaning. Participants read through short vignettes and determined whether sentences containing certain key phrases (e.g., gradable adjectives, cardinals, quantifiers) were literally still true even in contexts that favored a more natural, pragmatic interpretation.

Their study found that speakers were in fact able to tease apart pragmatic elements of meaning from semantic ones but that the ability to do so is sensitive both to the particular type of phrase used in the sentence as well as the point of view a speaker adopts (e.g., his or her own, or that of a third party). By adopting a third-party perspective and relying upon their folk notion of interpreting literally, speakers were able to distinguish between semantic and pragmatic meaning more reliably.

These findings have implications both for future research into the theoretical distinction between semantics and pragmatics and for the empirical investigation of this distinction. The fact that participants' ability to distinguish semantic from pragmatic meaning was sensitive to the different types of phrases used in the experiment is not predicted by the theoretical literature classifying types of pragmatic meanings. This finding raises questions concerning the psychological validity of such classifications. For the empirical investigation of semantic and pragmatic meaning, the fact that, when interpreting from the perspective of Literal Lucy, speakers more frequently drew this distinction suggests that speakers need appropriate criteria to guide their judgments about an utterance's meaning.