Evolution of language

[ericmark]

They don't even do that. They reserve it for GU5.3 bases which can be other voltages. 24V is common.
But how did this incorrect usage come about?

I have found with 50 mm spot lights it is a real problem, in the caravan the spot lights are rated 10 - 30 volt DC, in my bathroom rated at 12 volt 50 Hz, and not even sure it is a GU5.3 base, I think the U means bayonet fitting, so it is a G5.3 not a GU5.3 although seen it written many times as GU5.3.

 

[ericmark]

That's probably the one which worries me most, particularly when I see people (here and elsewhere being told that "230V is low voltage".

For those in the electrical industry to have their own 'correct' terminology, which they use amongst themselves, is fair enough.

However, as far as the general public are concerned, it fortunately has (to my knowledge) not happened (yet), but if there ever comes a day when any consumer items which operate at ~230V are labelled "Low Voltage", I think it will probably only be a matter of time before tragedies arise as a result.

Kind Regards, John

But what happens if I put a bulb marked as low voltage into a 110 volt supply when it is designed for 12 volt, this advert says

Please check the suitability of your transformer before selecting your LED MR16 light bulb.

but no where on the advert does is state 12 volt, in the Q&A section you get.

I am changing the bulbs in. My campervan to led, and the lights use a 12v supply when not on a site. Will these do the job?

Hello
These light are designed to be supplied by a constant voltage led driver 12VDC Please do not use it with electronic transfomer but 12VDC Power Supply ,so we do not think they will be suitable

Thanks using Q&A

They are correct not suitable, as camper van really 13.8 volt not 12 volt DC, but in the main the lamps are marked 50 Hz, so should not be used with a 12 VDC power supply, but likely will work, and likely will also work with a kHz electronic transformer as long as rated zero to max output and not a minimum output over size of bulb. Should be a toroidal transformer but Screwfix don't sell them.

 

[JohnW2]

But what happens if I put a bulb marked as low voltage into a 110 volt supply when it is designed for 12 volt...

As I said, my hope is that you will never find a consumer product marked/labelled "Low voltage", since if it were 'electrically correct' it would be misunderstood by the vast majority of the general public, or vice versa.

In any event, as has often been said, there is really no place (or need) for products to be labelled/marked 'LV' or 'ELV' since that is never enough - the actual working voltage has to be specified.

Kind Regards, John

 

[EFLImpudence]

Although you say "happening now", you are only able to quote those examples because the 'initial misuse' has already occurred, in the past. It therefore seems that what you would like to do is to limit the proliferation of those 'evolutions', since it's clearly too late for your to prevent the start of that evolutionary process.

Well, you say nothing can be done because it has already started but you also say people should not be corrected.

Those things, and the one's you mention above, irritate me as much as they do you, but I think they're probably rather different from the 'evolution of language', at least in the sense I was thinking/talking about. What we have here is a mixture of sloppiness and phonetic spelling/writing, and I am not sure that the dictionaries and grammar books are ever (at least, any time soon) going to accept them as 'correct' ...

It all started with abbreviating, something that was not tolerated by my teachers (and not only the English teachers) back in the 60s. "Would have" came to be written ('sloppily' in the eyes of my teachers!) as "Would've" and, when spoken, that sounds extremely close to "Would of" - which moved some people to start writing it as such - and exactly the same for all the others you mention above.

I personally disagree with "would've" because it is not accurate and almost unpronounceable. All people do when saying "would have" is drop the aitch (also note - not haitch) so should still write "would have"

What irritates me just as much (in my offspring as well as anyone else), but which is not an example of that, is "Can I get XYZ" when asking for something - and I'm not sure how that arose.

American. It is amazing how quickly these things catch on.
Watching TV tonight a lot of English people are saying "meet with" and "talk with".

That's an interesting one, since there is definitely quite a lot of what I write in 'professional documents' today which I would not have dreamed of writing 30 or 40 (maybe even 20) years ago. I obviously would not use any of the 'sloppy' things mentioned above - but, as I've said, I'm not convinced that they will ever, at lest in our lifetimes, become acceptable for written English.

Maybe these things will never 'evolve' and be officially accepted but, again, you say people should not be corrected.

As above, it's an attempt on your part to reduce (or 'stop'!) further proliferation, given that it has already happened, and is already with us.

Already with us, yes, but not accepted as correct yet supposedly intelligent people in positions of authority start using it - as beginning every sentence with "so".

The US has obviously has had a major impact on "UK English" over the past 50+ years. I do have a friend who is a linguistics academic, and it's her view that evolution of English has been 'more reasonable' than that in a number of other languages, although I have no way of knowing how true that is.
I wasn't aware of that. The only country I'm aware of which has had an organisation/body highly 'protective' of its language is France. In the UK, we seem to have traditionally relied primarily on the OED to be the arbiter (and 'definer') of what is 'right and wrong' about English, and use of English.

I think the OED is part of the problem as I mentioned before.

Another gripe is what I call the BBC compulsory unnecessary preposition after the verb - closed down, shut down, blocked off, opened up, and the dreadful 'opened back up' instead of reopened.

Doesn't it just mean that a lot of people who speak or write for a living - the media - are really not very good at it?
That is young and middle-aged people who have not been taught properly.

 

[JohnW2]

Well, you say nothing can be done because it has already started ...

It was you, not I, who started that line of discussion when you wrote ...

Obviously one cannot alter what has already happened ....

... which surely was an acknowledgement that the particular bit of 'evolution' had already happened - so that the most you could hope to do would be to restrict the spread of the evolution that had already occurred.

I personally disagree with "would've" because it is not accurate and almost unpronounceable.

I'm not sure what you mean by 'not accurate', but whether you agree or disagree with it,, it (and all the other abbreviated forms like it) are widely used, both in speaking and writing - and, as I said, whilst I would not personally call it "almost unpronouncable", the point is that when one does pronounce it, it sounds almost the same as "would of" - which I assume is why some people started writing it as that.

American. It is amazing how quickly these things catch on.

Yes, I realise that it came from America (just as did many of the changes in UK English) - but I still don't know 'how it ["get"] arose'.

Maybe these things will never 'evolve' and be officially accepted but, again, you say people should not be corrected.

Anyone is free to correct people who are using 'sloppy English' if they so wish - and I certainly wouldn't condone it. I suppose it's safe enough from a keyboard, but I'm sufficient of a coward that I would be cautious about who I subjected to such 'correction of sloppy English' on a face-to-face basis

However, as I said before, this 'sloppiness' represents something different from the general 'evolution of language' which I was primarily thinking and talking about.

Another gripe is what I call the BBC compulsory unnecessary preposition after the verb - closed down, shut down, blocked off, opened up, and the dreadful 'opened back up' instead of reopened.

Professional chefs seem experts at that, since everything is ".... off" these days - "fry off", "bake off", "roast off" etc. However, professions and trades have always developed their own 'jargon' (in some cases almost a 'private language'), and I'm not sure whether that also comes into your category of 'misuse of language'.

Doesn't it just mean that a lot of people who speak or write for a living - the media - are really not very good at it?

Well, clearly not good at speaking or writing in the way that you feel they should speak and write. They clearly are very 'influential' in relation to how the general public speak and write, but I don't think you can blame them for a lot of the specifics you've mentioned.

Kind Regards, John

 

[bernardgreen]

It’s easy to hear “Newspeak,” the “official language of Oceania,” as “news speak.” This is perfectly reasonable, but it gives us the impression that it relates strictly to its appearance in mass media. Orwell obviously intended the ambiguity---it is the language of official propaganda after all---but the portmanteau actually comes from the words “new speak”—and it has been created to supersede “Oldspeak,” Orwell writes, “or Standard English, as we should call it.”

In other words, Newspeak isn’t just a set of buzzwords, but the deliberate replacement of one set of words in the language for another. The transition is still in progress in the fictional 1984, but is expected to be completed “by about the year 2050.” Students of history and linguistics will recognize that this is a ludicrously accelerated pace for the complete replacement of one vocabulary and syntax by another. (We might call Orwell’s English Socialists “accelerationsts.”) Newspeak appears not through history or social change but through the will of the Party.

Students can read more Here

 

[ericmark]

As to shortened words or phrases to say fused connection unit (FCU) and then latter say FCU that's OK, and OK has been around for that long it is now a word, and official aids to communication where each language has them actually means a French man can talk to an English man with neither knowing each others language, QLS must be the best example at start is means everything received and understood and at end is everything received and understood, really designed for use with Morse code as it really speeds things up, but the Q code is often used with speech, and the common codes are well understood around the world.

But the private codes and phrases are is seems miss understood and there is no ready available list on what they mean, for example LOL

exclamation
exclamation: lol

1. used to draw attention to a joke or amusing statement, or to express amusement.
   "I love how you said ‘coffee is not my cup of tea’. LOL!"

verb
verb: lol; past tense: loled; 3rd person present: lols; gerund or present participle: loling; past participle: loled; past tense: lol'd; 3rd person present: lol's; gerund or present participle: lol'ing; past participle: lol'd
laugh audibly or be amused.
"I literally LOL'd when the updates popped up"

No where does it say it means "laugh out loud" maybe it does not mean that? It is not restricted to tradesmen, and to be frank to say recreation craft directive (RCD) or residual current device (RCD) at first time of coming up in writing I tend to miss, as unless on a narrow boat forum most understand which one I am talking about. If you see CD on the back of a car you don't think it means compact disc, and on a plastic case you don't think it means core diplomat.

But I have written all this in text, I have not texted it.
“The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ,
Moves on: nor all thy Piety nor Wit
Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line,
Nor all thy Tears wash out a Word of it.”
Do you really think Omar Khayyam wrote in English? and when have you used the word "writ" I would have said written. We use to have lime light, and arc light now we have AFDD so we know where it's all coming from.

 

[bernardgreen]

Crossing into the plumbing trade,

PRV or PRV Pressure Regulating Valve or Pressure Relief Valve

 

[SUNRAY]

Crossing into the plumbing trade,

PRV or PRV Pressure Regulating Valve or Pressure Relief Valve

We got stuck on that one on a controls job, on a page of a drawing which had been emailed to us there was PrV, PRV, PRv & pRV [I think those are correct but from way back]. A 'pressure relief vent' was associated with both of your listed which were attatched to a 'primary recycling vessel'.

Different companies used different abreviations for the same thing and some seemed very obscure, PV, HV and CV seemed to crop up in different places but they have dropped too deeply into the grey matter.

 

[ericmark]

Crossing into the plumbing trade,

PRV or PRV Pressure Regulating Valve or Pressure Relief Valve

Can it still be called the plumbing trade, organ builders still use lead, but a plumber is a worker of lead, one of there jobs was to repair the roof where lead is used.

They are clearly not pipe fitters, I have worked with pipe fitters very skilled work grinding a 36 inch heavy wall pipe so once lifted into position by the crane it fits first time.

Not all work with gas, so gas fitter does not fit the bill.

As to engineer I consider over level 3 training to become an engineer and most tradesmen are just at level 3 (over level 3 is higher education i.e. University in the main).

I find names for tradesmen is hard, even in the electrical trade, industrial, commercial, shop-fitting, domestic, and petrol-chemical are very different branches of the same trade. When I was young we would move across the branches, but the scheme providers stopped that to a great extent.

I was reading on one of the forums on how some one had oil fired central heating which could not heat just domestic hot water, the installer of Nest told them it could not be done. Maybe some thing missed in the telling, but my Nest does DHW in summer without central heating with a thermo syphon system oil fired, so one wonders what the guy who tried to fit that Nest a real tradesman?

My dexterity is reduced after an accident, so I have needed to use tradesman for jobs I would normally have done my self, they seem nice guys, but do seem to lack skill in some areas, maybe I found some 16 week wonder boys. But when the heating guy said how he used a motorised valve as a relay one wonders if really trained in the trade. Plumber would not expect electrical knowledge, so called heating engineer I would, I would have said that was part of his trade.

Being frank when I looked at my daughters Y Plan central heating it took some time to get my head around it, and central heating is likely the most complex system built in to the home, not including stand alone items like the TV set, but items which no option but the tradesman does the work on site, central heating is likely the most complex.

 

[bernardgreen]

My experience is that a lot of "engineers" can install a standard system and can connect up the various items.

Most of this skill in installation is due to their training. The system falls down when these installers are required to diagnose mis-operation and/or failures in the system and fault finding was not part of the training scheme's curriculum.

Naming a tradesman if difficult, especially those who are competent in several different types of work.

 

[SUNRAY]

As to shortened words or phrases to say fused connection unit (FCU) and then latter say FCU that's OK, and OK has been around for that long it is now a word, and official aids to communication where each language has them actually means a French man can talk to an English man with neither knowing each others language, QLS must be the best example at start is means everything received and understood and at end is everything received and understood, really designed for use with Morse code as it really speeds things up, but the Q code is often used with speech, and the common codes are well understood around the world.

But the private codes and phrases are is seems miss understood and there is no ready available list on what they mean, for example LOL No where does it say it means "laugh out loud" maybe it does not mean that? It is not restricted to tradesmen, and to be frank to say recreation craft directive (RCD) or residual current device (RCD) at first time of coming up in writing I tend to miss, as unless on a narrow boat forum most understand which one I am talking about. If you see CD on the back of a car you don't think it means compact disc, and on a plastic case you don't think it means core diplomat.

But I have written all this in text, I have not texted it.
“The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ,
Moves on: nor all thy Piety nor Wit
Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line,
Nor all thy Tears wash out a Word of it.”
Do you really think Omar Khayyam wrote in English? and when have you used the word "writ" I would have said written. We use to have lime light, and arc light now we have AFDD so we know where it's all coming from.

I alway knew it as 'Lots Of Love' and struggled for a long time making it fit into messages.

 

[ericmark]

I alway knew it as 'Lots Of Love' and struggled for a long time making it fit into messages.

Oh so LOL is a modern 88 from old Q code?

 

[StephenOak]

but the OED could protect the language more vehemently and list things as a 'common misuse' rather than just change the definition

In the UK, we seem to have traditionally relied primarily on the OED to be the arbiter (and 'definer') of what is 'right and wrong' about English, and use of English

Those who work on the OED, going back (AFAIUI) to the first, would disagree with both of you. Professional lexicographers working in English regard what they do as descriptive rather than prescriptive.

The Académie Française tries to control how French is used but I don't think is anywhere nearly 100% successful.

Doesn't it just mean that a lot of people who speak or write for a living - the media - are really not very good at it? That is young and middle-aged people who have not been taught properly.

This is, IMO, part of the problem. There has been a vogue for a long time not to "stifle individual's expression / dialect / etc" that has led to more formal English not being taught properly or, in some cases it seems, at all.

People should, again IMO, be taught formal English but not be told that this is proper English. What is used depends on the context. In casual speech most of say things that sound like "could of", etc, and I see nothing wrong with that. I would never write that and, except when quoting speech, I can see no reason for anyone writing that. In casual written English I see nothing wrong with "could've", but I would always use "could have" in a more formal context, e.g. a document at work.

Poor teaching of English leave people not knowing how to write more formally, nor when they should do so. Hence there are frequent stories of school leavers with good GCSE English submitting CVs, etc, with poor (or worse) spelling, grammar etc.

Part of teaching when to use what sort of English is understanding the relationship between speaker/writer and listener/reader and what has to be done to achieve effective communication.

• In a conversation we all can be quite casual about we speak as the other parties can interrupt and ask what something means.
• On a forum like this (where replies are often quite quick) a certain degree of informality is acceptable. Precision is of course needed where it is relevant. So when talking about a protective device that tripped, making it clear if it was a fuse, MCB or RCD may be significant so it is important to say which, but if nothing tripped than I see nothing wrong with an ordinary DIYer replying "none of the fuses blew".
  
• When writing, say, a document at work where the recipient has no way of asking questions, very clear writing is needed.

I also suspect that poor teaching of English leaves people not realising that they should continue learning. We have seen here people using the wrong term when it is relevant, being politely corrected whilst the question is answered, and the OP continuing to use the wrong term and even insisting that it is okay as people more or less understand what they mean.

But the private codes and phrases are is seems miss understood and there is no ready available list on what they mean, for example LOL

In the early 1990s, a colleague (Katherine) of my wife's did a job swap with someone in a US firm in the same business area. Back then email at home was very far from common but all three of us had it at work. From time to time Katherine would send my wife funny things she had seen by email and always signed off with 'lol K', meaning 'Lots of love Katherine', so much so that if we mentions her it as 'lol K'.

At the same time Usenet was quite a significant part of the Internet, and it was on Usenet that LOL meaning Laughing Out Loud originated.

 

[SUNRAY]

Oh so LOL is a modern 88 from old Q code?

I have always considered 88 to be the femanine version of 73.