Course credit for crud
IN THIS post-truth world, the power of facts is much diminished. Whether it is the conspiracy theories of US president Trump, fake news, mendacious political campaigns in the UK or the filter bubbles we find ourselves trapped inside, it seems factual information is in retreat from public discourse.
It is with much relief, therefore, that we find educators riding to the rescue. The University of Washington in Seattle is now offering students course credits for a new class titled Calling Bullshit in the Age of Big Data.
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Evolutionary biologist Carl Bergstrom and data scientist Jevin West describe their syllabus by way of a succinct mission statement: 鈥淥ur world is saturated with bullshit. Learn to detect and defuse it.鈥�
A non-partisan effort, the pair explain that the course is neither a veiled critique of certain individuals nor a satirical offering. 鈥淎dequate bullshit detection strikes us as essential to the survival of liberal democracy,鈥� they write on the course homepage.
If you鈥檙e a long way from being a Seattle student (either in kilometres or years), don鈥檛 despair. The syllabus and most materials are online and available to anyone who wishes to enrol (). To refresh a Henry Adams maxim: They know enough who know how to learn about bullshit. We only hope someone sets up a scholarship system for the rest.
鈥淩ichard Williams sends in a photo of a filling station pump in Donegal, Ireland, offering 鈥渄igital air鈥�. He wonders, does it work for analogue tyres?鈥�
Just our type
JUST when we think we鈥檝e seen them all, a new retronym bowls us over. Glenn Pure writes to say: 鈥淚 note a number of examples have been published recently, but I鈥檓 surprised you haven鈥檛 yet included 鈥檈m dash鈥� and 鈥榚n dash鈥�.鈥�
These typographical terms, he says, are so named because they 鈥渁pproximate to the width of a capital M and capital N respectively. It seems likely that鈥檚 how these words were originally coined.鈥�
When not demarcating written clauses or delighting 快猫短视频 readers, Glenn says that as words in their own right, 鈥渆n鈥� and 鈥渆m鈥� are also very handy in tight games of Scrabble.
A is for鈥�
MEANWHILE, Simon Cains writes in to say that the early phonetic alphabet introduced by the RAF gave rise to its own retronyms. 鈥淎 = ack, so anti-aircraft guns became AA, and then became ack-ack,鈥� he says, 鈥渁 term which lasted much longer than that alphabet.鈥� And the international Christian social service movement Toc-H takes its name from the abbreviation for Talbot House, a first world war respite centre.
The second world war phonetic alphabet also gave us retronyms, says Simon, such as Willie Pete, the deceptively friendly call sign for white phosphorous chemical munitions. And Whiskey Tango Foxtrot, as someone on the receiving end might exclaim.
X marks the other spot
PREVIOUSLY John Culver shared his mobile phone bill calculated to a highly precise 16 decimal places (13 May). 鈥淭his reminds me of a perfect illustration of the difference between precision and accuracy that happened to me a few years ago,鈥� says Ian Gordon.
Having booked a short break to a cottage in north Wales, the booking company sent GPS coordinates for the property. 鈥淭he figures given had sufficient decimal places to identify our destination to within one-thousandth of the thickness of a human hair,鈥� says Ian.
鈥淚magine our amusement when we arrived at the designated coordinates, only to discover that we were in the wrong place by about five miles.鈥�
Ada memoire
DESPERATELY seeking a Susan, or any other woman who has been immortalised as an eponym, Nina Baker asked Feedback readers for help (10 June).
鈥淚 suggest the Ada programming language,鈥� says Barry Cash, 鈥渘amed after Ada Lovelace, credited with being the first computer programmer.鈥�
Shine on
AND a bright spark appears above Graham Legg鈥檚 head. 鈥淭he most obvious example of such an eponym is Tabby鈥檚 star, after Tabetha Boyajian,鈥� he says (14 January, p 10). 鈥淒oes that count, or do we need to wait until a unit of stellar variability 鈥榯he tabby鈥� is derived?鈥�
Brew鈥檚 that woman?
HAVING let the idea percolate in his mind for a bit, Mats Andersson also writes in with a suggestion. 鈥淚 have a female eponym which might not properly be called 鈥榚ngineering鈥�,鈥� he says, 鈥渂ut it鈥檚 nevertheless one that is indispensable in contemporary engineering: the Melitta coffee filter, named for its inventor, Melitta Bentz of Germany.鈥�
Clipped speech
FURTHER to earlier letters about the true origin of the shorthand term Nazi, Bob Ladd writes that the phenomenon of reducing long words into bite-sized pieces (like burger or mic) is known among etymologists as clipping.
鈥淲hat鈥檚 unusual about the German version of clipping is that it starts with a long compound word, clips both main parts of the compound, and then sticks the clipped parts back together,鈥� says Bob.
Something rather similar happens in both Chinese and Japanese, he says, 鈥渂ut their character-based writing system makes this a very natural strategy. I don鈥檛 know how the German convention got started.鈥�
Nonetheless, for the sake of German typesetters and scribes, we鈥檙e glad it did. Perhaps the key to emulating German efficiency is to start by truncating all your 惭补尘尘耻迟飞枚谤迟别谤.