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Location: Arizona

Wednesday, October 05, 2005

Things in life that bother me. This is my new list. I am having trouble accepting the concept of invisible light. I mean, isn't the whole idea of light that it is visible. Light is just that - light. Without it nothing's visible. So, now at this late date I must accept the idea that radio waves and MICROWAVES ! are light, they are just invisible. Please. Who says so? I have just come to accept the concept that waves are also particle and now I have to grasp this light thing. Visible light is great as it is color and color is something I love and understand on lots of different levels. Did you know, for example, that the English language has the most words for color, some 3000 plus, more than any language. I think we can make some assumptions about English speakers from this. We like color and it is very meaningful to us. Maybe we are even more sensitive to color than say the Germans or the French. Although, the French do quite well with it. I wonder how many words for color the Eskimo have? I remember hearing that they had hundreds of words for snow. I have one word for snow. There was a tribe in Africa that had red, green, blue and brown. That's it. Miners came and taught them yellow so they could find the yellow stones that had diamonds in them.

5 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

Without the electromagnetic spectrum, and without recognising that there are other ways to transmit energy, how would we have clairvoyance and psychic powers? Seeing that which cannot be seen. ;-)

Electromagnetic waves are visible to the proper detector. The eye happens to respond to a particular band of frequencies, and better in some people than in others. The color-blind lose part of that band.

The chaos book I am reading distinguishes between Newton's concept of color versus that of Goethe. Goethe apparently had a much more relative concept of color based on perception. Red seen under blue illumination is not the same red seen in daylight.

Brain again.

12:32 PM  
Blogger Blair said...

This Blog post has a great picture that can illustatrate a bit of how light waves can be measured differently.

4:34 PM  
Blogger Anne Coe said...

You people are just too smart. Geode, I suppose you are reading the book on Chaos Theory in German too. I quit reading mine as it turned out to be way to New Age in a bad way. I would love to look at the one you are reading. Check out Blair's post site. Interesting.

6:43 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

This word list is extracted from an Eskimo to English "dictionary" and is definitely not comprehensive. This was the worst such compilation I have ever worked with; among other problems, the compilers' attempts to alphabetize things, even short indices, failed miserably (e.g. "snow" before "seasons"). Consider also this from the preface:
Be it noticed beforehand that the Eskimo are not agreed in the use of their language with reference to many words -- not only that in the South here and there other expressions are used, and also that to many a word another meaning is given than in the North, but even in one and the same place not infrequently such differences are found. And frequently the female sex has again its peculiar expressions. With regard to the latter, not much notice has been taken in composing this dictionary, because the men often only laugh about them; ...

'ice' sikko
'bare ice' tingenek
'snow (in general)' aput
'snow (like salt)' pukak
'soft deep snow' mauja
'snowdrift' tipvigut
'soft snow' massak
'watery snow' mangokpok
'snow filled with water' massalerauvok
'soft snow' akkilokipok

4:00 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

49 words for snow and ice from West Greenlandic[4]
This word list is taken from a book on West Greenlandic grammar is almost certainly not comprehensive. I've entered the list as it appears in Fortescue's "West Greenlandic". Note that in Fortescue 'q' corresponds to 'k' in Peck.
'sea-ice' siku (in plural = drift ice)
'pack-ice/large expanses of ice in motion' sikursuit, pl. (compacted drift ice/ice field = sikut iqimaniri)
'new ice' sikuliaq/sikurlaaq (solid ice cover = nutaaq.)
'thin ice' sikuaq (in plural = thin ice floes)
'rotten (melting) ice floe' sikurluk
'iceberg' iluliaq (ilulisap itsirnga = part of iceberg below waterline)
'(piece of) fresh-water ice' nilak
'lumps of ice stranded on the beach' issinnirit, pl.
'glacier' (also ice forming on objects) sirmiq (sirmirsuaq = Inland Ice)
'snow blown in (e.g. doorway)' sullarniq
'rime/hoar-frost' qaqurnak/kanirniq/kaniq
'frost (on inner surface of e.g. window)' iluq
'icy mist' pujurak/pujuq kanirnartuq
'hail' nataqqurnat
'snow (on ground)' aput (aput sisurtuq = avalanche)
'slush (on ground)' aput masannartuq
'snow in air/falling' qaniit (qanik = snowflake)
'air thick with snow' nittaalaq (nittaallat, pl. = snowflakes; nittaalaq nalliuttiqattaartuq = flurries)
'hard grains of snow' nittaalaaqqat, pl.
'feathery clumps of falling snow' qanipalaat
'new fallen snow' apirlaat
'snow crust' pukak
'snowy weather' qannirsuq/nittaatsuq
'snowstorm' pirsuq/pirsirsursuaq
'large ice floe' iluitsuq
'snowdrift' apusiniq
'ice floe' puttaaq
'hummocked ice/pressure ridges in pack ice' maniillat/ingunirit, pl.
'drifting lump of ice' kassuq (dirty lump of glacier-calved ice = anarluk)
'ice-foot (left adhering to shore)' qaannuq
'icicle' kusugaq
'opening in sea ice imarnirsaq/ammaniq (open water amidst ice = imaviaq)
'lead (navigable fissure) in sea ice' quppaq
'rotten snow/slush on sea' qinuq
'wet snow falling' imalik
'rotten ice with streams forming' aakkarniq
'snow patch (on mountain, etc.)' aputitaq
'wet snow on top of ice' putsinniq/puvvinniq
'smooth stretch of ice' manirak (stretch of snow-free ice = quasaliaq)
'lump of old ice frozen into new ice' tuaq
'new ice formed in crack in old ice' nutarniq
'bits of floating' naggutit, pl.
'hard snow' mangiggal/mangikaajaaq
'small ice floe (not large enough to stand on)' masaaraq
'ice swelling over partially frozen river, etc. from water seeping up to the surface' siirsinniq
'piled-up ice-floes frozen together' tiggunnirit
'mountain peak sticking up through inland ice' nunataq
'calved ice (from end of glacier)' uukkarnit
'edge of the (sea) ice' sinaaq

4:00 PM  

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