#something something americans will measure with anything but the metric system

[rabiesofficial]

WAIT HOW TAL ARE YOU

At least 5 and 3/4ths of a subway foot longs if you account for the one inch of shrinkage per sandwich

[physalian]

On Using Measurements and Metrics in Fantasy

This is what *I* do and what I find more immersive, easier to write, less world-bending, and more productive: I don’t use actual metric or imperial measurement systems. Why?

Personally I don’t like seeing a world completely different than our own referencing an Earth-bound measurement system (but when I must, I use metric even though I’m American).

Some people don’t have a useful frame of reference for how big something actually is if you just throw big numbers at them. Or even big units. Yeah I know a ‘football’ field is big, but that’s a very foggy and useless ‘big’ if I don't actually watch the sport and see it on a daily basis.

Specific numbers end up seeming more important than they are, whether you’re giving weights, lengths, times, etc, because you got specific. 24 hours won’t raise any brows but 22 hours will. And you just open yourself up to plot holes getting needlessly specific. You’re inviting your readers to do the math and if *you* didn’t do the math, they will find out about it.

This is for fantasy, not any other genre, although I’d still rely on vague numbers anyway unless I’m writing something super sciency where the math is important. Anything from sports to rocket science.

So what I do instead:

Give you measurements you can reference yourself. If I have a tiny fantasy macguffin, it’s about a pinkie finger wide, not 2cm. If I have a sci-fi ship, it’s about two houses/stories tall, not 20ft. It’s a puncture wound the size of a fist, not 4in. It’s a bed small enough for the character to sprawl and still hang off. It’s shoes that can fit in the palm of their hands.

Why I think this works better:

I really suck at converting numbers to actual measurements. Tell me to measure 4 inches between my hands and I’ll give you a gap +/- 2. But the size of a fist? Well I’ve got two right here, now I know what you’re talking about. Hands aren’t all the same size, but for me reading, that’s all I need to know. Do not make me bust out a tape measure or google to properly appreciate the scale of a thing in your book.

Outside of letting my characters give rough time estimates (e.g. a journey taking maybe 2 weeks) because they don’t know themselves, specific numbers aren’t very useful.

If you pick the right size comparison (picking the right allegory), it’ll read more immersive and less sterile. A character just got shot. Is the wound 1 cm, the size of a pencil, or the size of the fingers trying to dig the bullet out? A character is trapped in a criminally small cell. Is it 5 feet wide, or is it so small, they can’t even stretch out fully? A character has to make an incredible shot with a gun or a bow. Is their target 100ft away, or is it an ant on the horizon, is the target’s head the size of a marble? A character is about to fall, is the drop 800ft, or is it so far, they can’t even see the bottom? So far there’s clouds at the bottom? So far the river below is thin as a hair? The biggest lake in the region might be 4 miles across, but more importantly, standing on the bank feels like standing at the coast, cause that there’s an ocean. A tower might be 60ft tall, but more importantly, it gives you vertigo and seems to sway in the wind and it’s taller than every other structure around.

I think this also works with character descriptions. My character has no idea how long he’s been held captive, but his hair has grown out over his eyes to cue you in on the passage of time. Or my character isn’t 4’11, but her head doesn’t reach her boyfriend’s chest. Or, my character has some truly massive muscles, biceps like this other dude’s head. My character has an ugly scar from a nasty knife fight. It’s not eight inches across, but the person touching it can’t even cover it with their whole hand. This character has lost a lot of blood, not 1 liter, but enough that their clothes are dripping with it and the carpet can’t soak it all up.

Generally, the actual number isn’t the most important detail your audience wants to take away from the page, it’s what that metric now means for the scene. A 4ft cell means nothing to me, but a cell so small, my character might go crazy from claustrophobia is important.

And, also, maybe your characters also suck at gauging metrics. I have a character who’s good with horses who’ll give you their heights in hands, but another who’ll just say that one’s so tall, he can’t see over her shoulders.

When the characters need to know the numbers, give the numbers. If you have two people building something, letting them toss weights and lengths back and forth makes sense. But when it’s only the audience that needs to know the numbers, consider coming up with some other way to convey them.

[rainedragon]

Shopping online can be a struggle. I know I personally am particularly bad at figuring out how big something is or isn’t from the photos and/or measurements, and so many lolita items have to be bought online because in person sales are so rare. This past weekend I attended Fanime in California and had the luxury of being able to see a bunch of things in person to see their actual size. Now, I’m American, and we all know that Americans will use anything else except the metric system to measure things. Which brings me to this month’s Bibliotheca theme: Banana (for scale).

Keep Reading....

[fuck-customers]

We only do measurements in real units of measurements!! Don't fucking come to a store looking to make something for your specific piece of furniture and not have measurements in inches, feet, yards, meters, I don't fucking care, just have measurements in some real unit!!

I'm trying to go on break and I literally have my hand on the breakroom door and this inconsiderate bitch decides NOW is the time to ask me a stupid question. She wants to know how much fabric she'll need for her 10 person table.

"How big is it in feet or yards?"

"It sits 10 people"

"Ok, that's great, but how big around is it in feet, yards, meters, inches...?"

"It can seat 10 people"

"Yeah I got that. If you don't have the actual measurements in a real unit of measurement, you need to measure your table and come back with the numbers."

Stupid Americans will really fucking measure in anything but the metric system.

[judesstfrancis]

u know the rest of the world got us on one thing americans really will measure distances in anything other than the metric system. I cannot conceptualize how long 6 ft is but my brother is 6 foot 4 and I CAN conceptualize how he fits in space. so whenever I see something is about 6ft I visualize my brother in that area to figure out how much space that thing would take up. and u know what I'm never wrong. so ig take that metric users

[tildeathiwillwrite]

Tag Game: OC Interview

Thanks to @thewritingautisticat for the tag!

Spinning the Wheel... result is Henrik Bronze! (from The Legend of Orian Goldeneye) Answers are in black font, my own thoughts and comments in blue!

Gently tagging @faytelumos @fourwingedwriter @paradise0parrot @gummybugg @scaewolf and open tag! :D

Were you named after anyone?

Henrik was my mother's father's name. It's not common to this side of Atai, but it's fairly common where her family's from.

Atai is the name of the continent on which the story takes place. Saint's Shoal is on the west side. Henrik's family is from the east side.

When was the last time you cried?

Had a pretty bad sprain as a cadet. Still bothers me sometimes, and on the worst nights it'll bring tears to my eyes. Don't tell Asta, though, she worries too much.

Do you have any kids?

I do not. There was once a time where I thought I wanted kids... but that was many years ago.

Backstory stuff.

Do you use sarcasm a lot?

No, I always say what I mean.

In other words, he's pretty blunt.

What is the first thing you notice about people?

How they carry themselves.

Please elaborate.

...if someone has weapons training, whether it be swords, knives, hand-to-hand, they tend to have a certain air about them, an awareness of their body and their surroundings.

Threat assessment, if you will.

What is your eye colour?

Dark brown.

Doing these interviews has made me realize the sheer number of ocs I have who possess dark brown eyes. I don't even have brown eyes.

Scary movies or happy endings?

...what's a movie?

It's basically a play. But more technologically advanced.

I see... I think I prefer happy endings. But I don't mind a little suspense every now and then, even though sometimes it can remind me a bit too much of my day job.

Any special talents?

It's very difficult for others to lie to me and get away with it. I don't know, I just have a talent for spotting a person's tell. I'm also good with sword fighting, if that counts.

He also has a talent for being extremely harsh.

...that was uncalled for.

But it's true, is it not?

*sigh*

Where were you born?

A nowhere town north of Saint's Shoal. If I didn't leave to become a soldier and later a garrison head, I would probably still be there.

Would that be such a bad thing, though?

Not necessarily...

Do you have any pets?

I do not.

Would you like pets?

Not particularly... something low-maintenance, if at all, but I don't have time for that kind of thing at the moment.

Yeah, probably for the best.

What sort of sports do you play?

I used to participate in the annual games, particularly footracing and nonlethal swordplay, when I was younger. Now I have to help judge the games, but I don't mind.

How tall are you?

About one hundred and eighty-two centimeters, give or take.

Six feet for us Americans. Somnia's measuring system most accurately translates to the metric system.

What was your favorite subject in school?

It's been a long time since I was in school... I always liked the hour we had outside, free to run around and vent all the boredom I remember feeling from the class before. I don't recall what class it was, though.

It was history. Big shocker, I know.

What is your dream job?

I never wanted anything more than to be part of the garrison, and my younger self would be ecstatic if he ever found out I became garrison head. It's a lot of work, time and energy, but I think it's worth it.

Blank questions:

Were you named after anyone?

When was the last time you cried?

Do you have any kids?

Do you use sarcasm a lot?

What is the first thing you notice about people?

What is your eye colour?

Scary movies or happy endings?

Any special talents?

Where were you born?

Do you have any pets?

What sort of sports do you play?

How tall are you?

What was your favourite subject in school?

What is your dream job?

[thatone-churro]

okay. as an american, the “americans will use anything but the metric system to measure” jokes are very funny (as someone partially going into a science field our refusal of the metric system irritates me), but like. i don’t like how nontraditional measurements made relative to the size of other objects (six apples tall, weight of two hamburgers, etc.) is kinda seen as a joke. i can’t gauge length/size/weight in ways i can visualize/understand by just numbers and units, so personally, those relative descriptions are better to actually comprehend the scale of something. i realize this is probably just a personal thing but. idk. i wish it wasn’t perceived as a joke as frequently as it is.

[graduallywatermellon]

Okay this is a really minor thing but it always bugs me so much when I see the "Americans will use anything but the metric system" meme

The thing is, I don't know about you but I don't have a good grasp for how big things are in measurement, metric *or* otherwise. Saying something is 34 feet long is meaningless. I can understand that that's a lot of feet, but I can't actually picture how big that is. It's some vague, abstract thing to me, kind of like how if a number gets big enough your brain literally fails to grasp how big it really is. 34 feet is just some vague big measurement to me.

Now, if someone said "The thing was 34 feet, that's around the size of an average school bus," I can picture it. I've seen a school bus. I've interacted enough with them to have a solid grasp of them in my mind. It's no longer an abstract big measurement. It's school bus sized.

There was a video going around I want to say a week ago that used a green screen to show how tall flood water is when rising around a person, and I think it gets the same idea across. '3 Feet of water' is kinda a meaningless idea, unless you can see it coming up to the thighs of someone, and then you can understand the actual scale of it.

Maybe it's just because I'm so burnt out on American bad jokes (Not to say it's not bad, it's that the jokes make fun of us being trapped in a system we have no control over. You're laughing at the people instead of being horrified at the failure of our government) that even something silly like the measurement posts makes me kinda :/ at this point, but god. Can we please stop making fun of something that, even if silly, does serve a purpose and is helpful? Please?

TLDR: Using non-traditional units of measurement (Like a lawn flamingo) can be incredibly helpful when trying to visualize a measurement and I really wish we would stop acting like it's stupid. Silly, sure, but that's not a bad thing.

[https-chaos]

"Americans will use anything but the metric system" listen. Do you just *know* how fast 50 km per hour is by heart? No. But you DO know the way wind will feel if it's knocking your garbage cans down.

Everyone knows how big a football field is, and has at least seen a person standing on one, but not everyone can just *feel* 100 yards (basically 100 meters give or take).

500 kilograms of something is abstract as hell but a grand piano or a horse makes sense in your brain.

Like I get the criticism, trust me. I'm also sick of using the imperial system. But for the purpose of practical, everyday measurements of abstract stuff like wind speed, what's so wrong with using the "garbage can lid open/knocked over/down the street/gone" scale? What's wrong with a boulder the weight of a horse? Why do you hate using football fields as a visualization tool?

[corvidcall]

tbh it drives me crazy when people will be like "americans will literally use anything but the metric system" but the thing someone is trying to measure isnt even one you would use metric for. i keep seeing people commenting it in posts about money???? theres no metric measurement for money. saying something is. idk the cost of 4 costco hotdogs. is not me refusing to use the more sensible metric measurements. are you saying i should instead be using euros?? dollars are already base 10, you goons. am i trying to measure the mass of the dollar??? for what purpose??????

[catscraftsandcommentary]

I have seen this! Admittedly, possibly on a FB group called (something like) "Americans will use anything but the metric system to measure things," which is...fair.

*side-eyes the "banana for scale" meme*

I think it's old enough that at one time, people were going "but Chik-Fil-A funds LGBTQ hate groups, you shouldn't buy from them or use their sauces!"

(My parents like CFA, and while I'm not THRILLED and still avoid their food, the company at least seem to have realized that homophobia LOSES them more business than it makes them, and so maybe they should cut that shit out.)

But yes, that is a very cute little calico! *sends her kisses*

[agentthree3]

I just had a thought that made me both confused and feel really big brain-

The term “metric shit-tons” or “metric boat-loads” etc. show how ridiculous the metric system is. If your system of measurement is so wonky that it’s used as a filler for an unspecified weirdly large amount of something, I think you’ve won the “confuse everyone” game. It’s also sometimes used as a stand in for a weirdly specific large of something. (At least in my experience)

Americans will use anything but the metric system, except for in hyperbole, then we will dunk on our own system bc we can.

[iminye]

Height Headcanons for the Finwean siblings (+ wives because I couldn't stop myself)

for @tolkienfamilyweek day two - siblings

Note: This is meant to entertain, don't take anything said here too serious, though I will fight for my tall boy Finarfin agenda. Also if there is any form of measurements mentioned I will do the world a favour and use the metric system, sorry Americans out there

...

General order: Finarfin → Findis → Fingolfin → Lalwen = Fëanor

first off all all of them are tall by elvish standards

In Fëanor's humble opinion Lalwen is just the least worst sibling because they're literally the same height and he doesn't feel like she mocks him when they're standing next to eachother

Reasons why he feels the others are mocking him (even though they totally don't):

a) Finarfin and Findis are like always there when something for once is out of his reach and make the mistake of - brace yourself - offering help

b) Fingolfin is just unfortunate for being the exact same height as their father (sorry buddy but Fëanor has enough problems with you looking so much like dad and now you're also as tall as him. not. fair)

Off-topic but: Lalwen has the habit of just picking any of her siblings up and carrying them around if so desired, doesn't matter that they're taller than her

all of them find is kind of funny, even Fëanor isn't pissed because honestly he does the same thing with Nerdanel and the kids, can't blame his half sister, carrying people around is fun

honestly everyone has carried everyone over their shoulder at some point but Lalwen does it the most

Fingolfin is just like two centimetres taller than Lalwen and Fëanor in terms of actual height but his hair is just so ridiculously poofy that he seems almost as tall as Finarfin (same goes for Finwë if he isn't wearing his hair in braids)

Findis is as tall as and looks a lot like Ingwë, and while the two of them find it hilarious the royal court of Valmar (and Tirion) always has to do a double take before approaching either of them

It doesn't help that their voice range is almost the same too, yes either Findis has a very deep voice or Ingwë a surprisingly high voice

Finarfin has a hard time with about every door in Tirion due to the fact that he hits his head about everywhere he goes. Finwë had the official law for the average height of doorframes changed because of this exact reason (which proofed to be not enough once Argon had reached his full height poor guy)

honestly once he got his growth spurts he found his new personal archenemies in Tirions architecture which is exactly why he moved the Alqualondë (the Teleri have a thing for overly high doorframes and ceilings)

also Finarfin was the tallest of the Noldor until the next generation reached adulthood then he suddenly ranked fifth being the same height as his own daughter

think about it once everyone leaves he regains the title

Lalwen and Findis have the least issues with their height and Fingolfin would too if that wasn't one more thing about himself that got him hate from his older brother

Fëanor probably invented high heels at some point out of pure spite and because he wanted to be taller than Finarfin but was completely incapable of wearing them

he gifted the first fully functional pair to Anairë on her wedding day so that "she would at least be able to kiss her husband without having to stand on her tip toes" (he needed a wedding present ok? Nerdanel made him get one)

Speaking of Anairë: the wives of the Finweans ranked by height: Nerdanel → Earwen → Elemmírë → Anairë

Elemmírë and Findis are married I don't make the rules

Nerdanel is tall but still not as tall as her husband (their genes combined are what gets them Maedhros, all the others turned out about their own height or a bit shorter *cough* Caranthir *cough*)

Earwen certainly inherited her uncles genes which she passes down to Galadriel but sadly her mother was beyond short and so she got a good mix in between, slightly above average height

Elemmírë is totally average in height and has a thing for tall women, good for her that Findis is, by the time they're married, the tallest woman of the Noldor

Anairë is short, like if she and Tuor would stand next to eachother he'd be slightly taller than her and that says something - she loves tall men though and with her newly acquired pair of high heels she is at least able to look her husband in the eyes

compared to a normal sized human like me they'd all be giants though. I'm talking about a more or less twenty-five centimetres difference between myself (172cm) and Anairë (ca. 197cm)

[meichenxi]

Ooh anything about linguistics and/or Chinese linguistics that interests you- what do you find most interesting?

Ooooo thank you! First let me apologise for the lack of rigour i.e. sources - I am ILL.

HMMMMM ok...let me talk a little bit about one thing I find fascinating - the idea of 'linguistic complexity'. It's an interesting topic that a) demonstrates the failures of linguistics that only takes Indo-European languages into account; b) demonstrates how a conflation of linguistic and moral judgements leads to absolute chaos; and c) proves that sometimes the purpose of all models and hypotheses is to be a useful aid in description, and not to be 100% accurate. Which means that multiple models can exist at the same time. Also, it shows just how cool Classical Chinese is.

I'm going to make this into two posts because I have been asked to wax lyrical on this stuff twice...this one will be a general overview of what linguistic complexity is and some of the issues around it, and the other post (@karolincki 's ask) will be an overview of these issues as pertaining to Modern and Classical Chinese.

Linguistic complexity: an introduction

What is linguistic complexity? Basically what it says on the tin: how 'simple' or 'complex' is one language in relation to another. If you automatically think that sounds dodgy - aren't all languages equally complex? what is a simple language? etc - just hold on. We'll get there.

A very important starting point: complexity here only refers to linguistic complexity. There are many ways to measure this, but broadly speaking it refers to the amount of stuff in a language a learner has to deal with. Are there genders? Well, that's more complex than not having any, because it's an extra thing to remember. Do you have to express whether the information you're conveying is something you personally experienced or hearsay? Again, more complex than not. Different tenses? Essentially, you can look at complexity like this: if you were describing this language or putting it into a computer program, what is the minimum length of description you would need? The longer the description, the more complex the language. In a standard understanding of complexity, a language like English is more complex than a language like Vietnamese (English has more tenses, moods, conjugations, irregularity...), and a language like Georgian is more complex than a language like English (Google a single verb table of Georgian and you will see what I mean).

(this will be long)

What complexity does not mean is anything to do with the cognitive abilities of the people who speak it. It doesn't mean that people who speak English are unable to conceive of the difference between a dual and a plural (2 apples and 3 apples), just because the language doesn't mark it. It doesn't mean people who speak Chinese are unable to conceive of the past conditional ('I should have gone...') just because they don't have a separate tense for it. It doesn't mean Italian speakers don't know whether they experienced the thing themselves, or heard about it from someone else, just because they don't have a set verb ending for it. All linguistic complexity means is what the language requires you to express.

I'm putting this out there very clearly because this sort of thinking is bound up in a lot of racist ideas and ideology. You'll have heard of the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis? Unfortunately named, since they never really worked together, and Edward Sapir was actually a relatively cool dude for the time who argued against linguistic relativity - i.e. the language you speak determines how you think. Yes, in the 19th (and much of the 20th) century, when certain linguists referred to 'simple' and 'complex' languages that is what many of them meant: speakers of a simple language are 'simple', and a complex one are 'complex'. But there was a huge backlash against these racist ideas, and that backlash was hugely influential is shaping the direction of typology (the branch of linguistics which is broadly concerned with these sorts of questions). More on that later, but for now: please understand that when I say linguistic complexity, I am not implying a single thing about the people that speak it.

Back to complexity. Of course language, like any system, is made up of moving parts: you don't just need to consider how many parts it has, but also how interdependent they are, whether they interact with each other in a predictable way, how likely they are to change. You might also want to consider how easy the system is to learn for somebody who has never used it before. And then, of course, languages are more complex still because they are not machines, but ever-changing things: do you count a rule like the conditional inversion in English, which only applies to a total of three verbs? Is that less complex because fewer verbs use it - and therefore you need to think about it less - or does that make the system more complex because you need another, meta-rule to say when you need to use it and when not? What about irregularity? Is a language like English that doesn't have many rules but has a sizeable amount of 'irregular' verbs more or less complicated than a language like Swahili which has a lot more rules, but follows them assiduously? And what happens when some people use one rule and others don't - do you count those as the same language (lumping), which may render the grand overview less accurate, or do you count them as totally separate languages (splitting), in which case when do you stop?

Hmm. Complexity. Is. Complex.

Those are a lot of factors that need to be considered here. Even saying something is 'irregular' doesn't mean very much without further quantification. For example, if I say that the 'irregular' verb ring goes to ring, rang, rung in English, you can very easily find other verbs which conjugate similarly: sing, sang, sung etc. So is that really irregular? Or is it just another, less productive rule? But then if it's a rule, why do we say fling, flung, flung and not yesterday I flang the ball? What's going on???

And what about 'total' irregularity, so called 'suppletion', where (and this is a very scientific explanation) a random non-related word just seems to appear in a paradigm, like it's got lost on the way home? Like I go, I went; like to be, I am, he is, I were; like good, better, best. Ok, so is the irregularity in I go and I went somehow....more irregular than irregularity in I sing and I sang? Uhh. Ok. And then is the irregularity in bad, worse, worst somehow more irregular than better and best, because at least for better and best you can see the -er and -st endings?? Finally, what about a 'spoken' but very predictable irregularity, such as the way we have a reduced vowel in 'says'? Where do we count that? Is that more irregular, or less irregular? Is it maybe 33% irregular?

I think you get the point. And of course all of this becomes more complex when you start to consider the interaction of lots of different systems at once. What about tone? If you have regular tone like Chinese, most people would agree that it's more complex because it's an added thing. But tone probably only developed in part as a response to losing some really important sound contrasts that other languages have kept...and also there is no possibilities of 'irregularities' in tone the way there are in something like verb conjugation...you can't just have a random sixth tone. And then what about syntax? If you have lots of very complex word ordering rules, is that more or less complex than a language where you have to rely on the human being to use pragmatics to infer what the ever loving fuck is going on?

Yeah. This is sort of just one of those things where every year a new linguist comes up with a spicy new matrix to 'measure' complexity and then everyone shits on them in journals and then comes up with their own idea which is promptly shat on. I don't know either.

Ok, so how is this relevant to Chinese?

To answer that question we need to circle round a bit to the history of typology that I vaguely alluded to earlier. At various points - depending on how racist the linguist in question was - people in the 20th century were starting to realise that all of this stuff about 'complex language = complex civilisation / complex thought' wasn't quite as water-tight as they'd hoped. Perhaps it was their better judgement, but it's also likely to have been influenced by a lot of contact suddenly with Native American languages - many of which are vastly complex by literally any metric you could possibly imagine, but the people speaking them were not colonising other countries and building amphitheatres and all of those necessarily, comfortingly European ideas of 'civilisation'. This movement away from such racist ideology, even if it was fuelled in part by a different type of racism, meant that suddenly everyone was very wary about making statements about linguistic complexity at all. It smacked of all the things they were trying not to be associated with.

I'm going to quote some Edward Sapir here for no other reason than I think it's really unfortunate that he's most famous for something that has the potential for incredibly racist ideology that he literally never said:

'Intermingled with this scientific prejudice and largely anticipating it was another, a more human one. The vast majority of linguistic theorists themselves spoke languages of a certain type, of which the most fully developed varieties were the Latin and Greek that they had learned in their childhood. It was not difficult for them to be persuaded that these familiar languages represented the “highest” development that speech had yet attained and that all other types were but steps on the way to this beloved “inflective” type. Whatever conformed to the pattern of Sanskrit and Greek and Latin and German was accepted as expressive of the “highest,” whatever departed from it was frowned upon as a shortcoming or was at best an interesting aberration. Now any classification that starts with preconceived values or that works up to sentimental satisfactions is self-condemned as unscientific. A linguist that insists on talking about the Latin type of morphology as though it were necessarily the high-water mark of linguistic development is like the zoölogist that sees in the organic world a huge conspiracy to evolve the race-horse or the Jersey cow.'

People generally began to get the hang of it after this, and stepped away from linguistic classification at all. There was a broad consensus that that sort of thing was done with, a thing of the past. It's kind of funny, because of course people's unwillingness to look at the complexity of language because 'all people are the same' shows that they still think language and culture/cognition are intimately linked! It was done out of a desire to not be racist, but you can't even reach that conclusion unless you have a sneaky secret bit of bioessentialism going on in your sneaky little brain. Because if the complexity of language doesn't reflect the complexity of your thought, why would it matter whether some systems are bigger than others? That they had more parts?

It literally wouldn't matter at all..

So what happened next? Linguists started to revisit these old linguistic classifications and ideas of complexity, but in the hope of proving, instead, that actually all languages were equal. You can definitely see the theoretical aims here: not only is a good from an ideological point of view (again, if you still equate linguistic complexity to complexity of thought), but it's also quite handy if you believe that all human babies approach language learning with the same biological apparatus ('Universal Grammar', if you believe in that, and other cognitive principles). If all babies have the same built-in gear, you sort of want the task they are given to be of roughly the same magnitude. That's one of those things linguists like to call theoretically desirable - which just means it would be neat if it did.

We're getting to Chinese. I promise.

So how you could make systems so vastly different as English and Georgian and Chinese roughly the 'same' level of complexity? One answer is irregularity: languages with huuuuuge verb and noun declensions like Georgian tend to have very little irregularity, where languages with less extensive systems like English tend to keep it around for longer. There are lots of reasons for this I won't go into, but it's a general trend. Irregular systems are more work for the brain to remember, which, predictably, is more 'complex' for a learner to acquire. Compare a language like English and German: German may have more cases and declensions and rules, but once you learn them...that's it. Compare that to English, where you'll be learning phrasal verbs and prepositions as a second language learner until the day you die (and possibly beyond). It's a different type of 'complex', but it's still deserving of the title.

That obviously doesn't work for a language like Chinese. Chinese has no conjugations, and so can't possibly have any irregularity in the same way. But fear not: there are lots and lots and lots of ways in which languages often exhibit what might be called 'complexity tradeoffs': languages with complex tone, for example, almost always have simpler sound systems elsewhere, and many languages with complex case arrangements tend to have free word order. One thing is complex, another...simplex (a word unfortunately genuinely in use).

This seems nice. We like this. It means that the different parts of the same system may be differently sized, but the whole system in total is about the same as any of other language. There’s just one problem: this isn’t how languages seem to work.

For every example of a complexity trade-off you can find, there are other languages which don’t have any such ‘trade off’ at all. There are plenty of languages where grammar is complex and the sound system is complex; or languages like Icelandic and German where there are cases but fairly rigid and fixed word order; or other cases where there is a huge amount of irregularity but also crazy verb systems, and so on. A language like Abkhaz has supposedly 58 consonants in the literary dialect: but it also has insanely complicated grammar. No trade-off there. Finally, it has long been presumed that whilst verb morphology etc is simpler in languages like Chinese, syntax would be more complicated: recently, a number of studies have proved exactly the opposite. Both, in fact, are simpler.

In conclusion, where does this leave us? Whilst the idea behind complexity trade-offs is well-motivated but not totally sound, and whilst these do not always seem to be present in the way you might hope, what this does do is force us as linguists to question whether we have spent enough time considering the types of complexity that are present in languages like Chinese, and how we reconcile that with more ‘familiar’ complexity. It’s interesting to think about because it shows what happens when you fail to consider these things.

That’s all for the overview on linguistic complexity today!! I’ll talk specifically about complexity in Chinese in the next ask, because this is already very long. Be aware, I’m not going to give you any answers necessarily - these questions are way above my pay grade - but boy can I give you some thoughts.

[hasufin]

On measurements

This afternoon (well, yesterday afternoon, technically, because I’ve been up past midnight checking my measurements) the concrete contractor called me to say their crew got done with their last job a bit earlier than expected and would tomorrow work?

I’m flexible and while that’s waaay sooner than expected, sure, let’s do it.

Now, this presents some problems. The big one is, I cannot get the shed kit I want. Construction materials are expensive and rare beasts right now. It’s almost like there’s a pandemic raging which has reduced production and transport of these materials, along with every 40-something homeowner, bored and stuck at home, all tackling the projects they’ve been putting off.

So, for one, we’re going to have to just hope I will be able to get the kit in another month or so. And run with that. The guy who will be running the crew comes out to talk with me, he seems happy with how much I’ve cleared the land (I even put up stakes and strings, but I emphasized to him that’s an estimate because I was doing it solo and didn’t use anything to make sure it was all square. Still, I’ve got the site ready. The downside is, his English is not great (and my Spanish is, of course, completely terrible). So there’s something of a language barrier there.

Anyway, the hard part is going to be the anchor bolts. The shed kit assumes you’ve got a slab poured already and provides anchor bolts which you put in by drilling into the existing concrete. Fuck that, it’s both easier and stronger to put in anchors while the concrete is wet.

So I went off to Lowe’s this evening to get the anchor bolts. The manual for the kit calls for 1/2″ (for the main uprights) and 1/4″ anchors (for the walls). But Lowe’s only has 1/2″ anchors, so I’m just doing those, and will have to use the ones that come with the kit later.

Then, I’m looking at the diagram in the install manual. And I want to murder someone. This shed is sold as a 12′x20′ shed. It uses American Standard bolts and screws. But the diagram is in metric.

Now. I can handle metric. In many circumstances I prefer metric. What I Do Not Like is changing between systems.

Even worse... okay, so the slab I’m having poured is to be 13′x21′: in theory 6″ larger than the shed on each side, which is a comfortable margin of error (they recommend at least 4″ margin). But this means I am looking at the diagram and doing algebra to figure out how far each anchor bolt has to be from the edge of the slab. Because the diagram sometimes shows how far it is from a hypothetical center line. But with most bolts it shows from the horizontal but NOT the vertical, or from the vertical but NOT the horizontal. Or it shows how far two bolts are from each other AND from the edge of the shed (i.e., not the slab, of course). I think I have it all figured out, but this could have been so much easier. And I hope to hell the guys tomorrow can handle metric, are precise with the slab size, and that the shed has a bit of wiggle room. Because otherwise... ugh.

As a tech writer, I wish to banish whoever made that diagram to a special hell. The one reserved for people who write EULAs and set fire to orphanages.

[3starjammies]

Recently anytime someone compares the size of something to something else people always reply with some variation of “Americans will use anything but the metric system” and its like... do you seriously never compare the size of something to something else? Can you really not see how comparing the size of something to something else to emphasize how unexpectedly big or small it is can be more fun or dramatic? Also have you considered maybe you don’t always have the opportunity or care about measuring something? Are you just carrying a ruler around and measuring everything you see?