=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= EDline Vol. 3, no. 6 (8 February 1998) Editorial mailing list Published by the Electric Editors =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= Contents: Q & A---Previous queries [2cg] Billions and trillions [2ck] Accentless English [2cn] Radio Free Europe (Offshoot from: [6] Just for Fun) [2co] Proofreading marks as a font? Q & A---New queries [2cp] Sulphur or sulfur? [2cq] Ordering of letters FYI [3bo] New e-mail discussion list on reading [3bp] Citing electronic references [5] Bookmarks [6] Just for fun [8] Administration =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= ---[2] Q & A --------------------------------------------------------- ** [2cg] Billions and trillions Date: Sun, 1 Feb 1998 From: David Ibbetson, ibbetson@idirect.com Richard Harris writes > Okay, so if I have been reading this thread carefully, the order of > use of these large numbers is (in ascending magnitude): > > million > billion > trillion > quadrillion > > But what happens when we need to describe numbers larger than > quadrillions? Do we use "quinrillion". And just what do these numbers > look like in ones and zeros? My mind can cope with millions (1,000,000) > and billions (1,000,000,000), but the others? As far as I know the names continue quadrillion, quintillion, sextillion, septillion, octillion, nonillion, but anything beyond quintillion is exceedingly rare. Their value is ambiguous. In the English/European scheme you add SIX zeroes at each step so million is 1 followed by six zeroes billion is 1 followed by 12 zeroes trillion is 1 followed by 17 zeroes etc. In the US scheme you add only THREE zeroes at each step after million so million is still 1 followed by six zeroes, but billion is 1 followed by nine zeroes trillion is 1 followed by 12 zeroes etc. In recent years some British publishers, notably the Economist, have adopted the US scheme. As a consequence I have been forced to regard billion and upwards as ambiguous and unusable, unless one is certain that the audience is exclusively US, or they are defined on first use. (In Canada, where I now live, a mixture of US and UK practices are used, consequently billion and upwards have always needed to be clearly defined.) You can use milliard for 1 followed by 9 zeroes, but many English speakers are unfamiliar with it, or you can use the metric prefixes: 1 mega-thing 1 followed by six zeroes 1 giga thing 1 followed by nine zeroes 1 tera thing 1 followed by 12 zeroes etc. but, again many, most people in English-speaking countries, even if metricised, aren't familiar with them. (What do our schools teach? End of rant.) --------------------- Date: Mon, 2 Feb 1998 From: Ian Kingston, ian@ikingston.demon.co.uk Richard Harris wrote: > Okay, so if I have been reading this thread carefully, the order of > use of these large numbers is (in ascending magnitude): > ... > But what happens when we need to describe numbers larger than > quadrillions? Do we use "quinrillion". 'Quintillion', I think. > And just what do these numbers look like in ones and zeros? My mind > can cope with millions (1,000,000) and billions (1,000,000,000), but > the others? Regardless of whether you want to write them out in words or numbers, it makes sense to switch to exponential notation (10^6, 10^9 etc.) - no need to use ambiguous words, and no chance of missing out the odd zero. ------------------------- Date: Tuesday, 3 Feb 1998 From: Eddie Kent, eddie.kent@mcr1.poptel.org.uk Richard Harris asked for names of the larger numbers. Here are those that have been used. Because we are stuck with ASCII I shall have to use some conventions. The caret ^ means 'raised to the power of', so 2^3 is two raised to the power of 3, or 2x2x2=8. I have used # in Graham's number although the convention is for an upward pointing arrow. NAMES OF NUMBERS thousand........10^3 million........10^6 billion........10^9 trillion........10^12 quadrillion........10^15 quintillion........10^18 sextillion........10^21 septillion........10^24 octillion........10^30 nonillion........10^33 decillion........10^36 Those are in normal (and recommended) use. All of the following have been used, some more often than others. vigintillion........10^63 googol........10^100 googolplex........10^(googol) Vigintillion is sometimes written vigillion; other number names that have been used are centillion 10^303, primo-vigesimo-centillions 10^366 and milli-millillion 10^3000003 In addition there are Skewes's number 10^(10^(10^(34))) and Graham's number 3####################################################################3 where 3#3 = 3^3= 27, 3##3 = 3#(3#3) = 3#27 = 7,625,597,484,987, 3###3 = 3##(3##3) = 3##7,625,597,484,987 = 3#(7,625,597,484,987#7,625,597,484,987), which is already too large to write down, and so on, 64 times. Dr Edward Kasner was working on a problem and asked his 9-year-old nephew for a name for the number one followed by a hundred zeros. The boy suggested googol, which it now is. Kasner later got his nephew to calculate that the number of raindrops falling on New York in a century is much less than a googol. For anyone who is still with me, there is a fairly simple formula which estimates the number of prime numbers less than any given number. It is known that for any numbers we might use this formula gives an overestimate. Skewes proved that his number is the first for which the formula can be shown to give an underestimate. For many years Skewes' number was the largest number used non-trivially in a proof and people exhausted themselves trying to give some idea how large it is. But you can't. If all the particles in the universe were universes, each containing the usual number of particles, then that total of particles is still way less than Skewes' number. But even that is dwarfed by Graham's number which is so large that using the most compact notation ever invented it still could not be writtrn down within the space of our universe. Thus a new notation had to be invented, and that was done by Donald Knuth, the man who wrote the mathematical program called TeX (pronounced 'tek'.) ---------------------- Date: Sat, 7 Feb 1998 From: Chuck Hollingworth, c.e.hollingworth@bangor.ac.uk For an up-to-date and well-informed opinion, you need to speak with an astrophysicist, or someone similarly accustomed to dealing in large numbers, as their meaning has changed in recent years. But there may be a table in the Oxford Dictionary for Scientific Writers and Editors. To answer your immediate question, after quadrillion, you continue to go up in steps of 1000 thus: quintillion (now 10 to the power 18, i.e. 1000 to the sixth power) sextillion (10 to the power 21) septillion (10 to the power 24) and you will find further details of these numbers, together with their former size and the correct number of zeros, in recent editions of the Concise Oxford Dictionary. You will notice that the prefixes are from the French. But then the system breaks down, in that there is no huitillion, and shifts to Latin: I have heard of octillion, nonillion, decillion, etc., but these aren't in the COD. The French prefixes may go back to the days when large numbers were expressed as powers of a million rather than of a thousand. So, a billion was a million to the second power, i.e. 1 billion = 1 000 000 x 1 000 000 = 1 000 000 000 000, which we would now call a trillion; a trillion was a million to the third power (i.e. 1 000 000 x 1 000 000 x 1 000 000 = 1 000 000 000 000 000 000, which we would now call a quintillion) and so on. This may explain why old values of such numbers were much larger than the values now used, but to be honest this is not something I know much about, and I accept no responsibility for any blunders here - it's Saturday afternoon, and my caffeine titre is too low! If you want to irritate authors and publishers, you can always change any such impossibly large, ambiguous, number to the convenient American 'zillion', which is undefined and hence meaningless ... Don't worry if you find this stuff difficult to conceive: even Carl Sagan, the popular astronomer, allegedly used to say "billyuns and billyuns" rather than try to specify large numbers for intergalactic distances or the number of molecules in a star. Note that because of all this confusion over billion etc., the metric system of units (SI) has rigorously defined prefixes for astonishingly large, and small, multiples of the base units (hence, megatonne, microgram, and so forth), and for editing purposes this is often the simple and clear way out if readers are familiar with SI units. There is an appendix table in recent editions of the COD. +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+ ** [2ck] Accentless English Date: Sun, 1 Feb 1998 From: David Ibbetson, ibbetson@idirect.com Mark Levinson writes > Let us not forget the dieresis ("diaeresis" to the aesthetes), seen > within living memory on words like naive and cooperate. In his later years No"el Coward wanted a diaeresis (however spelled). David Noel Isserlis Ibbetson (Assorted accents completely optional) +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+ ** [2cn] Radio Free Europe (Offshoot from: [6] Just for Fun) Date: Mon, 2 Feb 1998 From: David Price, dprice@nccnet.co.uk Sorry if I'm repeating anything that's been said before on this subject, but I've only just started receiving this mailing list. Radio Free Europe and Radio Liberty (which was aimed at the Soviet Union) were indeed propaganda stations, with a specific policy of countering Soviet and East European propaganda. I used to work for the monitoring service of the BBC World Service, where Soviet and East European broadcasts were monitored. These broadcasts were relentlessly positive about the communist regimes, even to the point of not reporting air crashes and other disasters which happened in these countries. The U.S. propaganda stations would try to highlight the shortcomings of the communist system while at the same time giving a positive impression of the West. The BBC World Service is usually regarded as having been much less biased than the U.S. stations, and the current series of ads on BBC TV showing the likes of Gorbachev, the Dalai Lama and Shimon Peres praising the BBC's broadcasts as being a source of "truth" suppports this viewpoint. These world leaders obviously valued and still value the BBC's striving for impartiality, but did the ordinary people of the Soviet bloc? I have heard that young people, certainly, thought the BBC was rather boring. They were frustrated with the system and wanted to hear how much better things would be under capitalism, and so preferred Radio Free Europe and Radio Liberty. Sadly, many are now finding that the propaganda broadcast by these stations was just that. --------------------- Date: Mon, 2 Feb 1998 From: Josephine Bacon, 100270.3224@compuserve.com Good on yer David, always "le mot juste". Radio Liberty and Radio Free Europe were at least as "propaganda-free" as Peace and Progress, the Soviet station which broadcast in foreign languages. The propaganda was more to the taste of the listeners and slightly more subtle, that's all. As journalists, we know that *all* broadcasting and press media are full of propaganda, as much for the things they leave out as for the things they put in. To give one example among millions, the International Womens Day marches in the 1970s, when Women's Liberation was in its heyday, were huge. They were *never* mentioned on any BBC radio station (or any other, because there was only LBC) and I was the only journalist who covered them, and that was as a total freelance, uncommissioned, for BBC Radio London. But an even better example is Margaret Thatcher's banning Sinn Fein from the airwaves. Hers was a blatant ban, the D notices contain many other secret bans. Don't these naive people from behind the former Iron Curtain realise that democracy is just sugar- coated dictatorship! +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+ ** [2co] Proofreading marks as a font? Date: Mon, 2 Feb 1998 From: Juliet Sydenham, Juliesyd@aol.com I am editing a paper called NetCrime for a quarterly journal. In order to make it look 'trendy' and apposite the author has called the paper '>>NetCrime'. I understand what he is trying to do, but as I seldom do any Web searching I'm not sure he's using the right meaningful symbols. Could someone advise me? ----------- And don't forget about Daniell Morrisey's query in last week's issue about the availability of proofreading mark fonts +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+ ** [2cp] Sulphur or sulfur? Date: Fri, 6 Feb 1998 From: Jane Kerr, bywater@zetnet.co.uk Does anyone know what the current position is on the spelling of "sulphur" in UK English? A paper by a British author that I edited recently spelt it "sulfur" throughout. Other spellings in the paper were consistently UK English. While we're on the subject of elements, I once heard a (probably apocryphal) story about the origin of the US spelling of "aluminium" - i.e. "aluminum". A large aluminium company commissioned a new sign for their head offices, which was supposed to read "Acme Aluminium Corporation" or suchlike, but a mistake was made, and by the time it had been spotted, the new name had gained currency. Has anyone got a more plausible explanation? +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+ ** [2cq] Ordering of letters Date: Sat, 7 Feb 1998 From: Iain Brown, i_brown@compuserve.com I am at a loss as how to order letters after one's name. For instance, if Joe Bloggs was a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and had an MA from the University of London, how should these letters be ordered? Is is: Joe Bloggs FRSL MA or: Joe Bloggs MA FRSL I have been looking for chapter and verse on this, but no source mentions the correct styling. And what would happen if Mr Bloggs was appointed, say, OBE? Would it be Joe Bloggs OBE ...? ---[3] FYI ----------------------------------------------------------- ** [3bo] New e-mail discussion list on reading Date: Mon, 2 Feb 1998 From: Iain Brown, i_brown@compuserve.com [Cross-posted from SHARP] The History of Reading Special Interest Group ListServ HRSIG (short for 'History of Reading Special Interest Group') is a discussion forum for those who share a common interest in the history of literacy. For the most part, discussion focuses on a broad range of historical topics related to literacy (e.g. uses of reading/writing, classroom pedagogy, instructional texts, children's literature, libraries and historical societies, community and family literacy). But HRSIG also serves as a bulletin board for posting job announcements, meetings, and publications of interest to those who do historical research on literacy. In addition, it enables researchers to ask questions of the Listserv membership that relate to their own research topic. Subscribing to the list If you would like to join the list, e-mail MAISER@FS1.SCHED.PITT.EDU with the following in the message area: SUBSCRIBE HRSIG Do NOT include punctuation, your name, or any other information in the body of this administrative message. +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+ ** [3bp] Citing electronic references Date: Fri, 6 Feb 1998 From: Maureen Wright, MWright@email.dot.gov.au [Cross-posted from Editorial-L (Australia), with thanks] A couple of years ago some of you may have seen my piece in the Australian Government Publishing Service "Stylewise" newsletter, on citing references from electronic source. I have now had the opportunity to examine the published Final Draft international standard ISO 690 Part 2, and have prepared a new note, sourced from the standard. --- Citing references to electronic sources An increasing number of publications and other documents are appearing in electronic form and are created, maintained, and disseminated on a computer system. An electronic document may be fixed and unchangeable, or it may take advantage of it's computer environment to allow modifications in both form and content. An electronic document may not have an equivalent in a paper form or other equivalent. Writers need to create references to these electronic resources in order to document their research. The International Standards Organisation has published a draft standard for bibliographic references to electronic documents: ISO 690 Part 2, "Information and documentation - Bibliographic references - Electronic documents or parts thereof" ISO/FDIS 690-2. (ISO 690 is the basic ISO standard for bibliographic references. The original, published in 1987 under the title "Documentation - Bibliographic references - Content, form and structure", is now designated part 1 of ISO 690.) The following is a condensation of the recommendations of ISO 690 Part 2. The standard goes into further detail to cover a variety of different types of electronic documents, including email, newsgroup contributions, etc. Cite electronic bibliographic references in the following order: primary responsibility of contribution, title of contribution, primary responsibility of host document, title of host document, type of medium (e.g. online; CD-ROM), subordinate responsibility of host document (optional), edition, issue designaton (for serials), place of publication, publisher, date of update/revision, date of citation (for online document), series, numeration within host and location within host (where applicable), notes (physical description; accompanying material; system requirements; frequency of publication; language; other notes), availability and access (e.g. URL), other availability information, standard number (e.g. ISBN, ISSN). The following is an example of such an entry: CARROLL, Lewis. Alice's Adventures in Wonderland [online]. Textinfo ed. 2.1. [Dortmund, Germany]: WindSpiel, Nov. 1994 [cited 19 Feb. 1995]. Available from Internet: URL:http//www.germany.eu.net/books/carroll/alice.html. Also available in PostScritp, TeX DVI GNU Info, and ASCII versions from Internet: URL:ftp//ftp.Germany.EU.net/pub/books/carroll/> Definitions: host document Document containing contributions or separately identifiable component parts that are not physically or bibliographically independent. primary responsibility Person (or corporate body) responsible for writing the document, or editors of a document derived from various sources or contributions, provided that the editor is named prominently (add ed. after editor's name). See also subordinate responsibility. subordinate responsibilty Person or corporate body performing a subordinate function, such as editor, translator, illustrator, recipient of electronic mail, sponsoring body etc. ---[5] Bookmarks ----------------------------------------------------- Date: Sat, 7 Jan 1998 From: Laura Pomeroy, info@taxbriefs.co.uk MLA electronic citation style Further to my bookmark in last week's issue of EDline ... The new Web site from the Modern Language Association now includes updated information on MLA style. The site summarizes how to cite sources from the World Wide Web. This information will appear in the forthcoming edition of the _Style Manual_ (pub. date April 1998) but is currently not available anywhere else. (The _Style Manual_ will go into the subject of Internet sources in greater detail than the Web page.) The page also answers some frequently asked questions about MLA style. The pages are the only MLA-authorized Web site on MLA style. < http://www.mla.org/set_stl.htm > --------------------- Date: Mon, 2 Feb 1998 From: Iain Brown, i_brown@compuserve.com New integrated dictionary-thesaurus available on the WWW: the Wordsmyth English dictionary-thesaurus at < http://www.lightlink.com/bobp/wedt > A full dictionary and thesaurus look-up services on the Web, with over 100,000 entries and 50,000 headwords. ---[6] Just for fun -------------------------------------------------- "Lines from the slushpile", no. 20 Mrs. Rogers said, "I'm sorry I lost my temper, but I was grumpy, and when I'm grumpy I get grouchy." +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+ "Everyone needs an editor". no. 12 Date: Wed, 28 Jan 1998 From: B. Jas Sutton, jastext@mnet.fr "One should fight like the devil the temptation to think well of editors. They are all, without exception--at least some of the time -- incompetent or crazy. By the nature of their profession they read too much, with the result they grow jaded and cannot recognize talent though it dances in front of their eyes". -- John Gardner --------------------- Date: Mon, 2 Feb 1998 From: Josephine Bacon, 100270.3224@compuserve.com Re: "Everyone needs an editor". no. 11 > "The one thing I have learned about editing over the years is that you > have to edit and publish out of your own tastes, enthusiasms, and > concerns, and not out of notions or guesswork about what other people > might like to read". > -- Norman Cousins NOW I know why commissioning editors are so subjective and narrow-minded! +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+ "Everyone loves booksellers" Q. How many booksellers does it take to change a light bulb? A. Only one, and they'll be glad to do it, too, except no one shipped them any. They also didn't know you had any light bulbs coming out this year--and what are you doing in the store anyway today? ---[8] Administration ------------------------------------------------ EDline provides the opportunity for a weekly online discussion of matters editorial and editorial business. * POSTING MESSAGES TO THE LIST All messages to be posted to the list should be sent to Iain Brown, at: i_brown@compuserve.com Include as the subject line, "EDline [topic]", where [topic] is the subject under discussion. Topics might include areas such as Grammar, Spelling, American English or Punctuation. Messages should be pertinent to the basic premise of the list; they may be withheld, or redirected if more pertinent to one of the other mailing lists. The spelling and grammar of messages will *not* be corrected, but some editing of length may be undertaken. 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