Greg Sonnenfeld wrote circa 11-08-19 10:33 AM: > Data is now accepted as a mass noun by most computing organizations > including those in IEEE. I remember having a long debate about this at > Ames in regards to a publication.
Well, that might be an indirect cause for my bad behavior, I suppose. I could say that "So many of my colleagues do it that it's only natural that I would do it sporadically as well, even if I'm trying not to do it." I find this is the case, for me, with both cussing and my (mostly dormant) Texas accent. When I'm around cussers, I tend to start cussing, too. When I go home to Texas, I tend to start talkin' like 'em. And I _know_ this has had an impact on my lack of fluency with SI units. It's taken me quite some time to _think_ in Celsius. And I'm way behind on changing from miles to kilometers and pounds to kilograms. I think I'd have to leave the country and immerse myself in SI to make any real progress. But I can't accept the "everyone else does it" defense of my bad behavior. I'd have to give up huge chunks of my personality in order to do that. So, I need another reason. Why can't I get a handle on this problem like I can with: o 24 hour clock, o "What in Hell" as opposed to "What the Hell", and o "Where are you at" as opposed to "Where are you", etc. What makes "data" trickier than those others? Nicholas Thompson wrote circa 11-08-19 01:27 PM: > So who is it NOT absurd to? Highschool English > teachers? Statistics teachers who are channeling THEIR highschool English > teachers? It's not absurd to me. I actually think the way one uses language has a deep impact on the audience/receiver. I'm not saying I have any significant language skills; but any lack of those skills is no excuse for not trying to design my language for the audience. Some audience members may be persnickety people. And if they're anything like me, a bad or odd "sounding" phrasing can prevent them from hearing whatever message I'm trying to send. Granted, it's pretty petty if, say, a peer-reviewer rejects a paper just because the language is bad. But it's a real consideration. I can't tell you how many cool concepts I've _finally_ understood after re-re-re-reading some technical paper written by a non-native English speaker. It's just plain difficult to concentrate on the message when every other sentence seems funny or off. > I think the reason that it is still a problem relates to its having no > plural. Flock refers to a bunch of sheep, but you can also have flocks. > Data refers to a bunch of numbers, but we can't speak of different bunches > of numbers as "datas". That sounds like it's on the right track. But, again, it's indirect. I'd be more inclined to think that it's the vagueness of the concept that gets in the way. The meaning of "flock" (or herd or whatever) is ambiguous, at least to me. It's an artifact of the measurement protocol. Data is used in this vague way, too. By contrast, "dataset" presents no such problems. There seems to be a crispness to "dataset" that I don't get with "data". It's more concrete, has harder boundaries, or something like that. But it is definitely related to whether or not you can pluralize it. The meaning of "data" is vague enough that if you had 2 datas, everyone around you would refer to that collection of collections as "the data". Flocks are only less vague because everyone we're likely to talk to is a human with eyeballs. It's our eyeballs that define the flock and allow us to say "flocks". -- glen e. p. ropella, 971-222-9095, http://tempusdictum.com ============================================================ FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
