Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2014 October 21

= October 21 =

Etymology of Ebola
I know the disease got its name from the river- is anything known about the language the river's name came from? 70.190.182.236 (talk) 04:37, 21 October 2014 (UTC)


 * This page says that "Ebola" (or "Ebola River"?) means "black river" in the local language Lingala. &#8209;&#8209; Mandruss (t) 05:11, 21 October 2014 (UTC)
 * Obviously, it's wrong. If it's from Lingala, then most likely it came from the root-verb -bola "hit".--Lüboslóv Yęzýkin (talk) 21:29, 21 October 2014 (UTC)
 * Is it obvious? Do you have any refs? I did some looking around, and found this dictionary . It gives "river" -> ebale, but has nothing for "black." So it's possible that you are right and the virologists in question didn't know much about Lingala. Maybe they just saw 'ebale' in their dictionaries in the dark and thought it was close enough. It's also possible that the name "Ebola" is not a Lingalan name... the same site above does give "ebola" as a form of the verb to crush, as you suggest.  SemanticMantis (talk) 19:03, 22 October 2014 (UTC)
 * I was tempted to connect the name from ebale, but then we should somehow explain the change of the vowels. So if we want to derive the name from Lingala, it rather came from -bola. Ebola is not only a verb form but a noun as well, e- is the noun derivation prefix of the 7th class. But, well, it may be indeed not from Lingala. "Black" in Lingala is -yindo and ndombe (a Kikongo borrowing) like in Mai-Ndombe (means "black water").--Lüboslóv Yęzýkin (talk) 22:09, 22 October 2014 (UTC)

Opposite of 'holistic'
Some colleagues wanted to address a complex problem through a 'holistic' approach, meaning to try and solve the big problem, in its entirety, and over a longer time period. Others wanted to take a slice, a piece, a part of the problem, work on it in the shorter term to try to learn something about how to address the complexities by working on the smaller more discreet part of the problem first, then to extrapolate from that for addressing the larger, holistic problem. So I'm trying to characterize these approaches. If the first approach is the 'holistic' approach, what is the other approach? Something like the opposite of holistic. Piecemeal has the connotation of 'unorganized'. If somebody can suggest an elegant phrase or characterization, thanks for that. — Preceding unsigned comment added by User:193.173.50.222 (talk • contribs)


 * Reductionist, atomism, and bottom up are all relevant, as is divide and conquer. I'd probably go with "reductionist", but in some contexts that can be a bit of a loaded term or insult, used to mean "you're missing the big picture." (p.s. your notion of holism seems slightly different than mine, and that described in the article. It's not about solving a big problem or a long time period so much as it's about considering everything at once, with a ready acceptance of emergent phenomena. Small problems can still be approached holistically and in short time.) SemanticMantis (talk) 14:28, 21 October 2014 (UTC)


 * Also, you can say someone is taking a reductionist or bottom up approach, but should probably avoid "atomic approach", in favor of "atomistic approach", to avoid confusion over actual physical atoms. SemanticMantis (talk) 14:33, 21 October 2014 (UTC)


 * Discrete? Note spelling. Matt Deres (talk) 16:18, 21 October 2014 (UTC)


 * ( Isn't discretization the better part of valour? :) SemanticMantis (talk) 16:28, 21 October 2014 (UTC)


 * In the given example, a reductive approach might be a better antonym. Reductionism is usually taken to be a philosophical ideology, that things are or can be understood as only the sum of their parts.  For example, Richard Dawkins' selfish gene theory is most often criticized as naively reductionist.  To give a perhaps unfairly hostile example, someone who says something like, "The mind doesn't really exist, all there are are particles, and the rest is illusion" would be called a reductionist.  A reductive approach might be like triage at a bus crash, where you divide the injured into those who will die, regardless of treatment, those who will live, regardless of treatment, and those whose fate depends critically on if they are treated, and focus medical expertise on the immediate critical injuries of the third group. μηδείς (talk) 16:40, 21 October 2014 (UTC)


 * I take your point, that we don't necessarily want to bring up a whole philosophical school of thought just because someone wants to divide a problem into smaller parts. However, my dictionary (NOAD) says "reductive: tending to present a subject or problem in a simplified form, esp. one viewed as crude" - wiktionary's entry also says it is usually pejorative in modern use, and neither has the idea of breaking apart a complex problem, just presenting it simplistically. SemanticMantis (talk) 17:12, 21 October 2014 (UTC)


 * I am afraid we might be stuck, the word doesn't have those negative connotations for me unless I were to say something like "overly reductive", whereas reductionist seems to have jut as much baggage. There's also modular, but that applies only if the parts came separated in the first place. μηδείς (talk) 17:29, 21 October 2014 (UTC)


 * We might also contrast a "deconstructive" approach with a holistic approach, but Deconstruction also happens to be the name of a whole philosophical/literary analytic movement, which similarly limits our ability to use it as a simple semantic concept without fear of being misinterpreted :-/ SemanticMantis (talk) 17:16, 21 October 2014 (UTC)


 * I assume this is a matter of curiosity, and that a fight is not about to break out over what the factions are called. You might also want to look at Critical path method both for the usefulness of the concept itself, and as it may inspire another term. μηδείς (talk) 17:25, 21 October 2014 (UTC)


 * A "targeted approach" sounds quite positive, and in fact implies that the opposite method lacks focus. (In some cases, a more general approach does seem like a bad idea, such as giving general antibiotics to treat a scratch, instead of applying topical antibiotics to the scratch directly.) StuRat (talk) 01:23, 22 October 2014 (UTC)

resources for IPA?
Inspired by the threads above, I'd like to get more comfortable with International_Phonetic_Alphabet, specifically the ability to read it phonetically and transcribe my speech. Can you recommend some online resources for this? This is almost what I want, but it's a little buggy on my system, and not very polished. To be useful to me, the resource will have to have many audio samples available, and play them easily. Thanks, SemanticMantis (talk) 14:53, 21 October 2014 (UTC)


 * The Crown Academy of English has a tutorial video (24:27) at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o8KppNXfx2k.
 * —Wavelength (talk) 16:08, 21 October 2014 (UTC)


 * See (and hear) The sounds of English and the International Phonetic Alphabet | Antimoon.
 * —Wavelength (talk) 17:47, 21 October 2014 (UTC)
 * Well-known and easy-to-use.--Lüboslóv Yęzýkin (talk) 20:47, 21 October 2014 (UTC)


 * Thanks all! SemanticMantis (talk) 15:32, 23 October 2014 (UTC)

City centre
Is there a specific term for what people generally regard as the "city centre" for practical purposes instead of the actual geographic centre point of the city, if they happen to be in separate places? J I P &#124; Talk 19:06, 21 October 2014 (UTC)
 * In many cities in the U.S., this can be called downtown (though there are a few quirks, see Uptown Charlotte; also in New York City, "Downtown" has a very specific meaning which is different than merely the business district). The general term is "city centre" (which need not be the geographic center) for cities in the UK and Australia, and Central business district for cities in the U.S.  -- Jayron  32  20:18, 21 October 2014 (UTC)


 * It will very much depend on the city. Some cities have a natural centre, a grand plaza or large market place surrounded by buildings etc.  Others don't.  In Australia, the official road distances between cities are measured between their respective main post offices, but that doesn't mean the PO is necessarily the city centre, it's just an arbitrary but consistent and reasonably useful system.  --   Jack of Oz   [pleasantries]  20:19, 21 October 2014 (UTC)


 * It should also be noted that the way cities are organized in the U.S. and Australia may be different than in Europe. In Europe, the historic "core" of the city is often the oldest part of the city, and may be filled with historic buildings and old neighborhoods rather than large commercial centers.  For example, you find that the main business districts in the U.S. (like the Chicago Loop, Downtown Boston, Downtown Los Angeles, or Midtown, Manhattan) are located pretty close to the geographic "core" or "center" of their cities.  In Europe, the big "Skyscraper" district isn't necessarily centrally located.  See La Défense in Paris, or the Moscow International Business Center, or Esposizione Universale Roma; in many of these cases the modern CBD is located some distance from the geographic center because all the land in the geographic center is historically already occupied.  -- Jayron  32  20:32, 21 October 2014 (UTC)




 * In Manhattan, Midtown is the business center, basically from 34th to 59th streets, with the Wall Street area as a secondary business center.


 * In Philadelphia, the city center, pronounced Senner City, is Center City. μηδείς (talk) 20:54, 21 October 2014 (UTC)


 * The city center is like the "heart" or "nerve center" of a city. The "symbolic" center It has nothing necessarily to do with being a geographical center, although it likely would have started out that way. Consider the Chicago metro area, whose "center" is downtown Chicago, although there's almost nothing east of it except Lake Michigan. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 23:57, 21 October 2014 (UTC)
 * I agree. I don't think city centre is commonly used to mean the geographical centre of a city. — SMUconlaw (talk) 17:27, 22 October 2014 (UTC)

Central business district --TammyMoet (talk) 09:27, 22 October 2014 (UTC)
 * Don't see what that has got to do with the question. City centre and central business district are not the same thing at all. --Viennese Waltz 10:09, 22 October 2014 (UTC)
 * I agree. While the central business district and city centre of a city may happen to coincide, the terms are not exchangeable. Often, in older cities, the city centre is a historical district (sometimes called the "old city" or "old town") frequented by tourists, while the central business district is located elsewhere. — SMUconlaw (talk) 17:30, 22 October 2014 (UTC)
 * That's a very bold statement: "not the same thing at all". They're not always the same, but they very often are. That business is going on there is a very good indicator of that it is a city centre. AFAIK, the terms are used completely interchangably down under. /176.10.249.240 (talk) 18:45, 22 October 2014 (UTC)
 * I'd go farther and say that "city center", "central business district", and "downtown" are all interchangeable terms, except in a few specific cities where "downtown" has a localized meaning. (I'm Canadian.)  In a large city, all of them typically embrace a large area that may include office developments, shopping areas, an old town, and one or more symbolic focal points.  If you need a term with a more specific meaning, you have to use a different term, like "central square" or "financial district". --174.88.134.249 (talk) 21:59, 22 October 2014 (UTC)


 * Generalizations that don't look at the historical development of a city don't work Center City is nowhere near the geographical center of Philadelphia.  Old City, Philadelphia, an eastern neighborhood of Center City borders on the Delaware and includes Independence Hall.  Once the second largest city in the British Empire, Philly grew outward from a core onlo on the west side of the river.  City Hall was built to the West of this, and the commercial area are largely around and West of City Hall.  Center City is basically the Manhattan of Philly, with other large neighborhoods like South Philly being its "outer boroughs.


 * New York City, however grew northward from the southern tip of Manhattan. Wall Street and City Hall are here, and the Twin Towers stood on a special foundation, but otherwise large skyscrapers were not possible due to the quality of the Bedrock.  The Greenwich village area has mostly poor bedrock, and it was with the building of the Chrysler Building on East 42nd and the Empire State Building on West 34th that the densely commercial skyscraper-filled area called Midtown developed.  NYC again has no real center, Manhattan is in the NE, and the center of Manhattan is Central Park which is surrounded by much smaller buildings its Upper East Side and Upper West Side than is Midtown.  You can call Manhattan north of Central Park; Harlem, Spanish Harlem, Washington Heights and Inwood, as well as the Bronx "Uptown" but this is mainly a train direction, with subways heading north and south.  Likewise, anything below about 34th street can be called downtown, but again, the terms follow the north-south orientation of the island and its streets and subways.  Brooklyn, however, does have a real downtown, which is its commercial center and which is centered near the Brooklyn end of the Brooklyn Bridge. μηδείς (talk) 01:43, 23 October 2014 (UTC)
 * Center City, Philly is the fairly close to the geographic center of the original city of Philadelphia, prior to the annexation of other parts of Philadelphia county like Northeast Philadelphia and Germantown, which had either been rural areas or had their own urban cores prior to consolidation. If you draw a line east-west and north-south through the pre-consolidation Philadelphia, you basically land on City Hall, which is also in the heart of the central business district.  -- Jayron  32  02:13, 23 October 2014 (UTC)

Some of the replies here are rather beside the point. I wasn't asking in what cities the "city centre" is located in the geographical centre or about the difference of those areas. I was asking about what the place that people usually regard as the "city centre", regardless of its geographical location, is called. J I P &#124; Talk 18:50, 23 October 2014 (UTC)


 * It will depend on the city, JIP. If you ask New Yorkers what is the city center they will probably look at you funny, then say "Central Park?" if you press them.  If you say that 's not what you meant, they will probably say, "Do you mean Midtown?".
 * Philadelphians will say, "Did you mean Center City?" as if you were from out of town, or trying to trick them. Oldsters might say City Hall, if they knew how the city grid is laid out, and that until the 1980's it was illegal to build a building taller than the statue of William Penn on city hall.  Otherwise they are just likely to correct you, and say, "No, it's Center City, not the City Center." μηδείς (talk) 19:38, 23 October 2014 (UTC)
 * Is there any sort of generic term for "whatever part of the city is thought as the centre", regardless of that part's name? A recent survey by Helsingin Sanomat found out that most Helsinkians view the "city centre" of Helsinki as the Three Smiths Statue, even though it's located quite a bit south of the geographical city centre. How do I say "the (something) of Helsinki is exactly located at the Three Smiths Statue"? J I P  &#124; Talk 19:53, 23 October 2014 (UTC)


 * I'd have to refer you to Jayron's very first answer, in most cases downtown will refer to the "central" most built up part of the city. That would apply to Baltimore, Philly, New Brunswick, NJ, Camden, NJ, Boston, Brooklyn, Newark, NJ and most cities I know from the NE.  But each often has its own specific name for the area, like the harbor, etc.  And Manhattan is very ambiguous as mentioned above.  If you live on 86th Street and head south to 42nd to go shopping, you have gone downtown to Midtown.  But if you live in the Village and head downtown to City Hall, The World Trade Center, or the foot of the Brooklyn Bridge you have also gone downtown to the southern tip of the island, but to the Wallstreet Area, not to the city center.  If you were making up a fictional US city, follow Jayron's first response. μηδείς (talk) 02:52, 24 October 2014 (UTC)


 * 'Center' for what? I think that's the underlying question when trying to pinpoint what is essentially an abstract concept, as cities are not Euclidian entities with easily definable centers. In many cities 'Downtown' and 'Midtown' often compete for that distinction in the sense of attracting business, residents, visitors; city leaders (try to) impose an instituional focus with "Civic Center" projects; and all the while a city evolves from myriad physical and cultural changes. The downtowns of NYC, Boston and San Fancisco, for examples, are only the centers for people who live/work in the downtown areas, usually, as geography has limited the reach of those districts. For further reading about city (cultural) centers, I suggest a great article by Jane Jacobs about what makes for less boring, more livable downtowns. El duderino (abides) 19:35, 27 October 2014 (UTC)

Chinese language question
I recently saw this web page about a mistaken computer translation from Chinese to Finnish. The computer translation says "Today, good coffee with vaseline". What does the Chinese text actually say? I can't just copy-paste it to Google Translate because it's just an image, not actual text. J I P &#124; Talk 19:44, 21 October 2014 (UTC)
 * The text appears to be 今日もコーヒーゼリーがラまい (correct me if i'm a bit off), and i think it's saying something about coffee-flavoured jelly? also definitely japanese, not chinese.  ~Helicopter  Llama~  21:12, 21 October 2014 (UTC)
 * As it turns out, we have an article on coffee jelly which the user may have been referring to, as it is apparently "big in Japan"; after some research, it's a little clearer now and the user appears to be saying that she is enjoying coffee jelly at a place called either "Ramai" or "Mai Line" (I searched up Ramai but all I got was this and the menu does not specifically mention coffee jelly or any dessert, though I'd like to try their Balinese coffee!)  ~Helicopter  Llama~  21:46, 21 October 2014 (UTC)
 * It's Japanese.　"コーヒーゼり" is "coffee-flavored jello". The character is not the katakana (Ra (kana); It is the hiragana  (U (kana)), so the word is not "ramai", but "umai". The sentence is " which means, "The coffee jelly is good (delicious) today too." or something similarly worded. "Yurie" is a Japanese sounding name so it's possible that this person is just using that as part of their signature, or was just pointing out the a "funny" software translation. It's is kind of funny actually, and pretty much shows why people shouldn't rely too much on translation software. - Marchjuly (talk) 02:52, 22 October 2014 (UTC)
 * 今日も could also be translated as 'as ever' or 'as always', if you wanted to make a smoother English translation. "Today too" is just not idiomatic in English. It would imply that it was delicious/tasted good yesterday as well as today, but may or may not have been so good in previous days. In Japanese it is completely normal to use this phrase, however.  KägeTorä - ( 影 虎 )  ( Chin Wag )  04:05, 22 October 2014 (UTC)
 * Thanks . Agreed. I just threw that in at the last minute before leaving for lunch. "As always" sounds better to me. Anyway, the key thing I was trying to point out was "ramai" vs. "umai". The original sentence should make more sense once that correction is made. - Marchjuly (talk) 05:47, 22 October 2014 (UTC)