On the word, 'theory'

The Japanese language has two separate words equivalent to the two usages of the English word, 'theory'.

理論 [RI-RON]
A system of knowledge built on logic to systematically and uniformly explain individual phenomena. In addition, a purely logical knowledge corresponding to practice.

説 [SE-TSU]
1. A principle (belief) or claim for certain things.
2. Rumor.

I tried to translate the Japanese definitions as faithfully as I can into English. The first word, 'ri-ron', is equivalent to the scientific usage of the English word, 'theory' (as in 'the theory of evolution' or 'the theory of relativity'), while the second word, 'se-tsu', is equivalent to the common usage (more like 'I have a theory!'). Setsu doesn't need to be substantiated and can be wild claims.

It's a shame the English language doesn't have two separate words; we can avoid a lot of confusion.

Comments

dinogami said…

It's a shame the English language doesn't have two separate words; we can avoid a lot of confusion.

It does--"theory" is correct in, say, "theory of evolution" or "germ theory of disease" or "theory of plate tectonics." The correct word for the common "usage" of "theory" is, in many instances, "hypothesis"; in other instances, it's "guess" or "supposition."

21 February, 2012 13:15

Raptor's Nest said…

I'm well aware of that, but the general public doesn't seem to be. The two Japanese words are distinct to begin with.

21 February, 2012 13:34

Raptor's Nest said…

Plus, the English word, 'theory' actually can be used in the sense of 'hypothesis' and still be correct. But the Japanese word 'ri-ron' cannot be correctly used in the meaning 'hypothesis'; nor can 'se-tsu' be correctly used as 'theory'.

21 February, 2012 13:37

dinogami said…

the English word, 'theory' actually can be used in the sense of 'hypothesis' and still be correct.

It can, but it shouldn't, just the same way that I could call a TV show a "movie" (it is a moving picture, after all), but shouldn't. Just because everyone does something incorrectly does not, per force, make it correct!

21 February, 2012 14:45

The difference between Lion and Tiger skulls

A quick divergence from my usual dinosaurs, and I shall talk about big cats today. This is because to my greatest delight, I had discovered today a wonderful book. It is called The Felidæ of Rancho La Brea (Merriam and Stock 1932, Carnegie Institution of Washington publication, no. 422). As the title suggests it goes into details of felids from the Rancho La Brea, in particular Smilodon californicus (probably synonymous with S. fatalis ), but also the American Cave Lion, Panthera atrox . The book is full of detailed descriptions, numerous measurements and beautiful figures. However, what really got me excited was, in their description and comparative anatomy of P. atrox , Merriam and Stock (1932) provide identification criteria for the Lion and Tiger, a translation of the one devised by the French palaeontologist Marcelin Boule in 1906. I have forever been looking for a set of rules for identifying lions and tigers and ultimately had to come up with a set of my own with a lot of help

Old drawings: Allosaurus

Recently, I came across a stash of old drawings that I had completely forgotten about. I'll try and upload them in the next week or two. Some are palaeo, others are not, but still quite interesting nonetheless... Here is the first. I think it is an Allosaurus head. At least the skull looks like an Allosaurus and it has lacrimal horns like an Allosaurus , so it must be an Allosaurus . Nothing special I guess...

R for beginners and intermediate users 3: plotting with colours

For my third post on my R tutorials for beginners and intermediate users, I shall finally touch on the subject matter that prompted me to start these tutorials - plotting with group structures in colour. If you are familiar with R, then you may have noticed that assigning group structure is not all that straightforward. You can have a dataset that may have a column specifically for group structure such as this: B0 B1 B2 Family Acrocanthosaurus 0.308 -0.00329 3.28E-05 Allosauroidea Allosaurus 0.302 -0.00285 2.04E-05 Allosauroidea Archaeopteryx 0.142 -0.000871 2.98E-06 Aves Bambiraptor 0.182 -0.00161 1.10E-05 Dromaeosauridae Baryonychid 0.189 -0.00238 2.20E-05 Basal_Tetanurae Carcharodontosaurus 0.369 -0.00502 5.82E-05 Allosauroidea Carnotaurus 0.312 -0.00324 2.94E-05 Neoceratosauria Ceratosaurus 0.377 -0.00522 6.07E-05 Neoceratosauria Citipati 0.278 -0.00119 5.08E-06 Ovir

Raptor's Nest

Search This Blog