Re: The importance of being pedant

[Leigh Palmer <palmer@SFU.CA>]

At 1:37 PM -0700 7/23/99, Michael Edmiston wrote:

> Although this is taking more time than it's worth, my curiosity has
> gotten the better part of me.

Michael - shame on you! From the useful and provocative information
you've provided following this putdown it is clear to me (who started
this digression) that you do not really believe what you say. I will
not take offense since you have instantiated my point that precision
in language is desirable in scientific communication if not in art.

> But the overwhelming evidence, both printed and by personal testimony
> from chemists is that the words vapor and gas are used interchangeably.
> I can cite published examples in very popular physical chemistry texts
> if anyone wishes to check them out.

That is a bad thing in my view. One word is redundant when speaking
of real substances. Precise scientific language is not in any way
enriched by having two evidently confusing terms that mean *nearly*
the same thing. If "gas" is as good as vapor (and we certainly use
it in an ineradicable sense, as "ideal gas"), then we should stop
using the term "vapor" altogether in scientific parlance. If, on
the other hand, we want to recognize the differences between real
substances and ideal gases in language, then we should welcome the
term vapor and use it exclusively for real substances.

I'm not arguing that those who call a vapor a gas are in any sense
incorrect. Their speech does lack the precision of which it is
potentially capable, however, and somehow I believe that no one in
this group would find it impossible to improve his scientific
communication skills by refining his language.

> I conclude that the people who spend their research lives studying such
> things do not make a distinction between vapor and gas.  I also
> conclude that the best name we should use for water that exists in the
> "fog phase" is the word "dispersion."

Your first point is granted. I will make the point that water in
what you call its "fog phase" is actually only part of a system I
prefer to call by its precise name; it is an "aerosol". I do not
believe that pure water ever exists in the dispersion-of-droplets
state we call "fog". Air (or some other, ah, gas) must be present
for the droplets to be dispersed in* if the system is to survive
any longer than the free fall time.

But I come to praise Michael Edmiston, not to berate him. I'll
also "out" him! I consider Michael to be one of the most valuable
contributors to this list, just as my wife regards him in the list
(chemed-l?) to which she belongs. Bluffton College must be a good
school.

Leigh

*Please excuse the dangling participle. I need Viagra for my
language this afternoon. I got up at 4 this morning.