Re: Using standardized SI prefixes
On Tue, Jun 12, 2007 at 02:36:55PM +0200, Magnus Holmgren wrote:
> On Tuesday 12 June 2007 14:09, Adam Borowski wrote:
> > English linguistic is a descriptive science -- what is correct and what is
> > not depends on what people use. This stays in stark contrast to
> > prescriptive languages like French where a government agency is entitled to
> > ban the use of an established word and enforce using a made-up replacement.
>
> You're arguing that since few people use an otherwise superior concept, Debian
> should not use it either -- a fallacy known as argumentum ad populum
> (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argumentum_ad_populum).
Except, I did not claim that one of the versions is superior. What I stated was:
1. English is a language where the correct usage is what most people use,
2. "kilobyte" is preferred over "kibibyte" by a vast majority of those whose
communicate using means accessible to Google search
Thus, referring to popularity is not fallacious here; my argument was that
in the case of English, it's popularity not prescriptions which determines
which version is correct.
--
1KB // Microsoft corollary to Hanlon's razor:
// Never attribute to stupidity what can be
// adequately explained by malice.
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