EPONYMS

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Dr. Goodword
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EPONYMS

Postby Dr. Goodword » Wed Jul 04, 2007 11:12 pm

The latest addition to our features is a Glossary of Eponyms. Unlike those found at other websites, ours focuses on words with genuine eponyms, i.e. common nouns created from proper ones. We also provide definitions for the words in our glossary, their parts of speech, and detailed explanation of how they came to have eponyms.
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Perry
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Postby Perry » Thu Jul 05, 2007 1:04 pm

What a wonderful new tool. As we used to say in my youth, right on!
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bnjtokyo

eponyms

Postby bnjtokyo » Fri Jul 06, 2007 1:19 am

Dear Dr.

I was wandering through the new glossary,and I think you got the definition of "bel" wrong.

The Glossary says a "bel" is "1/10 of a decibel," which immediately struck me as being not in keeping with the naming conventions for metric units, "deci" being the
prefix used to refer to the unit that is 1/10 of the base unit and "deca" being used to refer to 10 base units. Consider "decahedron," "decaliter" and "decameter" in contrast to "deciliter" and "decimeter." (I guess there is no such thing as a "decihedron")


Wiki defines "decibel" as "a common measure of sound intensity that is 1 tenth of a Bel on the logarithmic intensity scale."

So a "bel" should be 10 decibels, not the other way around.

Otherwise, a useful addition to the reference shelf.

sluggo
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Postby sluggo » Sat Jul 07, 2007 7:07 pm

Good catch BJ.
As the answers.com Sci-tech encyclopedia states:

Decibel
A logarithmic unit used to express the magnitude of a change in level of power, voltage, current, or sound intensity. A decibel (dB) is 1/10 bel.

In acoustics a step of 1 bel is too large for most uses. It is therefore the practice to express sound intensity in decibels.


--seems to be fixed now in the Eponybase. Side note: the letter index seems to work intermittently

Anyway, nice addition, Doc!
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Stargzer
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Postby Stargzer » Sun Jul 08, 2007 10:34 am

Since it's a logarithmic scale, something that is 3 dB greater than something is twice as large, 6 dB is four times as large, 8 dB is eight times as large, and so on.

See the Wikipedia article on Decibel for more information.
Regards//Larry

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LukeJavan8
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Postby LukeJavan8 » Sun Feb 07, 2010 1:28 pm

As one who understands nothing of logarithms, I must
say I enjoy the TV show "Numbers' where Don Eppes'
brother Charlie uses them for everything as he is
a prof in math at CalSi.
-----please, draw me a sheep-----


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