On Sat, 27 Oct 2007 03:08:57 +0200, Paul Rosen <p...@lycos.de> wrote:

>On Fri, 26 Oct 2007 12:26:29 -0000, Grant Edwards <g...@visi.com>
>wrote:
>
>>>>> gedankenexperiment
>>>> 
>>>> I am astonished. Is this really an english word imported from the
>>>> german language
>>
>>I've certainly heard it used many time by many different
>>english speakers (usually technical scientific types).
>
>Although it has become an english Identity, because in German we have
>to write the Nouns beginning with a capital Letter. To read it this
>way is just as strange for me as for you, if I wrote english Nouns
>with Capitals. ;-)

Well, Paul, you handle English as well as any.  So if English isn't
your first language, I think lower-casing the first letter cannot be
too strange, though I'm sure it tickles a back part of your mind.

I grew familiar with the gedankenexperiment as a child.  So it's
understood well enough by people who read such books as I did.  A lot
of people in the US don't read a lot and certainly don't read a lot of
science, so they may be unfamiliar with the concept and/or term.

Having learned to read German in school (I won't admit to actually
being much good at producing German, but I can read German fairly
fluently), the term has two separate paths for understanding.

As far as capitalization goes, if you see it small-case then you know
it is probably from within an English usage context.  The strangeness
can just trigger that recognition.  I suspect that is exactly how it
works in your mind, already, since you are excellent with English.

There are a lot of so called "loan words" from German to English. Some
very commonly known ones are lager and apple strudel, for example.  A
little less used are angst, gestalt, autobahn, doppelganger (replace
the umlaut-a with just a), reich and blitz (though most folks have
heard the term blitzkrieg and reich from watching WW II war movies, if
nothing else.)

Reichstag is a word that political folks also generally know in the
US, because that fire in Berlin's Session Chamber was a turning point
in German history towards establishing a Nazi Germany.

There are also a tremendous number of German-English cognates.  But
you cannot escape knowing about those.  Words like Milch (milk) or
Zirkus (circus.)  Once tuned in to various changes (z's becoming a
soft-c in English as in that example I just gave, or where endings
like -ig, -lich, -isch and -ität change into -(l)y, -al, -ic, or -ful
in English -- or the reverse of this, coming from your perspective, I
suppose) you find your way a lot faster between them.  But it may be
the case that it is easier for an English speaking person to "see"
these cognates than a German speaking person.  I've not considered
that thought until just this moment and don't know what to think about
that.

Jon

Jonathan Kirwan wrote:
> On Sat, 27 Oct 2007 03:08:57 +0200, Paul Rosen <p...@lycos.de> wrote:
> 
>> On Fri, 26 Oct 2007 12:26:29 -0000, Grant Edwards <g...@visi.com>
>> wrote:
>>
>>>>>> gedankenexperiment
>>>>> I am astonished. Is this really an english word imported from the
>>>>> german language
>>> I've certainly heard it used many time by many different
>>> english speakers (usually technical scientific types).
>> Although it has become an english Identity, because in German we have
>> to write the Nouns beginning with a capital Letter. To read it this
>> way is just as strange for me as for you, if I wrote english Nouns
>> with Capitals. ;-)
> 
> Well, Paul, you handle English as well as any.  So if English isn't
> your first language, I think lower-casing the first letter cannot be
> too strange, though I'm sure it tickles a back part of your mind.
> 
> I grew familiar with the gedankenexperiment as a child.  So it's
> understood well enough by people who read such books as I did.  A lot
> of people in the US don't read a lot and certainly don't read a lot of
> science, so they may be unfamiliar with the concept and/or term.
> 
> Having learned to read German in school (I won't admit to actually
> being much good at producing German, but I can read German fairly
> fluently), the term has two separate paths for understanding.
> 
> As far as capitalization goes, if you see it small-case then you know
> it is probably from within an English usage context.  The strangeness
> can just trigger that recognition.  I suspect that is exactly how it
> works in your mind, already, since you are excellent with English.
> 
> There are a lot of so called "loan words" from German to English. Some
> very commonly known ones are lager and apple strudel, for example.  A
> little less used are angst, gestalt, autobahn, doppelganger (replace
> the umlaut-a with just a), reich and blitz (though most folks have
> heard the term blitzkrieg and reich from watching WW II war movies, if
> nothing else.)

I'm horrible with grammar and usage of foreign
languages.  OTOH, I find that I carry around
an enormous collection of Spanish and German
nouns.  Bremsstrahlung, wehnelt, the difference
between Bach and bock have all come up recently.

I can't look at a one-way street sign without
thinking Einbahnstrasse...