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. -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]