From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 X-Msuck: nntp://news.gmane.io/gmane.science.mathematics.categories/4516 Path: news.gmane.org!not-for-mail From: "Eduardo J. Dubuc" Newsgroups: gmane.science.mathematics.categories Subject: Re: abutment = aboutement? Date: Fri, 22 Aug 2008 13:46:06 -0300 Message-ID: NNTP-Posting-Host: main.gmane.org Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Trace: ger.gmane.org 1241019994 13663 80.91.229.2 (29 Apr 2009 15:46:34 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@ger.gmane.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Wed, 29 Apr 2009 15:46:34 +0000 (UTC) To: categories Original-X-From: rrosebru@mta.ca Sat Aug 23 09:39:49 2008 -0300 Return-path: Envelope-to: categories-list@mta.ca Delivery-date: Sat, 23 Aug 2008 09:39:49 -0300 Original-Received: from Majordom by mailserv.mta.ca with local (Exim 4.61) (envelope-from ) id 1KWsP6-0001RX-Vk for categories-list@mta.ca; Sat, 23 Aug 2008 09:39:41 -0300 Original-Sender: cat-dist@mta.ca Precedence: bulk X-Keywords: X-UID: 51 Original-Lines: 25 Xref: news.gmane.org gmane.science.mathematics.categories:4516 Archived-At: [ Note from moderator: It is time to close this thread. Further discussion of the linguistic part of Michael's query should happen away from the list. Thanks to contributors. ] Michael Barr wrote: > I am NOT about to change a word that has apparently existed for over 50 > years just because it is not particularly meaningful. "aboutissement" existed for over 50 years of course, but the translation "abutment" is, (at least in the references given in these postings, including the translation of the grothendieck-serre correspondence) much more recent, it seem that all of its occurrences are from the second millennium, or very close. On the other hand, we have learned in these postings that in the 1980's and before, the word "limit" (and not "abutment') was used for what a spectral sequence converges to. An authority as Peter Hilton used "limit". There are a lot of well established words in mathematics which are not particularly meaningful, but the difference with "abutment" is precisely that they are well established.