X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII-7-bit X-Google-Thread: f996b,ef84650dd3e606e5 X-Google-Attributes: gidf996b,public X-Google-ArrivalTime: 2001-10-20 05:08:08 PST Path: archiver1.google.com!news1.google.com!sn-xit-02!supernews.com!news.tele.dk!small.news.tele.dk!130.133.1.3!fu-berlin.de!uni-berlin.de!212.120.170.103!not-for-mail From: grue@mail.ru (Timofei Shatrov) Newsgroups: alt.ascii-art Subject: Re: what is it? Date: Sat, 20 Oct 2001 11:57:22 GMT Lines: 57 Message-ID: <3bd01ad0.899141@News.CIS.DFN.DE> References: <3BC7137B.20402@usa.net> <9qclsj$moe3s$3@ID-39741.news.dfncis.de> <3BCE4670.9080009@usa.net> NNTP-Posting-Host: 212.120.170.103 X-Trace: fu-berlin.de 1003578933 26909380 212.120.170.103 (16 [101885]) X-Newsreader: Forte Free Agent 1.21/32.243 Xref: archiver1.google.com alt.ascii-art:8705 On Thu, 18 Oct 2001 19:40:33 GMT, ppunk@damthatspam.chello.nl (Peter Punk) tried to confuse everyone with this message: >On Thu, 18 Oct 2001 03:02:42 GMT, Peter Henderson >provoked the following text: > >>Peter Punk wrote: >>> It is an acronym, and if an acronym is pronouncable as a regular word, people >>> usually will pronounce it as a word. >>> Some examples are NATO, NAFTA, UNESCO, ASCII, etcetera. >> >>Actually, et cetera is two words. It comes from Latin, literally, "and >>(the) rest." (The is in () because Latin doesn't have articles. Articles >>are "the" "a" and "an.") So et cetera is not an acronym. Technically it >>can be one word, but not how it's usually used. Usually it means, "and >>so forth." As one word it means "odds and ends." Then it's a noun. >> Compare: >>. And finally an >>acronym is a word made from the first letters of other words, according >>to the dictionary. I think it's also sometimes the first _few_ letters >>(not only the first _one_). > >Gee, had i known that you'd think that i think that etcetera is an acronym (it >is not, it is a contraction as you demonstrated), i would have used "and so >forth" instead. > >But you could have known that that's not why "etcetera" was in the list, because >aconyms, contrary to abbreviations, are usually written in all caps. "Etcetera" >wasn't. > >>Hope that helps your English to be more perfect. Maybe you can do that >>with my Danish? (or whatever language(s) you speak, if I remember >>incorrectly) :o) > >Pardon my French, I'm Dutch :-)) > >So you have taken an interest in the boring and hard-to-pronounce language >called Dutch have you? :-) > >>BTW what does "1800wu/2.563yrs" and similar mean in your sig? > >I take part in the Search For Extra Terrestrial Intelligence (SETI) at home >through the SETI@Home project. >I have installed a program (as have over 3 million others all over the world) >that downloads a piece of data, collected by the Arecibo radio telescope in >Puerto Rico, filters it and when the program is finished filtering the data >package (or work unit as it's called) it sends back the result and downloads >another work unit. I think searching for prime mersenne numbers (www.mersenne.org) is much more useful. Who cares about aliens when they're >1000 light years away? -- GRUE@|And to auoide tediouse repetition of these woordes: is equalle to: MAIL|I will sette as I doe often in woorke use, a paire of paralleles of RU|one lengthe, thus ===, bicause noe .2. thynges, can be moare equalle. GRUE.FREESERVERS.COM|Robert Recorde,"The Whetstone of Witte',1557.[4*72]