January 04, 2007, 06:41
zmježdnumbering groups of things
It's such a pity that
dyad is a "stupid" word, because it has quite a few sibling words. For example,
monad (fr. L
monas 'unit',
monadis, fr. Gk μονος
monos 'one');
dyad (fr. Gk
duas,
duados);
triad;
tetrad;
pentad;
hexad;
heptad;
octad (but also note
ogdoad);
ennead; and
decade.
Here you have words for groups of N from one to ten. Why make it a suppletive set of words. Use dyad, instead of pair, when it is quite possible to use other groups of N words. Nice how decade originally meant a group of ten anything, and not just years. We have cardinal numbers, for counting, and ordinal numbers for ordering, then why not, I ask you, group numbering for denoting groups of things.
It also occurs to me that since
pair is ultimately from Latin, and a loanword in English, what perfectly good native word got forced out of the word hoard.
January 08, 2007, 02:40
pearcequote:
Originally posted by zmježd:
why not, I ask you, group numbering for denoting groups of things.
Yes, I am with you zmj. Imagine however, the look on shop assistants' faces when you want to buy a dyad of pants. Or, a dyad of trousers. I wonder how many legs you would get.