Aluminium or aluminum

Bearded_Galaxy · Sep 30, 2009

Aluminum is the way to say it, because the British themselves frequently fail to even pronounce their own language right. "Saw" sounds like "soar," for anyone with a heavy British accent. Even if the rest of the world uses aluminium, they also use grams/kilograms as a measure of weight, which is completely wrong. Grams are a measure of mass, which is directly related to weight (at least while on earth or near another source of gravity), but they're very different. Things to not weigh 20 kilograms, they have a mass of 20 kilograms. Granted, most of us Americans can't pronounce the English language properly, but try visiting the American NW (Washington and Oregon). Most of us pronounce English properly.

If I offended anyone, I'm sorry, but I haven't said anything much worse than some of the stuff that's been said. Besides, I can take it when people say bad things about Americans (as long as it's not overpoweringly offensive and blatantly arrogant).

larrball · Sep 30, 2009

33846 said:
I always thought it was spelled aluminum because I have never seen it spelled any other way, until now. But aluminum sounds better to me..

Who posted the "tinfoil" post?
:shhh:

larrball · Sep 30, 2009

john_lawson said:
hey lets keep this thread to a Alu-minimum-ha lol ok i'll shut up now

John has a point , If his wife see's the word LASER. not good.

-minimum <--- old Key word.Best for spouse.

Bad joke, i know but john's a good sport.-- he take's one for the team every time he log's in.

Flaminpyro · Sep 30, 2009

wow larrball do you know what the edit key dose ?

larrball · Sep 30, 2009

Dubble post-- deleted.(i could have gone for a trippee post (if i had known before hand) .

dr-ebert · Oct 2, 2009

Bearded_Galaxy said:
Things to not weigh 20 kilograms, they have a mass of 20 kilograms.

Completely wrong, of course. Under the influence of earth's [standard] gravity, a mass of 20kg has a weight of 20kg *). You might as well argue that a thermometer doesn't show the temperature but just a certain length of mercury (or colored alcohol) thread.

*) Ignoring the buoyancy caused by the atmosphere, which has to be taken into account for low-density materials or high-precision measurements.

One wonders why americans aren't so consequential to also say helum or lithum :thinking: Isaac Asimov once wrote a Black Widowers story about a professor who grew highly irate about the rest of the world's stupidity to say "aluminium" which just adds a completely unnecessary "i", wasting his time. When a student dared to argue with him, he made that student's passing grade dependent on him figuring out which "very special element" he was just thinking about. (The correct solution was the element with the most syllables, have fun finding out which one that is!)

Elektrotechniker · Oct 3, 2009

it's spelled aluminio in greek, so I like saying aluminium in english

charliebruce · Oct 3, 2009

Bearded_Galaxy said:
"Saw" sounds like "soar," for anyone with a heavy British accent.

How do you pronounce "saw" in an American accent, if not like "soar"? "Saw" when pronounced like "cow" sounds too close to sow (female pig).

HIMNL9 · Oct 3, 2009

All those peoples that are wrong and don't know it ..... that metal name is "ALLUMINIO"

..... here, ofcourse,

.....

Bearded_Galaxy · Oct 3, 2009

dr-ebert said:
Completely wrong, of course. Under the influence of earth's [standard] gravity, a mass of 20kg has a weight of 20kg *). You might as well argue that a thermometer doesn't show the temperature but just a certain length of mercury (or colored alcohol) thread.

Actually, you're wrong. Grams are a measure of mass, which doesn't change, regardless of gravity. Weight is a measure of the force of gravity, which changes depending on factors like if you're closer to the moon than to earth, or if you're in free fall. Astronauts do not measure a weight when orbiting the earth because they are in free fall, but their mass can still be measured, by how much force is required to accelerate them at a particular rate. Gravity is a measure of force, which has a metric unit of Newtons, or kg m/s/s. Mass is simply grams (or kilo grams), and is therefore not interchangeable with weight. Mass is easily calculated near the surface of the earth by calculating an object's weight, then dividing by the acceleration of gravity (roughly 9.8 m/s/s). But mass is very different from weight.

Bearded_Galaxy · Oct 3, 2009

charliebruce said:
How do you pronounce "saw" in an American accent, if not like "soar"? "Saw" when pronounced like "cow" sounds too close to sow (female pig).

We pronounce it like it's spelled. There's no R in saw. Certainly not like cow, sow, or any other word it's not.

(Sorry for the double post)

HumanSymphony · Oct 4, 2009

Bearded_Galaxy said:
We pronounce it like it's spelled. There's no R in saw. Certainly not like cow, sow, or any other word it's not.

(Sorry for the double post)

I concur. "Saw" in no way, shape, or form sounds/looks like "soar" :wtf:

Benm · Oct 4, 2009

On the weight/mass thing: Its just a matter of using the proper units. Mass is measured in kilograms, weight is measured in newtons. If you really mean weight instead of mass, you should express the force in newtons to avoid confusion.

A problem with it is that even engineers keep using odd/wrong units for certain specifications - such as the thrust of an aircraft engine in 'pounds'. There is something like a lbf (poundforce) thats actually a valid unit, but then again, why not just say the engine provides a thrust of xx kN and be done with it?

Bearded_Galaxy · Oct 4, 2009

Pounds IS a measure of force. Hence we have a unit of NewtonMeters, or as we usually hear with cars, pound feet (though I prefer foot-pounds). Each unit serves the same purpose, force times distance (energy), but they measure differently; one NewtonMeter is NOT equal to one foot-pound.

Does anyone know how many poundfeet to one Joule?

Benm · Oct 5, 2009

Nah, pounds are a measure of mass. Something like a foot-pound (or pound feet) is a measure of torque - like newtonmeters though there obviously is a multiplication factor between them.

Bearded_Galaxy · Oct 5, 2009

No, pounds are a measure of weight, and weight is a measure of the force of gravity, so pounds are a measure of force. The English units of mass are called slugs. And Foot-pounds are often used to describe torque, but a force times a distance is energy, which is the case with NewtonMeters and foot-pounds. If pounds was a measure of mass then how could torque be defined by mass times a distance? Look it up on Google, a foot-pound is roughly equal to 1.356 Joules, which means they must measure the same thing, even if in different amounts.

Aluminium or aluminum

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