Spanish Word of the Day

Quote: Wizard

Fecha: 26-1-13 Palabra: Estallar Today's SWD means to explode, in both the sense of a bomb or in anger.

The question for the advanced readers is whether there is a common root to the word estrella (star). Perhaps because stars eventually explode?

There is no common root. As Nareed pointed out, the ancient Romans would not have equated stars with high energy events.

There is a common root between "estallar" and "astilla" (splinter). Romans actually spelled the word as "astella".

Perhaps Nareed can use the verb to describe a person, much like in English you say that a person "burst into tears". It seems to mean that a person erupts in emotion, but I can't tell if it is positive or negative.

Quote: Pacomartin

There is no common root. As Nareed pointed out, the ancient Romans would not have equated stars with high energy events.

I'm not unused to people claiming this or that ancient civilization or savage tribe knew things we don't know. But, come on, knowing advanced astrophysics millennia before such a discipline even existed stretches credulity waaaaaaay too much.

That said, the ancients were humans just like us. They could, and did, discover some amazing things. But science, while not advancing on a fixed path, does build upon prior discoveries. The ancient Romans, or the ancient Greeks who were more science-oriented, didn't know what stars were. They didn't even know what planets were. For all that they were geniuses when it came to math and astronomy, for the time, they weren't even able to measure the distance to the planets, the Sun or even the Moon, much less the stars.

Hipparchus of Nicaea drew up one of the earliest star catalogs, recording the position of each star in the heavens. One suggestion is that he did this because he'd seen what he thought was a new star. That is, a star that had not been there before. Very likely he saw a nova. Centuries alter, Tycho Brahe, the last of the great naked-eye astronomers, saw a new star (it was hard to miss, everyone saw it). But Brahe made very detailed observations on it, as far as his means allowed him to. He wrote his observations down in a paper called "De Nova Stella," or "Concerning the New Star."

Unfortunately this happened in 1573. The first telescopes were invented until early in the 1600s.

Since then the closest Supernova on record was 1987-A, observed in 1987. Unfortunately "close" is a very relative term as far as astronomical distances go. 1987-A took place in one of the Magellanic Clouds, satellite galaxies of the Milky Way, over 150 thousand light years distant. All other modern observations of Supernovae come from even more distant galaxies.

Quote: Nareed

I'm not unused to people claiming this or that ancient civilization or savage tribe knew things we don't know.

Anaxagoras, who lived in Athens, Greece, around 450 BC , thought that the Sun and stars were fiery stones, that the stars were too far away for their heat to be felt, and that the Sun was perhaps more than a few hundred miles in size. With that Anaxagoras was,, the first one to suggest that the Sun is a star.

The idea that the Sun was a star began to circulate among scientists in the 17th century with the invention of the telescope.

But it only became common knowledge less than 200 years ago. In 1838, Friedrich Bessel for the first time measured the distance to a star without any assumptions about the nature of stars and found it to be enormous. Distances to other stars followed soon, and then people could calculate the true brightnesses of stars, corrected for their distance to us, and discovered them to be about as bright as the Sun. When other things about the Sun were also found to be like those of stars, such as its surface temperature and chemical composition, then the proof was finally here that the Sun is a star.

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In general, I believe Archimedes was possibly the greatest mind of all time. He had the most brilliant insights into the universe. He was killed by a common soldier who thought he wasn't responsive enough to his orders.

Quote: Pacomartin

Anaxagoras, who lived in Athens, Greece, around 450 BC , thought that the Sun and stars were fiery stones, that the stars were too far away for their heat to be felt, and that the Sun was perhaps more than a few hundred miles in size. With that Anaxagoras was,, the first one to suggest that the Sun is a star.

And there was another Ancient Greeks who spoke of atoms. But in both cases they were only speculating. Along the right track, to be sure, but without much in the way of supporting evidence. That's why such work led to nothing for thousands of years.

I wonder why the Greeks never made much about electricity. They knew static electricity rather well, and even how to make it. But no one studied it more than that. Yet they had the means to make advances. I blame it on a lack of scientific methodology, at least in large part.

Quote: Pacomartin

In 1838, Friedrich Bessel for the first time measured the distance to a star without any assumptions about the nature of stars and found it to be enormous.

"Reality trumps theory every time." Carlos Wu.

It's very easy to look back on the past and find mirth or incredulity at how wrong even geniuses were about the world and the Universe. Except that we're not better off ourselves.

Consider. We know the grat big bulk of the Universe is made of something we call "dark matter." But we haven't even a clue as to what the hell dark matter is. We also just learned the Universe's expansion is accelerating, and that the farhter an object is the faster it moves away. So we bring up "dark energy," while again being clueless as to what it is.

About the only way in which we're better off is that we know what we don't know. Or at elast some of what we don't know. Yet i can't help to think of Socrates, who declared that if he was the wisest man in Athens it was only because "I alone know that I know nothing."

So decades or centuries from now our descendants will be laughing at our ignroance of the Universe.

And in my opinion, (the) Baltimore (Ravens) must be destroyed.

Quote: Nareed

I wonder why the Greeks never made much about electricity. They knew static electricity rather well, and even how to make it. But no one studied it more than that.

They apparently tried to use electric fish as a medical remedy for headaches. Static electricity, fish, and lightning are it's only natural forms. None of them is very useful, so it took a lot of time before the first battery was built.

Quote: Pacomartin

They apparently tried to use electric fish as a medical remedy for headaches. Static electricity, fish, and lightning are it's only natural forms. None of them is very useful, so it took a lot of time before the first battery was built.

But they knew about rubbing amber with silk to produce static electricity. The very name for electricity comes from the Greek word for amber. Yet none thought about a device to measure charge, for example, nor made the connection between sparks and lightning (of course it took until the 18th Century for that last).

And in my opinion, (the) Baltimore (Ravens) must be destroyed.

Sorry to change the topic back to Spanish. Recently I found myself in a Target store in a more Spanish-speaking section of Vegas than where I live. They had a lot of bilingual books for young children, which I loaded up on. I read them to my six-year-old. The following comes from Cinderella at the part when Cinderella successfully tried on the glass slipper, in the presence of her stepsisters.

English: The stepmother and two stepsisters couldn't believe their eyes.
Spanish: La madrastra y las dos hermanastras, que lo veían y no se lo creían, quedaron de una sola pieza.

Question #1: Is there not an equivalent expression in Spanish for not believing ones eyes?
Question #2: What does the quedaron de una sola pieza mean? Literally, I would translate that as "they remained with one piece only." But piece of what?

Quote: Wizard

Question #1: Is there not an equivalent expression in Spanish for not believing ones eyes?

Yes. It's "Lo veo pero no lo creo," or "No lo puedo creer," or "No puede ser," or "No puedo creer lo que vero," among others.

Quote:

Question #2: What does the quedaron de una sola pieza mean? Literally, I would translate that as "they remained with one piece only." But piece of what?

It makes no sense. It's tagged on after the snetence. kind of like "[..] couldn't believe their eyes, purple crayon dinosaur."


And in my opinion, (the) Baltimore (Ravens) must be destroyed.

Quote: Nareed

And in my opinion, (the) Baltimore (Ravens) must be destroyed.

Despes de los Ravens (I'll refrain from using Cuervos) ganan, quedarás de una sola pieza.