i see, thanks! i still think 'combustion engine' is incorrect terminology. maybe your blog will turn out to be so popular that everyone will adopt your terminology, and it'll just be a pet peeve for the olds like me, like using 'literally' as a figurative intensifier. until then, though, it will make people familiar with the field cringe when they read your posts
i think there were a lot of things that were obviously true to people about motorcars in 01903 that turned out to be false; to mention a few, the ridiculous level of danger involved in traveling over fifteen miles an hour, the impossibility of them ever becoming as widespread as horses (due to their overwhelming mechanical complexity), and the utter impracticality of electric cars, though that one took quite a while to change. hindsight is 20:20
maybe if henry ford had still been building steam cars in 01899 when he founded the company that eventually became cadillac (acquired by gm in 01909), the first decade of the twentieth century would have seen the kinds of advances in low-thermal-mass heat exchangers and flash boilers that ford instead had to make in areas such as transmissions and the engine block. but maybe that wouldn't have been enough, or maybe ford's mind was better suited to mechanical and industrial engineering than to thermodynamics. maybe the inherently larger thermal mass of a steam engine doomed it for this application in a non-path-dependent way, much as there are no diesel motorcycles
you probably know more than i do about the relevant history, so you're more likely to be right
just to clarify, the standard definition of 'combustion engine' includes steam engines https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Combustion_engine, while it's mcdonald's personal definition of it that doesn't
as for the pedantry, though, guilty as charged
there is a shorter term for 'internal combustion engine' that doesn't have a conflicting standard definition; you could call them 'explosion engines', which is what we call them in spanish (because 'motor de combustión interna' is even longer). sometimes this term is limited to otto-cycle engines (as in https://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motor_de_explosi%C3%B3n) but logically should include diesel engines as well
in addition to lacking a conflicting standard definition, 'explosion engines' has the advantage that, like 'dynamic programming', it makes the subject sound more exciting
In this day and age where we have lots of extra bits to store values, why go with only five digits? We're just kicking the can down the road. I propose we move to at least 12 digit years starting today: May 31, 000000002024
Comments
i see, thanks! i still think 'combustion engine' is incorrect terminology. maybe your blog will turn out to be so popular that everyone will adopt your terminology, and it'll just be a pet peeve for the olds like me, like using 'literally' as a figurative intensifier. until then, though, it will make people familiar with the field cringe when they read your posts
i think there were a lot of things that were obviously true to people about motorcars in 01903 that turned out to be false; to mention a few, the ridiculous level of danger involved in traveling over fifteen miles an hour, the impossibility of them ever becoming as widespread as horses (due to their overwhelming mechanical complexity), and the utter impracticality of electric cars, though that one took quite a while to change. hindsight is 20:20
maybe if henry ford had still been building steam cars in 01899 when he founded the company that eventually became cadillac (acquired by gm in 01909), the first decade of the twentieth century would have seen the kinds of advances in low-thermal-mass heat exchangers and flash boilers that ford instead had to make in areas such as transmissions and the engine block. but maybe that wouldn't have been enough, or maybe ford's mind was better suited to mechanical and industrial engineering than to thermodynamics. maybe the inherently larger thermal mass of a steam engine doomed it for this application in a non-path-dependent way, much as there are no diesel motorcycles
you probably know more than i do about the relevant history, so you're more likely to be right
I doubt anyone other than your good self is going to be confused by the differentiation between "steam engine" and "combustion engine" tbh.
confusion was not the emotion i was experiencing. it was more like vicarious embarrassment, usually called 'cringe'
This kind of pedantry build on nothing than personal definitions is the worst.
just to clarify, the standard definition of 'combustion engine' includes steam engines https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Combustion_engine, while it's mcdonald's personal definition of it that doesn't
as for the pedantry, though, guilty as charged
there is a shorter term for 'internal combustion engine' that doesn't have a conflicting standard definition; you could call them 'explosion engines', which is what we call them in spanish (because 'motor de combustión interna' is even longer). sometimes this term is limited to otto-cycle engines (as in https://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motor_de_explosi%C3%B3n) but logically should include diesel engines as well
in addition to lacking a conflicting standard definition, 'explosion engines' has the advantage that, like 'dynamic programming', it makes the subject sound more exciting
I appreciate the back and forth your comment sparked, very educational, but unrelated to that I would like to know why you precede years with a 0?
https://longnow.org/ideas/long-now-years-five-digit-dates-an...
"It’s an idiosyncrasy to which we are dedicated."
In this day and age where we have lots of extra bits to store values, why go with only five digits? We're just kicking the can down the road. I propose we move to at least 12 digit years starting today: May 31, 000000002024
00000000let's 0000000000do 000000000it