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Post by gavinmccord on Aug 2, 2008 13:59:58 GMT
On re-reading Alastair Maclean's thriller, The Satan Bug (1962), I noticed that the abbreviation for the British Broadcasting Corporation was unsurprisingly, B.B.C.
However, Polyvinyl chloride was abbreviated as PVC, with no periods.
Is this a standard for chemical names or is there another reason?
(When it comes to his later novels, 10-15 years later, the periods in any abbreviation are all gone.)
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Post by Paul Doherty on Aug 2, 2008 19:15:21 GMT
We have a long-running argument here about acronyms, Gavin, and I suspect you've added fuel to the fire. I'd say that PVC is maybe a word in its own right, albeit one spelt in capitals, and thus does not need full stops between the letters. Most people would, after all, be hard-pressed to say what the initials stand for.
BBC, however, to most people would stand for British Broadcasting Corporation, and is thus an initialism. So, when the convention was to mark initialisms with full stops, B.B.C. it would have been.
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Post by Tone on Aug 2, 2008 20:48:30 GMT
>I'd say that PVC is maybe a word in its own right, albeit one spelt in capitals, and thus does not need full stops between the letters. Most people would, after all, be hard-pressed to say what the initials stand for.<Wouldn't that be soft-pressed? They'd be hard-pressed for uPVC.  Tone
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Post by Dave M on Aug 2, 2008 21:04:44 GMT
PVC, I suppose, can't be an initialism, since V isn't an initial letter within Polyvinyl Chloride  |
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Post by Twoddle on Aug 2, 2008 23:11:52 GMT
PVC, I suppose, can't be an initialism, since V isn't an initial letter within Polyvinyl Chloride But we (or I, anyway) don't pronounce PVC "puvucu". We pronounce each letter individually and not as a word (here we go again), so in my mind its an initialism, not an acronym. (Who mentioned acronyms anyway?) |
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Post by Dave on Aug 3, 2008 0:50:23 GMT
so in my mind its an initialism, Missing one of these? ' |
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Post by Alan Palmer on Aug 3, 2008 7:48:35 GMT
PVC wasn't as widely used in the 1960s as today. The author probably thought of it a a name for the plastic, like nylon, rather than as an initialism, or whatever it is.
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Post by Twoddle on Aug 3, 2008 9:52:19 GMT
so in my mind its an initialism, Missing one of these? ' Thanks, Dave; I spent an hour searching for that. I knew I'd dropped it somewhere. |
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Post by Paul Doherty on Aug 3, 2008 13:22:15 GMT
PVC wasn't as widely used in the 1960s as today. The author probably thought of it a a name for the plastic, like nylon, rather than as an initialism, or whatever it is. That's what I meant. (And in my book, that would make it an acronym.) |
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Post by Pete on Aug 3, 2008 17:42:32 GMT
PVC, I suppose, can't be an initialism, since V isn't an initial letter within Polyvinyl Chloride So surely that makes it an abbreviation. Lots of chemicals are abbreviated to a few letters, as it makes them easier to talk about than having to use the full compound name all the time. Think of DDT, DNA and RNA, LSD, and so on. |
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Post by Tone on Aug 3, 2008 20:26:24 GMT
>So surely that makes it an abbreviation. Lots of chemicals are abbreviated to a few letters, as it makes them easier to talk about<
I'll accept "abbreviation", but would prefer to call it the "short name" for the stuff. Short names like "sonar", "radar", and "quasar" formed as not-really-acronyms. (And what was wrong with asdic, anyways?)
But definitely NOT an acronym.
Tone
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Post by Paul Doherty on Aug 3, 2008 21:46:40 GMT
In your view, Tone. But I think I've posted before that the evidence is unclear but tends to show that the word was never intended to be as restrictive as you wish it to be, and indeed has not become so restricted.
Abbreviation is a very general word, of course: we're discussing what type of abbreviation it is.
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Post by Tone on Aug 4, 2008 20:33:47 GMT
> and indeed has not become so restricted.<An attitude fueled by whom? (I do have supporters for my view.  Tone
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Post by Twoddle on Aug 4, 2008 22:09:53 GMT
> and indeed has not become so restricted.<(I do have supporters for my view. Tone And you may count me among them. |
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Post by Dave M on Aug 5, 2008 7:43:05 GMT
Yes, I'd say that an acronym must be a word ... but then I get lost in what a "word" is. I think that in she has a BMW, they picked up an SOS and you gave him the OK, the "letters" bits are indeed words. (Evidence for that is that an expansion into what the letters might stand for changes the meaning.)
In he is an MP, however, I'm content that the "word" version is "Member of Parliament" and that MP is an initialism.
That leaves a huge area in between, and in there we have things like PVC.
Perhaps the answer is to say that if it's being used as an acronym, then it's an acronym.
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