Re: Call for consensus - I18N issues in process/guide doc

Masataka Ohta <[email protected]> wrote:

>> It has been several days since Martin posted his revised suggestions to the
>> language of the guidelines and process document and I have not heard any
>>further
>> comments on the subject.
>
>So what?

Such rudeness!

>> Does this mean we have consensus?
>
>No.
>
>How can you uniquely encode a German letter 'A' with umlaut in UTF-8?
>
>A single "character" of 'A with diaeresis' or two "character" sequences
>of 'A' and "combining mark of diaeresis"?

Can you say "equivalence class"? How about "normal form"?

>Note that my sentence is confusing becasue the definition of "character" in
>ISO 10646/UTF-8 is broken and confusing.
>
>						Masataka Ohta

On the contrary, we do have consensus. Everyone here except you understands
that you do not understand the issues *as stated here*, and your opinions
are incomprehensible and unhelpful to all the rest of us. I don't mean to
be rude to you, or to suggest that you are simply wrong.

In Japan, as in China, the legacy of the Logical school of philosophy is
quite strong. The founding document of this school, BaiMa Fei Ma, (HyakuMa
Hi Ma, or White Horse is not Horse) is almost totally confusing to most
Westerners. What it says is true, but is stated (and translated) in a way
that is almost guaranteed not to be understood correctly. For example (my
translation): "Horse can be yellow, or black, or white, but White Horse can
only be white. Therefore White Horse is not Horse." The usual incorrect
translation, "A white horse is not a horse," is of course false. However,
if you say to a Westerner with any knowledge of logic "The set of white
horses is not the set of horses," you get instant comprehension and
agreement.

Much of what you say appears to come from misunderstandings of this type in
*both* directions due to such differences. You say that

U+00C4          LATIN CAPITAL LETTER A WITH DIAERESIS

and

U+0041 0308     LATIN CAPITAL LETTER A, COMBINING DIAERESIS

are not the same (true, but not relevant), and refuse to accept that they
are defined to be equivalent, or else hold that the equivalence is true,
but not relevant, for reasons which none of us understand.

If you wish to discuss these matters with us, you must stop telling us that
we are simply wrong, and work with us to understand where we misunderstand
each other.

--
Edward Cherlin  Ask. Someone knows.               [email protected]
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NewbieNet, Inc.               __but no simpler__.    Albert Einstein
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