# Difference between revisions of "Talk:2492: Commonly Mispronounced Equations"

This comic is obviously a take on the generation Z style of writing words without vowels so that they fit on T-Shirts, text messages or to avoid censorship, like "BRLN", "O RLY", "PIX PLZ". Some of the people from that generation are now established scientist, leading their respective fields forward. Obviously this is how they refer to common equations. 162.158.92.29 13:10, 22 July 2021 (UTC)

I think the wave equation is wrong based on units, but it's been a while. The wave speed ought to be squared. Of course, c could be a squared speed, but it's usually not. 172.70.34.164 01:22, 22 July 2021 (UTC)

I agree, normally it's written as C squared... The equations in order are 1: Gravitational Attraction, 2: Einstein's Mass / Energy Conversion, 3: Pythagorean Theorem (triangle side relations), 4: Area of a Circle, 5: Entropy equation, 6: Ideal Gas Law, 7: Euler's Identity, 8: Newtons Second law, 9: Wave equation, 10: The derivative of a function f, and, 11: The Quadratic Equation... I don't understand the linguistic rules being applied to the names, but they seem to be visual as much as anything 108.162.237.66 02:04, 22 July 2021 (UTC)
You should turn that into a table in the explanation. We can have a column where we try to come up with the pronunciation rule. Barmar (talk) 04:10, 22 July 2021 (UTC)

The equation for the thing I have as what it was made by is L = i ψ ¯ γ μ ∂ μ ψ − e ψ ¯ γ μ ( A μ + B μ ) ψ − m ψ ¯ ψ 1 4 F μ ν F μ ν . {\displaystyle {\mathcal {L}}=i{\bar {\psi }}\gamma ^{\mu }\partial _{\mu }\psi -e{\bar {\psi }}\gamma ^{\mu }(A_{\mu }+B_{\mu })\psi -m{\bar {\psi }}\psi -{\frac {1}{4}}F_{\mu \nu }F^{\mu \nu }.}

when copy-pasted from Wikipedia. here is the link: These are both the links. For archival, this is the thing: LAGRONJ EYSIBARYMOODMOOSIOYLERSIBRYMOOAMOOBAMOOSIMASIBRSIQORTFAHMOOVYFAHMOOVY. 4D4850 (talk) 02:22, 22 July 2021 (UTC)

My friends and I actually pretty often say "PəV-nert" for the ideal gas law. First syllable is kind of vowel-less, sort of a schwa if anything. But also stressed? Didn't know you could stress a schwa but, guess I did. 172.70.130.160 02:36, 22 July 2021 (UTC)

My teachers always pronounced it PIV-nert. 172.69.62.20 18:38, 22 July 2021 (UTC)

I think this is the XKCD that has made me laugh the most, out of all 2492.

I'd say it might be the one that made me laugh the most, out of all 2623. I won't, because it didn't, but I could. --4D4850 (talk) 03:23, 22 July 2021 (UTC)

I tried to transcribe these pronunciations into IPA, because reading them like this is kind of ambiguous. I probably got a bunch of stuff wrong though. fəˈdʒæmɚ | ˈɛmkɑˌtu | ætˈbutkut | ˈæpɚˌtu | həˈsplɒgpi | ˈpævnɚt | ˈaɪpɪn | ˈfimɑ | dut kəˈduks | ˈfækslɪmˌoʊ ˈfæksəˌfɒx | zəˈbɔbə fækˈtoʊɑ | ˌɛpsɪˈhutəˌmu ˈdupsɪˌkwɔrps

Why is it a soft G in the gravity equation? Barmar (talk) 04:10, 22 July 2021 (UTC)

I believe it's a reference to the "gif" pronunciation debate. "Fuh-gam-er" is the obvious pronunciation, Randal is facetiously asserting "Fuh-jam-er" is correct.--108.162.250.130 05:00, 22 July 2021 (UTC)
I think it might be because the English letter "G" is pronounced "Gee" (i.e. "Jee"), which made its way into the pronunciation here.BenjaminTheBenevolent (talk) 10:27, 22 July 2021 (UTC)

The most similar time when equations are actually 'pronounced' a bit like this is the "soh cah toa" mnemonic for the trigonometric identities - should this be in the explanation? (the comic made at least me think that might be the original inspiration) 141.101.99.204 06:42, 22 July 2021 (UTC)

How is "soh cah toa" a mnemonic?? It's just a bunch of random letters. Normally you memorize random letters by coming up with words that fit together, not vice versa. I think this is much harder to remember than the thing it is supposedly a mnemonic for. If anyone actually finds it useful, can you explain how it works for you? I've seen this before so I suppose it's a real thing, but I find it baffling. 108.162.221.220 04:15, 23 July 2021 (UTC)
Not sure it's a mnemonic, no, but I was taught SOHCAHTOA by a very good (but strict) maths teacher as in "... (like?) that volcanic eruption". Given we were 10, 11 years old, I don't think we even knew about Krakatoa at that point (despite having also a very good Geography teacher who readily identified lumps of 'Gneissian schist' that I may have brought back from holiday - he also had a much better sense of humour...) so whether I (or the teacher?) was mistaken in understanding "Sohcahtoa" to be purported to be a (now ironically memorable) volcano rather than it was a "it rhymes with..." mnemonic, I don't now know. But since then I have always used SOHCAHTOA to confirm in my mind which trigonometric identity I should use. And, later, I learnt and never forgot that Krakatoa is/was west of Java! 141.101.98.230 08:20, 23 July 2021 (UTC)
(PS - If I ever have to use the "Many Very Elderly Men Just..." mnemonic (or whatever it is, I was sure it had had Earthenware Vases, but maybe only in a reversed version!), I tend to have to backform it from my unclear recollection of the mnemonic(s) I've been told plus just knowing that it's "Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, **, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune*, Pluto-if-we're-counting-it*" (* - except between 1979 and 1999 when it was "...Pluto-definity-counted-at-this-time, Neptune") (** - and then there's possibly an A, B or C here for Asteroid, Belt or Ceres; nobody I know has ever added Kuiper and/or Oort into the string of words to need remembering, though) using very non-mnemonical direct or indirect knowledge about the solar-system, like Clarke's written version of 2001 aiming at Saturn but Kubrik's film 'only' going as far as Jupiter. So I "(Sometimes?) Might Very Earnestly Make And Join Something Unprecedented Never Known Originally" on the spur of the moment.)
The circle area might be meant to read out like "upper two", referencing the square. I can't see the same for any of the others though. / 162.158.183.157 06:52, 22 July 2021 (UTC)
Mneumonics are supposed to make it easier to remember the equations; this collection would actually make it more challenging to remember these. Mind you, as a math tutor, my first thought was that these were attempts at mnemonics that missed the mark, badly. Nutster (talk) 15:04, 22 July 2021 (UTC)

I see nobody has attempted the Transcript yet. (Also I'm wondering how to 'properly' pronounce P-One V-One Over T-One Equals P-Two V-Two Over T-Two.) 162.158.155.157 10:41, 22 July 2021 (UTC)

I started a transcript. --4D4850 (talk) 16:54, 22 July 2021 (UTC)

Sorry to come in as an amateur, but I think the equation pronounced Ha-SPLOG-pee is actually the equation for Shannon diversity. 162.158.126.134 11:58, 22 July 2021 (UTC)

In my opinion, most of the contributions here are from people pretending to know more than they do. Edit away. Be bold. 172.70.114.172 21:04, 22 July 2021 (UTC)

The Pythagorean Theorem one made me think of the AT-AT debate for Star Wars

The wave equation reminded me of Jimmy Durante's Ink A Dinka Doo: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EWqi9eWwXvk I think I'm dating myself (no one else will). Barmar (talk) 16:55, 22 July 2021 (UTC)

I don't think it's clear if the provided pronunciations are the Correct ones or the common mispronunciations

It's worth noting that the majority of these equations are especially likely to be elided, and that the way they're routinely elided is generally incorrect - and more than that, the stressed syllable in particular is likely wrong. Especially notably "Fu-Jam-Er" should be "Fu-Gam-Er" and "Pav-Nert" should be "Piv-Nert". The joke works on the level of equation pronunciation being pretty intrinsically funny if you're not familiar with the specific equation, but also on the level of the specific equations having a standard pronunciation that pointedly isn't the one in the comic.

It would be interesting to try and reverse-engineer the original equations behind, for example, "Fus ro dah", or "Avada Kedavra". Cavaler (talk) 12:53, 23 July 2021 (UTC)