The arrow in a crossbow is called a “bolt”. If you are thinking of lightning as a thing that travels from the sky to the ground, then you are thinking of it as a thing that is like a bolt. If it’s a thing that travels from a god’s hand to a target, it is like a bolt. Meanwhile, lightning travels at the pretty much the speed of light. We talk about it going from the clouds to the ground or from the ground to the clouds, but when we say that, we are, in abstract, talking about which way the electrons are flowing. In terms of human experience, a lightning bolt doesn’t travel ANYWHERE. If you turn on a flashlight, do you perceive the light as it “leaves” the flashlight” and “goes out” towards the world? If you use a laser pointer, do you see the beam leave the pointer and hit the target? No. In lightning’s case, It just appears, full sized from nothing visible to something that has one end in the clouds and the other end on the ground. Neither end appears first. I know. I’ve had it hit within maybe 30 feet of me while I was walking home last summer. It was quite memorable. It happened so fast, I didn’t really see it. I just remembered seeing it, because by the time I figured out wtf happened, it was already gone. I definitely remembered seeing it. I just didn’t experience the vision until it was gone. No rain. Not much in the way of clouds. BAM! I also distinctly heard a zapping sound just before the boom, though both sounds were examined in memory without sufficient present-tense attention to register the sensations until they were over. It was interesting to have a threat come and go before i had time for an adrenal reaction. I still had the reaction. I just paused, feeling all this manic energy build and it was obvious that there is nothing useful to do with the impulse. I decided to start dancing; mostly appalachian clogging, since that’s pretty much the most energy-intensive dancing I know how to do without the help of a partner’s momentum. It sufficiently diffused the mania that I bypassed the urge to scream or cry. Otherwise, it felt as if my chest would burst. charghwI’ vaghnerya’ngan rInpa’ bomnIS be’’a’ pI’.

On May 24, 2021, at 10:50 AM, mayqel qunen'oS <mihkoun@gmail.com> wrote:

Thank you SuStel, voragh, and charghwI' for taking the time to reply.

voragh:

...

Or is lightning (the general phenomenon) an attribute of another god whom you need to distinguish from Zeus?

No, the only god in reference to whom I've seen the lightning bolt is Zeus.

In the beginning, I hadn't given much thought to this matter, and used {pe'bIl}, because I thought that in English lightning and lightning bolt were actually the same. Until I wondered why all English sources about Zeus say "lightning bolt" instead of just "lightning". It was then when I became confused. On the other hand though, I thought "but I've never heard someone say in English 'he was hit by a lightning bolt', so how much of a difference can there be"?

Anyways, I understand now, so thanks. I'll just keep using {pe'bIl} on its' own.

~ Dana'an o zeus, o father, o king! _______________________________________________ tlhIngan-Hol mailing list tlhIngan-Hol@lists.kli.org http://lists.kli.org/listinfo.cgi/tlhingan-hol-kli.org

Don’t forget the verb {raw} “lightning”: rawbogh Qun neH ghaH ZEUS’e’ Zeus is the only god that “lightnings”. or even as an epithet: ZEUS rawwI’ Zeus, the “lightning-er” True, these translations sound decidedly awkward in English but probably less so in Klingon. BTW, we’ve seen a weather verb used metaphorically in Klingon: ghIq QavwI'chaj DuQchu' qeylIS betleH chaHDaq SIStaHvIS negh 'Iw Then Kahless's bat'leth pierced the last of them, showered with the soldiers' blood. (PB) … and in English: (st.klingon 11/1997): Speakers who do this seem to be aware that they are breaking the rules, so they are doing it for rhetorical effect. (It has the same sort of feeling, perhaps, as if someone were to say in English … “It's lightninging and thundering outside…”) Voragh __________________________________________________________________ From: mayqel qunen'oS Thank you SuStel, voragh, and charghwI' for taking the time to reply. voragh:

Or is lightning (the general phenomenon) an attribute of another god whom you need to distinguish from Zeus?

No, the only god in reference to whom I've seen the lightning bolt is Zeus. In the beginning, I hadn't given much thought to this matter, and used {pe'bIl}, because I thought that in English lightning and lightning bolt were actually the same. Until I wondered why all English sources about Zeus say "lightning bolt" instead of just "lightning". It was then when I became confused. On the other hand though, I thought "but I've never heard someone say in English 'he was hit by a lightning bolt', so how much of a difference can there be"?

(st.klingon 11/1997):

Speakers who do this seem to be aware that they are breaking the rules, so they are doing it for rhetorical effect. (It has the same sort of feeling, perhaps, as if someone were to say in English … “It's lightninging and thundering outside…”)

What is this "this" which speakers do? jIH:

pe'bIl tIH 'oH wa' zeus DI'on''e' one of the characteristics of zeus is the lightning ray/beam De'vID: FWIW, I read your Klingon sentence before your English translation, and I took {tIH} to mean "shaft (of spear)", as though the lightning were a physical weapon which is hurled like a spear, which is pretty much what Zeus does with a lightning bolt.

I like this alternate translation, since after all this is what Zeus seems to do; i.e. throw the lightning as a spear. However, I'd like to take this opportunity to say, that one of the things in Klingon I dislike (and when I say dislike, I mean hate), is when multiple meanings are shoved on a single word. If I say {muD Qun ghaH zeus'e'}, then what do I mean? "Zeus is a god of weather", or "Zeus is a god of the atmosphere"? Now, yes, even in natural languages this can happen/happens, but the tools one has in a natural language (vocabulary + grammar) give him ways to make things clear. Let alone the fact, that in natural languages there are so many synonyms for a number of words. So one can simply choose another word/synonym. Of course, being on this list for almost 6 years, I know/expect that someone will say "context will clarify". But I don't think that a reader is obligated to read an entire paragraph each time the clarification could easily be made, if only we hadn't received a billion different meanings for a single word. ~ Dana'an *zeus is, zeus was, zeus will be; o great zeus!*

Good analysis. Of course, we feel different about our word “weather” than we feel about the term “atmosphere status”, but since Klingon doesn’t have a word for “weather”, maybe they feel exactly the same about the phrase {muD Dotlh} as we feel about our word “weather”. I think the real meat you your analysis is that Zeus is not the guy who tells you about the weather, like a meteorologist. Zeus is the guy who can CHANGE the weather. We could list the different things that Zeus can do with the weather, as you suggest, but I’d guess that since Zeus can probably cause lightning, rain, wind, etc. to start, he could also cause them to stop, so even the absence of all the specific kinds of weather we associate with Zeus could be caused by Zeus. The important thing you’ve pointed out is that Zeus is not one who observes or reports on weather. Zeus causes changes in weather to happen. charghwI’ ‘utlh (ghaH, ghaH, -Daj)

On May 25, 2021, at 8:01 AM, SuStel <sustel@trimboli.name> wrote:

On 5/25/2021 7:45 AM, mayqel qunen'oS wrote:

...

(st.klingon 11/1997):

...

Speakers who do this seem to be aware that they are breaking the rules, so they are doing it for rhetorical effect. (It has the same sort of feeling, perhaps, as if someone were to say in English … “It's lightninging and thundering outside…”)

What is this "this" which speakers do? Erroneously think of -moH as being part of the verb stem and saying things like quvmoH'egh he/she honors himself/herself. See the transcript here: klingonska.org/canon/1997-11-30-news.txt <http://klingonska.org/canon/1997-11-30-news.txt>

...

However, I'd like to take this opportunity to say, that one of the things in Klingon I dislike (and when I say dislike, I mean hate), is when multiple meanings are shoved on a single word.

If I say {muD Qun ghaH zeus'e'}, then what do I mean? "Zeus is a god of weather", or "Zeus is a god of the atmosphere"? There are two problems here.

First of all, muD doesn't mean weather. muD means atmosphere, and you can talk about muD Dotlh the status of the atmosphere to refer to what the weather is doing. We don't have a term for the actual weather in Klingon, just status of the atmosphere. So I can say things like muD Dotlh HIja'! Tell me what the weather is like! (Literally, Tell me the atmosphere's status!), but I probably wouldn't say things like muD Dotlh Qun ghaH Zeus'e' Zeus is the god of the atmosphere's status, because what I WANT to say is that he's the god of the rain and wind and lightning and clouds all put together, not the god of the weather report.

Secondly, you MUST accept that languages give multiple meanings to words. ALL languages do it. I can't demonstrate this in Greek for you, but it's easy in English: I'll pick a word, say high. Dictionary.com lists forty distinct senses of the word. How do you know which sense I mean when I say it? Context. If I say I can jump really high, you know I don't mean high as in sense 16, "rich; extravagant; luxurious" or sense 18, "remote." Or most of the others. You know what I mean, because there's only a limited number of those senses that I could apply to my own jumping.

...

Now, yes, even in natural languages this can happen/happens, but the tools one has in a natural language (vocabulary + grammar) give him ways to make things clear. Let alone the fact, that in natural languages there are so many synonyms for a number of words. So one can simply choose another word/synonym.

Of course, being on this list for almost 6 years, I know/expect that someone will say "context will clarify". But I don't think that a reader is obligated to read an entire paragraph each time the clarification could easily be made, if only we hadn't received a billion different meanings for a single word. You don't need to read a whole paragraph to get context. In I jump really high, the context is me jumping. That's enough context to know which kind of high I'm talking about.

-- SuStel http://trimboli.name <http://trimboli.name/>_______________________________________________ tlhIngan-Hol mailing list tlhIngan-Hol@lists.kli.org http://lists.kli.org/listinfo.cgi/tlhingan-hol-kli.org

On 5/25/2021 10:50 AM, SuStel wrote:

On 5/25/2021 10:32 AM, Will Martin wrote:

...

Of course, we feel different about our word “weather” than we feel about the term “atmosphere status”, but since Klingon doesn’t have a word for “weather”, maybe they feel exactly the same about the phrase {muD Dotlh} as we feel about our word “weather”.

If they do, then it's an idiom we can't recreate through pure analysis. We use the noun /weather/ in a couple of different senses: the collection of wind, water, visibility, and temperature in the atmosphere ("The bad weather wrecked the boat"); the current state of the atmosphere due to all those factors ("The weather isn't looking good for flying today"); and the reporting on this state ("And now on to the weather"). Taken literally, the Klingon *muD Dotlh* is only the second of these: the state of the atmosphere due to the effects of wind, water, etc.

Now, one could say that Zeus is the god of the state of the atmosphere, and that wouldn't be inaccurate, but when one says Zeus is a god of the weather, I think one is really referring to the first of the senses I mentioned: he commands the wind, water, visibility, temperature, and so on in the sky. Those things aren't the *muD Dotlh,* though together they can change the *muD Dotlh.*

In other words, if my boat is being tossed about on the waves, it's not because the /status/ of the atmosphere is tossing it about; it's because the physical phenomena of wind and water in the sky are tossing it about. In English, we use the word /weather/ for both of these things; in Klingon, it appears to me that *muD Dotlh* is specifically the former, the status of the atmosphere, and we don't seem to have a single term to refer specifically to the collection of physical phenomena.

Or to put it another, another way, if you ordered me to *QuQ Dotlh ja'*/Report engine status!/ I might reply, *tujqu' QuQ*/The engine is overheating./ I would NOT say *tujqu' QuQ Dotlh*/The engine status is overheating./ If you ordered me to *muD Dotlh ja'*/Report atmosphere status!/ I might reply *SuS 'ej SIS*/It's windy and rainy./ I would not reply *SuS muD Dotlh 'ej SIS*/The atmosphere status is blowing and raining./ -- SuStel http://trimboli.name

On 5/25/2021 11:08 AM, Will Martin wrote:

The word “status” implies an unchanging state. It’s often numeric, like a temperature measurement, or an average wind speed or velocity (speed, plus direction), but technically speed implies change in location at a measured rate, so it’s a statistic that doesn’t exist without change. Change in location is NECESSARY for speed to exist.

A lot of things in weather don’t exist without change. The barometer readings typically include the modifiers “falling” or “rising”, because the change in the measurement is more meaningful than the specific number frozen in time.

Rain implies a quantity of water moving from the clouds to the ground, changing the state of the cloud (less moist) and the ground (more wet).

What you're describing is the uncertainty principle (a function and its Fourier transform cannot both concentrate on small sets). The more precisely you narrow down the temporal scope of the measurement, the less precisely you know the value of the measurement you're looking for, because the phenomenon itself has a temporal component. I don't believe the word /status/ implies an unchanging state, since one needn't attempt to reduce the temporal domain of a measurement to zero to obtain a status. In any case, I fail to see the relevance to this conversation. -- SuStel http://trimboli.name

On 5/25/2021 12:04 PM, nIqolay Q wrote:

On Tue, May 25, 2021 at 10:32 AM Will Martin <willmartin2@mac.com <mailto:willmartin2@mac.com>> wrote:

Good analysis.

Of course, we feel different about our word “weather” than we feel about the term “atmosphere status”, but since Klingon doesn’t have a word for “weather”, maybe they feel exactly the same about the phrase {muD Dotlh} as we feel about our word “weather”.

KGT, p. 220, ("Klingon-Federation Standard" dictionary)

*muD* weather (in general) (n)

*muD Dotlh *weather (at any given moment) (n)

Well, well, well! Whoever thought of looking at the actual word list? And there we are. Zeus isn't God of the Weather at a Given Moment; he's God of the Weather in General. *muD Qun.* -- SuStel http://trimboli.name