[Due to technical difficulties, I'm posting this on behalf of Lila Gleitman.]
The nonsense about Eskimos having a zillion words for snow just won't go away. This morning on CNN a reporter said:
The Eskimos have more than 100 words for snow.and mentioned several of them, including a word for "pink snow", a word for "fried snow", and a word for "deep-fried snow". Even if the reporter hasn't yet learned the truth about this matter, and doesn't have a fact-checker, you'd think that an elementary knowledge of physics would suggest the implausibility of "fried snow".
My father, who was a humorous man, often pointed out that in the old Madison Square Garden they often had basketball in the afternoon and ice hockey at night. He said, and fooled me for a few years, that they had these machines so marvelous as to chill the water so fast that it was still warm when it first froze. Just think what he would have gotten past CNN!
Posted by Bill Poser at January 24, 2005 12:36 AM