[CHAPTER VI]
The Question of Nomenclature
If we take up a book or a paper dealing with mathematics (especially analysis) printed in a language, such as Japanese, which is quite unintelligible to us, we shall, nevertheless, soon succeed in finding out what it is about and often in understanding its main contents. The reason of this is, of course, that the mathematical formulæ consist of symbols which are intelligible to us because they are used in the same manner by all civilised nations. The same thing holds good in physics, and especially in chemistry; chemical formulæ contain at the present day such detailed information concerning the relationships of the substances symbolised, that one might conceive the possibility of writing a chemical paper with formulæ alone.
In the case of the descriptive natural sciences, the Latin names of the genera and species, the Latin nomenclature of anatomy and other similar groups, form a common international possession. Physiology, biology, sociology, as well as history and ancient philology, possess as yet, however, no system of internationally intelligible terms. In modern philology (phonetics) practical endeavours have already been made to construct an international system of sound symbols. All these sciences possess naturally the designation of numbers by means of numerals which have a perfectly international character. Since in mathematics not only the quantities, but also the operations, are denoted by universally understood symbols, it is already possible, with comparatively few additions, to express long trains of mathematical thought in a manner which is internationally intelligible, that is, intelligible to those who are acquainted with the science and its symbols. For a considerable time Professor Peano, in Turin, has been publishing works written in this manner. We perceive here the realisation of the ideal of a purely ideographic language, which can be read by the specialist without his requiring to translate it into the words of any particular form of speech.
To quote a similar example from chemistry, J. H. van't Hoff, in one of the publications of his youth, avoided assigning names to the chemical substances with which he dealt, considering that his meaning would be much better conveyed by the corresponding structural formulæ. Such a text would be quite intelligible to a trained chemist without the formulæ calling up in his mind any particular words, indeed without any such words existing at all.
These well-known facts show that the problem of an international language has already been partly solved in science. In so far as definite and fairly stable concepts have been formed in science, they may be designated by arbitrary symbols, which may if necessary be universally accepted and understood. Hitherto such symbols have been mainly employed for reading, that is to say intended for the eye, and not for the voice and ear. For example, in different languages quite different sounds are assigned to the numerals, so that, whilst the written symbols are universally intelligible, the spoken ones are not.
However, there are a considerable number of exceptions to this statement. The word integral is quite as international as the symbol ∫ and the chemical symbol Tl is pronounced everywhere thallium, or something very like it. On looking through the table of the chemical elements one finds that more than two-thirds of the names possess similar sounds in the chief languages. Differences occur only in the case of the well-known elements, where the words employed in daily life have found their way into science, whilst the newly discovered elements all possess international names. It follows from this that the further problem of assigning an international system of sounds to scientific concepts has been in certain departments of science already approximately solved. It is true that the sound is still somewhat dependent on the speech basis of the particular nation, so that, for example, not inconsiderable deviations may occur in English. But, as the written and printed word is always simultaneously known, the recognition of a name as pronounced by a foreigner does not cause any very great difficulty.
There exists here a field of work for those who are interested in the idea of an artificial language which is as fertile as it is interesting. As is well known, we scientific men suffer a good deal from the fact that the same words are frequently employed for the vague ideas of daily life as well as for the perfectly definite concepts of science. This is indeed one of the most important reasons why new designations for scientific concepts should, as far as possible, be taken from the dead languages, such designations being thereby already international. It ought therefore to be a comparatively easy task to devise by means of this international material and the linguistic rules of the language of the Delegation a system of international names for the clearly defined concepts of the different sciences.
Such a system possesses a double purpose. In the first place, it could, I think, be used in our present natural languages. Certain English expressions occurring in electrotechnics, such as shunt, extra current, are employed in German and French just as if they were national words. The international names in their international form might be employed in every case where a precise scientific terminology was required, without doing much violence to our natural languages. The inflow of foreign words through the channels of technology and science as well as those of commerce and music has already shown itself to be irresistible, so that a strict carrying out of the principle of "purity" in our national languages has been a practical impossibility. In literature properly so called one will endeavour nevertheless to adhere to this principle, but where the chief question is one of precision of concepts, as in science, language must be regarded as a handmaiden, whose first duty is to obey. For language stands only in a secondary relationship to the independently developed and determined concepts of science, which have been already fixed by the symbols assigned to them, just in the same way that language has fixed the concepts of daily life.