Saturday, February 7, 2026

"Permanently pause"?

特朗普"permanently pause",汉语直译是“永久暂停”。问Google "Does 'permanently pause' sound like an oxymoron?"(注:oxymoron是“矛盾修辞”)回答Yes, the phrase "permanently pause" is an oxymoron because its two words contradict each other. 问ChatGPT,答It sounds contradictory, but it isn’t actually an oxymoron因为"pause" is being reinterpreted: instead of meaning “temporary stop,” it’s being used in a broader sense of “stop (without specifying duration).” Then permanently clarifies the duration. 问DeepSeek,答它can be considered a mild oxymoron / is technically oxymoronic但through common usage—especially in tech and business—it has developed a clear and practical meaning: to halt a process with no intention of ever resuming it, while often implying that the thing itself is not being deleted. So, while it's an oxymoron in a dictionary sense, it's a useful and accepted phrase in modern language.查Google图书,在1895年的《New York Court of Appeals》中就已出现"permanently pause"。

汉译为“永久暂停”也许非上乘,不妨译作“不设期限地暂停”更符合该词组的真正的意义。假如外国人问为什么那么多“无期徒刑”并且“缓期执行”实际并非“无期”?道理相同,也是因为我们用词不当。

Friday, February 6, 2026

A few medical terms

The broadest English term for 受伤 is injury, while wound refers only to injuries with visible cuts or skin damage, and does not include sprains, strains, or bruises. A sprain is an injury to a ligament (the connection between bones), and a strain is an injury to a muscle or tendon (the connection between muscle and bone). [英语“受伤”最广义的词是injury,而wound仅指有可见伤口或皮肤损伤的伤,不包括扭伤sprain、拉伤strain、瘀伤bruise。扭伤是韧带(ligament,骨骼与骨骼的连接)受伤,拉伤是指肌肉或肌腱(tendon,肌肉与骨骼的连接)受伤。]

By the way, a non-medical person may confuse the two words ligament and tendon. Here's a trick. A ligament is a link, connecting two things of the same type, between one bone and another bone in this case. (Generally speaking, there's no such thing connecting a muscle to another muscle, so that's ruled out.) For tendon, think of the word tension; they both begin with ten- and end with -on. When a muscle pulls on a bone, the muscle is under tension.

In case you can't think of link when seeing ligament, think of the word ligature (as 'fi' for 'f' and 'i' bound by a ligature, or 'æ' for 'a' and 'e'), or even league, which originally meant a pact binding governments.