Chemistry in Esperanto

 Kemio en Esperanto

Gxenerala, Organika kaj Biologia Kemio

Success! Well, okay… only a minor success, but still. I finally managed to track down a PDF copy of “General, Organic, and Biological Chemistry” in Esperanto (Gxenerala, Organika, kaj Biologia Kemio). Yes Finally! After months of trying to track it down on the internet. I finally contacted an Esperanto speaker in Columbia, who gave me a link to the only working torrent.

http://isohunt.com/download/70393117/2afe090c0ce000911d7c89f499858d01ef8033a1.torrent

Sukceso! Bone, okaj… nur malgranda sukceso, sed ankoraŭ. Mi fine sukces ..mi trovis .PDF kopio de “Ĝenerala, Organika, kaj Biologia Kemio” en Esperanto (Gxenerala, Organika, kaj Biologia Kemio). Jes Fine! Post monatoj de provanta spuri ĝi en Interreto. Mi fine kontaktita Esperantoparolanton en Kolumbio, kiu donis min la korekto ligon por torento.

I originally found out about that book (Gxenerala, Organika, kaj Biologia Kemio) after doing a random search about the -ENZO suffix, and how it originated. That search led me to the reference to the translation of the book by the Chicago Esperanto Society. So, logically you would think that by contacting the Chicago Esperanto Society, would pave way to obtaining a copy…

sakarozo (sukero - sukrozo), glukozo kaj fruktozo

…NOPE. They had never heard of it, nor had any copies. I’m not sure why it was so hard to track down, but alas i’m happy i found it. Now the work can continue on being able to translate Penumbra Overture into Esperanto. And eventually my original goal of translating the Golden Book of Chemistry Experiments into Esperanto as well. I’ve already translated the cover. It reads “La Valora Libro da Kemiaj Eksperimentoj”.

La Valora Libro Da Kemiaj Eksperimentoj

I’m still not that great at Esperanto, and still haven’t learned enough about the grammar, but I’m getting better at as time goes on.

and here is an interesting demonstration about combustion in chemistry by Daniel Solomon.

Kaj tio estas interesa klarigo de bruligxo esperante en kemia fakultato de Varsovia Politekniko je 14/12/07 de Daniel Salomon.

Esperanto and the -enzo suffix

Penumbra Overture Esperanto Map

So, today i was translating the maps for Penumbra Overture. I was curious as to where the “-enzo” suffix comes from. Many if not most of my Dictionaries don’t have it mentioned. Peter Benson’s comprehensive dictionary is one of the few that do, and actively uses it. Here is a neat article i found that describes how the term was invented.  http://www.chicagoreader.com/chicago/cu-iu-ci-tie-parolas-esperante/Content?oid=870796

Here is a copy of the important parts in Bold:

Cu iu ci tie parolas Esperante?
(Anyone here speak Esperanto?)
By Korey Willoughby

Despite a bad rainstorm, 25 members of the Chicago Esperanto Society have gathered at the Public Library Cultural Center to dedicate a new book, a translation into Esperanto of a college-level chemistry text………………<SNIP>

Thus the chemistry book that has provided the occasion for this meeting–it’s called Generala Organika kaj Biologia Kemio or “General Organic and Biochemistry”–is being dedicated to the countries of the third world. Bixby tells the audience that third world people are at a tremendous disadvantage because they have to spend years learning English before they can study science. “English is not an easy language to learn,” she says. “And scientific English is definitely not easy.”

Because Esperanto has a simplified grammatical structure and follows regular rules of pronunciation and spelling, Esperantists say it can be learned in much less time than it takes to learn English. “We believe the time will come when people of the third world can learn Esperanto in one-sixth the time and then learn science through Esperanto,” Bixby says.

But as the chemistry-book project demonstrates, translating scientific material into Esperanto takes a lot of time and hard work. Fifteen people from nine different countries worked on the translation. The project took six years to complete.

One of the problems was that much of the scientific terminology needed for the text didn’t exist in Esperanto before the project started. Scientists had to devise it as they translated the book.

“People said the book couldn’t be done because Esperantists hadn’t worked out the chemical and scientific terminology,” says Bixby. “But the way you create a language is by needing it, by using it, by working with it every day. We now have made a host of scientific terminology clear.”

For example, Esperanto had no word for what English-speaking scientists call “tracers,” the radioactive chemicals used in nuclear medicine. The editors of the textbook had to combine the Esperanto verb traci, “to trace,” with the affix enzo, derived from the Esperanto esenco, “substance.” The result was tracenzo, “substance that traces.”……………<SNIP>

Esperanto’s capacity to grow and change in the face of new situations has made it much more successful than a host of other created languages, most of which have dropped into obscurity………….<SNIP>

EDIT: i found a torrent which has a copy of the rare Esperanto chemistry book mentioned above. (Get it here)

Esperanto word mixup today

So, I’ve been working on translating the game Penumbra Overture into Esperanto.

Unfortunately, i had a word mixup that really confused me. I was looking for the word “gunpowder”, and i thought it said the EO equivalent was “pluvo”. But, the word “pluvo” means “rain”. And you cant have two words with that much difference mean the same thing. So, i went off trying to figure of other ways of translating gunpowder.

I thought “Pluvoro” was supposed to be powder. I was confused as why. Because the rootword “oro” means “gold”.

These are all the words i considered. The prefix “paf” means shoot or gun. The suffix “pasto” means dough. “eksplodenzo” means explosion (substance). “faruno” means flour.

pafpluvoro?
….pafpasto?
….pafeksplodenzo?

….maybe paffaruno?

I finally figured out i read it wrong. Gunpowder is “Pulvo” and Rain is “Pluvo”. See how they can easily get confused? I finally decided to use Pafpulvoro (shootingpowder). Hopefully that will prevent anyone playing the game from thinking it’s “rain”. Oh, and the -oro attached the the back of “powder” doesent mean gold. It means “pulverised substance”. Yeah, pulvoro is any powder.

mia ornama maizo travivis neĝo-ŝtormon

[English]

My [ornamental] indian corn just survived a brief spring snowstorm. Here in Northern Colorado spring snowstorms are common, and have even happened once on the 4th of july!

My decision to plant it on April 1st probably was a bit early, but the corn is very hardy, and seems to be thriving anyway. It’s survived two early morning frosts as well as the snow, so it’s pretty clear they are adapted to these conditions. I look forward to seeing how they develop by fall.

I predicted with a crappy punnit square that about 1/4 should theoretically be pure purple when fully grown, with 2/3 with half green/red colors, and another 1/4 fully green. I am excited to find out. From my research on the subject, i think there are seperate genes for purple pollen, purple husks, purple stalks, and of course color of seeds. That makes it seem hard to get homozygous crosses of all purple traits.

———–

[Esperanto]

Mia ornama maizo postvivis mallongan printemp-neĝoŝtormon. Ĉi tie hejme en Nordaj Koloradio printempaj neĝoŝtormoj estas komunaj kaj eĉ okazis sur la 4-a de julio iam!

Mia decido planti ĝin en la 1-a de aprilo verŝajne estis tre frue sed la maizo estas tre fortika kaj ŝajnas esti prosperanta ĉiuokaze. Ĝi travivis du fruajn matenajn frostojn kaj la neĝo, tiel ke ĝi estas sufiĉe klara, ke ili estas adaptiĝinte por ĉi tiuj ĉirkaŭaĵoj. Mi aspektas antaŭen vidi, kiel ili evoluas de aŭtuno.

Mi prognozita kun aĉa “punnit” kvadrata, ke pri 1/4 devus teorie esti pura purpura, kiam plene kreskinta, kun 2/3, kun duono verdaj / ruĝaj koloroj aliaj 1/4 kaj plene verda. Mi estas ekscita por malkovri. El miaj esploroj pri la temo, mi kredas, ke estas apartaj genoj por purpura poleno, purpuraj ŝeloj, purpuraj tigoj, kompreneble kaj koloro de semoj. Tio faras ĝin ŝajni malmola iĝi “homozygous” trapasas de ĉiuj purpurajn trajtojn.