[meteorite-list] What makes a hammer a hammer?

From: Darren Garrison <cynapse_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Sat, 03 Jan 2009 22:17:32 -0500
Message-ID: <26a0m4h15rnbogpp97lvms68jusiumabpr_at_4ax.com>

On Sat, 3 Jan 2009 21:50:18 -0500, you wrote:

>I thought you meant to say the community of hammer collectors within the
>meteorite collecting community was small -- relative to the international
>meteorite collecting community itself.

I would say that it probably is, when defined as a "main concern" for the
collectors-- you have people who collect by type, people who collect by
location, people who collect only witnessed falls, and people who collect based
on wherther or not it hit some human artifact. At most, what percentage of
meteorite collectors have "hammers" being a main collecting criteria? 10%? I'd
bet that it doesn't approach 25%. It is, then, a small percentage of what is
already a tiny (compaired to world population and compaired to other areas of
collecting) group of people.

My point being-- a term in use by such a small number of people and known by
such a small number of people woukd, I think, be more vaguely defined than
something-- say-- that would reach The OED or Encyclopedia Britannica (leaving
the Urban Dictionary and Wikipedia out of the equation for the moment).
Received on Sat 03 Jan 2009 10:17:32 PM PST