Non normal or abnormal

[Mo Heekan]

I'm sorry, but where or why has 'non-normal' suddenly taken over from abnormal?

Sorry for my rantings, but I now see check lists saying "in a non normal situation". Would someone please tell me where 'abnormal' has gone and is non-normal correct?

It sounds very Americanese to me.

I'm confused (not difficult), so please help.....

:confused:

[ramsrc]

As far as British English is concerned, to the best of my knowledge there is no such word as "non-normal". The opposite of "normal" is "abnormal"

I am afraid I cannot comment with respect to our friends on the other side of the pond, but there is no reference to "non-normal" in any dictionaries I have looked in.

The only thing I can think of, is perhaps it is thought to be clearer when read quickly?

[Weight and Balance]

My wife the English teacher tells me it's all about connotations, or the emotional linkages we have to words that may be in addition to their "official" denotation.

In North America, "abnormal" makes people think of craziness, mental disease, and so on. On some sub-conscious level, a North American might say to himself "well, the engine is on fire, but I'm not abnormal, and my co-pilot probably isn't abnormal, so I'll skip that page in the emergency procedures".

My wife the English teacher also tells me that, in English, if a word appears more than once in publicly distributed documents, it is "official". Dictionaries record things after the fact and are usually several years, or decades, out of date. This is unlike some other languages (French comes to mind), where there are official dictionaries, enforceable by law.

[Trash Hauler]

non Normal would be francois and ABnormal would be for all you despicable people who do not come from this most illustreous country (excepting our brotheirs in the eastern provinceirs of Canada) ..............................................TIC :D:eek:

[BEagle]

I imagine the antipodean expression is "She's f*cked mate" drills?

[Young Paul]

"Non-normal" is a Boeing-ism, I believe, for something that is not routine, but not emergency. I think it covers things from cross-bleed starts to engine shutdown and relights.

Abnormal would have covered it. If you get engineers (in the broad sense) to write things, don't expect English.

My favourite other example is making the singular of "vertices" "vertice" in a computer graphics application.

From an ex-engineer (in the broad sense).

[machone]

Could the change in language be something to do with liability. Insurance and manufacturers. non normal does not sound as serious as abnormal or " its f....d" checklist.
:(

[lunkenheimer]

It sounds 'Americanese' but especially 'Lawyeresque' to me. Of course, in the US, we have become somewhat desensitized to the lawyers.

Could be an 'engineerism' (I used to couldnt spel engginere, now I are one :) ) (truly, I am) but my money is on the lawyers

[twistedenginestarter]

English is not simply a language used for communication by English people. It is a worldwide common language as well. We should call it the lingua franca but that sounds slightly wrong to me. Anyway, as a result we must be tolerant of different styles.

Australians are reasonably ok. They do little else apart from change the ending of all nouns to 'i' or 'ie' eg Uni, tinnie, hostie etc.

By contrast Americans like to make up new words and constructions rather that use existing ones. You may be inclined to think this is not actually English but something called perhaps georgebushish, but you are wrong. It is still the language of Shakespeare (not that you can understand that without help).

The main thing is do you understand what they are saying. The answer is - almost always you do.

[Engineer]

Non-normal

This euphemism appears to have replaced the supplementary procedures that complimented the normal, emergency and abnormal procedures in the AFM.

Various airlines appear to refer to them as conditional or additional procedures. Have seen one example where abnormal procedures were referred to as irregular procedures.

One can only assume that since these items were additional to the emergency/abnormal checklists and not covered in the Normal checklist then a good idea was to call them non-normal.

What in a name eh!!:) :) :)

['%MAC']

Twistedenginestarter brings up a very good point. During the succession of the American colonies, a statesman and educator proposed that to truly cut the ties with the English empire and become an independent country a new language was required. So it was that this educator and statesman started on his endeavor to write a dictionary with new spelling and sometimes new words, which amazingly was adopted by the new colonies. Noah Webster brought about other changes in education, but his perversion of the English language and the authority he gives, even from his grave, to change and modify language is his most lasting legacy. Now, I do prefer the OED for learning etymology and literary examples, but when forced into technical writing I am bound by the APA publication manual. The APA is very clear on which references I may use: Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary or Webster’s Third New International Dictionary.

Young Paul hit nail on head, this is a Boeingism. Probably with help from the legal department. As for Bushisms, take a lose fitting homonym and choose the most absurd. Exempli Gratia:
Press: “Now that Al Gore has conceded, you are the President, how do you feel?”
Bush: “Well, Al Gore was rather arrogant, but it’s a little unfair to call him conceited.”
Another Bushism, ‘cause they’re so fun. “The problem isn’t pollution... the problem is the impurities in the air and water.”

But Dan Quayle was the all time best, visiting a fourth grade spelling bee, he misspelled ‘potato’. Or citing the often quoted “a mind is a terrible thing to waste” he forgot the rather important words ‘to waste’. Considering who we have had in the White House recently, I’m voting for the Monarchy next time. But I’m in Florida so it probably won’t be counted.

[Capt. Crosswind]

After thinking about this momentarily I suggest non-normal is an
abnormal expression

[twistedenginestarter]

Actually Boeish is a language which should be discouraged.

Technical occupations like commercial aviation involve a lot of jargon. Jargon is words which have special contextual meaning even though they may be otherwise quite ordinary words.

If some one asks whether you have a back-up for your Powerpoint presentation, you will assume they mean an electronic copy of the source rather than a pile of supporting affidavits or a group of large mean looking black blokes with polished heads.

If Boeing start talking about non-normal rather that abnormal then you flush away all the meaning of abnormal and have to waste time trying to gauge whether Boeing are trying to create some new subtle meaning for their new jargon word. You may be left thinking "do I use this procedure when things are only slightly unusual but not when things are really bad- in which case what am I supposed to do then?"

In the UK you can see some stuff specially written to be plain and simple (I think Egg is like this). It is so much better.

I think Boeing are just being self-indulgent allowing their people to write waffle when a tiny bit more thought could give us the meaning phrased accurately, simply and unamibiguously.

These people are simply being lazy. They don't quite like the connotations of an existing usage so they make up a new one. Trouble is as that point they are the only ones who understand what the new usage means. Everyone else now has the burden of working it out.

[Young Paul]

Well, how do you think language actually comes about, then???!!!

10000 new words a year, and about 50 stick in general use and 2000 in technical use.