MDMD(0): Sigmated Ampersand

[David Casseres]

jody sez

>The derivation of the word *ampersand* seems to be, literally: the symbol,
>"&", itself, stands for "and". That is, a word, defining a symbol, which
>stands for a word.
>
>Circular, reflexive, and perhaps annular comment on what lies between a
>symbol and what is symbolized.

Say whut?  The graphical symbol stands for "and," & it has a name, 
"ampersand."  This isn't the *derivation* of the word "ampersand," and it 
isn't reflexive or circular or even annular.

>But the glorious symbol chosen for the cover seems to harken back to the
>Latin Epsilon of Et, the first letter of the latin *and*. It is a huge
>Gothickal Epsilon with a voraciously extending tongue, threatening to lick,
>to taste, and more than just taste, anything it can, frog-like, flick into
>its digestive apparatus.

Yeah, except epsilon isn't latin at all, it's Greek, and the letter the 
ampersand is based on is a Latin E.

>And to what other uses have Epsilons, of the capital variety, been put?
>Well, (funny you should ask) mathematically speaking, to signify the
>process of summation  of all the sector'd subintervals of an area under a
>curve- as the number of subintervals increases toward infinity (or, the
>limit of the expanse of each subinterval approaches zero), i.e.,
>integration.

Yeah, but those are *not* of the capital variety -- they're little 
epsilons.



Cheers,
David