Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Why do ships use “port” and “starboard” instead of “left” and “right?”

oceanservice.noaa.gov

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

341–350 of 636 posts

Re: Why do ships use “port” and “starboard” instead of “left” and “right?”

#341

Post by HPsquared »

lostlogin wrote: post #258
HPsquared wrote: post #254

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you're inside a ship, it's often hard to say what way around you are: "left" and "right" have utility for the perspective of a person onboard. Port and starboard are the onboard equivalent of North/South/East/West when walking on land, especially if you're inside a building with no windows for external reference. This is unlike for a doctor, where it's obvious which side is which: you can see the patient.

> This is unlike for a doctor, where it's obvious which side is which: you can see the patient. This isn’t always true and it’s not always obvious. For example with imaging - axial slices of the patient through symmetrical structures. The brain, lower abdo, a single leg or arm etc, etc. There are conventions in image display for a reason - it is not obvious. For axial slices, as an observer, you are positioned as tho…

Shouldn't doctors simply use the Greek or Latin words for left and right?

Re: Why do ships use “port” and “starboard” instead of “left” and “right?”

#342

Post by denton-scratch »

jdietrich wrote: post #130
abhibeckert wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> At the other extreme you have the medical profession where the first thing you learn in medical school is that left/right always refer to the patient's perspective In (musical) theatre we do it the other way around. The we call it "stage left" and "stage right" or "SL and SR" since we use abbreviations everywhere in our notes. It's always from the "stage manager's perspective" which is traditionally (but not always…

In the automotive trade, a vehicle has a "driver's side" and "passenger side". This only partly solves the ambiguity, because of course some countries drive on the left.

Commonly referred to as "offside" and "nearside"; terms I find confusing. I think the nearside is the side near the edge of the road, and the offside is the side near the center of the road.

Re: Why do ships use “port” and “starboard” instead of “left” and “right?”

#343

Post by ivanhoe »

denton-scratch wrote: post #329
narrator wrote: post #267

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One interesting thing about middle ages technologies, like boats, is that the words in the different romance languages for things invented in this era are very different from each other. For example, in Spanish boat words like port and starboard are totally different[1]. Other examples of middle ages words that are very different: windmill = molino, wheelbarrow = carretilla. Words that refer to older things have more…

> windmill = molino I don't know Spanish, but "molino" looks like French "moulin", which is a mill; a windmill is "moulin a vent". So I reckon "very different" is an exaggeration.

and Italian "il mulino"... it all comes from Latin "molinum" for the mill (and "mola" for the grind stone used in mills)

Re: Why do ships use “port” and “starboard” instead of “left” and “right?”

#344

Post by cycomanic »

jojobas wrote: post #226
tzs wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's also the approach taken in some Australian native languages, e.g. [1], where they use absolute directions instead of relative directions, so they would call what we call the port side of a boat the north side if the boat was heading east, and call it the west side if the boat was heading north. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kuuk_Thaayorre_language

Surely they don't have built-in compasses, so what would they do in an unfamiliar location on an overcast day?

Actually I reca reading some interesting studies where they found that children from these tribes even after turned around blindfolded could readily point out absolute directions. I don't recall reading an explanation, but they did seem to have a better inherent way of orient themselves absolutely.

Re: Why do ships use “port” and “starboard” instead of “left” and “right?”

#345

Post by jodrellblank »

antognini wrote: post #89

It's interesting to compare how different professions handle the ambiguity in left/right. In the maritime world they went with an approach at one extreme, where they just use two completely separate words, "port" and "starboard." (Though that's far from the only case where there's a special word for something on a boat.) At the other extreme you have the medical profession where the first thing you learn in medical s…

Then you have cars, where left/right would make perfect sense in all cars from the driver’s perspective but instead people use “nearside” and “offside” which are relative to the kerb while driving[1]. That means it’s relative to which side of the road the country drives on so if you drive a right-hand-drive UK car into mainland Europe, do nearside and offside swap on that car and you need to buy differently named replacement parts?

Always annoying that it could be clearer and more stable and shorter to use the driver’s perspective with “Driver left/right” to be specific and then would be the same sides on all cars moving or parked in any orientation in all countries.

[1] not valid if you turn around and park backwards!

Re: Why do ships use “port” and “starboard” instead of “left” and “right?”

#346

Post by saiya-jin »

antognini wrote: post #89

It's interesting to compare how different professions handle the ambiguity in left/right. In the maritime world they went with an approach at one extreme, where they just use two completely separate words, "port" and "starboard." (Though that's far from the only case where there's a special word for something on a boat.) At the other extreme you have the medical profession where the first thing you learn in medical s…

French (maybe its in english too actually, natives could comment) say rive gauche and rive droit for which bank of the river or lake we talk about. Always taken from perspective of river flowing downhill. Makes sense, just takes some time getting used to when coming from language which doesnt obsess about it that much

Re: Why do ships use “port” and “starboard” instead of “left” and “right?”

#347

Post by pmontra »

narrator wrote: post #267
jjav wrote: post #191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Though that's far from the only case where there's a special word for something on a boat. Understatement of the week... pretty much everything on a boat has a different word for it. Often for practical reasons, sometimes purely traditional reasons. It is nice because it binds one to nautical tradition leading back centuries/millenia.

One interesting thing about middle ages technologies, like boats, is that the words in the different romance languages for things invented in this era are very different from each other. For example, in Spanish boat words like port and starboard are totally different[1]. Other examples of middle ages words that are very different: windmill = molino, wheelbarrow = carretilla. Words that refer to older things have more…

Molino is mulino in Italian. Ancient Greek and Latin had similar words starting with mol-. Given the importance of that technology I'm not surprised that the word didn't change much. English' mill is also close to the romance languages. [1]

Port and starboard used to be "babordo" and "tribordo" in Italian but they were replaced by "sinistra" (the very word used to say "left") and "dritta".

[1] https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/mill#Etymology_1

Re: Why do ships use “port” and “starboard” instead of “left” and “right?”

#348

Post by ivanhoe »

roveo wrote: post #339
denton-scratch wrote: post #329

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> windmill = molino I don't know Spanish, but "molino" looks like French "moulin", which is a mill; a windmill is "moulin a vent". So I reckon "very different" is an exaggeration.

I imagine this word should be of Indoeuropean origin, Eastern Slav words for a mill also contain m-l-n (e.g. melnitsa). Modern English lost the "n" part, but it was present in Middle English, milne.

yes, it's "mlin" or "mlyn" in a number of Slavic languages, and I just looked up it's etymology in Serbian and the book says it comes from old slavic "mъlinъ" which they say comes from the Latin root "molinum"

Re: Why do ships use “port” and “starboard” instead of “left” and “right?”

#349

Post by modernerd »

ajeet_dhaliwal wrote: post #335
HPsquared wrote: post #254

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you're inside a ship, it's often hard to say what way around you are: "left" and "right" have utility for the perspective of a person onboard. Port and starboard are the onboard equivalent of North/South/East/West when walking on land, especially if you're inside a building with no windows for external reference. This is unlike for a doctor, where it's obvious which side is which: you can see the patient.

It just seems like an old convention that has stuck, seem'm much simpler to anyone not familiar with ships to say 'ships left' or 'ships right' than to have new words. We don't do this with cars. You have a left rear door, not a port rear door.

> We don't do this with cars. You have a left rear door, not a port rear door.

“Driver side rear door” or “passenger side rear door” are pretty common, at least in the US and UK, where they mean the opposite.

“Nearside“ (passenger side nearest curb in a right-hand drive vehicle driving on the left) and “offside” (driver side furthest from curb) are also used in the UK.

Re: Why do ships use “port” and “starboard” instead of “left” and “right?”

#350

Post by theiz »

modernerd wrote: post #349
ajeet_dhaliwal wrote: post #335

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It just seems like an old convention that has stuck, seem'm much simpler to anyone not familiar with ships to say 'ships left' or 'ships right' than to have new words. We don't do this with cars. You have a left rear door, not a port rear door.

> We don't do this with cars. You have a left rear door, not a port rear door. “Driver side rear door” or “passenger side rear door” are pretty common, at least in the US and UK, where they mean the opposite. “Nearside“ (passenger side nearest curb in a right-hand drive vehicle driving on the left) and “offside” (driver side furthest from curb) are also used in the UK.

If you ever went 4x4 driving, you use driver / passenger to indicate the direction someone has to go to. This is because the navigation often is done from someone standing outside the car, where using left/right can be rather confusing.
Post reply on HN