Re: [tlug] Is a power supplier under warranty?

["Stephen J. Turnbull" <stephen@example.com>]

Raymond Wan writes:

 > Thank you both for looking it up!  Funny that Japanese lists them both
 > as synonyms.

The Japanese language doesn't make the distinction, which goes both
ways.  You've heard of the famous Inuit languages with scores of words
for "snow", I suppose?  English doesn't have that many. :-)  I'm sure
there are plenty of examples in Japanese, too, but I can't think of
any striking ones off-hand.

I believe there are also cultural and economic implications.  For one,
in banking, Japanese institutions are horrible at evaluating credit
risk (please don't say "Lehmann shock", that was a "black swan" event
like the huge tsunami of 3/11 -- here I'm referring to consumer credit
and lending to SMEs, which do constitute statistical universes, and
charging appropriate premia for high-risk lending).  Instead they take
hostages (collateral in land or "rentai hoshounin").