Can I refer to my catamaran as a ship?

[StuM]

Another definition which contains more than a grain of truth:


1. A boat leans to the right when turning right
2. A ship leans to the left when turning right.

[parkstone bay]

And submariners always call their vessel a "boat", regardless of size!

(To be very strictly pedantic, and just to keep the thread going, isn't a ship technically a sailing vessel "square rigged on 3 masts or more"?) That's a joke, but I'm blest if I'm going to find a smiling face to show that.

[hellosailor]

Generally, you can call your, uh, floating thing a ship if:
A) You want to be pretentious, or
B) It is over 100' long and self-propelled, or
C) It carries self-propelled boat(s) on board and regularly launches and uses them. (Dinghies don't count.)

Or, of course, you can look up the standards and definitions that your audience follows. Whether that's Chapman's or some federal code of regulations. Call it whatever keeps you happy.

[44'cruisingcat]

My grandad, who served in the Royal Navy through and after WW2, told me the definition of a ship that he was given:

A ship has more than one full length deck above the waterline.

Which seems to work, and explains why submarines, no matter how big, are referred to as boats.

[masonc]

You can call your boat a ship, and you can wear one of these cute hats as well.

[hellosailor]

FWIW, I've always been told that submarines are still called "boats" because for many years, a submarine was exactly that. A small craft carried aboard and launched from a larger ship, never intended to go any significant distance under its own power.

Remember "submarines" like the Hunley and the Turtle were pretty much playthings compared to the *ships* of their time. And once tradition comes in...that won't be changing.

[Whiz-Bang]

Originally Posted by hellosailor

Generally, you can call your, uh, floating thing a ship if:
A) You want to be pretentious, or
B) It is over 100' long and self-propelled, or
C) It carries self-propelled boat(s) on board and regularly launches and uses them. (Dinghies don't count.)

Or, of course, you can look up the standards and definitions that your audience follows. Whether that's Chapman's or some federal code of regulations. Call it whatever keeps you happy.

WRT C)... how about a "skiff", does that count?

[StuM]

[QUOTE=parkstone bay;2686350 That's a joke, but I'm blest if I'm going to find a smiling face to show that.[/QUOTE]


Just type a ":" followed by a ")"

[Shadowwalker]

A ship can carry a boat. A boat cannot carry a ship.

[Lost Horizons]

Originally Posted by Alan Mighty

Australian citizens have no "rights" compared to, for example, US citizens. No right of free speech (other than an implied right, according to a court interpretation), no right to travel, and so on.

Unfortunately, United States neither declares nor recognizes a right to travel.

[Olddan1943]

SV is the usual designation for a sailing vessel.
MV is the usual designation for a boat having an engine as the primary source of propulsion.
I just call mine a boat.

[Alan Mighty]

Originally Posted by Lost Horizons

Unfortunately, United States neither declares nor recognizes a right to travel.

I thought the Bill of Rights restrained the US govt from depriving a person of liberty without due process of law.

Granted, this did not seem to mean much to slaves.

But it suggests to me that US citizens have the right to move home, their place of abode, from one street to another, from one town to another, from one state to another.

Perhaps I have it wrong.

[hellosailor]

'Unfortunately, United States neither declares nor recognizes a right to travel."
Actually, it is pretty early in our Declaration of Independence that the rights to "life liberty and the pursuit of happiness" are mentioned, and our state and federal courts have all rules that "liberty" means we can go pretty much when and as we please, anything else being a question of "arrest" "kidnapping" or "imprisonment" and usually illegal.
Americans are one of the few peoples who are allowed to leave their country, or travel around within it, with "Papers! Where are your papers?!"
Now, getting back in without papers is more problematic, you have to prove you can be here. But leaving? Traveling? No one has ever asked me for my permit to do that. I just go.

[Wayfarer1008]

From Wikipedia to add more confusion to the ship controversy :
Ships are generally larger than boats, but there is no universally accepted distinction between the two. Ships generally can remain at sea for longer periods of time than boats.[3] A legal definition of ship from Indian case law is a vessel that carries goods by sea.[4] A common notion is that a ship can carry a boat, but not vice versa.[5] A US Navy rule of thumb is that ships heel towards the outside of a sharp turn, whereas boats heel towards the inside[6] because of the relative location of the center of mass versus the center of buoyancy.[7][8] American and British 19th Century maritime law distinguished "vessels" from other craft; ships and boats fall in one legal category, whereas open boats and rafts are not considered vessels.[9]

[MikeDofFreo]

Originally Posted by Alan Mighty

You're a genius, Mike. Good on ya, mate.

Have a stickie beak at this website wot has got it all wrong:

Do we have the right to freedom of speech in Australia?

Write in and set them straight, sport. You're a champion.

I think that you have misunderstood the cases under consideration.

The point was whether or not there is a guarantee of free speech, in the constitution, which would prevent parliament from reducing that right. Laws such as those against defamation can be seen, by some, as against free speech.

It was suggested, in the cases, referred to in the article to which you refer, that 2 sections of the constitution guaranteed free speech and prevented the government from legislating against it. if correct, that would mean that defamation laws did not apply.

The situation is now controlled by the High Court decision in Lange which held that those 2 sections of the Australian Constitution only refer to political debate in the context of the electoral system.

Hence, the decisions do not remove the common law assumption of free speech, they simply say that there is no bar to parliament legislating to curb some areas of free speech by passing defamation laws. However, the there is a restriction on that curb where it would interfere with speech in respect of the electoral system.