English Language & Usage: Multi-Layered Discourse Room

12:02 AM

My condolences.

Especially for your father, of course.

terdon

12:14 AM

Thanks.

How is he coping?

terdon

OK. It's kind of strange that he's so far away but they haven't really been parts of each other's lives for more than 40 years. Hell, more than 50 actually.

shrugs

Wow. Not the most flattering profile pic:

user3629249

101

Wow.

12:31 AM

I see.

1 hour later…

1:51 AM

Mellifluous: autological or heterological?

2:42 AM

@Cerberus We had both a how-to-make-plural modus operandi and corpus collosum questions today.

I’ve mucked up the answer a bit but am too tired to set it straight.

@tchrist Oh, where?

> or for third-declension consonant-stem ~~nouns~~ neuters

But you could simply have said: for all neuter plurals.

Both in Greek and in Latin.

The suffix -a was probably originally something that indicated "a large number of, an abstract entity of".

3:00 AM

Yes, right.

Or at least at some point, that's what it was.

And both feminine -a and neuter plural -a probably came from this, the latter resulting in suppletive declension.

I was trying to think of other declensions and could only think of cornua, but that’s not third.

I'm not sure how widely this hypothesis is held, though.

I mean, neuters.

The fourth is kind of third.

3:01 AM

I don’t know any first-declension neuters.

There aren't any.

You think that might have something to do with it? :)

And, according to the hypothesis above, there shouldn't be any.

Oh yeah.

Could be!

So only 2nd and 3rd neuters.

4th is a 3rd disguised by a stem on -u- and contraction.

Gen. portu-is → portus

Dat. portui

3:03 AM

I was taught it was a u-stem not an i-stem.

Acc. portu-em → portum

Etc.

@tchrist What was?

4th.

It is.

2 mins ago, by tchrist

You think that might have something to do with it? :)

Oh, I thought that was about the 1st.

3:05 AM

You have to realize that it has been nearly as long as you have been alive since I paid much attention to all this.

But yeah, all neuter plurals are -a is a good mnemonic.

Phenomena

As opposed to phenomina. :)

The 1st is the easiest. Maybe that’s why it’s first? :)

(Thinking of the #2 pencil.)

3:37 AM

Hehe.

I don't know: is it really the easiest?

It does lack a neuter, that is true.

But it has -a twice and -ae thrice.

Almost as bad as the 4th's four -us'es.

4:13 AM

Not fond of 4th.

uʍop ǝpᴉsd∩

Proposed Q&A site for sǝƃɐssǝɯ uʍop ǝpᴉsdn ǝdʎʇ oʇ ǝʞᴉl oɥʍ ǝldoǝd

Currently in definition.

A: is "modus operandi" singular or plural?

4:57 AM

Modus operandi is singular in both Latin and English. The plural is modi operandi, and, judging from this Ngram, I would advise against modus operandis. Since there seems to be some confusion over why only modus changes form in the plural, but never operandi, I'll explain that too. Modus is the...

8 hours later…

terdon

12:53 PM

I'm voting to close this question as off-topic because there is only one answer, and that has been given. Besides the OP was really asking about the name of a commercial brand of fruit juice. — Mari-Lou A Mar 10 at 12:36

"I'm voting to close this question as off-topic because there is only one answer, and that has been given. " Huh?

Evaporated.

2 hours later…

2:36 PM

@Cerberus re the plural of modus operandi: So, in Latin, what then is the translation of the English 'methods of operations' (plural on both)? Suppose it is modus anni (the methods of the year, just the first singular) and you want 'the methods of the year?

That's 'modi annorum', right? (even though 'year' is singular, the genitive has to agree with the noun it modifies, right?). So then how to get 'methods of the years'? or a plural in the genitive noun? (unless the number is about the modifier not the modifiee)

2 hours later…

Andrew Leach

4:41 PM

Yes, the genitive has to agree with the noun it modifies, but only that noun. So it's annorum only if annus is plural, it doesn't matter about modus.

4:56 PM

@Mitch No, a genitive does not agree with its head noun at all.

They can be both plural, but independently so.

So "modes of the year" would be modi anni.

It works just as in English with of.

@AndrewLeach That is not true.

Andrew Leach

Well, I said what you did. Or at least, that's what I meant.

A genitive noun does not agree with anything (except when it does, which is rare: appositions and such).

Haha, if you said what I said, then that's good.

Andrew Leach

I said genitive, and meant that only the relevant noun is in the genitive case.

I'm not sure I understand that.

But the second sentence of your first line was right.

> So it's annorum only if annus is plural, it doesn't matter about modus.

@Mitch "Modes of the years" would indeed be modi annorum, since you pluralised both. It's really simple, it works the same way as in English.

5:36 PM

@Cerberus OK...so for genitive nouns, there is no agreement at all? But adjectives agree totally (gender/number/case)?

@Mitch Yes, exactly.

Otherwise, how could you say, "the daughters of this man are smart"?

The daughters = feminine, plural, nominative.

Of this man = masculine, singular, genitive.

You can have "the intellect of the daughters of this man", in which case they are both genitive; but that is not agreement, it's independent numbers that happen to be both plural.

The same applies to "the daughters of these men".

Just as in English.

5:52 PM

@Cerberus "feminae homini illi sapientiae sunt" ?

er "filiae homini illi sapientiae sunt" ?

and for plural men "filiae homin?? illorum sapientiae sunt" ?

shoot, 'homo' is in its own declension! I should pick 'dude' or 'guy'.

@Mitch Feminae hominis illius sapientes sunt.

@Mitch Homo is third declension, stem homin-, as you said.

@Cerberus arghh! Where is duolingo for Latin?!!!

@Mitch Filiae hominum illorum sapientes sunt.

I don't know: does it exist?

By the way, homo is more like "a human being, a person, man in general".

Well, they should really make it much more open to add things.

When you really mean a masculine individual, use vir.

Is it closed?

6:01 PM

memrise is a lot like duolingo but works for any subject matter (not just language) and you can create your own set of facts to learn.

Is it like one of those card thingies?

(but duolingo has a lot of little details that are better, and eventually you become their very willing translation slave)

Heh.

@Cerberus Oh. So what is singular 'homo' then? Mankind but a group of one?

Just a man when gender isn't important, or a person, a human being.

But usually you would translate man as vir.

6:06 PM

@Cerberus Memrise is not a flashcard system, it's just like duolingo in that it is a multiple modes system (multiple choice, speak, translate, read, write but just words or short sentences, organized to repeat at an appropriate schedule)

(duolingo has a flashcard option for vocab)

@Cerberus got it. sorta like Mensch und Mann. sorta