English Language & Usage: Multi-Layered Discourse Room - 2012-04-23 (page 6 of 7)

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7:00 PM

It's sexy.

sounds foreign

1

Q: Money vs Monies

How would the meaning in the following phrase change if "monies" is replaced with "money"? universities would be diverted from basic research by the lure of new development monies from “the marketplace,”

Isn't this a dupe?

RegDwight ΒВBẞ8

1

Q: Should I use whose or which's?

Possible Duplicate: Other ways of saying whichs 'Which', 'whose' or something else? Is the word 'whose' referring to an inanimate object correct in this sentence? Usage of “whose” not referring to a person. Referring to some attribute of an inanimate object — use “who's”? ...

word-choice possessive

^ The longest dupe message I've ever composed.

@MattЭллен Ah right, I was thinking of something like that without the 'e'.

8

Q: When should a singular word ending in "y" end in "ies" plurally?

Words like "sky" and "money" have "ies" as a plural suffix (i.e. "skies" and "monies") but other words like "monkey" and "Emmy" do not ("monkeys" and "Emmys"). Is there a rule dictating the use of "ies"?

orthography rules grammatical-number

7:02 PM

@Jez From which country do you think she is?

Peut-être?

@KitFox Thanks.

I assume it's Dutch?

RegDwight ΒВBẞ8

@Cerberus her S and CH and O are very Dutch.

Matt Эллен

@Mahnax no, the new one is about the difference between money and monies

7:03 PM

It sounds almost German, but I don't like German accents.

@KitFox Yup.

@RegDwightΒВBẞ8 I noticed the o. Will listen to s and ch some more.

Getting coffee. brb

@KitFox I hate Dutch accents.

Bye!

RegDwight ΒВBẞ8

The S is probably not easy to notice for you as a native speaker.

Is it any s?

7:04 PM

@MattЭллен Eh, that's what I thought.

RegDwight ΒВBẞ8

@Cerberus Pretty much. In most simple terms, the Dutch just can't pronounce S at all. It's always a bit of a SH.

I haven't looked at any specific characteristics: my general impression was just that it was very Dutch, while at the same time quite good.

@RegDwightΒВBẞ8 Hmm surely not in every word? Can you give me an example?

RegDwight ΒВBẞ8

Oh crap I just closed it.

I am listening to "consent", but I can't really hear it.

@RegDwightΒВBẞ8 Like Germans fail to pronounce "th"?

7:07 PM

A Dutch accent is usually very flat and unmelodious.

RegDwight ΒВBẞ8

@Gigili well it's subtler.

@Cerberus try "rejects".

That's just so Dutch.

Can you give me a timed link?

Right-click on the moving thingie.

I taught you, remember?

RegDwight ΒВBẞ8

God people stop pushing me.

I am trying to answer Gigili, at the same time reopening the video again because it's long closed again... GAAAAH

Pleeaase uncle Reg!

If it is in the beginning, I can just listen to that...

@Cerberus "Copy video URL at the current time"?

RegDwight ΒВBẞ8

7:09 PM

@Cerberus "started" at around 1:20. Almost "shtarted"

OK.

@Gigili Yes.

RegDwight ΒВBẞ8

@Cerberus it is at the beginning. I never listened to more than three minutes.

Every single S of hers is not sharp enough.

The Spanish have that, too.

Hmm that started definitely sounds Dutch to me. But is it the s or the t?

RegDwight ΒВBẞ8

@Gigili The Germans kind of have the opposite problem. Their Ses are rather sharp. And so are their SCHes.

@Cerberus 3:07: compash to ashesh

Haha OK...

7:11 PM

Yay, I finished my video!

Assess sounds quite Dutch. She's not holding the s's long enough?

RegDwight ΒВBẞ8

It's not the holding. It's just not the right sound.

Compass, I'm less sure I can hear it.

RegDwight ΒВBẞ8

It's not an s.

It's almost a ts or dz kind of sound.

7:13 PM

I guess it is a mixture of quantity and quality.

She is rounding her lips too much with the s, and not holding it long enough too, perhaps?

@KitFox Or th?

@RegDwightΒВBẞ8 Right, but I never found out why they can't pronounce the "th". They pronounce it like "Se", e.g. Se dog is in se room. Or even "Ze".

As in thimble.

RegDwight ΒВBẞ8

I have no idea about such technicalities, I just know that speaking Dutch requires a German to lisp. Sorry, but that's how it is.

@Gigili because the sound does not exist in German.

I know.

RegDwight ΒВBẞ8

@Gigili You can't pronounce thousands of sounds, either.

7:15 PM

The Dutch can't pronounce th either.

Her l also sounds very Dutch.

"We wil hef to recognize".

RegDwight ΒВBẞ8

Yeah. Her O, her U.

@RegDwightΒВBẞ8 Prove it. I can pronounce almost every sound.

Why am I not a fox again yet? Can you see me as a fox?

Yes.

@KitFox I still see a spider.

7:17 PM

I am very annoyed by this. It must be something @Vitaly did.

RegDwight ΒВBẞ8

@Gigili I don't have to. You know you can't speak Russian, Chinese, or French without an accent.

@KitFox wait that wasn't a deliberate choice on your part?

Ugh, don't listen to Neelie Kroes, E. Commissioner.

RegDwight ΒВBẞ8

Never intended to.

Her English sucks. I guess it's the older generation.

@RegDwightΒВBẞ8 No, the spider was my choice, but I switched back to the fox hours ago.

7:18 PM

@Mahnax Are you satisfied with it?

@Gigili Yes.

I assume any nefariousness related to spiders must have something to do with Vitaly.

He is exceedingly clever that way.

Wow. That's an interesting accent.

I could listen to that all day.

Is it British? No, but it wants you to think so.

Very Dutch.

7:20 PM

No, it's not.

@Mahnax Umm, only "yes"?

It's very British and then some stuff that is confusing.

Sophie camouflaged her Dutch accent with some heavy Americanisms, but Neelie's accent is a strong Dutch accent.

@Gigili Well, sure, I'm satisfied. The requirements are met, it flows decently, and doesn't look shabby.

Plus, it's in 1080p HD.

@KitFox Well, a "neutral" accent is defined as British here, to many people. So her accent is probably based on that.

So it's not American at all, contrary to Sophie's accent.

7:22 PM

@RegDwightΒВBẞ8 I knew you would say it.

RegDwight ΒВBẞ8

soundcomparisons.com

@KitFox Notice how she says "worlt". That's very Dutch: we have no voiced consonants in the coda (end of a syllable).

She also says "witte" for "with the".

We hates them th's.

@RegDwightΒВBẞ8 Way to crash my browser.

@Mahnax Can you show me?

RegDwight ΒВBẞ8

@KitFox Sorry. That's not the one I was searching for anyway.

It only lists native English accents.

7:24 PM

@Gigili Eh, I'd rather not, sorry.

RegDwight ΒВBẞ8

Here's the one I wanted to post:

accent.gmu.edu

Are you going to rickroll me?

@Gigili It's a pain to upload huge files to YT and it's my very first work.

@KitFox never gonna give you up, never gonna… yeah, I think that's enough.

@Mahnax I see, no problem.

RegDwight ΒВBẞ8

@KitFox No. Your loss if you don't click.

Russian accents

7:26 PM

@Gigili Good good. Maybe I will share a later production.

@RegDwightΒВBẞ8 Which one is yours?

RegDwight ΒВBẞ8

None, obviously.

@Mahnax Good good.

OMG. Jasper turned himself into Gigili.

RegDwight ΒВBẞ8

Dutch accents

7:30 PM

Something is very wrong with my browser. Must fiddle with some stuff. Later.

RegDwight ΒВBẞ8

CU

@RegDwightΒВBẞ8 It says I need some Apple plugin.

I don't like fruits!

RegDwight ΒВBẞ8

Quicktime.

For the record, I said "good good" in here before Jasper ever did.

I will try it in another browser.

RegDwight ΒВBẞ8

7:31 PM

You have Safari?

Actually it works fine in my Chrome.

@KitFox Actually, I see the fox:

user image

RegDwight ΒВBẞ8

Spider here.

Ah, Opera is able to play the file in VLC.

The male from Amsterdam sounds Dutch, devoiced consonants and all.

RegDwight ΒВBẞ8

@Cerberus note that you can click on the "Generalizations" underneath the text to have them highlighted. It's easier to listen along that way.

@Vitaly I have shift-F5'd, but still the spider.

@RegDwightΒВBẞ8 Oh!

7:34 PM

I have even rebooted and still see the effing spider.

RegDwight ΒВBẞ8

Thus spake the spider.

user image

RegDwight ΒВBẞ8

Yeah.

Yeah, that's what I see, too.

Me: Why is our database server so slow?
Him: That's just in dev. It's not like that in real life.
Me: Wait, you mean THIS is the fantasy world? I think I must have taken a wrong turn somewhere.

7:36 PM

user image

@KitFox But only in the upper right corner, rite?

@RegDwightΒВBẞ8 Okay that is pretty cool.

I am not really aware of all the vowel thingies.

RegDwight ΒВBẞ8

@Robusto yeah when you set sail for Russia and ended up in the US.

Seriously though, I'd like meself some fantasy world. Escapism rules.

@Cerberus No, everywhere.

Do I pronounce them correctly without thinking, or are they part of my accent?

RegDwight ΒВBẞ8

Instead it's stupid reality life shit.

7:38 PM

I need a better fantasy, that's all. I mean, why would I put slow database servers in my fantasy?

@KitFox Oh! I see the foxes on the left.

RegDwight ΒВBẞ8

@Robusto I feel you, sis.

Put on your drag.

Not that kind of fantasy. Not any kind of fantasy, I appear to be discovering.

user image

Well, I'm off to English class soon. Good day to all of you.

7:40 PM

I colored this one for you @Vitaly.

Hmm not all accents have the generalization thing.

Is that Sütterlinschrift @RegDwightB8?

Bye Bob.

Hmm. Looks like I missed a few spots.

@Gigili That's Gothic.

RegDwight ΒВBẞ8

7:40 PM

@Gigili no, that's Fraktur.

Yeah.

We call it Gothic.

@KitFox Awwww!

RegDwight ΒВBẞ8

Actually it says right that right there in a comment.

@Gigili Meinen Sie die Beispiele in Fraktur? Oder das Zitat? — Clemens 5 hours ago

I saw it, but I wasn't sure how to reply.

@Vitaly I was trying to get the same blue that you have in your avatar, only lighter so you can see the details. I even trimmed off the girl-bits.

RegDwight ΒВBẞ8

7:43 PM

@Gigili just say, "die Beispiele".

Or let me transcribe it for you.

@RegDwightΒВBẞ8 Done.

Thank you.

RegDwight ΒВBẞ8

"Lesen Sie die Seiten 35–68." "Die berühmten Anfangsworte im Johannes-Evangelium, in Kapitel 1, Vers 1–5"

Oh, that looks more like "G" than "S".

Thanks.

RegDwight ΒВBẞ8

NP

@KitFox Thank you.

user image

7:47 PM

The girl bits...I love it.

@Vitaly I hope it helps you feel better.

Are you feeling better?

Spiders have no spines?

Yes, Doctor.

Good.

@Cerberus They have jointed bodies.

No spines.

7:48 PM

Right.

And no vertebrae.

They are arthropods.

So their bodies are in three segments.

BRB

Although I think spiders have the first two segments fused together.

@KitFox So what happens if you rate your spider gravatar as PG?

Spiders have a cephalothorax and an abdomen. @Vitaly will correct me, I'm sure.

7:52 PM

Oh, like a lobster.

So the first two are fused then.

They're the original little no-neck monsters.

@Vitaly I don't know. Some sites won't display it?

@KitFox This chat retrieves the PG gravatar.

gravatar.com/avatar/…

> "Little no-neck monsters. Why are they called no-neck monsters? 'Cause they got no necks. Can't wring their necks; they got no necks to wring." — Tennessee Williams

(Yes, I know it's a subset of G, but what happens?)

7:54 PM

Hmm.

Well, now I'm back to a PG-rated spider.

RegDwight ΒВBẞ8

You should totally drop that and use jQuery.

Yeah. And what happens if you switch to the fox now?

I should, but I de-prioritized that request.

Sweet Jesus, why did everything go gray?

Huh?

Because it's my favorite color.

7:59 PM

Agh! Now it's back to beige.

I switched back to fox again, but still see the spider.

Matt Эллен

I see the fox!

except in the bar in the top right

Me too!

@MattЭллен Refresh.

@MattЭллен Perhaps we are on the same CDN?

By the way, Gmail is annoying.

I want the old look back.

Matt Эллен

@Vitaly done so twice, it's still a spider in the bar

8:02 PM

They made it impossible to revert.

Whoa! OK, there it is.

Gmail is perfect.

I am foxy again in both places.

Matt Эллен

yeah! the fox is even in the bar

Perfect?

Matt Эллен

8:03 PM

oh! Vitaly is the spider

That's what I said.

I don't want it to change looks and change where the buttons are and change the way the buttons look. I don't want to have to learn a new routine just because some idiot designer at Gmail thinks this is the latest fashion!

frustrated

Another reason not to use web applications.

Perhaps I should use Seamonkey anyway. Or what is it called?

Matt Эллен

I don't see the problem

No?

@Cerberus Absolutely. By all means, use Seamonkey.

8:06 PM

You use it?

No.

I was just being supportive.

Oh. Well, thanks.

OK, I have to go. Later peeps!

CU

CU.

8:11 PM

Bya.

@RegDwightΒВBẞ8 Oh, and stop being passive-aggressive. Sis.

RegDwight ΒВBẞ8

I only just begun.

0

Q: Editing references in answer

Why does simchona edit my references in my answers? If the reference is "Oxford Dictionary of English" (eBook with copyright), why does simchona replace this with "Oxford Online Dictionary"? See here: http://english.stackexchange.com/posts/65367/revisions

Matt Эллен

CU @Kit

RegDwight ΒВBẞ8

@simchona - Really, my eBook is called "Oxford Dictionary of English", Second Edition, Revised - eBook Copyright 2010, as I directly read. — Carlo_R. 58 mins ago

@simchona - Do you have something to say? — Carlo_R. 43 mins ago

@simchona - Are you sleeping? — Carlo_R. 38 mins ago

@simchona - Is there someone with you who prevents you from answering? — Carlo_R. 20 mins ago

Have fun @KitFox.

Matt Эллен

8:22 PM

this is quite a good documentary:

user image

Guess.

@RegDwightΒВBẞ8 She's painfully shy.

Economic collapse?

Matt Эллен

@Cerberus lowest temperature for the year

Gigi is closer, though I'm not sure what she means.

And the answer is...government budget deficits (in % of GDP, I presume)!

www.gfmag.com/tools/global-database/economic-data/10395-public-deficit-by-country.html

Matt Эллен

personal debt in thousands

oh!

RegDwight ΒВBẞ8

8:37 PM

Bah. "(estimate)", "(forecast)", "(projection)". Just say it already, you are pulling all three figures out of the same body part.

Matt Эллен

@Cerberus I think it's in pence

@MattЭллен No doubt.

user19161

@Cerberus You should tell them to revert to the old look too for youtube and blogger.

@RegDwightΒВBẞ8 Yeah, sort of.

@JasperLoy Oh I haven't even noticed a change there?

user19161

@Cerberus Well, the change took place a few months ago I think.

Matt Эллен

8:39 PM

how did this get multicollidered?

Ah.

Matt Эллен

10

Q: Generic name for places like village, town and cities

There is the German word Ort or Ortschaft which is a hypernym for places where people live like villages towns cities etc. Is there a correspondent word in English? I don't want to use location or place because they also represent geographical entities where no people live or even just bui...

single-word-requests geography

user19161

@MattЭллен I remember there is a term for it I studied in geography but cannot recall it.

GR ^

user19161

@Vitaly So what's the answer?

8:42 PM

WordNet, which is listed here, provides community and settlement as hypernyms for two different senses of village, and municipality as an additional hypernym for city and town

user19161

"Settlement" also rang a bell in me.

user19161

And for the record, Mahnax is right. I learnt "good good" from him.

user19161

But I told him it is called reduplication.

user19161

Wow Carlo got 155 rep today, pretty good I must say.

RegDwight ΒВBẞ8

Actually "Ortschaft" sounds pretty small to me. Ort works for cities, but Ortschaft? That sounds more like a God-forsaken place than like Munich or Berlin.

But splattne is from Austria, I believe.

8:46 PM

1

Q: Opposite/inverse of duplicate

What is a word that can function as the inverse of a duplicate question on Stack Exchange? I was looking, in the context of this question on meta, for such a word to distinguish the closed duplicate from the one it was closed as a duplicate of. The relationship is not simply an equal one between ...

single-word-requests phrase-requests inversion

what is it with people assuming everything has an opposite?

and every adjective has a noun form?

user19161

Well according to Reg, every word can be any part of speech!

Not to mention Wikipedia, which is as general as you can get

Settlement hierarchy

A settlement hierarchy is a way of arranging settlements into a hierarchy based upon their population or some other criteria. The term is used by landscape historians and in the National Curriculum for England. The term is also used in the planning system for the UK and for some other countries such as Ireland, India and Swaziland. The term was used without comment by the geographer Brian Roberts in 1972. The greater the population in a settlement, the larger geographic area, the higher the status and the greater the availability of services. Position in a settlement hierarchy can also dep...

2 clicks away from the town article on Wikipedia

Americans call a 5-person hamlet a 'city'.

mad.

RegDwight ΒВBẞ8

@Vitaly Hm. But that's not a hierarchy of hypernyms. Megalopolis does not include vilage, or vice versa.

I'll show you mad.

8:49 PM

@RegDwightΒВBẞ8 I thought he was German?

And lives in Italy.

RegDwight ΒВBẞ8

Could be.

that sounds like south tirol

user19161

@RegDwightΒВBẞ8 village

@RegDwightΒВBẞ8 I'm talking about settlement. In fact, the Wiki articles for village and city specify that those are types of settlement.

@Vitaly Not exactly the same thing.

RegDwight ΒВBẞ8

8:50 PM

@Gigili At any rate, he's in deep South. They have very peculiar ways of speaking.

@Vitaly ah! okay.

I would not call New York a settlement. It implies a close connection with settling.

RegDwight ΒВBẞ8

Well then post that in a comment and vote to close.

I.e. a small, new community.

a lsot of the answers and comments really tease out the different meanings. settlement is smaller (like Ort or Ortschaft).

user19161

They speak in peculiar ways, like God moves in mysterious ways.

8:51 PM

But I guess settlement and municipality are as close as you're going to get.

closing is for obvious answers, and it's not at all obvious here.

@Cerberus You can't really avoid that issue when you have to include villages and hamlets, can you?

And I think Ort is also slightly different: it is somewhat closer to "place".

@Vitaly Agreed.

I don't think an Ort really has to be a village or town.

Matt Эллен

@JasperLoy I know! like the other week he was in me drain pipes! Right old racket it was. I'll not be inviting him around any time soon

(the real answer is... oh I was going to say there is no exact word...but settlement comes closest, except, that is definitely not a hypernym).

RegDwight ΒВBẞ8

8:52 PM

@Cerberus untranslatability and lexical gaps. We've been there before, and we end up there on every single translation question. You can't even translate "mother" reliably. It has different connotations in every language.

Ortschaft is avillage/town, but not really a city (you can have a number of Ortschafts within a Stadt)

@RegDwightΒВBẞ8 Exactly: true synonyms do not exist.

> Zwei Hubschrauber trafen gleichzeitig am Ort des Geschehens ein. = "Two helicopters arrived on the scene at the same time."

user19161

I noticed Reg is making more typos this month. I think he needs more cookies.

those aren't typos.

But the OP claims that German has a purer hyperonym.

Which I find doubtful.

RegDwight ΒВBẞ8

8:54 PM

I have been disputing just that for like ten minutes.

So the question then, if it is just about English, is what is the hypernym (as opposed to what is the translation)

@RegDwightΒВBẞ8 Good.

Metonym...what was I thinking!?

Matt Эллен

@Mitch I would say it definitely is, given that it mean "a place where people settle to for a community" all things like villages, cities, towns, hamlets, etc, they all fall under this

@Mitch By the way, the Greek word for "name" is onoma.

user19161

@Cerberus That's what Reg mentioned to Spare Oom about KFC that day.

8:56 PM

The root is often onym-.

user19161

@Cerberus Sounds like Obama or Osama.

But never *nym.

@Cerberus but, if this is what you're talking about, the word is hypernym not hyperonym.

@Mitch Huh?

RegDwight ΒВBẞ8

@Cerberus TIL. That never occurred to me.

8:59 PM

(whatever the roots might be)

@RegDwightΒВBẞ8 TIL?

RegDwight ΒВBẞ8

@Mitch actually hyperonym is a valid altenative.

@Cerberus today I learned.

I just saw wikipedia too but I've never seen hyperonym before then.

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Apr '1223

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