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02:00 - 22:0022:00 - 00:00

F.E.
F.E.
10:03 PM
> I don't think any normal child would say, "Oh, all my relatives are here! Who has gifts for me?" (though it is probably acceptable and grammatical)
Okay, a child might stay that, but the child really means: "Who have" when they are saying it.
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
LOL
 
Anonymous
I'm having fun spectating.
 
Anonymous
(I'm hasing fun spectating.)
 
Anonymous
That's the joy of posting bounties.
 
Anonymous
You can sit back and watch a whole bunch of people talk about something. :-)
 
F.E.
F.E.
10:05 PM
There'll probably be a rash of posts when the bounty is about to come due . . .
 
Anonymous
@DamkerngT. I think people would probably say "quite commonly" rather than "quite not rarely"
 
F.E.
F.E.
> If “Who have read this book?” is grammatical, then so should be “Who are reading this book?”. Do you find this sentence correct? – Gilles 2 hours ago
How come my last post don't got no links in it?
 
Anonymous
@F.E. I thought it was interesting that you used the term "negative trigger", but now I see that you were quoting John Lawler.
 
Anonymous
I thought that would be rather unlike you, mixing terminological universes :-)
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
@snailboat I thought of using that too, but I tried to make it more noticeable. Looks like I succeed, though it's unclear if it's in a good way. :-)
 
Anonymous
10:07 PM
@DamkerngT. Well, quite not rarely is, I think, quite not grammatical
 
F.E.
F.E.
@snailboat Yup. . . . I also try not to explicitly use people's names, not when I can work around it. :)
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
Hehe
 
Anonymous
Although I might be persuaded to say quite not idiomatic instead :-)
 
Anonymous
Sometimes it's hard to tell the difference from intuition alone.
 
Anonymous
@Arrowfar Idiomatic has several meanings.
 
Anonymous
10:09 PM
One is more or less "natural-sounding"
 
Anonymous
Another is "semantically or syntactically non-compositional"
 
Anonymous
Today, you would never come up with the phrase "be that as it may" on your own
 
Anonymous
We all know the phrase, but we don't assemble it from pieces, we use it as a fixed unit
 
Anonymous
So it appears much more often than you'd expect if it were merely assembled from pieces each time
 
Anonymous
So we can call it idiomatic
 
Anonymous
10:13 PM
(You can assemble new phrases like it, but then you're deliberately using the grammar of an older version of English, which is not common and gives a rather different impression to the reader/listener)
 
Anonymous
Other phrases are syntactically normal but semantically non-compositional: "bite the bullet" appears to fit the rules of Modern English grammar just fine, but the meaning can't be figured out from the parts
 
Anonymous
So this sense of "non-compositionality" (not the same thing as the sum of its parts) is key to one sense of idiomatic
 
Anonymous
I suppose for the other meaning, I could try to say "natural" instead to avoid ambiguity
 
Anonymous
And maybe that would confuse people less.
 
Anonymous
So I may start doing that.
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
10:17 PM
@snailboat The way I see it, this is what makes idioms an idiom. However, it's a different thing from idiomatic.
 
Anonymous
@DamkerngT. One sense of idiomatic is "is an idiom"
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
@snailboat Hmm... I think idiomatic is fine.
 
Anonymous
Idiom too has both meanings.
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
Now I have to look it up. :)
> 1. [countable] linguistics an expression whose meaning is different from the meaning of the individual words. For example, "to have your feet on the ground" is an idiom meaning "to be sensible."
2. [singular/uncountable] a particular style in language, art, or music
http://www.macmillandictionary.com/dictionary/american/idiom
 
Anonymous
But in the non-compositional sense, it's a count noun ("an idiom"), whereas in the naturalness sense, it's non-count ("conforming to idiom")
 
Anonymous
10:19 PM
@DamkerngT. Hey, there you go!
 
Anonymous
Not an exact match for what I'm talking about, but useful definitions nonetheless.
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
It looks like I'm more familiar with #1. (I guess I could deduce the sense of #2 in context.)
 
user116848
@snailboat Thanks. You saw it :D (I thought you ignored it!)
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
Too late. A robot has already seen them. :D
 
F.E.
F.E.
It's that, it might be too messy and awkward for me to do any meaningful grammar critiquing in a chat room, . . .
 
Anonymous
10:22 PM
I can see them forever and ever, for my name is blue
 
Anonymous
Damkerng can see them too, for his name is italicized!
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
Yay!
 
Anonymous
(That second sentence sounded funnier to me than the first. For, for, for...)
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
(I've just noticed that my name is italicized! -- I thought it's italicized only on my screen.)
 
Anonymous
> 1. Peculiar to or characteristic of a particular language; pertaining to or exhibiting the expressions, constructions, or phraseology approved by the peculiar usage of a language, esp. as differing from a strictly grammatical or logical use of words; vernacular; colloquial.
 
Anonymous
10:24 PM
> 2. Given to or marked by the use of idioms peculiar to, or approved by, the usage of the language.
 
Anonymous
Those are the OED's definitions
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
Oh, they use the word peculiar!
Describing idiom as peculiar sounds weird, imo.
 
Anonymous
Their definition, too, is slightly different from the definition in my brain :-)
 
Anonymous
 
Anonymous
> Using, containing, or denoting expressions that are natural to a native speaker
 
user116848
10:26 PM
So the removing frenzy is over
 
Anonymous
That's the NOAD.
 
Anonymous
(A dictionary based on the ODE, not to be confused with the OED)
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
@Arrowfar It can be back in fashion any time!
 
user116848
:D
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
@snailboat They still confuse me every now and then.
 
user116848
10:28 PM
@DamkerngT. It looked kind of scary to me what they were doing :D
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
@Arrowfar Does my name look italicized on your screen?
 
user116848
@DamkerngT. Yes it is.
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
Ahh... Thanks for the confirmation. I thought it was similar to the blue background, but apparently it's different. :-)
(I should avoid shortening was as 's.)
 
user116848
Sometimes I get frightened with the ping sound when I am wearing the headphones with full sound. Man I can get a heart attack :)
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
Ah, you could use the disable button.
 
user116848
10:33 PM
There is? You use it?
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
(Click on the speaker icon (top-right corner, before the "all rooms" button) and set the notification to None.)
 
user116848
Let me see....
 
user116848
I see. What settings do you use?
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
@Arrowfar Sometimes I set it to None, though usually I just don't plug in my headphones. :D
 
user116848
nods :)
 
Anonymous
10:39 PM
Italics mean room owner.
 
user116848
@snailboat Don't be jealous snailboat :)
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
Oh, snailboat is a room owner too, and she has got a diamond and the blue color. :)
 
user116848
@DamkerngT. So Damks you guys created this room for real?
 
user116848
I didn't know.
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
It (the room) had already been existed before I joined ELL.
 
user116848
10:44 PM
So how come you are in the owners names?
 
user116848
Due to your reputation?
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
Other owners made me. :)
 
user116848
Cerbs is also there I see :)
 
user116848
Have you tried for the mod position here? I mean you are very rep user
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
I think ELL mods were appointed (or elected) when the site was forked from ELU.
 
F.E.
F.E.
10:46 PM
Okay, I'm officially involved over in that +100 question thread. :(
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
Hooray!
Wait, I can't see your answer.
 
F.E.
F.E.
And I posed this example to the current top two answer posts: "Who haven't yet handed in their assignments?" And asked them for their evaluation as to its grammaticality.
@DamkerngT. It's written in robot-invisible ink.
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
LOL
 
F.E.
F.E.
I guess you know what that means, when I pose a question like that to an answer post, as to how good that answer post is in my opinion.
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
nods -- I think the answer is in conflict with the other comment.
 
F.E.
F.E.
10:55 PM
Also, an example without the negative, perhaps: "Who have already handed in their assignments?"
 
Anonymous
@DamkerngT. Appointed a few weeks after the site started
 
Anonymous
Not directly related to ELU
 
Anonymous
Although I think they deliberately picked one mod from ELU so there'd be overlap
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
Ahh
 
Anonymous
(Although waiwai has never been active as a moderator here)
 
Anonymous
10:59 PM
@F.E. Seems reasonable to me
 
F.E.
F.E.
@snailboat And we all know where the 1st example came from . . .
 
Anonymous
@F.E. I'm sorry! :-)
 
Anonymous
Hehe.
 
Anonymous
@Arrowfar Moderators are only elected after a site graduates from beta.
 
Anonymous
Since most betas on Stack Exchange are now eternal, that means moderators are permanently appointed
 
Anonymous
11:01 PM
Back when ELU started, they used to only last for 90 days
 
Anonymous
(And when ELU graduated, it had less activity than ELL does today)
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
I think that was several years ago, probably?
 
Anonymous
English Language & Usage – english.stackexchange.com

Launched Q&A site for linguists, etymologists, and (serious) English language enthusiasts

 
Anonymous
562
English Language Learners – ell.stackexchange.com

Beta Q&A site for speakers of other languages learning English.

Currently in public beta.

 
Anonymous
See any discrepancies? :-)
 
F.E.
F.E.
11:02 PM
So which site is for grammar questions?
 
Anonymous
shrugs :-)
 
F.E.
F.E.
It seems to be ELL, since it is for learning English . . .
 
Anonymous
ELU closes grammar questions a lot more than ELL
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
It would be strange if "(serious) English language enthusiasts" weren't interested in grammar.
 
F.E.
F.E.
@snailboat Yes, I have noticed that.
 
Anonymous
11:06 PM
@DamkerngT. Everyone in the US takes English classes growing up.
 
Anonymous
But by and large, these classes aren't about grammar.
 
F.E.
F.E.
@DamkerngT. They ain't. But them folks do like SWR questions, though.
 
Anonymous
People who really enjoy these English classes, where you (for example) read and discuss English literature, might well consider themselves "English language enthusiasts"
 
Anonymous
Enthusiast isn't really a well-defined term in this context
 
user116848
I am currently searching net about how one can overcome a broken heart
 
user116848
11:08 PM
:)
 
user116848
Very silly solutions given
 
Anonymous
Poetically, people sometimes say mend a broken heart, but it's not the kind of thing everyone can say with a straight face
 
Anonymous
Heal a broken heart, too
 
Anonymous
Recover from, …
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
Ahh... I guess the phrase "rebound girls" might come up.
 
user116848
11:09 PM
Yeah it is very difficult. One of the hardest things I can encounter :)
 
Anonymous
Rebounds can be, and often are, male
 
user116848
@DamkerngT. Rebound girl---> meaning??
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
nods -- Somehow broken heart sounds more like a male thing to me. :-)
 
Anonymous
 
Anonymous
@DamkerngT. Not to me!
 
user116848
11:11 PM
@DamkerngT. Have you experienced it? Please do tell :)
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
@snailboat Oh, no! -- Thanks for the link, I was thinking how to put it nicely. :-)
@Arrowfar They say every man spend two years to mend their broken hearts. :-)
 
user116848
Yeah girls don't take it personally I guess. They can easily move on. Guys find it difficult if it's someone very special that they have lost
 
Anonymous
I deleted my chat message about the down/close vote wave.
 
Anonymous
It was who I thought it was. They apologized publicly
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
@snailboat Oh, they did? On the meta?
 
Anonymous
11:14 PM
Yes. They also acknowledged their third sock puppet
 
user116848
Currently I am rebounding by hitting the books and working towards my qualification :)
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
Ahh
@Arrowfar Work and books are good alternatives too!
(Should I say work there? Maybe it's safer.)
So the username is user08742 now. :)
 
user116848
I hate chicks. Very mean. My sorta gf became very mean to me so we fought and she left.
 
user116848
:)
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
Aww...
 
user116848
11:17 PM
May be that's why I failed my paper. I got very distracted by her.
 
F.E.
F.E.
@snailboat They allow sock puppets? That's not good.
 
Anonymous
@F.E. Not really.
 
Anonymous
But the moderators haven't done anything about them.
 
F.E.
F.E.
I've seen some members reappear with similar names . . . so that isn't too bad, in a way.
 
Anonymous
Multiple accounts aren't actually forbidden
 
Anonymous
11:19 PM
It just depends on what you do with them.
 
F.E.
F.E.
I could see a moderator wanting two accounts: one for official business, one for personal use.
 
user116848
Any of you have two ELL accounts here?
 
F.E.
F.E.
I could see a professional linguist using two accounts: one to give "official" answers, one as a regular, sloppy, opinionated member.
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
Perhaps it's like stock trading accounts. Having several of them isn't illegal, but doing inside trading is.
 
Anonymous
I only have one Stack Exchange account.
 
user116848
11:20 PM
Who would want two accounts?
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
Apparently, some do. :)
 
user116848
Seems shady
 
Anonymous
I think there are moderators who've created second accounts so they can do things as normal members, like merely voting to close rather than closing outright
 
Anonymous
That seems backwards to me, though
 
Anonymous
KitFox has KitSox, which she uses for a chat bot.
 
Anonymous
11:22 PM
That's a legitimate use of multiple accounts.
 
F.E.
F.E.
I've seen grammatically challenged pedants reappearing with user names that are only a little bit different from the earlier ones, thinking that no one would connect them. :D
 
Anonymous
I've seen that.
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
Should we install some bot here? :)
 
Anonymous
I don't believe the bot adds much to chat.
 
F.E.
F.E.
(cont.) But their grammatical opinions are so bad, and their diction so forceful, that it's obvious who they are.
 
user116848
11:23 PM
Bots are fancy thingies to attract people I guess :)
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
@F.E. Ah... I haven't noticed that on ELU, but I'm sure it happens.
@Arrowfar You probably won't need bots, when Robot is around. :D
 
user116848
@DamkerngT. haha True
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
whirling three rounds, gladly...
 
user116848
BTW Jarvis the bot is very funny. I mean he answers funny if you ask him something
 
Anonymous
I just remembered that saying someone's name three times summons them
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
11:28 PM
@snailboat Ahh... You could throw salt to ward them off.
 
user116848
Who vampires?
 
user116848
Or ghosts and demons :)
 
user116848
Oh I just found Jarvis's funny response......
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
Maybe Candyman!
 
user116848
in English Language & Usage, Jun 20 at 15:03, by Arrowfar
!!Where do you sleep at night?
 
user116848
11:30 PM
 
Anonymous
@DamkerngT. 塩(しお)をまくこと！
 
user116848
Can you say it in English please for me??
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
It's a Japanese translation of the English version I said, I think.
 
user116848
Okay I'll goggle translate it. No problemo!
 
user116848
I see
 
Anonymous
11:32 PM
塩をまく shio o maku is "throwing salt" (to cleanse spiritual impurities), literally closer to sprinkling/scattering salt
 
Anonymous
Sometimes people 塩をまく to prevent someone bad from returning :-)
 
user116848
I see
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
Hmm... Salt seems to work everywhere!
 
user116848
Old wives tale, right?
 
user116848
Do you guys believe it?
 
Anonymous
11:34 PM
We have some salt-related superstitions in the US but I think they're slightly different
 
user116848
I'd say Nah :)
 
Robert Harvey
Robert Harvey
It certainly works when your bad luck is snails in the garden.
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
@Arrowfar I'd just say I can't disprove it. :)
 
Anonymous
@RobertHarvey frowny
 
user116848
lolol
 
Anonymous
11:36 PM
It would be much kinder to the snails and better for your plants if you just stepped on the snails
 
Anonymous
That way they die quickly instead of with lots of pain
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
Oh, no, poor snails!
 
Anonymous
And salting is bad for the plants.
 
user116848
Man, I am very paranoid what can I do about it?
 
Anonymous
 
Anonymous
11:37 PM
> If you do spill salt, a pinch thrown over your left shoulder is supposed to blind the devil waiting there.
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
@snailboat Interestingly, I was blocked!
 
Anonymous
Oh! What?
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
I can't reach the site. :D
 
Anonymous
I'll quote the entire relevant section.
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
(Inappropriate contents, they say.)
 
Anonymous
11:38 PM
> Spilled salt: Because of Judas Iscariot, spilling the seasoning is associated with lies
>
> The Last Supper has given us two common superstitions: the first is that you should never seat 13 at dinner, and the second is that spilling salt brings bad luck.
>
> If you look closely at Leonardo da Vinci’s painting of the Last Supper, you can see that Judas has knocked the salt cellar over with his elbow. Thanks to Judas Iscariot, spilled salt is associated with treachery and lies. If you do spill salt, a pinch thrown over your left shoulder is supposed to blind the devil waiting there.
 
Anonymous
Who says?
 
Anonymous
Does Thailand have a national censor, too?
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
@snailboat Looks like the one who controls the nation-wide network, our ICT dept. :)
@snailboat We have one, too! Yay!
 
Anonymous
That's too bad. The evils of censorship afflict a lot of the world.
 
user116848
So what were you searching Damks?
 
user116848
11:39 PM
When you got the message
 
Anonymous
("Afflict a lot" is an amusing stylistic clash.)
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
@Arrowfar I followed the link snailboat gave me.
 
user116848
Ohhh, she is very evil
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
"the second is that spilling salt brings bad luck." -- Hah! That's the opposite of what I thought!
Perhaps this spilling doesn't mean sprinkle.
 
user116848
What about all the salt in the ocean?
 
user116848
11:42 PM
May be that's why no demons on water :)
 
Anonymous
There are saltwater snails.
 
Anonymous
Maybe there are saltwater demons. :-)
 
user116848
Snails are evil then :)
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
@Arrowfar I'm sure that we have lots of sea monsters. :-)
 
Anonymous
We sure do. Mesonychoteuthis!
 
user116848
11:44 PM
Yeah that too. But I am not superstitious.
 
user116848
:)
 
user116848
At all
 
user116848
I only see 1+1+1=3
 
user116848
But I do seriously believe in Angels and Jinns and Heaven and Hell :D
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
I was told that a good accountant can make 1+1 to be whatever you'd want it to be. :)
 
Anonymous
11:45 PM
Unlike the smaller giant squid, Mesonychoteuthis--the colossal squid--has sharp hooks on its arms and tentacles, the latter of which can spin 360 degrees
 
user116848
True :) I am no evil accountant
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
@snailboat Sphere sprang up in my mind.
 
Anonymous
The colossal squid is still largely unknown, and may grow much larger than what we've managed to observe so far. One might wonder whether Mesonychoteuthis is the kraken of lore!
 
user116848
@snailboat Can you type that spelling without googling it?
 
Anonymous
One of the most fearsome mollusks.
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
11:47 PM
I believe the kraken is the Mesonychoteuthis. -- "Release the Kraken!"
 
Anonymous
Yes, I can spell many names of mollusks.
 
Anonymous
I remember it by association with Architeuthis.
 
user116848
What's that?
 
Anonymous
The giant squid.
 
user116848
Architeu.....?
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
11:48 PM
> The giant squid (genus Architeuthis) is a deep-ocean dwelling squid in the family Architeuthidae.
 
Anonymous
The colossal squid is a newer discovery.
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
Trying to function as Jarvis here...
 
user116848
lol
 
user116848
Don't stress yourself robot :D
 
Anonymous
Mesonychoteuthis also has the largest eyes of any known animal.
 
Anonymous
11:49 PM
Possibly up to a foot in diameter, or more.
 
user116848
Wow! I want to see it in person!
 
Anonymous
(We don't know what sizes colossal squids come in for sure because of how few we've ever come in contact with.)
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
@Arrowfar nods -- I should rather get a Jarvis around. :)
 
user116848
:)
 
Anonymous
We do have various indirect evidence of them too, like
 
Anonymous
11:51 PM
Apparently they fight sperm whales.
 
user116848
@snailboat Why didn't you study sea creatures sciences?
 
Damkerng T.
Damkerng T.
@snailboat Oh, that's really interesting!
 
user116848
If you are so much interested in them I mean.
 
Anonymous
Presumably the sperm whales win more often―we find undigested remains in sperm whale stomachs
 
Anonymous
Malacologists use that sort of indirect evidence to determine how large the species might be
 
user116848
11:53 PM
Like number plates and skateboards :)
 
user116848
Undigested remains ^
 
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