Language Overflow

Anonymous

12:32 AM

I'm going to take a brief break.

1:13 AM

"Would you know if the overland or tube goes there?" -- I wonder if Britons really say that.

I'm surprised no-one has pointed out that we British naturally tend to express things more obliquely than Americans. So we usually ask Do you have a...?, since it's contextually obvious that if they do have it, we want it. (For the less-well-educated, it's 'Ave you gotta [light, boy]?) — FumbleFingers 2 hours ago

That's more like it.

Damkerng T.

1:26 AM

@JavaLatte that is actually Americanism. — MAKZ 5 hours ago

Hmm...

As far as I'm aware, the "is in his room" makes it clear that the borrowing of the book is an ongoing action, so "that he borrowed" and "that he has borrowed" have the same meaning in this context. There is a subtle difference to me in that if someone said "that he has borrowed" I would assume that the borrowing took place a short time ago, while in the former case I'd assume he'd had the book for a while. — John Clifford 16 hours ago

Intersting...

Can we say 'He has borrowed that book since last week'?

Anonymous

2:06 AM

If you intend to communicate that he borrowed the book last week and is still borrowing it now: He has been borrowing that book since last week.

Anonymous

He has borrowed that book since last week requires a fairly unusual situation to make sense. For example: He's borrowed that book four times, but was any of those times as recent as last week? - Yes, he's borrowed that book twice since last week.

Anonymous

John Clifford is imagining that the two would be used in the same situations, which is largely true, but technically the two don't have the same entailments, so it's possible to invent a scenario where they have differing interpretations.

Anonymous

By examining those scenarios, we can tease out the basic difference in meaning.

Fard

3:09 AM

"Getta" for "get a"?! That's a useless contraction (or relaxed pronunciation, if you will), adding an extra t. If it is ever in circulation, it's short for get to. — Fard 1 min ago

@snailboat

Riley Francisco

5:54 AM

Hey

I love the facelift

Damkerng T.

7:05 AM

@RileyFrancisco Glad you love it!

in English Language & Usage, Jan 16 '15 at 15:14, by tchrist

       I: If he will jump, you will not have to.
      II: If he will jump, he can win.
     III: If he will jump, he may win.
      IV: If he will jump, you must follow.
       V: If he will jump, you dare not follow.
      VI: If he will jump, you need not follow.

     VII: If he escapes, catch him.
    VIII: If he escapes, you can catch him.
      IX: If he escapes, you catch him.
       X: If he escapes, you could catch him.
      XI: If he escapes, you may catch him.
     XII: If he escapes, you might catch him.

Damkerng T.

7:28 AM

@snailboat Ahh... So, borrow keeps on going, unlike, say, drop.

(Either He has dropped the book since last week or He has been dropping the book since last week would sound odd.)

Damkerng T.

7:39 AM

1

Q: Is there a hyphen before "hundred" when used in adjective form?

For example: He had two-hundred dollars. He lived for one-hundred years. I have never put a hyphen before hundred in situations like those, but according to this (unsure of its reliability, however), it says: . . . one-hundred dollars is hyphenated because one-hundred is a compound...

> ". . . one-hundred dollars is hyphenated because one-hundred is a compound adjective standing before dollars . . ."

From the example since "xxx-hundred" is modifying something (dollars/years), making it an adjective, should I therefore put a hyphen in between?

Hmm...

"because one-hundred is a compound adjective standing before dollars"?

The original sentence in the article the OP quoted from:

> The other readers and I thank Jill and you for your generous gift one-hundred dollars to the . . .

I think it's perhaps ungrammatical.

Shouldn't it be for your generous gift of one hundred dollars?

(IMHO, hyphen or not is less important than that of.)

CowperKettle

8:32 AM

Good afternoon, @Dam!

> "Studies show that eating pork and drinking alcohol lowers your risks of becoming an Islamist terrorist by 100%".

@snailboat I downvoted too..

Damkerng T.

9:39 AM

@CowperKettle What a feast!

Damkerng T.

11:43 AM

3

A: Difference between "Add me" and "Add me up"?

I would say "Please add me as a Snapchat friend." Another option that is very slightly awkward might be "Could you add me as a Snapchat friend?". "Could you" is maybe a little more formal which is a tiny bit odd in this context. "Add me up" would be used more like a situation where you are closi...

Hmm... what does this close out mean?

> "Add me up" would be used more like a situation where you are closing out a bar tab at a bar and you ask the bartender to "Add me up" meaning "add up my bill so I can pay."

IͶΔ

12:33 PM

John that is the most honorable nickname I've earned on SE. — IͶΔ 10 secs ago

I disagree with this part of your first comment: That being said, ELL folks have always been expecting little to no research from the OP's, comparing to other SE's. I do think we tend to be more lenient, because it might be quite a challenge for an O.P. with rudimentary langauge skills to present a well-researched question. That said, I think "expecting ... no research" maybe overstates it. This meta post gets pointed to often, and it exhorts people to include their preliminary research. — J.R. ♦ 18 hours ago

Well, that confirms it. People still want to wear ear-plugs.

Even though they increase bacteria.

Damkerng T.

12:47 PM

@IͶΔ Wait, wait, isn't pointing to "Details, please!" in the direction of your sentiment?

(BTW, shouldn't it be better in the main room?)

IͶΔ

@DamkerngT. It is.

But please do tell how many times it was linked to yesterday?

Damkerng T.

Yesterday like "in the past", right? That would be often enough.

But if it's about questions posted yesterday, probably none.

Not really about the question, but I think you need an article or a determiner before throat. — Damkerng T. 44 secs ago

Now I wonder if it's really required.

IͶΔ

@DamkerngT. That's my point. No one sees it.

Well, maybe, except a robot.

Damkerng T.

@IͶΔ pats MAR...

IͶΔ

@IͶΔ That makes sense. Can I keep calling you the triangle anyway? XD — John Clifford 35 secs ago

We NEEEEEED this guy in chat.

Damkerng T.

12:56 PM

LOL

IͶΔ

@CowperKettle I just ate lunch and I'm hungry again.

Damkerng T.

We do say entered a position. Even though job is understood to be roughly synonymous with position, the word job still connotes a task (or set of tasks) rather than a position or office that we occupy for a time, and so we do not enter tasks. — TRomano 2 hours ago

Nice reply.

It's either his position or his office, I think, in entering the presidency.

IͶΔ

The bolding is contagious. I wonder if I'm also sick.

Damkerng T.

Wow, my comment was gone so fast!

IͶΔ

Why? Did you post spam? ಠ_ಠ

Or was it a "I'm closing this as OT 'cause it feels like it. ᕙ(⇀‸↼‶)ᕗ"

Damkerng T.

1:09 PM

Search for 44 secs ago up there.

IͶΔ

@DamkerngT. Did you remove it?

Damkerng T.

Nope.

IͶΔ

Or was it an inexperienced moderator?

It was him, wasn't it? Poker face

Damkerng T.

I'll take the fifth.

IͶΔ

I'll eat the fifth.

This is sick.

Damkerng T.

1:13 PM

For all intensive purposes people sometimes write idioms slightly incorrectly. The correct one is "look on the bright side". To quote someone from a forum thread on this topic: "I think "at" is probably wrong, and the accepted set phrase is definitely "look on the bright side". I think it is because one is not looking at a concrete "bright side" but it is somewhat akin to a general location or direction, as in "look on the left", or "look on the top"." — John Clifford 4 mins ago

IͶΔ

If I look at the bright side, my eyes will hurt.

Damkerng T.

I think it's a fair question to ask why one is correct and the other is not if people clearly use both.

IͶΔ

Bright sides are shiny, so it seems.

Damkerng T.

@IͶΔ Sounds logical!

Damkerng T.

1:44 PM

0

Q: How many stops is it/are there?

I just read a question in Oxford Word Skills about bus routes: 'How many stops is it to the park?' Although I feel "how many stops are they..." sounds awkward, "how many stops are there..." sounds normal to me. In many examples that I've seen with how many or how much, if the main verb is 'be...

grammar questions verb-agreement

How many stops is it to the park?

Why does it sound so British to my ear?

(I don't know.) I wonder how often American speakers would use that.

Hmm... the question above reminds me of something in Thai: X ราคาเท่าไหร่ (How much does X cost?)

Sometimes we reduce X ราคาเท่าไหร่ to X เท่าไหร่

Approx. translations (note that they're just approx.; it's difficult to translate these kinds of phrases precisely):

> X ราคาเท่าไหร่ ~ How much does X cost?

> X เท่าไหร่ ~ How much is it?

X ราคาเท่าไหร่ is always safe. X เท่าไหร่ is also fine on many occasions. The problem is I can't tell exactly when it's natural to use the reduced alternative.

I guess I never use X เท่าไหร่ as the first sentence in a conversation or a negotiation, but some other people probably do.

Damkerng T.

2:16 PM

1

Q: what is releation between Bolded text and "our capacity to..."?

According to Jim Whitman, ‘the weight of evidence is that our capacity to produce unwanted and sometimes dangerous conditions on a global scale is running greatly in excess of our deliberative and control mechanisms’. Human societies are ‘manufacturing’ new global security risks at a faster rate ...

phrase-meaning

Strange that I can't find the source of that quote.

I mean the original by Jim Whitman.

Araucaria

2:27 PM

Interesting question with no good answers that address the question:

3

Q: Explain something: anything

Any seems synonymous with some in some examples, such as "Is anyone home?". And any seems synonymous with every in some examples below, and definitely not in others. On the internet I encountered a German who asked me what the difference is between "some" and "any". I didn't have a really good...

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