English Language & Usage: Multi-Layered Discourse Room

In Bengali there are two types of superstitions. The good one is called Sanskar and the other one is called Kusanskar. Ideally, Kusanskar is what we would call superstition in English, i.e., "excessively credulous belief in and reverence for the supernatural." They come to society automatically ...

word-request

Why do people have to ask 'What is the word for...' when they have no idea if there's a word. They should ask 'Is there a word for...'

Mistu4u

Hmm, that si true...You can edit if needed.

Mitch

6:39 PM

@JacobBlack why? is it new years?

MετάEd

I thought I'd be clever and leave the iris in my new avatar transparent so it would pick up eye color from the background. Sadly the background at SE is almost always ... white. So, who wants to suggest an eye color for God?

Mistu4u

Somebody also commented it should be migrated to ELU. What do you think?

Mitch

It is a great question, the wording is just ... presumptuous.

I thin it is a good question in either place.

MετάEd

@Mitch Because they mean "what is the term for". Most times they are perfectly happy when the answer is a phrase, even though literally speaking they asked for a word.

Mitch

also migration is a bit ... heavy handed in the early beta stage.

aedia λ

6:41 PM

@MετάEd Rainbow!

user19161

@Mitch Chinese New Year.

Cerberus

Chinese New Year is always celebrated in my street. But it was apparently cancelled this year.

Due to a lack of sponsors.

We had a dragon dance on the 2nd of January, though.

Mistu4u

I like the fireworks they do in their New Year.

Cerberus

Sure.

Although I would prefer them to be lit not directly under my window.

The smoke was so thick I almost got nauseous. And that was with windows closed. I couldn't see the opposite side of the street.

Mistu4u

@Cerberus In fact I saw an accident myself when some rocket entered a house nearby. That was horrendous. The Chinese union paid the family compensation.

Mitch

6:53 PM

@MετάEd my point was about the 'leading question' "Have you stopped beating your wife?" kinds of presuming.

Cerberus

@Mistu4u Oh, God! What happened? A huge fire broke out?

Mitch

@Mistu4u I submitted an edit (waiting for approval). When you see it you'll notice that I also edited your end notes. I was about to get rid of them altogether because they were also presumptuous. But instead I reworded them. I don't feel like telling others, "don't do this" comes across right.

Cerberus

"Presumptuous"...isn't that a rather presumptuous word?

aedia λ

It's presumptions all the way down.

Robusto

►

It's coming down now.

user19161

7:03 PM

Sumptuous is not to be confused with scrumptious.

Mistu4u

7:14 PM

@Cerberus Fortunately it was not a heavy fire and nobody was there in that room in that moment. Only some furnitures were burnt. Repaid and reconstructed by the same Chinese union.

@Mitch Before I could react the edit was accepted. :)

Cerberus

7:31 PM

@Mistu4u Wow, that sucks. Such things usually only happen when individuals light fireworks here.

Mitch

8:01 PM

@Cerberus yes. a self-hating word.

Cerberus

Or self-descriptive.

MετάEd

8:16 PM

So … nobody wants to suggest an eye color for God?

TRiG

@MετάEd Bright bright blue. Piercing blue.

(This may be based on Terry Pratchett's Mort.)

MετάEd

@TRiG I like it. The other one I'm considering is flame colored, from a description out of the Christian book of Apocalypse.

TRiG

@MετάEd Does he also have a sword sticking out of his mouth?

MετάEd

@TRiG Ouch.

Cerberus

Black.

MετάEd

8:23 PM

I'm just doing the eye.

TRiG

@MετάEd There are some really weird things in Revelation/Apocalypse.

Cerberus

Because religion is a black hole.

TRiG

in The Library, Jan 2 at 18:09, by TRiG

@JonEricson Well, if you start with the assumption that there were some interesting mushrooms on Patmos ....

Cerberus

@mrshiny Order your wireless charger now! For your Nexus 4. Has it arrived yet?

androidpolice.com/2013/01/31/…

TRiG

@Cerberus Black could be good, actually. (Like Deacon Vorbis.)

Cerberus

8:37 PM

Who?

Black has its merits, yes.

Matt Эллен

@Cerberus Deacon Vorbis

Cerberus

Oh, Deacon Vorbis.

OK.

Matt Эллен

from Small Gods?

Cerberus

Who?

Matt Эллен

maybe I can't remember

Cerberus

8:38 PM

Nor I.

Matt Эллен

Small Gods

Small Gods is the thirteenth of Terry Pratchett's Discworld novels, published in 1992. It tells the origin of the god Om, and his relations with his prophet, the reformer Brutha. In the process, it satirises religious institutions, people, and practices, and the role of religion in political life. The audio codec Ogg Vorbis is named after the character Exquisitor Vorbis in Small Gods. Plot The Great God Om tries to manifest himself once more in the world, as the time of his eighth prophet is nigh. He is surprised, however, when he finds himself in the body of a tortoise, stripped of his...

Cerberus

Ahh.

I want to read that.

I have heard about it.

I only read one book of his once, long ago, and I liked it.

Matt Эллен

It's good. The first Pratchett I bought

Cerberus

Cool.

MετάEd

9:06 PM

@Cerberus Black is good too.

I tried a black hole but you didn't have much to say about it.

TRiG

@MattЭллен Small Gods picks up on themes first developed in Pyramids. (But the debate on the correct order for reading Discworld goes on forever.)

Matt Эллен

Pyramids was good. I really like assassin's guild books.

I've not really worried about the order.

TRiG

@MattЭллен The order does matter for some books. The witch series and the watch series are best read in order. The Death series doesn't matter so much.

I'd favour reading the whole thing in order, because that way you can watch his ideas develop.

Matt Эллен

I've not read the witches series, except for the phantom of the opera one.

I have gone back and read the Rincewind books in an order

phantom => phat nom

TRiG

9:26 PM

@MattЭллен Fans abbreviate that one as M!!!!

Matt Эллен

9:36 PM

Ah! I see, like the whole "Play that shall not be named" thing.

user19161

9:49 PM

@TRiG M for Maria!

TRiG

@JacobBlack The book is called Maskerade. The exclamation marks are included in the abbreviation because of reasons.

@MattЭллен Also, Pteppic was sexy.

Mitch

10:09 PM

@Cerberus It's only self-descriptive if it is has the same .. presumption about it.

@MετάEd mirror colored! ha ha I Win!

MετάEd

10:25 PM

@Mitch But that's almost what I have now, which is 100% transparency.

Which is a nice concept but not worth a crap on most pages.

Cerberus

10:40 PM

@MετάEd I believe I said "black hole".

@Mitch Does it?

aedia λ

11:07 PM

Snow's fallin' heavy but I can still see my street.

aedia λ

11:33 PM

Okay, not so much now. Time for a shoveling pass soon.

tchrist

They just reneged on our "not much snow" and are threatening much more.

-1

A: Why have the subjunctive and indicative converged in Modern English?

In my opinion, the greatest culprit in the attack on the English language in general, and the subjunctive in particular, is mass media. We live in a world which is promoting illiteracy. So few people read anything more than texts and emails (and the occasional blog), that they are never exposed...

I wonder whether they are any stats on the rate of answers posted by rep=1 users that get summarily deleted, compared with those of rep!=1 users.

Cerberus

@aediaλ Oh, dear.

@tchrist Shoot them!

tchrist

The paper says an inch, the radio says a foot.

Cerberus

Hmm.

tchrist

Ok, it's the mountains that may get a foot.

MετάEd

11:48 PM

@tchrist Sounds like the Mars Orbiter.

Cerberus

Let's hope it won't cascade down on you.

tchrist

I think the problem is that down here in the oxygen cesspools, the temperature will be too close to the freeze-thaw cusp to make a good call.

Cerberus

Or whatever snow does on mountains.

user19161

Wow, I have 2 stars, miracle!

tchrist

@Cerberus That’s money in the bank. And life. We live on snowmelt, you must understand, and perish without it. It is the only way we are habitable in these numbers.

/kick @Jasper.

Cerberus

11:50 PM

We?

tchrist

Our lands.

Cerberus

Humanity?

We do need rivers, yes.

tchrist

West of the 100th meridian.

Cerberus