Language Overflow

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

15:08

@DamkerngT. And the normal range is?

Damkerng T.

> Since a cat is considered overweight, or plump, at a FBMI score of 42 or more, I also worked out what waist my cats would have to have to be considered overweight - the "plump" column in the table above. - See more at: embracepetinsurance.com/blog/…

But the chart in a PDF seems to suggest that the rib cage circumference should be only about 39 cm or lower to consider a normal weight if a cat's LIM is 15 cm.

That's 9 cm!

Jim Reynolds

15:48

Losing weight is a huge challenge, er, difficult challenge!

I quit smoking, but I wonder if losing weight and keeping it off is even more difficult.

This is research-based, but culture-bound to some extent: berkeleywellness.com/healthy-eating/diet-weight-loss/article/…

Following the MIND Diet reduces risk of Alzheimer's disease by half! webmd.com/alzheimers/features/mind-diet-alzheimers-disease

It also reduces the risk of Alzheimer's disease.

Anonymous

@JimReynolds S'just calories.

Anonymous

If low carb or low fat helps someone reduces calories, then that's great.

Jim Reynolds

I don't think so.

Well, yes.

Anonymous

Neither is more effective than the other on a population level.

Jim Reynolds

Yes and no. Or Yneos.

Anonymous

15:53

Individually, people might find one sort of diet works better for them than another.

Anonymous

It's really just about compliance. Everyone knows how to lose weight (eat less, move more), but it's not really natural to do so when surrounded with easily accessible, hyperpalatable processed foods designed to make you want to eat more, with no real reason to move around.

Jim Reynolds

Sitting is the new smoking.

Anonymous

That's a bit overblown, but moving around does make people healthier :-)

Anonymous

Overeating is probably the new smoking.

Jim Reynolds

The recent data on inactivity is pretty compelling.

Anonymous

15:56

You must mean 2013.

Jim Reynolds

If we were only allowed to sit on lit cigarettes, we would be jumping.

Anonymous

That was highly publicized, but

Anonymous

ije.oxfordjournals.org/content/early/2015/10/09/ije.dyv191

Anonymous

> Conclusions: Sitting time was not associated with all-cause mortality risk. The results of this study suggest that policy makers and clinicians should be cautious about placing emphasis on sitting behaviour as a risk factor for mortality that is distinct from the effect of physical activity.

Anonymous

Activity is helpful, but it's less helpful than avoiding overeating.

Anonymous

15:57

Sitting is probably not going to kill us all.

Jim Reynolds

Overeating is probably the biggest problem.

And eating foods that exacerbate inflammatory processes.

Anonymous

Oh, well, what you eat matters, too.

Anonymous

But the quantity is a bigger risk.

Anonymous

They're not independent factors, though.

Anonymous

It's a lot harder to overeat healthy food, a lot easier to overeat processed junk food.

Anonymous

16:00

So for a lot of people, controlling what you eat makes it easier to control how much you eat. Counting calories isn't very natural.

Jim Reynolds

Perhaps we'll agree that it appears that physical inactivity is harmful regardless of weight: ajcn.nutrition.org/content/early/2015/01/14/…

Yes. And we face the compelling market psychology of the food industry.

There's an amazing chart somewhere, showing the relative cost changes in fruits and vegetables over the past decade or with that of crap food.

I've always been skinny, but my tummy is getting tummier and tummier.

journals.plos.org/plosmedicine/article?id=10.1371/…

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

@JimReynolds Yes.

Jim Reynolds

Yes, what?

I suppose those huge studies on sitting and physical inactivity rely on better and worse measures, like self-report data, etc.

Anonymous

16:19

@JimReynolds Visceral fat is very dangerous.

Anonymous

That's a more important measure than something like BMI.

Anonymous

The ratio of your waist circumference to your height is a better predictor of health outcomes.

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

My BMI is something like 24 now.

Oh, then I won't die young.

If we don't take stuff @JimR does into account, of course.

Anonymous

24 is in the 20 to 25 range that has the lowest all-cause mortality risk for people who've never smoked.

Jim Reynolds

I'm going to be an apple on two toothpicks.

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

16:23

@snailboat I've made smoke in the lab. Does it count?

Jim Reynolds

I don't plan on dying at all.

So BORING.

Damkerng T.

16:57

1

A: How to use supplementary -ing clauses at the end of sentences

The -ing phrases are participle phrases. They are allowed at the end of sentences, but you want to be careful that you don't accidentally make a misplaced modifier: *"Steve stood and watched a man, running his hands through is hair." This sentence is not good because it is hard to tell if Stev...

I wanted to upvote it, but why did they have to say Steve stood and watched a man, running his hands through is hair is not good?!

If only they didn't say that...

(Let's ignore the typo)

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

> LOUISE [rising and going to the table to coax him] Ah! You are
impossible. But you will make me a love potion, will you not?

NEWTON. I will write you a prescription, madam.

He takes a sheet of paper and writes the prescription. Louise
watches as he writes.

LOUISE. Aqua? But aqua is only water, monsieur.

NEWTON. Water with a cabalistic sign after it, madam.

LOUISE. Ah, parfaitement. And this long magical word, what is it?
Mee-kah-pah-nees. What is that?

NEWTON. Micapanis, madam. A very powerful lifegiving substance.

+1000 to Newton.

> LOUISE [taking the paper and tucking it into the bosom of her
dress] Good. That is better, much better. It is so much easier
to make men take pills than drink potions. And now, one thing
more. You must swear to give this prescription to no other woman
of the court. It is for me alone.

NEWTON. You have my word of honor, madam.

LOUISE. But a word of honor must be a gentleman's word of honor.
You, monsieur, are a bourgeois. You must swear on your Bible.

NEWTON. My word is my word, madam. And the Bible must not be

+1000 TO NEWTON!

+1000 to @Stoney

Esp. "And the bible must not be mixed with the magic of micapanis"

Anonymous

17:16

@JimReynolds You should replace reduces there with may reduce.

Anonymous

I haven't read the studies, but I just looked through the abstracts.

Anonymous

I wish people wouldn't write articles that say "one study showed".

Anonymous

You don't have to hide your sources.

Anonymous

It makes it a lot harder to see whether there's any there there.

Anonymous

I wanted to see the study the article referred to, but they made it very difficult.

Anonymous

17:25

The numbers are from this paper: researchgate.net/profile/Christine_Tangney/publication/… (preprint)

Anonymous

See, they didn't show causality.

Anonymous

And it was based on self-report data.

Anonymous

Yeah, I'm sticking to may :-)

CopperKettle

@JimReynolds A good study.

Good evening, Snails, all.

CopperKettle

17:48

I don't get this poem

I understand it up to "in vain", but afterwards it gets cryptic.

"I know this Being's lease" = I know that this Being is mortal?

There should be sites with plain English translations for poems.

I found a nice explanation

Araucaria

Hi folks. Anyone want to get this post on the dark side reopened?

CopperKettle

What post?

Jim Reynolds

Are you offering cash?

If you make one more mistake ... No!

:D

CopperKettle

18:04

To err is human.

(0:

Jim Reynolds

To point out errors, divine!

Hi @CopperKettle!

CopperKettle

To forgive, divine! To point out errors, Microsoftine!

Hi, @JimReynolds!

Jim Reynolds

lol

Araucaria

8

A: What is the correct verb that follows "as well as?"

Which of the following sentences is correct? He as well as they are in the wrong. He as well as they is in the wrong. Sometimes the expression "as well as" behaves like the coordinator and, and sometimes it doesn't. In your example(s)--and because delimiting commas aren't used-...

Jim Reynolds

restarting

Araucaria

18:06

@CopperKettle That one, I was having trouble with my cut and paste! :D

CopperKettle

@Araucaria Sorry, I've no powers to cast my vote for opening there! Not enough points, probably!

I upvoted the question though.

Jim Reynolds

Ditto

Araucaria

@CopperKettle Shame! Never mind. .. Thanks :)

@JimReynolds Cheers Jim!

Jim Reynolds

Maybe snailboat will later on.

CopperKettle

I should farm some points there, but the site is too cluttered with bad questions to my taste.

Jim Reynolds

18:08

Better than questions about your bad taste!

Araucaria

@CopperKettle I think cluttered with bad answers is more the problem ....

CopperKettle

(0:

Jim Reynolds

Bear 1: Why does Cop taste so bad? (For example.)

CopperKettle

@Araucaria Yes, probably. Hasty answers. (0:

Araucaria

@CopperKettle Indeed!

@JimReynolds Why does a cop taste so bad?

Jim Reynolds

18:10

@snailboat Of course, I was careless. I was focusing on my joke about Alzheimer's disease, which is such a hilarious topic.

Tell me!

Anonymous

@JimReynolds Oh, I didn't mean what I said as criticism, just a caution. There are a zillion studies, and we have to be cautious not to overinterpret them.

Anonymous

It's not necessarily a bad study either, but it's probably a good idea to give the actual paper a quick skim.

CopperKettle

"This review is written in a (?) blissfully plain English" -- should there be an article, I wonder.

Anonymous

@CopperKettle No, English is an abstract noun there.

CopperKettle

@snailboat Thanks!

Partitive usage of a does not work with abstract nouns.

Anonymous

18:18

English is occasionally used as a count noun.

Anonymous

@CopperKettle Hmm, well, abstract is a semantic term. I may have unintentionally crossed your wires with that quick response!

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

@CopperKettle What's wrong with an a?

CopperKettle

@snailboat Kettles have no wires, so no problem! (0:

Anonymous

English, when used countably to refer to individual instances of English, refers to different varieties of the language.

Anonymous

For example, in the phrase world Englishes.

CopperKettle

18:20

@Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ. dunno, the variation with a looked okay to me

Anonymous

But even then it's rare for people to talk about an English, I think.

Anonymous

It's pretty rare for people to actually enumerate Englishes.

Anonymous

@CopperKettle I can think of two reasons you might have thought a would work.

Anonymous

① You might be thinking of the literary device we talked about the other day: a young Rembrandt

Anonymous

If so, I think that is usually used when the proper noun refers to a person.

Anonymous

18:24

Well, the normally proper noun. Clearly there it's been turned into a common noun :-)

Jim Reynolds

@snailboat I didn't take it as criticism, at least not critical criticism. I did look at the paper a few weeks or months ago. I also read a more serious analysis of it, which talked about other potential health benefits associated with such diets and certain kinds of foods: nuts and cold ocean fish, olive and canola oils, and whole grains associated with less CVD and maybe diabetes, etc. What was that now? Hmm...

CopperKettle

@snailboat I see! Thank you!

Anonymous

@CopperKettle Oh, was my first guess right? :-)

Anonymous

Ooh, I feel so incoherent this morning.

CopperKettle

@snailboat This "partitive use" from Quirk et al got into my mind, probably. (0:

Jim Reynolds

18:26

That @Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ. ... what an English he uses! I tell you!

Anonymous

@CopperKettle We only briefly talked about the uses on page 290 the other day.

Anonymous

But did you notice that those all use the, not a(n)?

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

@JimReynolds Such condescension.

Jim Reynolds

It's an English, mixed with slobber, sub-human (no offense intended) primate grunting, and throwing his feces at people to express his feelings.

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

@JimReynolds Who? Me? Looks around

CopperKettle

18:28

@snailboat Probably yes. I forgot. (0: If that's incoherent, I'd like to be so incoherent.

@snailboat - yes, I've found it, it's about the

Anonymous

@CopperKettle When you think of partitive, remember the part at the beginning of the word.

Anonymous

You're selecting part of a larger set.

Jim Reynolds

@Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ. You can tell it's affectionate from how bad I'm trying to make you feel.

Anonymous

two of the three people

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

@JimReynolds Actually, I take it as a compliment, coming from you.

CopperKettle

18:30

@snailboat I found unit 5.59 at page 287, and there they speak of a used with a partitive effect

> Mavis had a good education.

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

@CopperKettle Where's Kim?

CopperKettle

> She played the oboe with a remarkable sensitivity.

@Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ. Who?

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

Oh, is it Quirk et al.?

Nevermind then.

Anonymous

a remarkable sensitivity doesn't look like it's partitive to me.

CopperKettle

Okay, I'll mind it never then. (0:

> "The partitive effect of the definite article in the history of Europe (example
5.58 [lb]) finds a parallel in the use of the indefinite article"

Anonymous

18:34

It's not parallel in that they're both partitive, though.

Anonymous

You have to look at it in the context of the preceding section.

Anonymous

I don't think they're saying it's partitive in meaning.

Anonymous

Hmm, it's not clear to me :-(

CopperKettle

Then I don't know what they are saying there..

Anonymous

Well, see the paragraph at the bottom of page 286?

CopperKettle

18:36

> the greater the amount of modification, the greater the acceptability of
alan

@snailboat about "cataphoric the"?

Anonymous

They're talking about using articles with abstract nouns, "changing a generic meaning into a specific or partitive one".

CopperKettle

yes

Anonymous

I read section 5.59 as meaning it was doing something similar semantically.

Anonymous

It's not really, though.

Anonymous

Well, I don't know what the sentence at the top of 5.59 is on about. Maybe someone else can explain it :-)

CopperKettle

18:39

@snailboat Even Quirk et al might be wrong.

@snailboat You might post a question at ELL!

(0:

Anonymous

I could, but I don't really plan on posting on ELL at the moment.

Anonymous

> Mavis had a good education.

Anonymous

If this is partitive, what is the larger set, and what is being selected from that set?

CopperKettle

@snailboat The larger set is "generic education", probably. The ballpark kind of education.

Anonymous

It seems more specific, but not partitive.

Anonymous

18:42

Quirk et al say:

Anonymous

> Both count and noncount nouns can enter partitive constructions, ie constructions denoting a part of a whole. Such constructions express both quality partition (eg: a kind of paper) and quantity partition (eg: a piece of paper). (p.249)

CopperKettle

Then a good education expresses quality partition.

Anonymous

They're using a different meaning for partitive than I expected.

CopperKettle

Live and learn.

Anonymous

Yeah. I seem to have gotten quite confused!

CopperKettle

18:47

Grammar books are quirky.

Anonymous

I'm still not going to use partitive that way, though :-)

Anonymous

@CopperKettle Was that a pun or the result of priming?

CopperKettle

@snailboat A pun! (0:

Anonymous

Quirk et al. 1985 is pretty messy theoretically and terminologically, but it has a lot of useful information in it :-)

CopperKettle

It has the best treatise of articles that I've read.

Combined with John Lawler's PDF on Generic Noun Phrase, it gives a great overview of article usage.

Anonymous

18:54

I think with English, you just have to be aware that ① it's usually a non-count, abstract noun; and ② when it's used (often in the plural, rarely actually counted) to refer to instances of English, that's usually conceptualized as varieties of the language rather than to uses of the language.

Anonymous

You can say something like the English of the King James Version.

Anonymous

Or you can say Standard English or African American Vernacular English or whatnot.

CopperKettle

It's a pity that one can't say "He spoke in a weird, archaisms-ridden English".

Anonymous

You can also say Her English is excellent!

Anonymous

@CopperKettle If it's about a variety of English, you can do something similar: He spoke in a pidgin English I could barely understand.

CopperKettle

18:59

> Her language is an exquisite English

Anonymous

@CopperKettle What interpretation do you intend?

Anonymous

I'm going to have to leave shortly.

CopperKettle

@snailboat I understand: when you use "an English", the sense "some widespread variety of English" hijacks the meaning slot.

Anonymous

@CopperKettle Even that usage is fairly rare outside linguistics, though.

Anonymous

a and English just don't play well together.

CopperKettle

19:01

nods

Anonymous

@CopperKettle You could turn it around and say His English was weird and archaism-ridden.

Anonymous

Although I'd probably rephrase it a little bit.

CopperKettle

@snailboat Yes. "His" makes the meaning "his idiolect" re-hijack the meaning slot. (0:

English is 70% redundant.

Anonymous

Natural language is fairly redundant in general.

Anonymous

That's one reason native speakers have an easier time of it. They can fill in the blanks more easily than non-native speakers.

CopperKettle

19:04

I discovered that from a sci posh video

What is NOT Random?

►

Anonymous

Okay, I have to go, but I'll be back later, let me know later if you need me to undo any of the damage of my bad chat explanations from this morning :-)

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

@CopperKettle That upside down guy Vsauce?

CopperKettle

@snailboat Okay! (0:

@Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ. Probably! I dunno who he is.

@snailboat -- see ya later!

Vsauce

Vsauce is a YouTube channel brand created by Internet personality Michael Stevens. The channels feature videos relating to various scientific and philosophical topics, as well as gaming, technology, culture, and other topics of general interest. == History == On June 24, 2010, Michael Stevens launched the main Vsauce channel. Initially, the channel's programming focused on video games and featured a number of different hosts. However, certain segments such as "IMG!" slowly took over and Michael Stevens became the sole host. The channel then graduated to a mix of information and online activities...

CopperKettle

20:09

I don't get this at all:

> Yet, for men's sakes whom thy vast malison
Must wither innocent of enmity,
Be not withdrawn, dark arm, the spoilure done,
Safe to the bosom of our prosperity.

Sonnet On Seeing a Piece of our Heavy Artillery Brought into Action

"Sonnet On Seeing a Piece of our Heavy Artillery Brought into Action" is a poem by Wilfred Owen. It deals with the atrocities of World War I. The poem is among those set in the War Requiem of Benjamin Britten. == Text == Be slowly lifted up, thou long black arm, Great Gun towering towards Heaven, about to curse; Sway steep against them, and for years rehearse Huge imprecations like a blasting charm! Reach at that Arrogance which needs thy harm, And beat it down before its sins grow worse. Spend our resentment, cannon,-yea, disburse Our gold in shapes of flame, our breaths in storm. Yet, for men...

Nihilist_Frost

21:44

sitis

Noun: sitis f ‎(genitive sitis); third declension

thirst

Verb: sītis

second-person plural present active subjunctive of sum

?????

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