Language Overflow

Anonymous

00:32

ELL is going to end up full of bad tag wikis if we keep approving them.

Anonymous

04:31

Somehow shrilly doesn't seem like an actual word to me.

Anonymous

It is. People use it.

Anonymous

But it doesn't seem that way to me.

Anonymous

It's not a particularly new word, either. The spelling and pronunciation are well established.

Anonymous

But I just can't seem to get it through my head. It doesn't sound right to me.

lekon chekon

05:20

hey.

I posted this as a question, but i'd still really appreciate your views on this.

I thought it wouldn't be a bad idea to give you something you require.

I thought it wouldn't be a bad idea to give you something you required.

Are both the above sentences grammatically correct? What's the difference in their meaning? When constructing sentences of this sort, should one try to keep the tenses in harmony using strictly the past tense only?

Crazy Ninja

05:36

Good Morning ~~Everyone~~ All!

Anonymous

Good morning! :-)

Anonymous

It's evening here.

Crazy Ninja

Other side of the world. are you before or after me? here it's 6th Dec morning

Anonymous

It's the 5th here.

Anonymous

Two hours left until the 6th :-)

Crazy Ninja

05:48

@snailboat its unreasonable you to say evening though, its almost close to mid night :P

Anonymous

What, really? It doesn't count as evening anymore? No one ever told me that!

Anonymous

oxforddictionaries.com/us/definition/american_english/evening

Anonymous

> The period of time at the end of the day, usually from about 6 p.m. to bedtime: 'it was seven o’clock in the evening'

Anonymous

The OED says 'usually, the time from about sunset till bedtime.'

Anonymous

I guess I'll keep on using evening the way I have all my life :-)

Anonymous

06:01

@lekonchekon Don't you already know the answer to your last question is 'no'?

Crazy Ninja

@snailboat hm.. yeah. But I tend to use night after 8:00 o'clock

Anonymous

@CrazyNinja It's perfectly reasonable, though, to use evening.

Crazy Ninja

meh..

Anonymous

google.com/search?q=%2210%3A00%20in%20the%20evening%22

Anonymous

google.com/search?q=%22ten%20o%27clock%20in%20the%20evening%22

Crazy Ninja

06:06

interesting

lekon chekon

08:54

@snailboat, do.
How big a difference does their meanings make though?

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

09:22

@lekonchekon Do what?

lekon chekon

09:43

i missed out one "I" ._.

I thought it wouldn't be a bad idea to give you something you require.

I thought it wouldn't be a bad idea to give you something you required.

What do you think the difference between the two is?

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

@lekonchekon Their last word.

You're complicating this too much.

lekon chekon

._.) my curiosity mostly gets the better of me. ._.)

i wish dam was here now.
he recommended this book that i've been reading for a while now.
I wonder if it covers topics concerning the verb tense consistency.

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

@lekonchekon What's "this book"?

lekon chekon

Practical English Usage by Michael Swan.

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

09:59

@lekonchekon That's an awesome book.

lekon chekon

I think the same.
I take it you've read it, so are there any sections in the book covering verb tense consistency?

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

@lekonchekon I haven't read it completely. O_O

Damkerng T.

@lekonchekon There are several topics that are about tenses. None, however, deals with the harmony or the sequence of tenses or whatever people call it, because, imho, no such thing exists.

There are entries for indirect speech, though.

lekon chekon

okay. :'|
And that's probably the thing that confuses me the most.
Anyway, i'll have to take off now, for i have two friends over.

Tata for now. :)

Damkerng T.

See you later!

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

10:10

@DamkerngT. Thank god. I thought I has gone insane.

This "tense consistency" is a dream.

Damkerng T.

It could be a good guideline, though, but I doubt if it's good advice (to teach "sequence of tenses").

Sequence of tenses

Sequence of tenses (known in Latin as consecutio temporum, and also known as agreement of tenses, succession of tenses and tense harmony) is a set of grammatical rules of a particular language, governing the agreement between the tenses of verbs in related clauses or sentences. A typical context in which rules of sequence of tenses apply is that of indirect speech. If, at some past time, someone spoke a sentence in a particular tense (say the present tense), and that act of speaking is now being reported, the tense used in the clause that corresponds to the words spoken may or may not be the same...

I think it's fine if we stopped at indirect speech.

Maybe it's because of Latin.

Damkerng T.

10:37

The English Say It This Way sounds like a good book title.

I can't look inside the book, and I didn't find the book anywhere.

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

10:48

@DamkerngT. That's either not a good sign or a good sign.

I imagine a descriptive grammar textbook for learners may not be that popular.

CopperKettle

11:07

The question has been marked as a duplicate of another question, which is unrelated to it really.

1

Q: Another wrong test? ("Since" and Present Perfect/Past Simple)

There's this test http://www.englishpage.com/verbpage/verbs12.htm The relevant part is: I have visited so many beautiful places since I (come) to Utah. Apparently it's more natural to say verb in a Past Simple after "since": "since i came" = 40,900,000 results "since i've come" = 8,830,0...

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

11:57

Hmm @Dam I think my Persian Language teacher agrees with the linguistic view on the spoken language and real language thingy.

@Cop +1 for making [catenative-verbs].

Damkerng T.

@Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ. That written language is not real?

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

@DamkerngT. Er, that spoken language is real doesn't mean written language isn't.

But yeah.

Damkerng T.

@Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ. But that's what the meta post implies, I think.

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

Hullo @Sid

Welcome to LO!

@DamkerngT. I dunno, your sentence is a bit too strong for me.

But yeah, spoken is the real language.

Damkerng T.

"Is spoken language ontologically superior to written language, really?"

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

12:01

These days my skin has become brighter since I study more and don't go out often.

Damkerng T.

Okay, I rephrase. That written language is inferior?

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

Hmm.

Anonymous

12:22

I think spoken and written language are both real.

Anonymous

But linguists do a pretty good job of pretending the written language doesn't exist.

Anonymous

That's one reason punctuation is so woefully understudied.

CopperKettle

13:17

Speaking of punctuation. (0: The text on the picture says: "Happy New Year, monkeys". Without the comma, it means, "Happy New Year of the Monkey"

Another joke from our local forum: "Hello, could I please book a table at your restaurant? - Yes, please tell me your name - Akhnaten - Could you please spell it out letter by letter? -- Yes, of course. A bird, two triangles, a wavy line, sun, another bird, a dog's head, and a scarab".

Damkerng T.

13:59

Good morning, @snailboat!

Anonymous

Good morning :-)

Damkerng T.

0

Q: What is the symbol for an Answer and why we're not using that?

I know the symbol of question is '?', we use that to ask a question verbally. But when giving the answer is there any symbol to denote that and if so why we are not using any symbol to mention the same?

american-english

Interesting! Is there any language with that?

(with an answer mark)

CopperKettle

@DamkerngT. Answers are generally longer, much longer than questions, hence having that sign would be unwieldy.

Good evening, Damnkerng, Snails!

Damkerng T.

o/

CopperKettle

@DamkerngT. It's like, you know, we have emoticons for marking a smile. But what are emoticons for marking normal mood? (0:

Damkerng T.

14:13

Maybe this, [o_o]

:P

CopperKettle

14:37

@CopperKettle Procedure has a mass noun usage, too. — Rathony 38 mins ago

Is that really so? "This is most dangerous procedure" - is that felicitous?

StoneyB

@CopperKettle We have to follow procedure.

CopperKettle

Hi, Stoney!

StoneyB

Good morning, CopperKettle.

CopperKettle

"We have to follow procedure" sounds borderline okayish to me, but for some reason "This is most dangerous procedure" sounds weird. But if it's okay, well, let it be.

StoneyB

No, the most dangerous thing won't fly.

Damkerng T.

14:44

@CopperKettle IMHO, the accepted answer doesn't really answer the question, but the OP has already accepted it, so there's nothing (much) we can do.

The other answer complicates the matter even further, imo.

CopperKettle

@StoneyB I know, but "a most dangerous procedure" seemed way better to me.

@DamkerngT. nods. The accepted answer seemed nice to me.

Maybe it could be improved. (0:

Damkerng T.

@CopperKettle nods -- I think it's a better one anyway.

> Most beautiful was the girl I knew in high school.

How freely can we invert or change the order of the normal pattern?

> Smart was the man I knew in this office.

Hmm...

> a) Smart was the men I knew in this office.

> b) Smart were the men I knew in this office.

These are different, too, I think:

> c) Angie looks the most like her father.

> d) Angie looks most like her father.

Damkerng T.

15:36

111

A: Which browsers are officially supported, and what else do I need?

The bottom line: "We support current and previous versions of all browsers with some reasonable amount of market share, but not beta or development versions." –Jeff, paraphrased (source); subsequently reaffirmed by other developers The following list is the community's best guess about su...

(Not really on-topic, but could be quite handy)

Damkerng T.

16:11

TIL another word for TV: boob tube

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

16:41

@Dam @S.R.I @Jasp free flags:

No onebox: ell.stackexchange.com/a/78061/14111

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

17:03

Hullo @Stoney!

I just created a new tag named [pictures] for questions that (will) ask "what's this word in this picture?"

StoneyB

17:33

That could come in handy

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

The only thing I'm scared of is misappliance.

But then again, I'm losing hope thrice everyday.

StoneyB

We'll just have to be vigilant

Jim Reynolds

18:34

@Dam boob tube, yes. Have you also heard idiot box?

Damkerng T.

@JimReynolds Never, but it sounds quite similar.

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

Guys I've been given a BIG homework.

BIG I say.

I've been asked to write a tutorial on how to "rule the exam readings" @Dam @Jim

Any resources to recommend?

Damkerng T.

Well, my nephew kept telling me "read questions first, then the passage". I don't quite agree with the idea.

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

I'd like to hear your idea @Dam the great counselor.

Damkerng T.

But if you read rather slowly, I admit that it's a good strategy.

Me? Learn to read faster. ;-)

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

18:51

@DamkerngT. That's not an hour-long lecture.

Damkerng T.

@Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ. I think we could even write a book on that, if we really want to. :P

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

Then write a book on that! (ノಠ益ಠ)ノ彡┻━┻

Here, I mean.

Damkerng T.

LOL

Let's make the book a bit cheap. We can start with basic stuff everyone already knows. (This kind of book is usually like that. It says things people already know, just cooler.)

Like, have enough rest. Don't panic. And so on.

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

@DamkerngT. And don't forget to brush your teeth every now and then.

Damkerng T.

The introduction may take about 5 -10 minutes already.

@Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ. You could add that to the speech!

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

18:55

@DamkerngT. It'd look more inspirational.

Damkerng T.

From that point on, there are several strategies you could use, most of which you already know, I bet.

You can dazzle them. You can get them hooked with a question. You can put yourself in their shoes. You can quote someone. And such.

Nihilist_Frost

19:10

5

Q: Barking up a tree ("barking up the wrong tree")

I don't understand expression barking up a wrong tree Does it think about putting bark on tree or taking it off? A person says you're barking up the wrong tree and he means don't bother me But what is it from? Does he mean the bark is wrong kind for the tree? Like "I am oak, tak...

meaning word-usage phrase-meaning

I roll on the floor laughing my brains out when I read this question. And the comments.

Damkerng T.

The avatar is also in jest, I think. :D

Nihilist_Frost

The whole question looks like he never meant to be serious.

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

@Nihilist_Frost I'm now 80% sure they're just a troll.

Nihilist_Frost

Even ELU is better for this question

Clearly not a constructive question.

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

@Nihilist_Frost Now you're arriving at the same conclusion.

Nihilist_Frost

19:33

The OP is just bouncing everywhere. Conducting forum behaviour instead of appropriate SE discourse

Ϻ.Λ.Ʀ.

Everyone should just stop engaging.

Nihilist_Frost

I filed a close vote for the question.

Damkerng T.

20:54

I'm going to move the discussion above to the main room. Thanks for everyone's understanding.

Nihilist_Frost

k

move the "barking up the wrong tree" discussion?

Damkerng T.

→ 5 messages moved to ELL's Cabin

That was probably better in the main room, too, but I'm on my iPad; I'm a little clumsy at the moment.

Damkerng T.

22:34

psychologytoday.com/blog/freedom-learn/201301/…

(teasing doesn't always mean bullying)

(most of the time, it doesn't)

Related: ell.stackexchange.com/q/78074/3281

Anonymous

22:51

> For example, a parent might tease a young child by pretending to offer him a piece of candy and then laughing and taking it away; the comment here is on the child’s strong desire for candy. (To most of us, this example seems mean; but in some cultures teasing of this sort is used to deliberately train children in self-control.)

Anonymous

I wonder how that's supposed to work.

Anonymous

Is it supposed to teach the child to accept that they can't have something just because they want it?

S.R.I

@snailboat It's supposed to teach the child not to go for it just because it is there

Anonymous

23:21

@S.R.I Oh, I see!

Anonymous

Does it work?

Anonymous

I'm not a parent.

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