Language Overflow

CowperKettle

03:44

1984: the year when COMPARED TO took the lead

Good morning, @Snails! Sawasdee khrap all!

CowperKettle

05:15

Etymology of the day: gasket

> 1620s, caskette, originally nautical, "small rope or plaited coil" used to secure a furled sail, of uncertain origin, perhaps from French garcette "a gasket," literally "little girl, maidservant," diminutive of Old French garce "young woman, young girl; whore, harlot, concubine" (13c.), fem. of garçon (see garcon).

> Century Dictionary notes Spanish garcette "a gasket," also "hair which falls in locks." Machinery sense of "packing (originally of braided hemp) to seal metal joints and pistons" first recorded 1829.

Ming Wang

Is any of you gonna take an IELTS test?

CowperKettle

05:31

Nope

It's interesting: in "hydraulic head", the word "head" refers to the height of the water column above the examined object.

@snailplane - you've frozen the Cabin! There's a pattern of creating and freezing chatrooms. (0:

Avicenna

Morning @CowperKettle

@snailplane So we can use days with or without a time preposition. Preposition is totally optional, right?

Anonymous

05:50

In this case, I can't think of any differences between the two.

Anonymous

@CowperKettle Well, we seem to be doing fine with all our chat in this room :-)

user227867

06:06

@snailplane Excellent. Now I can say this is the main ELL chat to all users and come here knowing that it is so.

Damkerng T.

06:16

@JimReynolds I think so, too.

Jim Reynolds

@MingWang Why are you wondering, Ming?

Damkerng T.

@snailplane Indeed. Thanks for the renovation! :)

Hi, @Jim!

Jim Reynolds

Kiss me! I voted!

Damkerng T.

@DEAD I guess I'd better leave that to the mods after the election.

Jim Reynolds

Sigh. Lesser of the numerous evils, you know.

Damkerng T.

06:20

@JimReynolds o_O

Jim Reynolds

The moderator candidates have promised me nothing!

Damkerng T.

Oh! LOL

Jim Reynolds

They only do things for the big corporate donors.

I read somewhere that @snailplane and @DEAD and @Cat, etc have been promised not only ELL t-shirts, but full ELL pajama suits.

Of course they'll just be mouthpieces for wealthy SE officials.

Jude

Szia!

Damkerng T.

Szia!

(Looks like it's trending.)

Jude

06:28

Lol! Ninja knows what it means

But he has to be bit Crazy for that

Ming Wang

@JimReynolds I just wanna ask for some experience for IELTS test.

DEAD

@JimReynolds The voices in your head work

@Jude You two are the same person, or just related?

@JimReynolds I did.

@DamkerngT. There isn't much RO's can do, but that much is important.

As the most respected guy in this chat, you wield the power of silencing dramas fast.

@ShadowWizard Not an RO here.

@MingWang Hello, welcome to LO!

Ming Wang

06:44

Hello

DEAD

That rhymes. It's slightly annoying but fun.

Damkerng T.

@DEAD Fortunately, there is no urgent need to do that, so far!

DEAD

Yay

But they are inevitable, and you know that.

Damkerng T.

nods

That said, I'm pretty sure that we're going to see our mods after the election more often.

(in chat, I mean)

Jude

@DEAD I have just merge :D

DEAD

06:58

Oh.

@DamkerngT. Whether I get elected or not, I would dust off meta and get some work done.

Damkerng T.

@DEAD Yay!

DEAD

It seems P.E.D. really wants something done, but he keeps getting struck by our humongous apathy.

Hmm, first, I'd ask people what they think a tag is.

If we have a vision of what we expect tags to be, it'll be easier to approach.

P. E. Dant

4.2k 8

Hmm, I wonder what he means by Thorn.

Damkerng T.

@DEAD Didn't we have some consensus the last time?

DEAD

@DamkerngT. Some consensus on what?

As far as I can see, the only agreement here is that something should be done about tags.

Damkerng T.

@DEAD Our ideas on tags.

DEAD

07:02

And even some people disagree with that.

Damkerng T.

@DEAD Þ

DEAD

@DamkerngT. Where are our ideas on tags?

Damkerng T.

I can't remember that meta post, but I think you wrote one before we started the retagging event.

DEAD

@DamkerngT. Oh. That'd make smileys much easier, but what is he referencing? Is the letter called Thorn?

Jude

One more flag accepted, i will get a silver batch :)

Damkerng T.

07:03

@DEAD Yes! Something from older English.

DEAD

@DamkerngT. Oh. That was momentary consensus about getting rid of grammar.

@Jude Badge. Also yay!

Damkerng T.

@Jude Congrats in advance! :D

Jude

my spellings.... uuurgh

Damkerng T.

:)

DEAD

@Jude No, my spelling uuurgh.

Your spellings should try really hard to be uuurgh.

Dam's typos are slightly uuurgh too.

Jude

07:06

I have actually put my real details in my profile, in case that HR people see my community involvement

Damkerng T.

@DEAD That was what my :) was for!

Jude

@DEAD You are 100% attentive to the details

DEAD

@Jude You should actually get 30 rep to vote in the election before it ends.

@Jude Only when I'm awake.

And feeling like nitpicking.

Jude

I think I have missed the Last one too :)

DEAD

Dam be careful.

I might reach your number of chat messages these days.

Jude

07:09

@DEAD Congratz in advance

you will be in safe house

DEAD

Oh wait, hell.

Dam is actually 192k chat messages.

I have a long way to go.

Jude

I have only 1 answer provided :(

Damkerng T.

@DEAD :)

@DEAD Oh! Approaching 200k already! What's your number?

DEAD

A measly 96k.

@Jude Then add more answers!

Damkerng T.

You'll get to 100k in no time!

Shadow Wizard

07:26

@DEAD so become one! ;-)

@DEAD pity that not 69k... :P

V.V.

08:07

@CowperKettle, IMHO,* the* belongs to both of them.

CowperKettle

Thorn (letter)

Thorn or þorn (Þ, þ) is a letter in the Old English, Gothic, Old Norse and modern Icelandic alphabets, as well as some dialects of Middle English. It was also used in medieval Scandinavia, but was later replaced with the digraph th, except in Iceland, where it survives. The letter originated from the rune ᚦ in the Elder Fuþark and was called thorn in the Anglo-Saxon and thorn or thurs (a category of beings in Germanic paganism) in the Scandinavian rune poems. Its reconstructed Proto-Germanic name is Thurisaz. It is pronounced as either a voiceless dental fricative [θ] or the voiced counterpart...

@V.V. Good morning! You mean "during the period of the fermentation"?

0

Q: "During period of fermentation" vs. "during the period of fermentation" - can we use the definite article?

From a book published by Cambridge University Press: In a batch operation, all necessary medium components and the inoculum are added at the beginning and not during period of fermentation. Therefore, their concentrations are not controlled but are allowed to vary as the living cells take the...

articles

Damkerng T.

08:25

> Maybe here it's okay to either use or omit "the"?

@CowperKettle I think so.

V.V.

09:14

@CowperKettle, it's left out to avoid repetition. The beginning and (the) period of fermentation.

CowperKettle

09:38

@V.V. I see! I did not think of that

Jim Reynolds

11:28

@V.V. @Cow That doesn't work here. But I see your reasoning!

We need the before period here.

But we don't need to repeat the in Please read the first and second pages.

Period is a noun here, requiring an introductory determiner.

V.V.

12:10

Because of different prepositions?

Avicenna

12:36

@CowperKettle I like it with the before period. I guess that's a misprint.

Jim Reynolds

13:12

@V.V. I don't know! Sometimes nouns need determiners, and sometimes not. But I don't know the rules that describe when.

V.V.

Or because of negation. You feel there should be the.

Jim Reynolds

Hmm... At the beginning and not the during period of fermentation. That looks logical, but I think we don't say the during period.

V.V.

Bad connection.

Thanks, I think they can't be connected because of different prepositions.

Anonymous

14:14

Good morning :-)

Anonymous

@JimReynolds During is a preposition, not an adjective.

Damkerng T.

@snailplane Morning!

Man_From_India

14:31

This answer made me curious to know about the POS of more than in more than 10 people. I however don't agree with the analysis of more than demonstrated in the answer.

3

A: Determiner, Adjective

Rather than trying to split a sentence directly into words, it's often more instructive to break it down into phrases, each of which breaks down further. This lets us see the overall structure better. For example, consider something like "tenth birthday card". Tenth is an adjective, and birthday...

I thought it's just an adverb and that functions as a quantifier.

Anonymous

15:09

@Man_From_India I don't think more than has a part of speech. I think it's two words.

DEAD

I can't wait for the election to end.

We gotta get some tag cleaning done.

Before my hype goes away

@snailplane Hmph

I guess Man studied prepositions too much.

Man_From_India

@snailplane hmmm good point. But how to show it in tree diagram? Do you think the answer says it correctly?

@DEAD it gives a lot of pain to learners :(

DEAD

And to men from India.

Man_From_India

Btw enjoying Monster House at home :-)

@DEAD I'm one of the learners.

Anonymous

Yes, I think more is the head of a determinative phrase in determiner function, with more in this case being the comparative form of the determinative much rather than the degree adverb more.

Anonymous

15:18

Typing from my phone :-)

CowperKettle

@snailplane How typical :0)

Good evening!

I'll lurk some.

DEAD

@snailplane Still faster than Usain

Man_From_India

@snailplane aa always :-)

CowperKettle

There should be some fast-entry mobile device.

Man_From_India

@snailplane any reason to not consider it as a degree adverb? And going in favour of more as a determinitive?

Anonymous

15:21

Good evening, Kettle o' Cowper!

Anonymous

@Man_From_India Morphologically no, but functionally yes – the phrase as a whole functions as a determiner, which suggests it's the determinative rather than the adverb.

Man_From_India

Good evening kettle.

CowperKettle

Namaste, Man ji!

Anonymous

My bus is fifteen minutes late and I'm cold :-(

Man_From_India

@snailplane right. more than ten is a determinitive phrase. I thought ten is the head determiner and more than a quantifier/modifier of the head determinative. Often adverbs modifies determinatives.

@snailplane it's too hot here :( exchange place :-) come here and let me be there :P

Anonymous

15:28

Ah well, the cold is hormetic :-)

CowperKettle

@snailplane I'm very sorry! Hugs Snails It's cold here too, only +11C

Anonymous

My phone really didn't want to let me type that word. I don't think my phone believes in hormesis.

CowperKettle

I had to look it up

Anonymous

Aww, thanks :-)

CowperKettle

(0:

Man_From_India

15:29

@CowperKettle same here hehe

Anonymous

@Man_From_India Oh, that's a plausible analysis too. I guess then you'd consider more than a compound.

Man_From_India

@snailplane yes.

Anonymous

Now I see why you asked.

Anonymous

So how do we distinguish between these two analyses?

Man_From_India

But problem is we can't consider it as an AdvP.

@snailplane tough question. Functionally I don't think there is any difference.

Anonymous

15:34

My bus arrived! O frabjous day!

Man_From_India

:-)

Btw got any weight?

Anonymous

Ahahaha, I plead the fifth.

DEAD

My brain works best when cold.

Anonymous

The snailbus is about to connect to the snailtrain.

DEAD

I've gained some weight since the past few months.

My BMI is now 24.5.

I've been doing less and less physical activity.

And study more.

Anonymous

15:39

Oh, watch out! The WHO defines 25 as overweight, although many people are better off with lower numbers.

Man_From_India

@snailplane got it :-) what if you could take 1000 cal in one shot?

DEAD

@snailplane Yah, 25 to 29 is overweight IIRC.

BMI isn't really accurate anyway.

It's really general.

Man_From_India

No wonder. The way this kid gobbles ice cream :-) this chemical is overweight :-)

DEAD

For someone like me with heavy, strong bones, BMI is misleading.

@Man_From_India I ate much more ice cream when I used to do a lot of different sports.

Man_From_India

It's true, BMI is a bit misleading. But doctors still calculate it. Don't know why!

Anonymous

15:42

@DEAD Right, you can have more body fat than is healthy even in the "healthy" range. And a very small percentage of the population actually manages a healthy body fat percent while in the overweight range.

Anonymous

But usually it errs the other way. It rarely tells people they're overweight when they're not.

DEAD

@Man_From_India It's a good enough indication

It's not as precise as some people take it to be, but it's a very useful rough estimation

Anonymous

BMI is a pretty good indicator if you combine it with using your eyes.

Anonymous

If you're The Rock, you can tell it by looking, and you don't need BMI :-)

DEAD

I'm The Pebble.

Man_From_India

15:44

Hehe

Anonymous

You can get a DEXA scan instead.

Anonymous

It costs more but gives you a better indication of your body composition.

DEAD

It's not that serious for me.

I estimate that until Konkur, I'm gonna gain a couple of more kilos.

This is the damnedest exam in history.

Anonymous

What exam?

DEAD

Konkur.

It's our university entrance exam, which got way more prominent than it should be.

Anonymous

15:48

Oh, I see.

DEAD

Basically, without Konkur, I have no future.

Anonymous

@DEAD By the way, there's only room for a couple pounds' variation in bone weight.

Anonymous

Your skeleton doesn't make up a large portion of your body weight.

DEAD

@snailplane There was a time these couple of pounds mattered for me.

Not just bone matter, you get what I'm saying.

Anonymous

But that's why the healthy BMI range is so huge, to allow for these variations :-)

CowperKettle

15:50

Word of the evening: ampholyte (looks like acolyte)

DEAD

But there's always dispute on the edges.

Anonymous

The epidemiological evidence, when you correct for confounders, tends to point toward a BMI around 20–21 being healthiest.

Anonymous

But the risks at 25 aren't much higher.

Anonymous

The go up very rapidly at 30, 35…

DEAD

@snailplane Mhm

Anonymous

15:53

In my country, we're rapidly approaching 30 as a typical BMI.

CowperKettle

@DEAD You can jog and count your carbs.

Not at the same time.

(0:

DEAD

@snailplane I read the other day that one third of Americans are at least overweight

Anonymous

And if your BMI is 20, you're thinner than 95% of the people around you.

Anonymous

@DEAD 70%. One third is obese.

DEAD

One big downside to MacDonald's existence.

I suddenly don't regret not having eaten an American hamburger.

Anonymous

15:56

McDonald's is everywhere now, all around the world.

DEAD

Not in Iran.

Færd

Is to come, I've heard.

Anonymous

Almost everywhere. :-)

DEAD

That's an insane number though.

I wonder how fast Iranians will beat y'all

@Færd Eh? I can't trust anything I hear these days.

Færd

@snailplane Are the obese from the comparatively wealthy stratum that can afford to be consuming all the time?

@DEAD Yeah. It would be no surprise though.

Anonymous

16:01

No, the correlation goes the other way. Most Americans can afford to eat all the time

Anonymous

Oops, I hit enter early.

Færd

Maybe because they cannot afford to eat healthy food.

@DEAD corporate.mcdonalds.com/mcd/franchising/…

> McDonald's has responded by posting a "franchise application for Iran" on its website so Iranians can apply to open a restaurant there. But the company is clear that nothing is happening yet.

(from here)

DEAD

@Færd I get an error.

Iran apparently isn't a country

Færd

That means they don't franchise Iranians, which probably means they're not about to come so soon.

DEAD

@Færd The media has implanted fear of Iran on people's heads for decades. It's still doing it more or less. No surprise shaking hands won't win us anything.

I wonder what the heck our officials were thinking.

We should still be wielding torches.

Færd

16:09

To be honest, I'm not really sure what the real problem is.

DEAD

@Færd Yah, the same ethics they've been murmuring into our ears for years they violate.

We already have corrupt officials to worry about, and the world is still holding grudges against us.

Sigh.

Færd

What's the main problem that is hindering trade between us and the West? Their fear of us?

DEAD

0

Q: English teacher or teacehr of English

What is understood if I say "I'm an English teacher? I teach English or I'm a teacher coming from England?

meaning

Anonymous

@DEAD I've had McDonald's before, but I think the last time was at least fifteen years ago.

DEAD

That typo is super weird.

@snailplane How many people there are like you?

Anonymous

16:12

Umm, I'm somewhat atypical :-)

DEAD

@Færd Dunno. It's like how citizens are to each other. Open faces and greetings and artificial smiles, but they'll stab you in the back.

Anonymous

Foreign relations is a depressing topic. And something I feel like I have no control over as a citizen.

Færd

@DEAD I think part of the problem is that they don't want to do fair trade yet. Misusing the opportunities in their favor.

We're not like China.

DEAD

@snailplane Mhm, and who's gonna benefit anyway? On our side at least, it's only that the corrupt leaders.

Anonymous

But I like how we have people from across the globe here on ELL :-)

DEAD

16:16

I like how we discuss religion, politics etc. without jumping on each other.

CowperKettle

@DEAD - why do we use HOAc designation for acetic acid? Whence the "HO"?

DEAD

I wish the whole west was like GreatBigBore.

Anonymous

It breaks down the "us vs. them" mentality when you get people from everywhere together on the internet.

CowperKettle

Does it mean the "HO" group (hydrogen + oxygen)?

DEAD

Yep

CowperKettle

16:17

Yay! I just twigged it.

DEAD

They could've equally said AcOH.

And they sometimes do.

CowperKettle

nods

Anonymous

AcOH is more fun to say.

DEAD

But the oxygen is always imagined to be connected more closely to the acetate.

@snailplane Chem is always fun. Some chemicals are more fun than others.

Anonymous

I like to say dysprosium.

DEAD

16:19

More obscure elements always intrigue me

Especially lanthanides and actinides.

Some of the transition metals are cryptic too.

Have you seen molybdenum compounds? So frigging cool

Anonymous

I don't think so

Færd

I bet I won't find them cool. Let's see.

DEAD

@Færd The weather is really hot these days.

Rudimentary physics. They'd get hot too.

Hafnium also has really cool complexes.

CowperKettle

> "Na acetate trihydrate 0.436 mg/ml, acetic acid up to pH 5.0" (Can I write this if I want to say that the acetic acid is added until the buffer solution has the pH 5.0?)

DEAD

It sounds really weird.

CowperKettle

16:23

D'oh.

Anonymous

We have a high of 24°C here today.

CowperKettle

@DEAD Why? Because usually the concentration of the ac.acid would be spelled out?

DEAD

For one thing, change it to sodium acetate trihydrate.

It's like saying water is dihydrogen O.

CowperKettle

@DEAD It is from a table, the authors tried to cram the sentence into a cell

DEAD

I read that 'cram the sentence into a hell'

Anonymous

16:24

Poor sentence!

CowperKettle

They have much wisdom yet they are not wise,
They have much goodness yet they do not well,
(The fools we know have their own paradise,
The wicked also have their proper Hell);

DEAD

@CowperKettle Then write the chemical formula.

CowperKettle

nods

DEAD

@CowperKettle My paradise is 35 degrees now and I'm melting.

CowperKettle

I remember that I spent some time trying to decipher "they do not well"

It means "they do not do good things"

DEAD

16:27

It's not an auxiliary do.

Anonymous

I can't tell what that means.

DEAD

That's what I thought at first.

CowperKettle

@snailplane You have to, you're the native speaker!

DEAD

And the linguist

Anonymous

@DEAD So you'd translate that to "They don't do well" in Standard English?

DEAD

16:28

I guess so.

Anonymous

Still kind of cryptic, at least without context.

CowperKettle

Noo..

Færd

Or maybe they do [not well] ?

CowperKettle

"They don't do well" would mean that they have poor health or something

DEAD

@snailplane More like 'they don't do good things'

CowperKettle

16:28

the source text

> What men are they who haunt these fatal glooms,
And fill their living mouths with dust of death,
And make their habitations in the tombs,
And breathe eternal sighs with mortal breath,
And pierce life's pleasant veil of various error
To reach that void of darkness and old terror
Wherein expire the lamps of hope and faith?

> They have much wisdom yet they are not wise,
They have much goodness yet they do not well,
(The fools we know have their own paradise,
The wicked also have their proper Hell);
They have much strength but still their doom is stronger,
Much patience but their time endureth longer,
Much valour but life mocks it with some spell.

DEAD

Are we deliberately distracting from the main question?

CowperKettle

@DEAD about the chemical sentence?

Anonymous

Ah, then "They do no good"?

DEAD

@CowperKettle No, about Scooby Doo

CowperKettle

Yes, that's how I read it

DEAD

16:31

@CowperKettle Hmm, so this is stuff from cells in a table, and not a normal sentence?

CowperKettle

@DEAD Yes, it's a compressed sentence

DEAD

If there's a line between the reported concentration and compound name, I'm good.

CowperKettle

> "Sodium acetate trihydrate - 0.436 mg/ml, acetic acid - up to pH 5.0"?

DEAD

@CowperKettle Is acetic acid up to pH 5.0 contents of a cell?

Anonymous

I just heard someone say "Drive careful!"

CowperKettle

16:33

@DEAD The cell describes the composition of the buffer solution

DEAD

@snailplane Indecisiveness, or too many nonnatives in the current America now?

CowperKettle

Probably as you add more HOAc into the buffer solution, its pH changes

DEAD

Yes.

Go read Henderson-Hasselbach

Also your extra apostrophe is killing me

CowperKettle

So they want to say: "We started with this concentration of NAOc: 0.436. We next added HOAc until the overall pH reached 5.0"

DEAD

Yup

CowperKettle

16:35

deapostrophization complete

apostrophes are hormetic

DEAD

Also desultory moggies

Færd

@snailplane Akin to drive safe.

CowperKettle

So when a sentence contains apostrophes, it would not kill you if it's apostrophe content is low.

(0:

DEAD

I'm a shock-sensitive chemical

Færd

What would happen to you if shocked? Vaporize?

DEAD

16:39

Even low contents of it's's are dangerou . . . explodes

Færd

Cool.

DEAD

TNT is like me too.

But it releases lots of gas upon degradation, and that's why that's TNT and I'm dead.

CowperKettle

> Sodium acetate trihydrate 0.436 mg/ml and acetic acid to pH 5.0 (maybe this would be more idiomatic)

DEAD

I can work better with 'up to'.

Although the addition lowers the pH, not increases.

CowperKettle

yes, indeed, acid is low pH

Anonymous

16:44

@DEAD Sounded like a native speaker to me :-)

DEAD

@snailplane Where? WHERE? Freaks out

I mean, of course I did.

CowperKettle

Word of the day: blindwormlike

> Yet in his marvellous fancy he must make
Quick wings for Time, and see it fly from us;
This Time which crawleth like a monstrous snake,
Wounded and slow and very venomous;
Which creeps blindwormlike round the earth and ocean,
Distilling poison at each painful motion,
And seems condemned to circle ever thus.

DEAD

That's gotta be a typo.

Google says it's not as common as I expected it to be.

With at least a couple of hyphens.

Although it's a pretty good way to twist word games.

CowperKettle

> Like a blindwormlike desultory moggie,
My brain works best in the hormetic cold

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