Language Overflow

Damkerng T.

00:52

A grammatically curious excerpt from The Martian:

> "Bad woman take pillow," Watney groaned, unwilling to open his eyes.

(Which makes English sound exactly like Thai or Mandarin!)

yubraj

02:00

Goob Monig everyone ! (I don't know Assimilation is correct here)

Jim Reynolds

03:16

@DamkerngT. What surprises you in this one?

mike

good morning :)

Jim Reynolds

Hi @mike

mike

hello :)

@DamkerngT. that quote is from the very beginning of the book, if I remember correctly

Watney is still half asleep - there's an element of 'caveman-speak' to his utterances at the time

Jim Reynolds

03:42

Thai and Chinese people who live in caves shouldn't throw nonessential function lexemes?

yubraj

06:15

What've you been up to?
What are you up to? In which situation or context and meaning we use these expression?

Or questions

V.V.

06:29

be up to sth informal

to be doing or planning something, often something secret and bad

Damkerng T.

07:24

@JimReynolds "Is this your first time to come to Sydney?" is idiomatic, really? Also "Is this your first time to Sydney?"

@JimReynolds I suppose the grammar of our languages are caveman-like to native speakers of Romantic and Germanic languages.

Damkerng T.

08:13

> Some speakers pronounce an R at the end of a word even when there is no vowel following. An example is U.S. President George W. Bush (who is from Texas) speaking to Federal Emergency Management Agency director Michael Brown in 2005: "The FEMA-R director's working 24/7"

> en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linking_and_intrusive_R#Linking_R

Interesting!

CowperKettle

Word of the Day: almost surely

Damkerng T.

@CowperKettle I guess it's a cousin of probably approximately correct. :-)

Jim Reynolds

08:33

@DamkerngT. Yessir. Both idiomatic. How does Is this your first time here? strike you?

Damkerng T.

@JimReynolds That's fine. I suppose Is this your first time to here? would strike you as a bit odd, though.

Jim Reynolds

Indeed.

Damkerng T.

I don't rule his phrasing out as unidiomatic. I think it can be idiomatic, but I don't know it's idiomatic where (i.e., in what dialects).

Jim Reynolds

First time to come to here also gets a thumbs-down.

Damkerng T.

@JimReynolds That was what caught my eye! Oh, sorry! I meant first time to come to Sydney.

Jim Reynolds

08:37

First time to Sydney seems widely used, across varieties to my intuition.

First time to come to .... haha. Yes. ..

It strikes me as probably commonly said, but probably less likely in writing and as register heightens. Alternatives would be more likely, methinks.

Damkerng T.

nods

hinative.com/en-US/questions/6526

The poll results seem to be in line with my idea, but the OP proposed 4 alternatives, so I'm not sure which alternatives those votes refer to.

Hey, this is interesting!

Jim Reynolds

As Ms plane has said, we can be unreliable when we consider what's natural, idiomatic, or common, in many cases.

Damkerng T.

mike

Is this your first time in Sydney? would also be acceptable, I would think.

Damkerng T.

> books.google.com/books?id=CzEFHu1s8QkC&pg=PA1

Jim Reynolds

08:44

Yes, Mike

Damkerng T.

So, Is this your first time to Australia? is perfectly possible in AusE.

Jim Reynolds

Is this your first visit to ___? might more often be chosen by people who tend to speak more carefully or in a "higher" style.

I wouldn't expect Is this your first time? if that were the extent of the context, though it wouldn't shock me.

I sense first time to placename exemplifies ellipsis.

Damkerng T.

I'd think Is this your first time? in such a context is a shorter version of Is this your first time here?

0

Q: When you want to ask someone to maintain their class

Please imagine that you take a friend (a guy) to meet a group of your friends at a party. The group and the guy are have never met one another and know nothing about one another. The guy starts clowning around out of the blue and you have no idea why he is acting like that. You feel shy in front ...

"What's wrong with you, dude? We're supposed to look cool in front of these guys. But you're making a fool of yourself!"

I guess there are several hundred ways to render it. :P

mike

09:01

@DamkerngT.: I wonder if he's writing a book sometimes

Damkerng T.

@mike He's writing a dictionary, or maybe a usage manual. I'm not sure what he calls it.

mike

ah okay

Damkerng T.

Thank you for answer if the sentence were 'he always knows that I am going there' , the answer is same ? — b.east 13 hours ago

This is also interesting.

I suppose He knows I'm going there is fine.

Adding always seems to change everything, at least to me. It doesn't sound right anymore.

And I don't think He always knows (that) I go there is fine, either.

Maybe He always knows when I go there.

It's (again!) highly context-dependent. Maybe He always knows I go there is possible. It's just that I can't think of a good context where it's fine.

Hello, @unarist!

unarist

:-)

All of my family ended up holidays today.

.o(ended up? finished?)

Damkerng T.

are back from?

unarist

09:14

ah, yes!

So a tomorrow breakfast will be rice and miso soup, instead of simple soup with rice cake...called "お雑煮".

Damkerng T.

Hmm... A tomorrow breakfast? I wonder if Tomorrow, breakfast will be ... can convey your thought better.

unarist

I thought Breakfast will be ... tomorrow., but Tomorrow, breakfast will be ... is better?

Damkerng T.

@unarist I'm okay with either of them. :)

Jim Reynolds

09:47

@DamkerngT. Yes. But if there is nothing more in the prior conversation, I think we'd seldom truncate it at time.

Damkerng T.

nods -- Agreed

!!wiki/biolinguistics

Ellbot

Biolinguistics

Biolinguistics is the study of the biology and evolution of language. It is a highly interdisciplinary field, including linguists, biologists, neuroscientists, psychologists, mahematicians, and others. By shifting the focus of investigation in linguistics to a comprehensive scheme that embraces natural sciences, it seeks to yield a framework by which we can understand the fundamentals of the faculty of language. == Origins == The biolinguistic perspective began to take shape in the mid-twentieth century, among the linguists influenced by the developments in biology and mathematics. Eric Lenneberg...

Jim Reynolds

@una Did you understand that we won't use A tomorrow breakfast ?

I think you understood that, but I'm not sure.

Damkerng T.

Biolinguistics makes me wonder... is language really essential to an intelligent life form?

Jim Reynolds

Definition of intelligence?

Damkerng T.

09:59

Good point!

I suppose self-aware is not enough.

Jim Reynolds

For the purpose of your wondering?

Damkerng T.

intelligence

Noun: intelligence ‎(countable and uncountable, plural intelligences)

(uncountable) Capacity of mind, especially to understand principles, truths, facts or meanings, acquire knowledge, and apply it to practice; the ability to learn and comprehend.
1912, Edgar Rice Burroughs, Tarzan of the Apes, Chapter 5
Not so, however, with Tarzan, the man-child. His life amidst the dangers of the jungle had taught him to meet emergencies with self-confidence, and his higher intelligence resulted in a quickness of mental action far beyond the powers of the apes.
(countable) An entity that has such capacities.
Tennyson

(20 more not shown…)

"Capacity of mind, especially to understand principles, truths, facts or meanings, acquire knowledge, and apply it to practice; the ability to learn and comprehend."

Hmm... language is not there.

Jim Reynolds

I should know. Because I'm very intelligent, believe me. That's what people are saying.

Damkerng T.

Haha!

unarist

@JimReynolds Yes, two breakfasts seems to be weird...

Jim Reynolds

10:01

I'm laying the groundwork for the next ELL election.

Two breakfasts is ok.

Damkerng T.

@JimReynolds The next election will be in 2116. :P

Jim Reynolds

It seems weird to you because it's both a countable and uncountable noun.

We can't use tomorrow breakfast though. At least not normally.

In addition to what you and Damkerng have already said, we can also use tomorrow's breakfast.

Tomorrow is not an adjective. And it doesn't work as a noun + noun combination.

unarist

For the example of countable breakfast, is last 2 breakfasts I've eaten OK? (today's and yesterday's)

Jim Reynolds

Yes. Probably introduced with the

Anonymous

Tomorrow is a temporal deictic pronoun.

Jim Reynolds

10:12

No profanity, please.

Anonymous

You don't say *you breakfast either, you say your breakfast. You don't say *the your breakfast, you say your breakfast. Tomorrow works the same way.

unarist

Tomorrow is not an adjective, ah, yes...

Anonymous

No determiner before it, and it goes in the genitive form tomorrow's when it determines a noun.

Jim Reynolds

Wow. A pronoun!

Anonymous

Because it functions as a determiner, not an attributive modifier (like an adjective or a noun).

Jim Reynolds

10:14

@sna Is the link you provided to the nutrition blog some weeks ago handy?

Anonymous

Dictionaries are mostly wrong about that one.

unarist

@snail Thanks for explain as pronoun, that's really clear!

Anonymous

@JimReynolds wholehealthsource.blogspot.com

Anonymous

His new book The Hungry Brain is coming out soon.

Jim Reynolds

No determiner before what?

Tomorrow as pronoun?

Tomorrow as pronoun?

Anonymous

10:17

You don't say *the tomorrow's breakfast, the same way you don't say *the your breakfast.

Jim Reynolds

Click

I have lost, in about 6 or 8 weeks, a surprising amount of the abdominal fat I accumulated over the past 18-24 months.

It happened rather effortlessly, consequent to experimenting with radically cutting cereals from my diet.

@snailplane Thanks. I was enjoying it, then got distracted.

Anonymous

In the U.S., we sell giant boxes of candy and call them "cereal". Cinnamon Toast Crunch is candy…

Anonymous

Hyperpalatable junk food :-) Nom.

Anonymous

I could eat cereal, sugary or otherwise, without gaining weight (or fat) but I choose not to. The sugary cereal is bad for my teeth and the non-sugary cereal is too bland to interest me.

Anonymous

The main reason I avoid really sugary foods is for my teeth.

Anonymous

10:31

What sort of cereal did you cut out?

Anonymous

@JimReynolds You're on the thin side already, aren't you?

CowperKettle

He is too weak from dieting to answer, so I'll answer instead: "Yes, Snailplane! I'm on the thin side!"

> I am resolved; 'tis but a three years' fast:
The mind shall banquet, though the body pine:
Fat paunches have lean pates, and dainty bits
Make rich the ribs, but bankrupt quite the wits.

Loves Labours Lost

Let me embrace thee, thin @JimReynolds, for wise men say it is the wisest course

(0:

Anonymous

10:58

@CowperKettle Lots of three years in that play :-)

Jim Reynolds

@snailplane I meant wheat, rye, barley.

Anonymous

@JimReynolds So the boring kind. :-)

Anonymous

Do you believe in the pseudoscience presented in Wheat Belly?

Anonymous

(That sentence contains my own response to your answer.)

Jim Reynolds

@snailplane Yes, but things were starting to take shape like an avocado pit with toothpick limbs

Anonymous

11:08

Darned android fat distribution.

Jim Reynolds

No. But remember that article I supplied linking wheat protein to dysregulations of the inflammatory process?

Anonymous

Do you think you're one of the people who that might apply to? Wheat doesn't cause any problems for most people, but there are some people who might be non-celiac gluten-sensitive.

Anonymous

It hasn't been studied enough.

Anonymous

My housemate thinks she's non-celiac gluten-sensitive.

Anonymous

As far as I can tell, I am not one of those people.

Jim Reynolds

11:14

We cannot say something like wheat doesn't cause any problems for most people if we wish to be scienfific, can we?

Though I am with you, generally

Anonymous

Would you prefer There is no evidence so far that wheat causes problems for most people?

Jim Reynolds

I'm not sure we can say that

Anonymous

Oh, I'd like to see the evidence, then! I haven't seen anything convincing yet.

Jim Reynolds

I'm not convinced

I saw a few things that raised question marks

Anonymous

Maybe you could read Dangerous Grains.

Anonymous

11:19

amazon.com/Dangerous-Grains-Gluten-Cereal-Hazardous/dp/…

Anonymous

Which suggests that up to 12% of the population may be gluten-sensitive.

Anonymous

And up to 1% may be celiac, with the majority undiagnosed.

Jim Reynolds

I feel you may be incorrectly placing me into a category

Anonymous

I just thought I'd recommend an interesting book :-)

Anonymous

I can't place you into any categories.

Anonymous

11:21

I do think it's interesting, the different ways we use the word cereal.

Anonymous

The way I used it, to refer to "breakfast cereals", things in boxes, most of which are covered with sugar?

Jim Reynolds

Oh. I jumped to a conclusion. But surely we agree that jumping can be healthful?

Anonymous

And then the way you used it, which was different.

Anonymous

@JimReynolds Jumping rope is good for your bones!

Anonymous

I think there are real problems with wheat that affect a portion of the population, and I think those problems need further study. I have no idea whether they apply to you personally, but they're interesting to talk about.

Jim Reynolds

11:24

Things that begin with Learn the shocking truth and then mention gluten are quick to turn me off.

Anonymous

Yes, it's very dramatic, isn't it?

Anonymous

Sounds like it's going to kill you in your sleep.

Anonymous

On the other hand, cutting out any kind of food you regularly eat will usually lead to losing weight.

Anonymous

Until your brain learns how to make up for it.

Anonymous

That's why low carb diets and low fat diets both tend to work in the short term.

Jim Reynolds

11:28

Any of a myriad systems

Anonymous

So we should expect cutting out wheat to lead to some weight loss for anyone who eats it regularly.

CowperKettle

Word of the day: normal calculator

Anonymous

Boop. I clicked the star.

Anonymous

@JimReynolds I think a lot of people think they have a problem with gluten but don't really.

Anonymous

It's hard to balance that with "but people with gluten problems do exist!" because we tend to fall back on simple heuristics like "gluten bad? no, gluten okay!" "no, not gluten okay! gluten bad!" :-)

Jim Reynolds

11:34

Or equate something that has a "healthful"-sounding ring to it as healthful

Anonymous

I don't think it's a bad idea for most people to cut out gluten for a while just to see what happens. For me, nothing happened, as far as I could tell.

Anonymous

Some people suggest there are other problems with wheat besides gluten.

Jim Reynolds

More interested in ATIs. Just interested

Anonymous

But if you cut out gluten, you're probably cutting out other wheat proteins too, right? :-) So you can try it out the same way.

CowperKettle

I read a couple weeks ago that people with keratoconus have low zinc levels. I bought a pack of zinc additives and tried them. I tried them three times, and each time I felt quite bad, so I stopped. Go figure.

Jim Reynolds

11:37

I don't have digestive problems

Anonymous

Gluten sensitivity may result in non-digestive problems as well.

Anonymous

@CowperKettle Maybe it drove your copper levels down.

Anonymous

If you have a copper deficiency, zinc will just make it worse by reducing copper absorption.

Jim Reynolds

I took a kettle up to our roof and stood on it.

That allowed me to reach a conclusion

Anonymous

A nice sturdy roof kettle? :-)

Jim Reynolds

11:42

It's not the same as being high on pot

Anonymous

Oh, you set that up and I totally missed it.

CowperKettle

@snailplane I read up on that, and it looks like you need to take a dozen of zinc pills for 3 to 6 months to really drive them down, and I only took 3 pills in total

Anonymous

@CowperKettle Oh, yeah, it doesn't sound like that should have made a big difference!

Anonymous

Maybe you just felt worse by chance.

CowperKettle

@snailplane That's why I kept taking it. But when I felt worse the third time, and had to skip the 22nd December Bicycle Ride due to that ("The Shortest Day Ride") I thought to hell with zinc

Anonymous

11:51

@CowperKettle Oh :-(

Anonymous

I'm not currently taking any supplements, except the protein shakes I make.

Anonymous

I don't get enough protein.

Anonymous

I have magnesium and calcium supplements and multivitamins.

Anonymous

They're sitting unused on my countertop.

Jim Reynolds

At least put them under your pillow

Anonymous

11:53

Haha.

Anonymous

"And when I woke up, my pillow was gone!"

Jim Reynolds

Haha

The case of the missing pillow

Or is it mood?

Anonymous

Hmm?

Anonymous

The missing modality?

Anonymous

Oh. Case.

Jim Reynolds

11:56

Case and mood. I always confuse them.

Anonymous

I'm just going to refer myself to tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/DontExplainTheJoke now

Jim Reynolds

Haha

Anonymous

@JimReynolds Case is the difference between he, him, and his. Mood is the difference between I did my homework and I probably should have done my homework.

Anonymous

(Or more strictly, modality.)

Jim Reynolds

Case... objective, nominative ...

Anonymous

12:06

In the traditional set of names, we have nominative, accusative, genitive. In the new set of names, we have subjective, objective, possessive.

Anonymous

They mean the same thing, but they're supposed to be easier to understand.

Jim Reynolds

Before about two years ago, I thought most warnings about sugar were nutty and pseudoscience.

Anonymous

That is, the nominative case is the one whose main use is to mark something as appearing in subject position. So why not just call it the subjective case (goes the argument).

Anonymous

@JimReynolds I still think that.

Anonymous

But I think sugar has done an awful lot of harm to modern society.

Anonymous

12:08

It's mostly added sugars, the processed sorts we add to foods that don't have them naturally, which cause problems.

Anonymous

If you eat a banana, the sugars in it are probably relatively benign, even though it has a lot of them.

Jim Reynolds

Well, that's what I meant

Anonymous

Yeah, but unfortunately the Taubeses and Lustigs of the world are painting an entirely different picture about the evils of sugar.

Anonymous

And it seems like those sorts of warnings have been taking center stage for the past while.

Anonymous

It makes talking about sugar really difficult, because people run into these things as soon as they start trying to research the topic, and they seem credible.

Anonymous

12:13

I've mostly given up on having serious discussions about nutrition with anyone I know in real life.

Jim Reynolds

Well, how about the ideas that more than 5, or I've heard 9, tsp a day of added sugar seems associated with pretty big risk increases for CVD?

Anonymous

@JimReynolds I believe it! Added sugar is associated with all sorts of problems.

Anonymous

I don't know the statistics off the top of my head.

CowperKettle

Just solved a statistical problem from a textbook (0:

Anonymous

You might also look up "free sugars".

Jim Reynolds

12:15

@CowperKettle

It's great fun!

CowperKettle

I calculated the standard deviation of the sampling distribution of the difference between means

Anonymous

It's a slightly broader term that also includes, for example, natural sugars in fruit juices and syrups.

CowperKettle

And from there I found the probability.. but I had to use the normal calculator for that

Anonymous

So we can talk about the problems associated with added sugars, or free sugars, or just sugar period.

Anonymous

@CowperKettle Yippee!

Jim Reynolds

12:16

@snailplane Yes

I read enough to convince me to make a very big change

Anonymous

I don't like large amounts of sugar.

Jim Reynolds

I still can't really believe I succeeded. I was quite the fiend

Anonymous

But I used to :-)

Anonymous

@JimReynolds Me too.

Anonymous

@CowperKettle You have nice handwriting.

Jim Reynolds

12:19

Where did the data come from, Cowp?

Was there a "real" question?

CowperKettle

from this online textbook

Anonymous

So that's where you found normal calculator, too! :-)

CowperKettle

@snailplane thank you!

@snailplane Yes (0:

Jim Reynolds

I found it so much more exciting to gather data from real-world observations.

CowperKettle

Yes, but you have to learn statistics first to be able to analyze the data

Jim Reynolds

12:25

Go to bookshelf, record # of pages from books on shelves 1 and 2, determine if ... I forgot

Anonymous

@JimReynolds It's interesting, because total sugar intake has been found to have either no relation or a negative relationship with body fatness. But if you look at added or free sugars, like in soda, there's a positive relationship.

Jim Reynolds

Yes

Anonymous

And in particular, excessive refined sugars cause abdominal fat distribution.

Jim Reynolds

Yes. And when we look at choices easily available in the real world...

Anonymous

And excessive visceral fat leads to the metabolic syndrome.

Anonymous

12:28

@JimReynolds I live in the real world, and I can get most of my sugar from fresh fruits if I want :-)

Jim Reynolds

Yes.

But can be a great challenge for most

Anonymous

I don't know what grocery stores and markets are like over there. Are they similar to stores in the U.S.?

Jim Reynolds

Even if we want or think we want

No. Some.

Anonymous

Over here, you can mostly find real food by ignoring all of the aisles and shopping only around the outside of a grocery store.

Anonymous

And by going to farmer's markets and such.

Jim Reynolds

12:31

Shopping the periphery?

Anonymous

Yes, that's what I mean.

Jim Reynolds

I just encountered such a term in recent days

CowperKettle

@snailplane speaking of my handwriting, have you received my Christmas card? I'm curious how long it took to be delivered. I sent it on December 15.

Anonymous

@CowperKettle I haven't!

Anonymous

I hope it arrives. I don't trust the USPS.

Jim Reynolds

12:33

But I was skimming through news or articles and didn't really process what it meant. Kind of funny process.

Anonymous

We often get our neighbors' mail, and they ours.

CowperKettle

@snailplane Wow. I was positive it would have arrived in 10 days. Curious.

Arrowfar

Hello snail, cowper and jim

CowperKettle

Good evening, @Arrowfar!

Anonymous

But we deliver the mail to our neighbors, and our neighbors bring ours by.

Anonymous

12:34

Hello

CowperKettle

Too bad I did not send it as registered mail. I would have been able to tell where exactly it is now.

Anonymous

@JimReynolds It makes sense in U.S. grocery stores, where all the aisles are filled, more or less, with junk and processed foods.

CowperKettle

@snailplane We have a large block-spanning house that stands on 4 streets at once. A couple of times delivery workers rang our door and wanted to bring in a TV set or a refrigerator bought by our neighbors.

Jim Reynolds

Taiwan has vastly higher quality fruit

Anonymous

The "periphery" is where you find produce, milk and other dairy, and meat in U.S. stores. But also fruit juices and some other things that are maybe not so good for you.

Anonymous

12:36

I don't consume a lot of dairy myself. I never drink milk. I should probably start taking those calcium supplements I have :-)

Anonymous

@JimReynolds We have nice fruit at our farmer's markets here.

Jim Reynolds

Yes.

Anonymous

@CowperKettle The United States Postal Service is just really unreliable :-(

Anonymous

@JimReynolds Even at the nicer grocery stores, the fruit isn't always very good here.

Arrowfar

@snailplane by good you mean tasty?

@snailplane snail you are lactose intolerant if I remember correctly right?

I hear cats are lactose intolerant too.

Cowper came and left.

Anonymous

12:41

@Arrowfar Fresh, unspoiled, not contaminated by mold, not a lot of bruising or other problems. That's more or less what I look for.

Anonymous

I try to buy fruit that is slightly underripe if I can, unless I plan to use all of it the same day in cooking.

Anonymous

I find that if fruit is more or less intact and fresh that it usually tastes fine to me :-)

Anonymous

It never really occurred to me to try to judge fruit from different sources based on how it tastes.

Anonymous

I guess people with more discriminating palates probably do that sort of thing.

Anonymous

@Arrowfar He bounces in and out a lot. I just pretend he's always here.

Anonymous

12:43

I don't pay a lot of attention to the avatar list over on the right. I just talk to people based on whether or not they've talked lately.

Anonymous

@Arrowfar Yes

Anonymous

I think some cats are lactose intolerant. I don't know much about that topic.

Anonymous

In the U.S. we have a culture of drinking milk, but I don't ever drink it personally. We have special kinds of milk that people with lactose intolerance can drink, but I don't drink those.

Anonymous

I think that for example they sometimes remove the lactose and replace it with other sugars, or they add lactase to the milk, which breaks it down for you.

Anonymous

And many lactose-intolerant people and vegetarians/vegans drink things like rice milk or almond milk, but I don't.

Anonymous

12:47

I guess most people here see not being able to drink milk as a problem that needs solving.

Anonymous

I wonder how many people here belong to milk-drinking cultures. It seems like it's been spreading around the world.

Jim Reynolds

I suck blood from my kitty.

Just enough so that he naps just a little bit more than most cats.

Anonymous

@JimReynolds You're a 殭屍!

Anonymous

I last had blood stolen from me on Tuesday.

Jim Reynolds

Haha. I wonder how much the technicians nip.

Anonymous

12:57

My blood tests did indicate some inflammation, I think.

Anonymous

But they don't usually.

Anonymous

I wonder what was wrong with me. I felt fine.

mike

Good evening all

Anonymous

13:16

Good morning :-)

mike

good morning indeed :)

I have electricity (and aircon) again, so I'm happy

Anonymous

Those sound like good things to have.

mike

yes. We get power outages here quite a bit

Anonymous

How long did you go without?

mike

it can be annoying at times

hm - about 7 hours or so

Anonymous

13:24

Is aircon (we say A/C here) crucial where you are?

Anonymous

Or just nice? :-)

mike

this time of year you can do without

in a few month's time it becomes a necessity though

(I got used to saying aircon when I lived in Australia)

it will get extremely hot here in a couple of months, and then hot and humid from april until October or so

engfan

13:43

Hello everyone 😊

mike

13:56

hello :)

Anonymous

14:23

Hello :-)

CowperKettle

15:24

Tula sugar, special edition dedicated to the election of Trump

user2684291

17:42

@CowperKettle Based on a quick Google search, "normal calculator" doesn't real outside the scope of niche websites that offer that sort of thing. It's inaccurately named at best; applications should have more specific names (I forgive them all the same, and they could've named it "Jimmy", for all I care). (To cavil further: it's also not technically a word (in English, words are space-delimited), just like the one before it, and there can definitionally be only one word of the day.)

Is it just me, or has Google latterly become (even) more unreliable when it comes to verbatim queries?

Eye wasp laying fasten loo swifty deaf ignition of "inaccurately".

Anonymous

@user2684291 Yep.

Anonymous

@user2684291 In English, orthographic words are space-delimited.

Anonymous

Those often coincide with some linguistically meaningful boundaries, but not always.

Anonymous

Each other, for example, is an indivisible compound but is written as two orthographic words.

Anonymous

Also, we could limit ourselves to one word of the day, but what would be the fun in that? :-)

user2684291

17:50

@snailplane Is "each other" a word?

Anonymous

Yep. It's just one grammatical word. It used to be two words, back in Middle English.

Anonymous

It underwent univerbation! :-)

2

Anonymous

scholar.google.com/… ← you should be able to click this PDF link, but if I supply the PDF link directly, I think it will fail a referrer check and refuse to give you the file.

user2684291

@snailplane Yes, it redirected me to another site before I could click the actual PDF link.

Anonymous

I'm going to be saying univerbation all day long.

Stack Exchange

18:04

0

Q: Are questions about learning methods on-topic?

I want to ask the community certain questions about pedagogy for online learning. For instance, when practicing listening activities for journalists, whether ELL knows how we can both listen to the same thing at the same time. If this is not on topic, where should it be asked?

discussion

engfan

18:31

Does categorically means clearly?

I mean can I use it instead of "clearly"

For example : "Categorically explain me what happened last night"?

user2684291

@CowperKettle I was wrong. Apologies.

@engfan I don't think it appropriate for the register which I assume the sentence is to be used in. Also, it's "explain to me".

@engfan You can find words that collocate with other words in this dictionary: oxforddictionary.so8848.com/search?word=explain

engfan

18:49

@user 2684291: Could you please tell me what's wrong with"explain me" ?

user2684291

19:09

@engfan The way I see it, the verb "explain" treats "me" as a direct object, and "explain" isn't ditransitive like "give" can be. If you want to emulate, e.g., the dative case, you need to employ a prepositional phrase like "to me".

Anonymous

22:13

Just a note on that: We don't have a dative case in English (although we used to), but linguists do sometimes refer to preposition phrases headed by to as "dative" by analogy.

Anonymous

And so in English, we have something called the dative alternation, an alternation between two forms that certain verbs allow:

Anonymous

> I gave the present to him.

Anonymous

> I gave him the present.

Anonymous

These have the same meaning, but they're different grammatically.

Anonymous

Unfortunately, not every verb participates in the dative alternation:

Anonymous

22:15

> I explained the problem to him.

Anonymous

> *I explained him the problem.　←　ungrammatical

Anonymous

Beth Levin lists verbs which participate in the dative alternation in English Verb Classes and Alternations: A Preliminary Investigation (1993). She breaks them down into three groups: give-type verbs (give, hand, lend, loan, rent, sell, . . .), send-type verbs (send, mail, ship, . . .), and throw-type verbs (fling, flip, kick, lob, slap, shoot, throw, toss, . . .)

Anonymous

Explain doesn't fit into any of these categories, and it doesn't have the same grammatical patterns as these verbs.

Anonymous

There are some verbs of communication which do allow the pattern, though: faxed, emailed

Anonymous

So unfortunately, you have to memorize which verbs work and which verbs don't.

Anonymous

22:23

Really, you just have to memorize which verbs have which grammar. They fit into semantic groups to some extent, but two verbs with similar meaning can have very different grammar, like say and tell.

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