English Language & Usage: Multi-Layered Discourse Room

RegDwighт

1:14 PM

I am sick and tired of arguing on meta.

Robusto

this-argument-goes-nowhere

Andrew Leach

People should be encouraged to give answer of their own. You never know, it might be upvoted.

Cerberus

Hi.

Robusto

It's all the doggy's fault.

Cerberus

By the way, my modem is broken, so it disconnects all the time. I was asleep.

Robusto

1:17 PM

Cerberus to Sell Bushmaster After Tragedy.

True story.

Cerberus

I ain't selling nothing.

What is a body to do without a bushmaster?

Andrew Leach

Depends whose bush it's master of.

Cerberus

There are always natives that need scaring.

@AndrewLeach Every bush.

Andrew Leach

@Cerberus That's just megalomania.

Em1

Hey guys. I have a question: Italic, bold, fore- and background of keywords, comments, etc. are considered as highlighting style. When consolidating with margin styles (e.g. line numbers, status bar, ...), which also have these properties, what is a proper term? I'm thinking of decoration style. Do you guys come up with any better ideas?

Cerberus

1:21 PM

@AndrewLeach I hope you are not discriminating against those suffering from this psychological syndrome?

Andrew Leach

I suppose describing it allows the syndrome to be discriminated. But I don't think it's discrimination against.

RegDwighт

@Em1 formatting?

It's not really decoration, you know...

Robusto

@spicey if you think that reviewing an item just because it's in the queue "encapsulates everything that is wrong with this Stack", then you have officially jumped the shark. People will review things simply because they are in the queue on all sites. In fact it's the whole point of the review queue, by design: "review these things here just because they are in the queue". What's worse, on some other sites people will only pretend to review, actively harming the site, as a matter of habit. You will be hard pressed to see that on ELU. — RegDwighт 1 min ago

Also, it's not true encapsulation.

Em1

Well, I thought of formatting, too. But is changing colors of a margin really formatting? @RegDwighт

RegDwighт

@Robusto That comes with jumping the shark. For free.

Robusto

1:25 PM

Object-oriented shark-jumping.

Em1

Formatting, imho, only relates to text arrangements.

RegDwighт

Well what are you writing, a brand book?

Then it's part of the brand, um, something. Design. Guidelines. Noun.

Cerberus

@AndrewLeach You have a thing for megalomaniacs?

Em1

What is a brand book???

Robusto

@RegDwighт Style guide.

RegDwighт

1:28 PM

Yeah.

Em1

Hm.

RegDwighт

@Em1 when you apply a padding:0px;background-color:#69c to an HTML element it is quite common for people to refer to that as "applying CSS formatting" or something along those lines.

Robusto

1

Q: Difference between "I am doing lunch" and "I am having lunch"

What is the difference between I am doing lunch and I am having lunch? Both indicate progress of action.

grammaticality

Dupe.

12

Q: Doing drugs vs having breakfast

Why do we do drugs but have food? Or even have a beer, which is alcoholic beverage thus a sort of drug too. In both cases we consume something. Is there a rule for this?

word-usage

Em1

Yeah. Sure. HTML elements usually are texts. And these are arranged through CSS. I would call it formatting in that case for sure. Even if it is an image, a flash movie, etc.

RegDwighт

I guess what I'm saying is I'm still not quite sure what the context is.

tchrist

1:30 PM

Doing drugs is opposed to having breakfast?

RegDwighт

...aaand I have five items in my inbox again. I have no patience for this.

@tchrist not for @Rob, don't worry.

tchrist

They will prattle your fingers off.

Em1

Yeah. Thanks anyway. :)

RegDwighт

I meant I have no patience for my inbox, not you.

Em1

But your inbox is more important ;)

Cerberus

1:32 PM

Ahhh my Internet is not working!

Robusto

@Cerberus So it's your Internet. Then I need you to fix it. Start with getting rid of Facebook and Twitter, please.

RegDwighт

@Em1 you're saying you're volunteering?)) Because I'm not.

Em1

@Cerberus I don't believe ya. You're writing in the net ;)

Cerberus

I would if I could!

Robusto

@Cerberus is too busy selling his gun manufacturer.

RegDwighт

1:33 PM

What's with the smiley flood? \(@_@)/

Cerberus

My modem is disconnecting every 5 minutes.

I am not tethering, but even that doesn't work properly, somehow. It is extremely slow.

Em1

@RegDwighт Didn't get that...

Andrew Leach

@Cerberus What were you saying about megalomania?

Cerberus

Ehh...

Robusto

@AndrewLeach The technical term for his condition is tricephalopathy.

Cerberus

1:35 PM

Who else owns it, then?

RegDwighт

So when will spicey take his business elsewhere?

Andrew Leach

@Cerberus We can probably be reasonably certain about who doesn't own it.

RegDwighт

He keeps saying he doesn't like us and wants to leave. Only to return and tell us how much he doesn't like us some more.

tchrist

Tease.

Blowhard.

Liar.

All those things.

Cerberus

@AndrewLeach Like whom?

tchrist

1:38 PM

For a bit of humor, did everybody see Barrie’s impression of a London cabbie?

Robusto

@RegDwighт He is the herpes simplex virus come to our orgy.

tchrist

3

A: "How far" vs "How long"

Asking How far? suggests that you are interested in the distance. How long? suggests you are interested in the time the journey will take. A native speaker concerned about the latter might combine the two and say something like Is it far to the hotel? Can you give me any idea of how long it will ...

Cerberus

I'm now tethering through USB.

tchrist

> To which the less than helpful answer in London might well be ‘Cor blimey, guv, ’ow long’s a piece of string? The traffic up round Hyde Park Corner’s murder this morning.’

Cerberus

AARRRGGGGH

Why the fuck isn't this working?

Robusto

1:39 PM

@tchrist I think we have a new Captain Obvious. Move over, Jasper.

Andrew Leach

@Cerberus Well, it can't be you :( What are you doing? Laptop via mobile phone?

Cerberus

@AndrewLeach Desktop. Normally Wifi tethering works fine, but now it is only half working, or less than half. I can't really load pages. Switched to USB tethering, no improvement. And my actual broadband Wifi modem keeps disconnecting.

Frustrated!

Angry!

You don't want to play Angry Dogs.

Now I'm on my modem again.

And it will work perfectly for a few minutes, then disconnect.

And I need to reset it.

Which takes several minutes.

Gigili

@Mitch Wow, really? What do you need the book for?

Andrew Leach

@Cerberus Not with the Angry Birds as well.

gravatar.com/avatar/…

Gigili

The Persian idiom is "توپ را به زمین کسی انداختن".

Cerberus

1:45 PM

@AndrewLeach Ugh yes, Angry Birds are the worst!

Andrew Leach

@Cerberus So the only common thing in each situation is your computer?

Cerberus

Well, not exactly: my phone loses the Wifi connection from my modem too.

And I called my broadband/landline company, and they said about 7 % of clients were suffering from the same problem, and they were trying to fix it before the end of the year.

So the tethering issue must be unrelated.

I'm not booting my laptop.

To test it, just in case.

user19161

I seldom downvote or closevote questions these days, but I just did some just now.

user19161

Nice hat @reg.

Andrew Leach

@JasperLoy Tyrant. Apparently.

user19161

1:50 PM

I watched "Knowing" starring Nicolas Cage. It's a very meaningful movie.

Cerberus

My laptop now detects neither connection...arggh!

user19161

@Cerberus Are you using XP?

Cerberus

sigh

Yes, Jasper, and that has nothing to do with it.

user19161

If you use Linux, you may be connected while the icon shows no network depending on your settings.

RegDwighт

@JasperLoy @Kit.

user19161

1:52 PM

But if you use Windows, that's just not possible, so I am afraid you are screwed.

tchrist

@JasperLoy Your sentence has superfluous words in it.

Cerberus

I has worked perfectly for two years, nothing changed, now a month ago the modem started disconnecting, and the telco knows about it (or so they say).

The tethering issue must be temporary, an unfortunate coincidence.

user19161

@RegDwighт Well, many people on Math have it. They're all nuts there, so I understand.

RegDwighт

@RegDwighт It's a lack of understanding of how this particular Stack works I think is the biggest problem. I simply don't understand why some answers are heavily upvoted and others downvoted when both of them are answering the question. I also don't understand why some are closed and others not or why the current question on irony is being recommended to be moved to a philopsophy discussion. Why, when irony is clearly defined in the dictionary? It's this kind of inconsistency I dislike. — spiceyokooko 2 hours ago

At least I got him to flat-out admit that the biggest problem is him.

I do wonder if he actually noticed that, though.

user19161

@RegDwighт You should answer this way. Here we discuss "irony" but not irony. QED.

Cerberus

1:54 PM

Pages also load very slowly or not a all on my phone.

tchrist

@Robusto Clueless people are always using prevaricate or equivocate when they just mean waver. It’s like misusing tantamount when you mean paramount. They don’t quite know what these long words mean, but still think using them makes them seem more smarter and impressive. Of course, the effect realized is precisely the opposite of the one intended.

Cerberus

Example?

tchrist

Me?

Cerberus

How can you confuse equivocate with waver?

tchrist

1

Q: Incorrect usage of "prevaricate"?

Today, while reading an online article, I came across the following comment: Young people regret their mistakes. Old people regret not deciding. In the contest of prevaricating between which choices we predict we will one day celebrate and those we will one day regret and the alternative ...

word-usage

user19161

1:56 PM

"What is the difference between 'man' and 'woman'?" is an English question.
"What is the difference between man and woman?" is a philosophy question.

tchrist

It really does happen all the time.

I cannot say for sure why, just know that it does. Quite annoying.

Maybe they meant oscillate.

Cerberus

Ugh, that sentence is unreadable anyway.

tchrist

They probably just want a blah-ate word and grabbed whatever was handy.

Cerberus

But equivocate...

That's quite different.

tchrist

And prevaricate isn’t?

People think equivocate means can’t decide.

Cerberus

1:59 PM

How odd.

At least praevaricate has the right metaphor for waver.

Matt Эллен

varicating before something

Cerberus

To praevaricate is to make a crooked furrow.

Var- = furrow.

Matt Эллен

ah, but it seems it's misspelt in Latin

it's only pre- not prae-

Robusto

@spicey: If you were able to spell better, I might take your words more seriously. — Robusto 11 secs ago

Cerberus

Ask Latin.

RegDwighт

2:03 PM

@JasperLoy you can do that.

Robusto

Anyway, gotta face the rainy, icy commute. Laterz.

RegDwighт

No wonder those people think this site is some kind of North Korea: they only see me talk to them.

Matt Эллен

@Cerberus maybe I will

Cerberus

@Robusto That's rude.

Remove it.

@MattЭллен I will convey messages back and forth from her, if you like.

Matt Эллен

@Cerberus how kind. thank you

Cerberus

2:06 PM

Careful, if I pass that along, she might see that as flirting.

Matt Эллен

I wouldn't want to make English jealous...

Cerberus

Exactly.

Matt Эллен

there is a photo shoot going on in my office

not for glamour models, though

just bog standard marketing

Cerberus

Oh!

Are you wearing your Sunday best?

Matt Эллен

I'm not in the photos so I'm dressed normally

Cerberus

2:11 PM

Aww.

Matt Эллен

plus, I'd be in a lab coat and goggles were I in the photos

Cerberus

The normal four-piece suit?

@MattЭллен Hahahaha.

Great!

Matt Эллен

yes, with reclining seats

Cerberus

Hmm my connection has held for over 10 minutes now!

Matt Эллен

yay!

Cerberus

2:12 PM

You would be in reclining seats?

puzzled

Matt Эллен

my four piece suite?

Cerberus

Ohh a suite.

Now I want to listen to a Beethoven suite.

Or maybe a cello sonata.

Matt Эллен

I quite fancy a boiled sweet

Cerberus

►

One of the best musicks ever made.

A boiled sweet?

Is that some disgusting British delicacy?

Matt Эллен

maybe a humbug

Cerberus

2:15 PM

WOW

Mitch

@Gigili need? No one -needs- a book like that. General Intellectual Interest. Also, I like the proverb game (for any given proverb find the proverb that recommends the exact opposite).

Cerberus

This recording is awesome.

Gould's passion with Beethoven...fantastic.

Matt Эллен

@Mitch a stitch in time saves nine

Andrew Leach

Humbugs are stripey, but they're tetrahedral.

These are naked, but the right shape.

Matt Эллен

only in some arcane recipe book. all the humbugs I've ever eaten have been rounded cubes

Andrew Leach

2:24 PM

When I were a lad...

Matt Эллен

:D

tchrist

@Cerberus Haven’t you seen how extremely rude the things the user @Rob is replying to has said in comments there on meta? People who live in glass houses and all.

Cerberus

Like what?

tchrist

@MattЭллен Er, hard candy?

Let me see if it is still there. I’ve flagged some.

Matt Эллен

@tchrist probably.

Cerberus

2:27 PM

Even so, since when do we stoop the to the level of miscreants?

Mitch

@Gigili excellent...that's 'toop raneh zamin kasy andakhtan' right? 'ball to the ground somebody threw'? (I don't know the conjugation well so I don't know who is doing what.) I'll look it up when I get back home.

Cerberus

My Internet has been working for over an hour now!

Matt Эллен

woohoo!

Cerberus

It is so erratic.

Mitch

@MattЭллен Haste makes waste

Matt Эллен

2:29 PM

@Mitch excellent!

Mitch

'Silence is Golden'

Matt Эллен

The squeaky wheel gets the grease

Mitch

Yay!

That pair isn't the best because the 2nd one is clever, and the first one just says 'X is good'.

'A rolling stone gathers no moss.'

Matt Эллен

true.

tchrist

The two rude comments appear to be gone.

@Cerberus No, I am not saying it is right. I am saying it is not a surprise.

user19161

2:32 PM

@reg is Santa Claws and @kit is Santa Paws.

Cerberus

God, that sonata is magical.

Piano and cello, my two favourite instruments.

Mitch

@Cerberus Gould is such a goofball!

user19161

My favourite instrument is the voice.

Cerberus

@Mitch Yes! Isn't it fantastic?

Matt Эллен

my favourite instrument is TNT

Cerberus

2:33 PM

@JasperLoy Yes, song and violin are great as well.

RegDwighт

@MattЭллен The TV channel or the overnight express?

Cerberus

@MattЭллен That's hardly an instrument, is it?

Andrew Leach

@MattЭллен Or the explosive?

Mitch

@JasperLoy My favorite instrument is the radio. Music just ... comes out...all by itself. The trick is to find one spot and not fiddle with it.

tchrist

@Cerberus This is a measured response to some of the apparently-now-deleted rudeness I referred to, so you see what sort of fecal matter is being thrown in people’s faces:

@spiceyokooko: Look through the 700+ questions I've answered; you'll find most of them are rather basic. You've called me a snob, you've inferred I can't read very well, all because you see a lot of closed questions. I analyzed the closed questions, and I found a lot of duplicates, and a lot of patient answers given, yet we are still characterized as too high-minded to help those that write those questions, no matter how bad they might be. Yes, you've made your point, and every ELU downvote probably cements it in your own mind. — J.R. 2 days ago

Cerberus

2:34 PM

@MattЭллен Or are you talking about instruments as in the "surgical" precision of Obama's drones?

user19161

@Mitch I have almost never listened to radio.

Cerberus

@Mitch How about...the Internet!

Matt Эллен

@RegDwighт The explodiest one

Mitch

@JasperLoy That's OK. Radio probably wouldn't be interested in what you have to say either.

user19161

@tchrist This stuff is getting serious.

tchrist

2:35 PM

Yes.

It is becoming its own problem.

Mitch

@Cerberus 'Internet'? That's not a word. Did you make that up?

user19161

@Mitch Aww.

Matt Эллен

@Cerberus an instrument of destruction!

user19161

The internet is not the WWW.

Cerberus

@tchrist I didn't see these apparently rude comments, but that is still no reason to respond below the belt. If they are truly so rude, you call them out.

RegDwighт

2:35 PM

@MattЭллен the overnight channel?

Cerberus

@Mitch You may not have heard of it. It's mine.

@MattЭллен Zactly.

Matt Эллен

@RegDwighт that's probably the best time to cross. fewest swimmers

Cerberus

Yeah the swimming queues across the Channel on a Tuesday morning are horrible.

RegDwighт

@Cerberus he has called us anal retentives. Collectively. Because three people downvoted an answer on meta. That didn't even answer the question. And instead was designed to foment unrest and division.

Cerberus

I bet 60 % of those are niggardly Dutchmen, trying to save money by avoiding the Eurostar.

Matt Эллен

2:38 PM

@Cerberus and they all expect sponsorship!

Cerberus

2 mins ago, by Cerberus

@tchrist I didn't see these apparently rude comments, but that is still no reason to respond below the belt. If they are truly so rude, you call them out.

RegDwighт

Oh I didn't respond at all.

I outright deleted the entire exchange. Including the answer.

tchrist

Good.

Mitch

@RegDwighт so it is just one rude dude?

Cerberus

@MattЭллен Really? I'll give them some sponsorship! I'll happily donate a few metric tons of toxic waste.

tchrist

2:39 PM

@Mitch Not exactly.

Matt Эллен

@Cerberus lol

RegDwighт

@Mitch it's a bunch of dudes that engage in something that amounts to blackmailing, or holding the site hostage. "If you downvote an answer of mine, you're an anal snob".

Cerberus

@RegDwighт Good, if it was truly so rude and unconstructive.

Mitch

@JasperLoy why did you steal Carlo's color? It is a great color but he has a patent on it. Actually, I just noticed, yours is slightly bluer.

Cerberus

That doesn't matter.

Mitch

2:40 PM

@RegDwighт stupid dudes.

user19161

@Mitch I just changed it back.

Cerberus

Patents should be as broad as possible.

Mitch

@Cerberus I own that sentence you just made.

Cerberus

Heck, you have some purple in you...

Mitch

@Cerberus I don't know how to take that.

Cerberus

2:41 PM

And OMG Tchrist has rounded corners! He is now the property of Apple, Inc.

@Mitch Come closer, and I'll brush it off.

You also have an eyelash.

user19161

Purple is very ugly.

Cerberus

Hey!

No racist talk in this chat.

tchrist

@JasperLoy Use violet instead.

Go monochromatic.

RegDwighт

The thing is, I tried to stay tuned. To engage them in conversation. To calmly refute their allegations, one by one. (So did tchrist, JR, and other users.) Rather than acknowledging that a point of theirs has been pulverized, they bring up another point. Only to have it pulverized as well. A typical behavior.

Mitch

@Cerberus Yeah. Some of my best friends are purple. Actually, they're fuchsia but they identify as purple because that's what people assume.

Cerberus

2:42 PM

Okay, it's leavy time.

user19161

@Mitch What does purple mean?

Mitch

@tchrist Indigo. There's no actual indigo in nature.

Actually.

user19161

Oh, I see. I have been whooshed.

Mitch

@JasperLoy It's a color.

tchrist

@Mitch Not a spectral color.

Cerberus

2:44 PM

@Mitch Ah, yes, of course. They identify [ window blowing in empty space where constituent ought to be ] as purple. What if they're in fact pink?

Matt Эллен

@Cerberus are you trying to prevent a flood?

tchrist

Violet is a spectral color. Purple is not.

Cerberus

@MattЭллен Leavy, not levy!

Matt Эллен

poiple, dats a foine colour

Cerberus

Or how do you spell the dike?

tchrist

2:45 PM

@RegDwighт Yes, you have. And the entitlists still nip at your heels and bite the hand that feeds them.

Matt Эллен

@Cerberus so you'll let Rotterdam flood?

@Cerberus yeah, that's right

Cerberus

Who cares about Rotterdam? She is our nemesis.

tchrist

@Cerberus 7th level druid spell: Change Earth to Water.

Cerberus

We have more dikes, thankfully.

Matt Эллен

@Cerberus so cold hearted

Cerberus

2:46 PM

@tchrist You wouldn't be the first to try. Good luck! It only works when we do it on purpose, as against the Spaniards and napoleon.

tchrist

@Cerberus Why are you all so anti-Latin? What did the Romans ever do to you?

Cerberus

@MattЭллен Well, it was admittedly bombed, but they tore down what beautiful buildings they had left, and now it is all an ugly post-war mess.

Matt Эллен

@Cerberus sounds like Plymouth

Cerberus

@tchrist We didn't have to set it aflood then, because it was still a big swamp any in Roman times.

Andrew Leach

@tchrist Apart from the roads, public health, proper government... (I wish I could remember the list)

Cerberus

2:48 PM

Besides, we were more-ore-less voluntarily Romanised.

Mitch

@MattЭллен I can't think f the opposite to 'a rolling stone gathers no moss'.

tchrist

@Reg I realize that it is problematic to risk appearing to delete or lock criticism to silence dissent, especially on meta, but I really feel that the comment chain on JR’s meta question has grown to exceed the constructive range. Maybe if it were on chat, it would be ok, but that chain is horrifically long, and not getting shorter, and not getting more constructive. IMHO. Yes, I am part of the problem, I do realize.

Mitch

@tchrist which one is not spectral? purple? isn't that just another word for violet?

tchrist

@Mitch Purple is not spectral, that is correct.

It has no spectral frequency.

You cannot have a purple LED, for example.

Because LEDs broadcast in a very narrow spectral band, rendering them for virtually all practical purposes monochromatic.

Mitch

@Cerberus Pink? Pink is not a serious color. There's no identity there. Maybe an outlook. But it's not a 'thing'.

tchrist

2:52 PM

It takes at least two different frequencies to produce purple.

Matt Эллен

@Mitch nor can I

Mitch

@tchrist challenge taken

tchrist

Pink is just a desaturated purple, you do realize.

Matt Эллен

I have been pondering, but work has got in the way

tchrist

And therefore, pink is also not spectral.

Mitch

2:53 PM

invent polychromatic emitting diodes

JSBձոգչ

tchrist

They put a glaze on the surrounding glass that emits a different frequency.

JSBձոգչ

this is carl sagan, but i'm not here to talk about carl sagan

tchrist

That way it can blend.

Mitch

@tchrist desaturated? can't it be full saturation just extra ...whiteness?

JSBձոգչ

2:54 PM

can we all agree that the building behind him is hideous?

Matt Эллен

@JSBձոգչ yes

tchrist

@Mitch Huh? Desaturated = more whiteness.

More saturated = less whiteness.

Or greyness.

Or blackness.

Those are all the same color.

Matt Эллен

did you just say all blacks look the same?

JSBձոգչ

@MattЭллен 20th century architecture was such a disaster

tchrist

To saturate is to drive out the whites.

Mitch

2:55 PM

@JSBձոգչ It is universally agreed that it is revolting. an exemplar of 'brutalist architecture'

Brutalist architecture

Brutalist architecture is a style of architecture which flourished from the 1950s to the mid 1970s, spawned from the modernist architectural movement. Examples are typically very linear, fortresslike and blockish, often with a predominance of concrete construction. Initially the style came about for government buildings, low-rent housing and shopping centers to create functional structures at a low cost, but eventually designers adopted the look for other uses such as college buildings. Critics of the style find it unappealing due to its "cold" appearance, projecting an atmosphere of total...

@tchrist Oh.

Matt Эллен

@JSBձոգչ it looks like some sort of inverted prison

JSBձոգչ

brutalism got such a fitting name

Mitch

@JSBձոգչ except.. hangs head in shame ...I kinda like it.

@tchrist I mix up saturation and brightness.

tchrist

Using an RGB model, pink is the notional product of first creating a purple by mixing red and blue light, and then desaturating that by introducing a modicum of oppositional green light to increase the neutral/grey/white component.

Mitch

@MattЭллен yeah! and I bet you think a black hole is some science thing instead of an epithet.

tchrist

2:58 PM

If there is only a little less G than R and B, you have a super-light pink.

JSBձոգչ

@Mitch it does help you imagine that you live in a state of permanent, neverending oppression, if that's what you're into

tchrist

You can vary the R and B proportions if you want say, lavender.

Mitch

@tchrist so I think your point is, if we colored that building in a rainbow...

it'd still look like a goofy cncrete block.