English Language & Usage: Multi-Layered Discourse Room

tchrist

12:55 AM

Front page is gone.

And now it is back.

It is so strange when that happens.

Robusto

@RegDwighт: Congrats on 40K. I saw you were close so I shamelessly put you over the top.

Hey, what happened to Yoichi's latest? Did it get migrated?

Robusto

1:28 AM

@tchrist What would be strange would be it not coming back.

Robusto

1:41 AM

@Robusto No, you idiot, it's still there.

Cerberus

1:54 AM

@Robusto Yo.

But someone told you that nuclear bombs worked and that they were based on E = mC².

Lots of information you had to accept.

@RegDwighт Genealogy, really?

Robusto

@Cerberus But I could doubt that the equations were correct right up until the point that an atomic bomb lit up over New Mexico. And I wouldn't need to believe those equations or even understand them to have evidence that they were correct.

Lack of belief is not a form of belief. That is the mistake religionists make about atheism.

Cerberus

@Robusto But what if those equations were in nowise involved in those bombs? How would you know? Don't you have to accept that some scientist (textbook) told you they were?

By the way, I am not only philosophically sceptical (although not sceptical in practice) of science, but also drunk.

I can't type straight.

You're spinning.

Robusto

@Cerberus What is the simpler explanation? That there is a conspiracy to hide the truth, or that equations and principles which the U.S. first put into practice were copied by other nations and put into practice?

Cerberus

Yes, the simpler explanation is exactly as you say.

My point is just that we do not understand the intermediate steps, and we have to accept (well, have to...) what scientists tell us. And there's nothing wrong with that.

C'est tout.

En tout cas, j'ai faim.

Robusto

Let's look at the statement "Atheism is a religion." Another way to say that is "Non-belief is a belief." Let's call belief B. Non-belief would be !B (not B). Therefore, the statement that atheism is a religion is tantamount to saying B = !B. Which is absurd.

@Cerberus But we don't have to accept it on faith. We can go and learn nuclear physics, if we're smart enough, and decide for ourselves.

Religion is a different beast. There is no chain of evidence — hell, there is no evidence at all.

Cerberus

2:09 AM

@Robusto Umm I can't agree with that.

@Robusto We could, but we don't.

Robusto

Then sober up.

Cerberus

And yet we accept.

Robusto

@Cerberus But it isn't faith.

Cerberus

@Robusto Indeed, there is no chain of evidence, but my point is just that we accept the chain as a whole. We do not examine each link.

Robusto

Or if it is, it's a very different type of faith. There are different definitions, if we want to play with words.

MετάEd

2:10 AM

I see we're back on religion.

Cerberus

@Robusto I wouldn't call it faith, no.

MετάEd

Where can I butt in, pray?

Cerberus

Hello there.

You naughty...

Robusto

No praying in chat. I am currently preying on a dog, however.

Cerberus

I'm totally drunk, so you can tell me anything.

I don't even mind preying.

MετάEd

2:11 AM

@Cerberus Liquor is proof that God loves you and wants you to be happy.

Robusto

You're so smart and good-looking, @Cerberus! I have faith that you will believe what I am telling you, too.

Cerberus

I have been preyed upon by several people tonight already.

Robusto

Oh, God. You haven't been out to a glory hole, have you?

Cerberus

@MετάEd Yay! I am fairly happy, but mainly unfocused.

@Robusto Um this sounds fishy, even in my state.

@Robusto Uh what?

I think this is something unspeakable.

I was at a semi-university party.

If you must know.

Robusto

@Cerberus Only in the sense that you can't talk with your mouth full, if you know what I mean.

Cerberus

2:13 AM

Umm I shall have to skip that remark, for I am a decent dog.

Robusto

Glory hole (sexual slang)

A glory hole (also spelled gloryhole and glory-hole) is a hole in a wall, or other partition, often between public lavatory stalls or adult video arcade booths for people to engage in sexual activity or observe the person in the next cubicle while one or both parties masturbate. The partition maintains anonymity. Body parts including fingers, tongue and penis may be used for anonymous oral, vaginal and/or anal intercourse. Erotic literature and pornographic films have been devoted to the sexual uses of glory holes. Method of use A 'glory hole' is usually a hip-high hole drilled, punched o...

Cerberus

I have heard of this.

I care not for lavatory stalls.

Semi-procreational activities and evacuation ought to be strictly separated.

Robusto

Nor do I. If the only place I could have sex was on the floor of a men's room, I would just skip the whole thing.

Cerberus

Unless you were totally wasted.

Robusto

I would have to be totally wasted. As in dead. Or not myself.

Cerberus

2:15 AM

Thankfully my wits have never left me to such a degree.

Am I still making sense?

My intuition feels weak.

Am I...articulate?

Robusto

Sometimes you make sense. Except when you say atheism is a religion.

Cerberus

I didn't say it was. Or I wasn't serious.

Robusto

Well, you seemed to be desperate to prove the contention. And you were very contentious about it.

Cerberus

Atheism in the strict sense may be a belief, but I would rather not call it a religion.

OMG I was contentious. Stop the presses!

Robusto

It is a disbelief. It is the lack of a belief.

Cerberus

2:17 AM

It depends.

Robusto

No, it doesn't.

Cerberus

If you positively declare that God does not exist...

A lack of belief entails that you leave the possibility open, to me.

Not necessarily, perhaps.

But it is possible that you leave the possibility open.

This is not the case with atheism.

You do not leave it open.

I personally don't leave it open in practice, but I may leave it open in theory.

Robusto

@Cerberus When did I ever say that?

I do not declare that God does not exist. I say I don't believe in a god or gods. That is a very different thing.

Cerberus

@Robusto Isn't that the strictest kind of atheism?

"I don't believe" is weaker.

Robusto

@Cerberus Whatever. The weaker form is sufficient for my needs.

Cerberus

2:23 AM

Bordering on agnosticism.

For mine too.

No. It is atheism.

Is it really?

Yes, it really is.

What is your definition of atheism?

Is it "does not hold the belief that God exists", or "believes that God does not exist"? Or "asserts that God does not exist"?

The first one leaves things open, in theory.

Robusto

atheism disbelief in the existence of God or gods.

Cerberus

2:25 AM

That is a big ambiguous...

In practice, the difference matters little.

Robusto

I think it is clear. I think you are simply drunk.

It matters a great deal.

Cerberus

How so?

I think God most probably does not exist...

But do I care about the rest?

Call me what you will.

Do I count as an atheist, if I am not 100 % sure?

Does it even matter?

Robusto

But it all comes back to this: atheism is not a religion. I didn't even make that claim until someone else said that it was.

Cerberus

I don't think it is a religion.

Mainly because a religion normally involved precepts and lore.

And because it involved believing in the supernatural.

Robusto

Did you read any of the articles I posted?

Cerberus

2:32 AM

Uhh...

I read some of your quotations.

And I did not disagree with many.

You know I was just playing the Devil's—God's advocate.

Robusto

Which is it: advocatus dei or advocatus diaboli?

You can't be both.

Cerberus

Not even if I try?

By the way, are Hannibal and Diabolus related?

Bal, bol.

I think so?

Baal...

Robusto

@Cerberus Baal humbug!

Delenda est Carthago.

@Cerberus Only in the same way that Hamilcar and boxcar are related.

Cerberus

You think so?

But but...

Jews and Phoenicians are both Semites...

And it is well know that the Jews were intolerant of neighbouring gods...

> a specific application of di0boko| ‘accuser, calumniator, slanderer, traducer’, f. diab0kkeim to slander, traduce, lit. to throw across, f. di0 through, across + b0kkeim to cast.

Hmm too bad.

Sorry, copy-pasting from the OED messed up the Greek.

Robusto

2:52 AM

OK, time for bed. Laters.

Cerberus

Ah yes, Hannibal and Beelzebub are related, both to Baal.

OK night!

MετάEd

4:02 AM

Advocatus diaboli. I love that.

Do you know there's an advocatus diaboli every time someone is brought up for sainthood?

We have a question about digital reverberators?

Cerberus

Yeah that's how it was invented!

Noah

10:58 AM

Hi

RegDwighт

11:34 AM

@Robusto why thank you. I was just going to wonder. I sat at .960ish for literally three days, and at .920ish for three days before that. A slow week.

In fact I just checked the stats last night, and we close, on average, twice as many questions as one year ago, while the total number of questions we get is the same.

We need a NaNoCrEluQriMo. A National Non-Crap-ELU-Questions-Writing Month. Heck, make it International, I'm generous today.

Cerberus

1:14 PM

Hello.

Hmm it was -10 °C this morning.

But tomorrow it will be between 4 and 8 °C.

Better.

Yo.

Noah

1:32 PM

@Cerberus That's below zero. Hell, dude.

Cerberus

I know!

This year's lowest temperature was in February, -23 °C.

And yours?

Noah

So have you started heating up your place?

Cerberus

Yeah it's heated all the time.

And I even have to keep it at 18 °C at night when I'm making bread. Otherwise the bread won't rise properly.

Luckily my house has good insulation.

Noah

Cool. Here it's above 40 F.

And that would be roughly 6-7 *C.

Cerberus

Oh, that's pretty warm.

Endurable, at least.

Let's hope winter will be over soon.

Noah

1:36 PM

Yeah. Here it pretty much stays the same.

Cerberus

All winter?

Noah

We dont get cold winter(s).

Yeah.

Cerberus

Do you live on an island?

Noah

Nope.

Cerberus

Hmm.

Then how does it work?

Or are your summer temperatures very high?

Noah

1:37 PM

We are on the coast.

or a coast :)

@Cerberus Not really.

Cerberus

Hmm.

But we are on the coast too, and we have the warm Gulf Stream in winter.

Noah

In summer it goes above 50 F.

Cerberus

So how can you have less variation in temperature than we?

Noah

Becuase we dont live in the same country.

By the way in sept we do get above 70 F.

So that is the warmest month.

Cerberus

Huh.

In which region do you live?

Or is that a secret?

Noah

1:56 PM

No, not a secret.

I live in CA.

I am sure you know where that is.

Cerberus

California, yes.

North or south?

Noah

Yeah, that is right.

Now that's a secret.

Cerberus

I see.

Then I'll assume the middle.

Noah

LOL.

I live in Berkeley.

Cerberus

Huh it is true.

SF has significantly less fluctuation than we do.

How odd.

You should have a land climate.

Noah

2:01 PM

But I lived for quite some time in Chicago. Man, Chicago is cold.

Cerberus

Amsterdam.

Robusto

Bubbles.

Cerberus

San Francisco.

How come you have such low summer temperatures?

Morning.

Noah

Umm, that's interesting.

Robusto

@Noah I agree. I lived through one winter where it got to -27°F with -85°F windchill.

Cerberus

2:03 PM

That's...chilly.

Robusto

@Cerberus San Francisco is right on the Pacific. The prevailing winds are westerly. Do the math.

Cerberus

But we have the Gulf Stream, and much lower temperatures in winter.

Robusto

@Cerberus You have the Gulf Stream until the thermohaline circulation shuts down. Then your country becomes an ice palace.

Thermohaline circulation

The term thermohaline circulation (THC) refers to a part of the large-scale ocean circulation that is driven by global density gradients created by surface heat and freshwater fluxes. The adjective thermohaline derives from thermo- referring to temperature and -haline referring to salt content, factors which together determine the density of sea water. Wind-driven surface currents (such as the Gulf Stream) travel polewards from the equatorial Atlantic Ocean, cooling en route, and eventually sinking at high latitudes (forming North Atlantic Deep Water). This dense water then flows into ...

Cerberus

Well, that hasn't happened yet.

And there are no signs that it will any time soon.

Robusto

But it could happen over a very short period of time.

Cerberus

2:05 PM

We'll see.

In any case, this does not explain Californian low summer temperatures.

Noah

@Robusto You might have noticed the cold wind, specially when it's blowing right at your face.

Robusto

@Cerberus Ocean water is cold. Wind off the ocean is cold.

Cerberus

Santiago.

@Robusto In winter, it is warm.

Hence sea climate.

Looks like Santiago also has much less fluctuation than we do.

Robusto

Santiago is not right on the ocean. In SF, if you go inland a few miles, the temperatures are much higher.

Cerberus

27 °F to 55 °F by day.

Robusto

2:09 PM

San Francisco is a peninsula, actually, between the Pacific and San Francisco Bay.

Cerberus

Santiago is apparently close to enough to the coast to exhibit the same pattern as SF.

Huh wait.

I mislooked.

Robusto

Cerberus

Santiago gets 13 to 28 °C.

Amsterdam gets 4 to 21 °C.

So not much difference.

It is also possible that we have a different distribution of peaks, because these are monthly averages.

Robusto

You have peaks in Amsterdam?

Cerberus

2:34 PM

Churches are tall.

Robusto

2:47 PM

0

A: Is "at least" a parenthetical expression requiring commas?

You should parenthesize the expression with commas in that sentence: Well, there was the one time, at least, the mother had him in the store. If you don't do so, the sentence becomes ambiguous. Do you mean to emphasize "the one time at least" or "at least the mother"? It's not clear. But se...

Look at the comment. No up vote, no acceptance. Just a meaningless thank-you.

I just helped her do her court-reporting job, too.

Ain't no justice.

Cerberus

See the Refugees.

RegDwighт

3:01 PM

@Robusto Ain't no justice when she's gone.

Speaking of which,

@RegDwighт: FYI, I didn't initiate down-vote topic. Please watch out — vehitha 29 mins ago

With every word he says, I understand him less and less. It's almost like he's been outdoing himself on purpose for the last few days.

(And what I do understand is actually a rather bold lie. He is the only one who keeps talking about down-votes there. Everyone else has been trying to put an end to that.)

> I understand here sentence started with adverb. Generally we start the sentence noun.

This is so deliciously self-contradicting.

Cerberus

Hahahaha.

That's a star.

RegDwighт

"Generally we start the sentence noun" is not a rule of Engish, and in fact if it were a rule it would deliciously contradict itself. Same for "For interrogative sentences we start with verb or auxiliary verb". Just look at your very own post. It has six sentences, and two of them are questions. Not a single one of those six sentences starts with a noun or a verb. — RegDwighт 9 secs ago

Honestly, what is it about people. I don't get them.

tchrist

Those aren’t people; they’re pidgins.

Cerberus

Deliciously funny.

RegDwighт

Anyway I think I should point him to John Lawler's canonical post on this kind of inversions, and ignore any and all follow-up questions.

tchrist

3:12 PM

Good idea.

RegDwighт

Well, he threw the "rule" out, and now the question is "This sentence starts with an adverb. When do we start a sentence with an adjective?"

He is trying to one-up himself.

tchrist

Yep, just saw that.

Clumsy edits do not well dispose me towards reopening.

Cerberus

Do not well dispose me?

That's an odd position for the adverb?

tchrist

Much dispose me?

I just wanted an adjective to start the sentence.

The rest I am not caffeinated enough to see. I was up a few hours in the middle of the night.

Robusto

@tchrist Poor you, wanting an adjective to start a sentence and not getting it.

tchrist

3:18 PM

Somewhere somebody said night ended at midnight. Bill I think. What a silly idea.

How can night end at midnight? How can summer start on midsummer’s day, or winter on midwinter’s day? I think these people do not understand mid-.

Robusto

@RegDwighт You keep starting the sentence adverb. Sentence noun to start. You not understand that?

RegDwighт

@Robusto Why is that by english grammar? Still have doubt about word in language English.

Cerberus

Aww.

@Robusto Yeah.

RegDwighт

@tchrist yeah, it's like a midwife ends your wife.

tchrist

You think life here is tough. SO has 505 flags this morning.

Robusto

3:21 PM

@RegDwighт Noun to grammar Englash. You not think!

@Cerberus OK, removed and placed in the other place.

Cerberus

Gracias.

tchrist

It kinda ticks me off when people quote literature without attributing it properly.

RegDwighт

Great edit.

Also, perhaps they expect their audience to be well-read.

It's a bit silly to slap attribution onto every "or not to be".

tchrist

I did not immediately recognize the Helen Keller passage; did you?

Robusto

@tchrist Sorry. "Noun to grammar Englash. you not think!" — William Faulkner, The Sound and the Fury

RegDwighт

3:24 PM

@tchrist I don't even know who that is, other than some famous cellar in Germany.

tchrist

Heh.

RegDwighт

So basically you can attribute the hell out of it, or not, what do I care. Helen Keller, Ian McKellen Heller, Adolf Shatner, same difference.

tchrist

It’s how Paris stole Helen from Menelaus: via the secret cellar passage. An X-rated version is also available.

Cerberus

I thought Aphrodite had charmed everyone...

RegDwighт

No she choked on the apple and died.

tchrist

3:26 PM

It was the bad Afro that killed her.

RegDwighт

— William Shatner.

Robusto

— William L. Shirer

@tchrist Not the airplane?

tchrist

Oh no, I feel more Helen Keller coming on:

0

Q: A single word for "blind" and "slow on the uptake"

We have a word "tiomny" in Russian which has meanings of "blind", "dim" and "dumb". Is there word (slang word) in American English which is as close in meaning to "blind" and "slow on the uptake"?

Robusto

Since we were talking about Fay Wray earlier. "It wasn't the airplane. It was beauty killed the beast."

RegDwighт

— Bilbiam from the Shire.

tchrist

3:28 PM

That’s too accusative.

And the wrong gender.

RegDwighт

@Robusto stop it. That was the worst line in the remake, composed entirely of worst lines.

Robusto

@RegDwighт That was in the original. Look again.

tchrist

I’m sure any doofus could come with something from Urban Dictionary, but that means nothing.

RegDwighт

@Robusto Which is precisely why I didn't say movie and specifically said the remake.

Everyone knows it was in the original. That's the point. The remake botched even that.

It was the worst delivery of anything ever. Including delivery of parcels by Tom Hanks.

Robusto

@tchrist ♫ Tiomny can you hear me? Can you feel me near you? Tiomny can you see me? Can I help to cheer you? Ooh-ooh Tiomny ... Tiomny ... Tiomny. ♪

@RegDwighт But it was perfect in the original. Exactly captured that early-'30s romanticism.

RegDwighт

3:33 PM

Exactly.

Robusto

0

Q: What does **let loose the berries** mean?

What does let loose the berries mean in the context below? A grocery store found out that customers wanted to pick their strawberries individually instead of buying them preboxed. Once it let loose the berries, sales went up

meaning meaning-in-context

What is this, some kind of pineapple holiday?

tchrist

blind squid.

RegDwighт

@Robusto It was full of everything today's movies are not. Political incorrectness, chauvinism, mysoginy, racism. And no love for the animal whatsoever. And it all added up to something grand.

tchrist

0

Q: What is the origin for meaning of "Wild-card"?

Please go through the below excerpt. 'Kasyam maranam mukti', goes the sanskrit saying, which means dying in Kasi leads to liberation. Hindus believe that if they die here, there is an automatic upgrade to heaven, no matter what the sin committed on earth. It is amazing how god provides this w...

meaning etymology

RegDwighт

And now I can't stop thinking about Tom Hanks delivering parcels in Cast Away, either.

tchrist

3:37 PM

The answer is almost worse. This is not a regex application.

More like a sports ref.

Cerberus

Cards.

Canasta and such.

Robusto

@RegDwighт And Jackson's remake is only the latest attempt to botch the original. There was the one starring Jeff Bridges.

tchrist

Wild card (sports)

A wild card is, in general, a tournament or playoff berth awarded to an individual or team that has not qualified through normal play. International sports In international sports, the term is perhaps best known in reference to big international sporting events such as the Olympic Games and Wimbledon. Countries which fail to produce athletes who meet qualification standards are granted "wild cards", which allow them to enter competitors whose abilities are below the required standards. In some instances, wild cards are given to the host nation in order to boost their chances. However, in ...

It’s the opposite of a get outta jail free card, but for heaven.

RegDwighт

Like in the opening scene where they have to establish how he's in Moscow, so they have him deliver a package to... the ~~Beautiful~~ Red Square. He literally stops on one corner of the square and starts unloading. And the next entrance to any building is 100+ yards away. And that "building" is the Spasskaya Tower of the Kremlin wall. The next office or really just any house is like two blocks in whatever direction.

Cerberus

I think Chad's answer is excellent.

tchrist

3:40 PM

It’s a get-into-heaven-free wildcard.

@Cerberus How now?

Cerberus

@tchrist I really think this particular usage was taken from card games.

tchrist

I do not deny that the sports usage derives from card games.

Cerberus

He explains the origin in the first paragraph.

The next two are illustrative.

tchrist

But this seems like a sports usage, not a card game one.

Oh good, a metro gnome question.

Cerberus

How are those two different?

Robusto

3:43 PM

@RegDwighт Well, never expect movies to make geographic sense. I remember another movie Tom Hanks was in, Nothing in Common, which took place in Chicago. But it shows him driving from O'Hare (northwest of the city) and as he arrives he is coming up Lake Shore Drive from the south. And he goes to work in the Post Office downtown, although he's supposed to be in a Michigan Ave. ad agency.

Cerberus

It's just the card-game usage as used in other contexts.

There is nothing special about the way it is used in physical sports, is there?

tchrist

It’s not really about physical sports.

It’s about being able to gain entry to somewhere you don’t deserve to be in.

Robusto

Wait, what? "So, the regular expression 'd*g' matches dog, dig, dag, dxg " Um, I think it would only match dg, ddg, dddddg, and so on.

tchrist

The *er has posted another unattributed passage.

And demanded that we go through it.

Damn it.

Robusto

He means d.g I expect.

Cerberus

3:46 PM

I don't feel that deserving is part of the intrinsic meaning of a wild card.

It is mechanical, it doesn't matter whether you deserve it or not.

tchrist

@Robusto It also matches g.

Robusto

@tchrist True.

RegDwighт

Yo g. We herd u liek asterix.

Robusto

Don't aks me 'bout asterix.

RegDwighт

Don't make me go nucular.

Cerberus

3:50 PM

@tchrist Huh, how does d*g match g?

Oh, yes.

Zero or more d's.

Robusto

I gots ta put a boot up you ass now?

tchrist

Don’t make me feed you.

RegDwighт

Yeah he got fed last night. At least that's what I overread.

Cerberus

I always forget about the way the asterisk works differently in Regex from everywhere else.

RegDwighт

It's like Tom Hanks who works differently in Fedex.

Cerberus

3:52 PM

Is he differently abled?

tchrist

For example, replacing o* with e in "good food" produces "egood food" if done singly, but "egeede efeede" if done globally.

Cerberus

But who would do that?

o+ is where it's at.

Robusto

►

tchrist

@Cerberus No: the Kleene star has always had its regex meaning. It’s just the muggles who’ve muddled it up.

Kleene star

In mathematical logic and computer science, the Kleene star (or Kleene operator or Kleene closure) is a unary operation, either on sets of strings or on sets of symbols or characters. In mathematics it is more commonly known as the free monoid construction. The application of the Kleene star to a set V is written as V*. It is widely used for regular expressions, which is the context in which it was introduced by Stephen Kleene to characterise certain automata, where it means "zero or more". # If V is a set of strings then V* is defined as the smallest superset of V that contains λ (the em...

RegDwighт

That's why it's called Kleenex.

Cerberus

3:55 PM

No doubt.

RegDwighт

His fat ex works for Fedex.

Cerberus

Heh.

You're so punny.

RegDwighт

I am puny.

But since that guy the other day told us that after one vowel you have to double consonants, I end up being punny.

Tottally nott my fault.

tchrist

It a mooey bovine way.

That is, with a heap of bull.

Cerberus

@RegDwighт Why has noboddy told me?

It would be double d in Dutch.

RegDwighт

3:57 PM

Why hasn't you told everybody that you don't read the entire site?

ALERT ALERT

Cerberus

Oh noes.

RegDwighт

All'arma! Aux abris !

tchrist

@Cerberus We spell that nobuddy in English.

Cerberus

Aux abris?

Why abris?

@tchrist Aww

RegDwighт

Tous aux abris !

Tous aux abris ! (Dude, Where's My Country?) est un essai du documentariste américain Michael Moore publié en 2004. Tous aux abris ! est une nouvelle attaque de Michael Moore sous forme de livre. Encore une fois, la cible principale est le gouvernement américain, plus précisément le président George W. Bush et son entourage. Michael Moore revient sur la période qui s'est écoulée entre les attaques du 11 septembre 2001 et l'invasion de l'Irak. Il appelle ses concitoyens à tout faire pour réagir et arrêter d'avaler ce que les dirigeants et les médias veulent bien leur dire en décortiquant p...

tchrist

3:59 PM

Odd “translation”.

Transcript for

English Language & Usage: Multi-Layer…