English Language & Usage: Multi-Layered Discourse Room

Mitch

18:00

@KitFox yeah...I guessed that eventually. Jeez, really? that's just competition.

KitFox

@Mitch Catholic competition.

RegDwight АΑA

Paul Weller

Paul Weller (born 25 May 1958) is an English singer-songwriter. Starting with the band The Jam (1972–1982), Weller then went on to branch out musically to a more soulful style with The Style Council (1983–1989). In 1991 he established himself as a successful solo artist, and continues to remain a respected singer, lyricist and guitarist. Despite widespread critical recognition, Weller has remained a national rather than an international star, and much of his songwriting is rooted in English culture. He is also the principal figure of the 1970s and 80s mod revival and is often referred...

Matt Эллен

I consulted two dictionaries that are not subscription only and neither had a definition for weller that was not a person's name

Mitch

@KitFox sorry. unclear. Jay;s comment was too strongly worded. " You're imposing a totally alien interpretation on the paragraph based on your preconceptions about the speaker". Dude..just say ... well..something about...well not so debate teamish.

Matt Эллен

The OED on the other hand does have a definition

Mitch

18:02

@MattЭллен they have a definition for everything.

Matt Эллен

1. A caster or founder (of metal).
2. A salt-boiler.

cornbread ninja

@MattЭллен I love the nightlife / I got to boogie / on the disco 'round, yeah

tchrist

@ΜετάEd How does merely using more words address your objection of the lack of correctly cited authoritative references?

Robusto

RoboCop

RoboCop is a 1987 American science fiction action film directed by Paul Verhoeven and written by Edward Neumeier and Michael Miner. The film stars Peter Weller, Dan O'Herlihy, Kurtwood Smith, Nancy Allen, Miguel Ferrer, and Ronny Cox. Set in a crime-ridden Detroit, Michigan in the near future, RoboCop centers on police officer Alex Murphy (Weller) who is brutally murdered and subsequently revived by the malevolent mega-corporation OCP as a superhuman cyborg law enforcer known as "RoboCop". RoboCop includes themes regarding the media, resurrection, gentrification, corruption, privatizati...

I raise you Peter Weller.

KitFox

@Mitch Plus, it's just silly. "You're making this crazy assumption that the meaning is racist just because you think that the speaker is racist because he belongs to an association that is founded on racist principles, you wacko."

Robusto

18:03

And why does Wikipedia put a picture of a stupid car in its RoboCop API grab?

ΜετάEd

@tchrist Is there something about "you gave your conclusion or interpretation, but without giving any facts to back it up" that you don't understand?

Mitch

@KitFox Oh...I was thinking competition like the BPOE or the Moose lodge or Shriners. But KoFC is probably the Italian version of that.

tchrist

@ΜετάEd I don't see any more verifiable facts in your statement than in mine. I am not trying to be an asshole. I honestly do not understand.

RegDwight АΑA

@Mitch so have 39 other dictionaries.

Mitch

@KitFox yeah...that's what it sounds like it is going towards.

KitFox

18:04

@Mitch They are a Catholic fraternal organization.

RegDwight АΑA

@Robusto haven't you seen the Michael Bay prequels? Robocop is a Transformers car now.

Mitch

@RegDwightАΑA see! references!

tchrist

@ΜετάEd Futhermore, this is a metaphor.

KitFox

Anyway, stop distracting me! I'm trying to find the original reference.

ΜετάEd

@tchrist The verifiable facts are that "sere and yellow are descriptive of an autumn leaf". I am not in any way casting doubt on your conclusion, but I do doubt that everyone who reads it is going to understand how you got there: what facts you based it on.

tchrist

18:05

@ΜετάEd How do you expect me to "prove" this.

Cerberus

@Mitch: Can't it be an affair with a woman, in that you should cast out a married man if you know he is having an affair?

Matt Эллен

@cornbreadninja ohai!

Mitch

@KitFox flicks wet fingers at eyes

tchrist

Oh for fuck's sake.

That's it.

ΜετάEd

Yeah, that's it. I've made my pitch, I'm done.

Mitch

18:05

@Cerberus can't -what- be such an affair?

ΜετάEd

YMMV

tchrist

You get 37 pages of foliage biology now.

ΜετάEd

@tchrist lol

tchrist

Followed by color-theory and chemistry.

Cerberus

@Mitch The "affinity"?

Robusto

18:06

Seriously, nobody is going to vote to close the "weller" question?

tchrist

And then we will discuss the human aging process.

Damn your eyes!

ΜετάEd

@tchrist Too late. I'm already well overdue for bifocals.

tchrist

Once upon a time, there was a beautiful green forest.

It was a deciduous forest.

Mahnax

fetches popcorn

tchrist

deciduous /dɪˈsɪdjuːəs/, a.

Etymology: f. L. dēcidu-us falling down, falling off (f. dēcid-ĕre: see decident) + -ous. Cf. mod.Fr. décidu.

Cerberus

18:07

I am not convinced by any of the KKK answers.

tchrist

As such, it is doomed to die.

Cerberus

It could be any of them, but I don't see any definitive references or arguments of authority.

tchrist

This fate was described by Robert Frost.

Nature's first green is gold,
Her hardest hue to hold.
Her early leafs a flower;
But only so an hour.
Then leaf subsides to leaf.
So Eden sank to grief,
So dawn goes down to day.
Nothing gold can stay.

Let us investigate the metaphor's of the poet.

The golden does not last.

It dies.

cornbread ninja

@MattЭллен how-dee!

tchrist

Now, yellow and golden are related.

First, your eyes has these things called cones.

Matt Эллен

18:09

@Cerberus I say it is one of the ways. Resepct Mah authoratahhhhh

tchrist

There are three kinds of these.

KitFox

@ΜετάEd Hey, I don't suppose you are anywhere near the Texas State Library?

tchrist

Some perceive shorter wavelengths.

KitFox

Or the Houston Public Library?

tchrist

Others perceive medium ones.

The third type also perceive medium ones, but slightly longer than the first ones.

Cerberus

18:10

@MattЭллен If you sounded serious, I would defer to your authoratahhhhh.

tchrist

This is due to a genetic mutation in the Old World Primates.

Cerberus

Taking a shower now, later!

tchrist

Originally, the tetrachromat reptiles morphed into dychromat mammals.

Matt Эллен

@Cerberus sounding serious? bah. you set your bar so high today!

tchrist

Because rats do not need to see color in the dark.

Mahnax

18:11

@Cerberus Bye!

tchrist

So after you became a bigger rat, you mutated.

cornbread ninja

later @Cerb

tchrist

This mutation is only on the X chromosome, and so is sex-related.

Chromosomes are the basic building blocks of life.

cornbread ninja

@tchrist crap.

tchrist

When two chomosomes have sex, they produce cones.

Some people prefer their cones with butterscotch, but for our purposes we need only consider the normal ones.

The two mediums, or if you would, the medium and the long, are both activated by various spectral frequencies.

I say various, because there are infinitely many metameric matches for any spectral color.

cornbread ninja

18:13

Ahh, an add homonym attack.

tchrist

And yellow is a spectral color.

Therefore a simple Old World primate cannot distinguish spectral yellow from its metamers.

You see, the yellow in the leaf was there ab ovo.

Or at least, odd initio.

The chlorophyl covers it up.

So it appears to be green.

But only for a little while.

Let me explain chlorophyl.

It is used for making trees.

JSBձոգչ

i am extremely peased by tchrist's scientific ill lucidation

tchrist

Chlorophill is The colouring matter of the leaves and other green parts of plants; found in the cells usually in the form of minute granules (chlorophyll-bodies or -corpuscles). Its chemical composition is uncertain. It forms the colouring matter also of various green water-animalcules, e.g. Hydra viridis.

cornbread ninja

chlorophyll

tchrist

Notice the viridis part.

That is why it is green.

cornbread ninja

18:16

chlorophyllis diller

tchrist

It has a copper atom hiding in it.

If it had had iron, it would have been red.

Hemoglobin is in fact red. That's because it has rusty iron in it.

Sometimes leaves can be red, too.

These leaves, though, are yellow. They were yellow to begin, and yellow to end, and in the middle they wore a verdant cloak of deception.

Robert Frost summarized this complex chemical sitation as only a poet could do.

ΜετάEd

@KitFox No, I'm one or two ordinary states away.

I'm in Fort Worth, if that's any help.

tchrist

Most people do not know that leaves that become yellow were yellow to start with as well.

But Robert Frost is no ordinary people.

KitFox

@ΜετάEd Hmm. I don't think so. Thanks.

ΜετάEd

@tchrist You can stop now ...

tchrist

18:19

You were probably confused by sere.

Sere is a complicated word.

ΜετάEd

@tchrist Let's just say that showing your work in your answer is a non-optional social convention.

tchrist

Sere can mean "A series of plant communities, each naturally succeeding the previous one."

That is probably the one you thought applied here.

Sadly, you would have been wrong.

ΜετάEd

@tchrist I was distracted by the balrog in the warehouse.

tchrist

There is also sere as in serrated, from the Latin word for saw.

JSBձոգչ

@ΜετάEd i am quite happy with tchrist showing his work

tchrist

18:21

Sometimes serrano peppers are yellow.

This happens when a fox has peed on them.

As so frequently occurs with English, however, you have been misdistracted by Latin.

Because *sere* was never a Latin word in this context. Instead it was
Etymology: OE. séar corresponds to MLG. sôr (LG. soor), Dutch zoor:-OTeut. *sauzo-:-Indogermanic *sausó-, whence Lith. saũsas, OSl. suχŭ, Gr. αὑ̆ος dry, Skr. çōsha drying up, withering. OE. seems to have had also a synonymous derivative síere (:-*sauzjo-), which in later Eng. would be represented by the same form as séar.

And here is where we finally hit paydirt.

Because as the old man withers, he becomes jaundiced.

He will soon hit the hummus.

Hummus is composed of the remains of yellow leaves.

And so the posthumous man, committed to the dust whence he came, is seared in the poet's image of the Fall.

Let me explain about the Fall.

This is told in the Book of Genesis.

KitFox

tchrist

The origin of Genesis is debated.

Matt Эллен

so, wait, @tchrist - you're explaining here something that you should have explained in your answer?

why don't you put it in your answer?

tchrist

However, the Fall is still the Fall, and that is where yellow leaves come from, and also Man's death.

For Man did not originally die.

But he ate this serrano a fox had peed on.

So then he turned yellow and Fell down into the hummus.

That is what sere and yellow is referring to.

Hope this helps.

Feel free to incorporate it into your own next answer.

You are even welcome to include screenshots.

Would you like me to teach you about screenshots?

JSBձոգչ

no

tchrist

18:27

Type space to continue, or q to quit.

Mahnax

@tchrist Please do. I know nothing of screenshots. types space

tchrist

@JSBձոգչ You said no, not q, so I will not quit.

JSBձոգչ

@tchrist :q!

cornbread ninja

[space]

JSBձոգչ

:e

cornbread ninja

18:28

puts on space suit

Mahnax

<kbd>            </‌kbd>

presses above button

cornbread ninja

space

tchrist

Would you like to reread the manpage for more? It is very educative.

cornbread ninja

@JSBձոգչ q

Mahnax

I'm going to get lunch. Bye everyone.

cornbread ninja

18:29

bye @Mahnax!

KitFox

@Mitch you still here?

ΜετάEd

@tchrist :q!\nkill -USR1 1

KitFox

@Mitch I think you are right. I think there is a special old school definition of "affinity." I can show you!

JSBձոգչ

@ΜετάEd :q!\nsudo killall -9 tchrist

cornbread ninja

> 10. A psychical or spiritual attraction believed by some sects to exist between persons; sometimes applied concretely to the subjects or objects of the ‘affinity’.

ΜετάEd

18:38

@KitFox Did you see my answer?

Cerberus

@cornbreadninja Sounds like it could be an affair to me...

JSBձոգչ

> 702.38a Affinity is a static ability that functions while the spell is on the stack. “Affinity for [text]” means “This spell costs you {1} less to cast for each [text] you control.

cornbread ninja

@Cerberus I concur.

KitFox

@Mitch For instance, from The Mt. Sterling advocate. (Mt. Sterling, Ky.), December 28, 1922 on this page.

Cerberus

@ΜετάEd +checkmark

KitFox

18:40

@ΜετάEd I did.

It's all over the place starting around 1910.

So I wonder where it came from?

Cerberus

1

A: The married man with an affinity

Notice that this passage uses quotation marks to indicate words which are a direct quotation. The passage is quoting a proverb making the rounds at that time. See for example, the Coshocton Tribune, June 3, 1918, p. 4: A married man with an affinity always runs the risk of talking in his slee...

KitFox

Yes, but what proverb?

And I think it is much clearer in the example pic I posted.

Cerberus

@KitFox I don; tknow.

@KitFox Oh, yes, this one is great!

I was picking up the phone and putting on my socks at the same time.

ΜετάEd

@KitFox The proverb I reproduce in the answer itself.

Cerberus

So all this points to any kind of affair.

ΜετάEd

18:43

@KitFox Unfortunately the picture is missing the quotation marks.

KitFox

@ΜετάEd That's a proverb?

It predates 1918.

Cerberus

@Kit Are you going to add that picture to your answer?

KitFox

No, it contradicts my answer.

But not Mitch's. Nor Ed's

Nor any of the others.

Cerberus

@KitFox Yes, but it seems correct, if you don't mind my saying to.

KitFox

I agree that it is correct.

Cerberus

18:45

I meant, after changing your answer accordingly.

KitFox

No, I'm not going to change my answer.

Cerberus

?

KitFox

HEY! I wonder if it is because that's when Woodrow Wilson was in office!?!

I bet that's it!!

Holy crap, it all makes sense!

Wilson was famously a married man with an affinity. AND he married a woman with Native American heritage after his first wife died.

All that was just a few years before the quotation.

Although, ironically, he was a big proponent of the KKK.

Hmm. ponders this

Cerberus

Hmm.

We should be able to find other references from around that time in which merely an affinity meant an interracial affair specifically, without explanation.

My money is still on affair/mistress in general.

KitFox

@Cerberus No, I don't think so.

Cerberus

18:53

Nor I.

KitFox

I meant that "a married man with an affinity" might have been popular around that time since the President was one.

Cerberus

That we would be able to.

@KitFox Oh, yes, sure.

That is very well possible.

If it wasn't in general use before.

KitFox

It doesn't seem to be.

Cerberus

Gotta run, bye.

Matt Эллен

CU

ΜετάEd

18:57

@KitFox In this it's pretty obviously a synonym for "mistress".

KitFox

@ΜετάEd Ayup. I think it is clearer than the example you gave.

I see that as a similar joke in a 1907 newspaper, as well as a story where "affinity" is used in scare quotes.

ΜετάEd

@KitFox With your permission I would like to use it.

KitFox

@ΜετάEd Oh sure, naturally.

I decided to delete my answer. We didn't really need five identical ones.

I wish I'd hit it before the downvoter got me, but 2 reps hardly dents me these days.

Wohoo! Got a badge for it. Awesome.

Matt Эллен

yay!

KitFox

@ΜετάEd It seems quite common to use "an affinity" like "a mistress" or maybe a better synonym is like "a lover" in the early 1900s.

I don't see it much before 1907 in historical newspapers.

It is certainly an old usage.

And I still think that it is covertly racist.

ΜετάEd

19:10

@KitFox The very word Klan tends to taint anything around it as racist because we associate them with racial violence. It's easy to forget that they were also sexist, anti-Catholic, and antisemitic. Well – are, not were.

KitFox

@ΜετάEd I shouldn't even say racist. I should say bigoted, or whatever it is that covers all that, because that's what I mean.

And hey, you didn't come to Writers chat today.

Matt Эллен

Yeah, Me and Mr S had to chat by ourselves

ΜετάEd

19:27

@KitFox Damn!

Can I make the excuse that someone distracted me with an interesting question???

KitFox

Did that really happen?

ΜετάEd

I wonder why I didn't get the notification???

KitFox

Since no one was there, we'll do it next week anyway.

ΜετάEd

@KitFox Well yes. All this business about affinity and autumn and affinity.

Every other Tuesday I've gotten a popup notice. :-(

KitFox

Let me check and make sure the schedule is still up.

cornbread ninja

19:30

I got the popup, if it's any consolation.

KitFox

@cornbreadninja But you didn't come either?

frowny face

Poor Matt was the only one there for hours, all by himself!

ΜετάEd

@cornbreadninja No, that means I was insufficiently attentive.

So, no consolation.

JSBձոգչ

@ΜετάEd i first read this as "I was insufficiently attractive"

Jez

Can we just have a poem for a blog post?

ΜετάEd

19:48

@JSBձոգչ That too.

@Jez I like that idea.

user19161

@ΜετάEd Or sufficiently inattentive.

ΜετάEd

Would it have to be a poem about ELU?

@JasperLoy No, I like not what that would imply.

RegDwight АΑA

0

Q: O r i g i n o f t h e "|" sign

What is the origin of the "|" sign in typesetting?

typesetting

user19161

@RegDwightАΑA I just used it to configure my TeX editor!

Jez

@ΜετάEd about ELU? no, I was thinking of about gender-neutral pronouns.

ΜετάEd

19:53

@Jez A poem about gender-neutral pronouns?

JSBձոգչ

@RegDwightАΑA i appreciate this guy's kindness in adding spaces between all of his letters

Jez

yep

Matt Эллен

@JSBձոգչ but not between words...

user19161

@JSBձոգչ That's weird. I feel like asking him why.

RegDwight АΑA

@MattЭллен actually between words as well.

Matt Эллен

19:55

well, it's not there now

RegDwight АΑA

@JSBձոգչ too bad he grew bored half way through.

@JSBձոգչ you don't wanna answer this other gem of his?

-3

Q: Grammatical modifier: " 'baby' oil "

Speaking from a linguistic perspective, if 'olive oil' is made from olives, why is 'baby oil' not made from babies?

modifiers

JSBձոգչ

@RegDwightАΑA already votes as gen ref

RegDwight АΑA

It is a legitimate question, though poorly asked. I guess over at GLU, people would be tripping over one another to answer.

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English Language & Usage: Multi-Layer…