English Language & Usage: Multi-Layered Discourse Room

Cerberus

2:00 PM

"All ensuing babies were promptly aborted."

RegDwighт

"He totally dropped his students and used jQuery instead."

tchrist

Well, at least the STD risk is lower that way.

RegDwighт

Are we helping too much, Kit? If you have enough material, we can stop.

KitFox

You may riff as long as you like.

Cerberus

"He never discriminated against any of his students; he also slept with the ugly ones."

KitFox

2:01 PM

That wouldn't fly. He's blind.

tchrist

@Cerberus No prob. Always glad to teach you furriners new words.

Oh...damn.

@RegDwighт Et tu.

@tchrist that retort took you that long?

Cerberus

2:02 PM

That would be one of his uglier students, I'd say.

RegDwighт

Did you have to look up the proper spelling of "tu" first?

Cerberus

No, "et".

RegDwighт

@Cerberus no, that's me. Riffing. Also, raffing.

Meysam

Howdy

tchrist

Was too busy worrying about the connection between the DM flag and sucking.

Seems a somewhat inefficient way of going about it.

Cerberus

2:03 PM

Oh nice.

RegDwighт

[Was too busy [worrying about the connection between the DM flag] and [sucking]]?

Meysam

Are these two equivalent? "I can't help laughing" vs "I can't help but to laugh"

RegDwighт

I think there's a question for that.

Cerberus

> In een brief raadt Apple-topman Tim Cook iPhone-gebruikers aan om gebruik te maken van andere apps zoals Bing, MapQuest en Waze om te navigeren.

Hilarious.

tchrist

Topman is certainly funny.

Didn't we have a top and bottom question already today?

RegDwighт

2:05 PM

10

Q: "I can't help it." Why help?

Why do we use the verb help in sentences such as the following to mean something like refrain from? I try not to eat junk, but I can't help it. I couldn't help laughing. I can't help but admire her bravery.

usage

tchrist

Oh right, the sides thing.

RegDwighт

Well, kind of.

All three constructions are in there, but that's about it.

Cerberus

@Meysam More or less, yes. But I would leave out the to in your second example.

RegDwighт

It doesn't explicitly ask if they are equivalent. It assumes that.

tchrist

The to is wrong.

RegDwighт

2:06 PM

@tchrist yes and I was going to reply with that TimeCube guy quote, but got distracted.

Cerberus

I know it's wrong, but I can't help enjoying the new Iphone's bad press.

RegDwighт

Jul 13 at 14:56, by RegDwight ΒВB

@JourneymanGeek How can you call the top and bottom sides of a cube sides?

Cerberus

If Apple starts recommending that you use Microsoft products to replace their own, the world has come to an end.

tchrist

“There’s nothing wrong with saying top and bottom; English is versatile that way.”

A cube has six faces.

I refuse to call it twelve sides.

Cerberus

I presume you are referring to this horrible gay slang?

tchrist

2:09 PM

I think English can use more than one word for things.

KitFox

What now?

tchrist

Without being ashamed of it.

KitFox

The mirror has two faces.

tchrist

Top and bottom only make sense if the cube has a particular rightsideupness.

Cerberus

Or if it happens to be lying on a certain side.

Which is usually the case...

KitFox

2:10 PM

There is always a top and bottom.

tchrist

That would be the bottom.

Cerberus

See?

tchrist

It always lies on the same side.

RegDwighт

@tchrist so you are the TimeCube guy. I knew it.

Cerberus

And then you have a frame of reference.

tchrist

2:10 PM

And do you know which side it always lies on?

Cerberus

Wow, you're smart.

tchrist

It always lies on the inside.

Oh noes!

RegDwighт

@tchrist The one with marmalade on it.

tchrist

It must be the outside.

Cerberus

Better.

KitFox

2:11 PM

A cube can only exist in a frame of reference, therefore it will always have a top and bottom.

tchrist

A cube can only exist in a frame of reference?

Cerberus

Is that so?

RegDwighт

@KitFox cubes don't exist in space?

Cerberus

How about a cube that exists only in my mind?

tchrist

Next you’ll be telling me that north is actually up.

KitFox

2:12 PM

It's true. I thought everyone knew that.

Cerberus

I suppose I would picture it in a certain position, yes.

RegDwighт

Someone inform the NASA.

KitFox

Can't have a cube without a frame of reference.

tchrist

No bite.

RegDwighт

I am my own frame of reference. Eat that.

Cerberus

2:12 PM

But how about if you formulate a cube as a mathematical formula?

KitFox

Still have a frame of reference.

tchrist

What, does it become a tetrahedron otherwise?

Cerberus

I suppose you would need x and y axes?

RegDwighт

@Cerberus hint. Three axes.

tchrist

grinds

Cerberus

2:13 PM

I think Kit is right, at least for all situations that I can think of.

KitFox

Of course I'm right.

It's self-evident.

tchrist

Orthogonal axes are self-referential.

RegDwighт

@KitFox You are wrong. QED.

Cerberus

@RegDwighт You don't say. I figured 2 would be enough for you to figure it out.

KitFox

I'm hungry. What's for gnawing on today?

Cerberus

2:14 PM

retracts tail

tchrist

norton

KitFox

brb

tchrist

Play ’er as she lies, Captain.

RegDwighт

Soon I will have more gold badges on SO, after investing a couple weeks, than I have on ELU, after investing a couple years. It's a sad state of affairs.

tchrist

That speaks volumes.

And of them.

Not all golds are created equal.

The ones about number of views are lame.

I see idiots with baskets full of them, and no other rep.

KitFox

2:18 PM

Mmm, Cheezits.

RegDwighт

@tchrist yeah those are basically free.

I got a Favorite Question on ELU today. That took me two years to accumulate. And it's silver.

Views don't mean jack and you get gold.

tchrist

Tells you what the founders care about.

$$$$$

Understandable, but shit.

RegDwighт

Yeah, it makes sense.

tchrist

The expletive was just that, not the other reading.

It’s obvious why they made 5 golds for review.

They want them done.

Shows how much their thinking has changed since Reviewer was silver for 1000.

Or how bad the site has gotten.

RegDwighт

I'm still waiting for my first Great Question. Like a little child for Christmas.

@tchrist that has rather stupid side effects though.

I'm munching through the Edit queues by fixing a letter here, a comma there.

tchrist

2:23 PM

I like Great Answer better.

I don’t question much.

Character flaw.

RegDwighт

Oh but that one I already have, so it's worthless now. Again, think little children.

KitFox

I hate the word "munch."

tchrist

It’s not idempotent.

RegDwighт

Yeah it's very moist.

KitFox

Exactly.

tchrist

2:24 PM

It’s the flossing afterwards that toasts my shorts.

KitFox

Do you remember everything about me, @Reg?

RegDwighт

And who are you?

KitFox

punches Reg's arm

tchrist

Horton Hatches the Egg

Horton Hatches the Egg is a children's book by Dr. Seuss, first published in 1940. The character Horton appeared again in Horton Hears a Who!, published in 1954. These two books later provided the thrust of the plot in 2000 for the Broadway musical Seussical. Based on a 2007 online poll, the National Education Association named Horton Hatches the Egg one of its "Teachers' Top 100 Books for Children." __NOTOC__Plot summary The book concerns an elephant named Horton, who is convinced by Mayzie (a lazy, irresponsible bird) to sit on her egg while she takes a short "break", which in actuali...

RegDwighт

@KitFox That means nothing in my frame of reference.

tchrist

2:26 PM

goto $job

RegDwighт

Kewl. I'm about to go home.

KitFox

punches Reg's wing

RegDwighт

Go punch some iPhones instead.

18 hours ago, by RegDwighт

Another theory I overheard is that they stress-test every product before it leaves the factory by means of a Chinese-worker punchfest.

tchrist

is now at $job.

RegDwighт

That was fast.

KitFox

2:28 PM

@RegDwighт I need that job.

tchrist

How come we don't get accused of multisocking when we chat from a bunch of unrelated addresses?

RegDwighт

Nobody needs jobs.

@tchrist who cares? Why?

KitFox

@tchrist I could tell you, but then I'd have to suspend you.

RegDwighт

I could suspend you, then I wouldn't have to tell you.

tchrist

@RegDwighт The programming on stack is really remarkably well done.

RegDwighт

2:29 PM

Tru dat.

tchrist

I don't type on multiple addresses at the same time. It's serial not parallel.

But other things, too.

I have never been on a system where things were so convenient. I'm sure the (real) moderator tools are similarly smooth to operate.

Because if they were not, they would be fixed.

Cerberus

This is what you get when you are subscribed to a Dutch newspaper in Iran.

This is real.

nrc.nl/inbeeld/2012/09/28/…

Some of those pictures are full nudes, which I presume would be censored in America as well.

RegDwighт

Still a lot of skin.

KitFox

Meh. Hard to say without having the original for comparison.

RegDwighт

That's some weird color, though.

KitFox

2:36 PM

They didn't mind the cocks hanging out everywhere though. That's funny.

Cerberus

Exactly.

Some of the captions say they are nude pictures.

RegDwighт

This is a cock's world.

Cerberus

But I am 100 % sure most of those pictures are not nude.

Just tight tops and short skirts.

KitFox

I was going to say that I suppose men aren't shocked to see their own equipment.

RegDwighт

@KitFox some are. But they are few and far between.

Cerberus

2:38 PM

Yeah.

KitFox

But they might be shocked to see that women don't have anything there.

Cerberus

Ayatollahs only care about what affects men, and homosexuality doesn't exist.

@KitFox gasp

RegDwighт

yesterday, by RegDwighт

Ayatollah Romney?

Cerberus

I bet every time you "quote" yourself from long ago, you just insert that "old" line on the spot with your mod powers.

tchrist

I have a friend whose cat's name is Willard.

Cerberus

2:41 PM

Great.

tchrist

He's considering renaming him if Willard is elected.

He'll just call him Prez.

RegDwighт

@Cerberus it would have a pencil.

Keep hoping.

Cerberus

Is that Romney's first name?

tchrist

It is.

Cerberus

@RegDwighт I believe it!

tchrist

2:42 PM

What's the use of superpowers if you never use them?

RegDwighт

FTFY

tchrist

Bute.

Cerberus

@RegDwighт Waaahhh!

If the biggest, at least you're also the funniest abuser of mod powers.

►

For some reason her German sounds really bad, even though she articulates well.

What do you think, @Reg?

Perhaps it is that she doesn't seem to use schwas?

She sounds like someone who really doesn't speak German.

KitFox

I think I might be feverish. How odd.

RegDwighт

I can't hear anything right now. The gay iPhone owner opposite myself is watching something.

Cerberus

2:54 PM

His new Iphone?

RegDwighт

@Cerberus you're just afraid to face the actual truth. That my quote skills are a testament not to powers of any kind, but to how much random rubbish a bunch of people will produce in just a few months.

You can't handle the truth.

Cerberus

You know what the dumbest thing about Iphone lines is? You can simply order the Iphone 5 on line.

RegDwighт

Where 10000 monkeys with an agenda will fail, 10 humans with none will succeed.

Cerberus

@RegDwighт Namely, yourself.

KitFox

Speak for your own monkeys.

RegDwighт

2:55 PM

@Cerberus I can't take credit for everything here. I wish I could.

Cerberus

How about a beating for your own rubbish?

reveals stick

RegDwighт

@Cerberus she has a very obvious accent.

jokerdino

How about now?

RegDwighт

The vowels are all wrong.

Cerberus

Yeah, Italian.

But it's not a normal Italian accent from someone who actually knows German, right?

RegDwighт

2:58 PM

Nope. Not Italian at all.

More like Greek.

But that could be due to the song.

Cerberus

Hmm.

She spoke Italian growing up.

With an Egyptian accent, perhaps.

jokerdino

@RegDwighт You use Debian right?

RegDwighт

> born in Egypt to Italian parents but naturalised French

Cerberus

I find her French to sound typically Italian.

RegDwighт

@jokerdino no. Used to. Five years ago.

Cerberus

2:59 PM

Yes.

RegDwighт

And by "use" I mean "browse the Web and type an occasional ls -ltr in a shell".

jokerdino

@RegDwighт Using Ubuntu then?

RegDwighт

I use whatever I am forced to. This is work.

Right now Ubuntu, yes.

Cerberus

►

I can't even understand her Dutch.

RegDwighт

Because it's the best thing since sliced bread, allegedly. Except they said the same thing about Debian, and before that about SuSE, and before that about Solaris.

Cerberus

3:01 PM

It sounds just like her German, as though she didn't understand what she was saying.

jokerdino

@RegDwighт hah

@Cerberus What a surprise. I don't either.

Cerberus

@jokerdino baffled

RegDwighт

I understand her Dutch about as fine as anybody else's.

jokerdino

But why?

Cerberus

It's just funny how people sound when they are saying words they don't understand.

Like what I sound like when I speak Russian or Turkish.

KitFox

3:04 PM

Why are my tables not striping?

jokerdino

Drop the table.

RegDwighт

What's with all the ise/ize questions?

Bah, these people on SO will approve any rubbish edit. Don't leave me enough time to fix and reject.

jokerdino

;-)

RegDwighт

We so need this:

49

Q: A way to "downvote" a suggested edit and affect *both* the edit suggester and reviewers

I find a lot of suggested edits pretty poor. For me, it feels like that more than a half of the suggested edits doesn't properly address all issues in the post. The trigger of today was this particular example. It does not remove the PLEASE HELP ME screaming of the OP and even more, it introduces...

discussion suggested-edits rant

The top answer hits the nail on its head.

> There are many more bad reviewers than good reviewers. People are able to ride this system to 2k rep by spamming reviews and then they graduate from bad editor to bad reviewer, and the circle repeats.

jokerdino

Just 3 days and it got ample of support.

RegDwighт

3:11 PM

Usefuler things got rejected before.

And it's not like it's exactly trivial.

We'll wait and see.

tchrist

@RegDwighт Am on RH Ent for work, but you're right: it's whatever they tell you to use.

RegDwighт

Rhein-Hunsrück Entsorgung?

jokerdino

Red hat enterprise

RegDwighт

Oh.

Right, there's that.

tchrist

@jokerdino You forgot an e.

RegDwighт

3:14 PM

Red hate enterprise?

tchrist

I have fawns parading before me.

jokerdino

I don't hate Red hat.

tchrist

Bingo.

Robusto

I don't date Red Hat.

jokerdino

Red hat was the first Linux distro I heard of

tchrist

3:14 PM

They are so cute.

Oh my.

jokerdino

But started using Ubuntu first.

RegDwighт

People keep pinging me as Red Dwight. They must have some sort of sixth sense or something.

jokerdino

@Robusto We might make a good couple.

tchrist

Now the bucks are coming behind them, eying the does.

This is going to get racey.

RegDwighт

But enough with this, time to mute commies.

tchrist

3:15 PM

No dating in this chat.

RegDwighт

Bis später.

jokerdino

@RegDwighт It took me a second to notice you are not Red Dwight.

tchrist

Aye.

RegDwighт

@tchrist that dates you.

Robusto

@tchrist Does the buck eye the does?

RegDwighт

3:16 PM

@jokerdino hint: Redinald is a really stupid name.

tchrist

If I don't date myself, who shall?

It does.

RegDwighт

I mean, even stupider than Reginald.

Over and out.

Robusto

Does the buckeye the does?

jokerdino

Reginald? Right.

tchrist

Bye Wedgie!

jokerdino

3:17 PM

Atom wedgie?

Robusto

So glad I got to sow my wild oats back in the days before MDR gonorrhea. Just saying.

tchrist

God yes.

jokerdino

Terrible things have been said before.

tchrist

I feel the same about having stopped eating meat right before moving to the UK.

Robusto

@tchrist How do you not eat meat in the UK? I mean, meat is in the frickin' air, man!

tchrist

3:20 PM

Had a girlfriend at the time, not a boyfriend. So no meat to eat.

Robusto

Oh. That kind of meat.

tchrist

Ate a lot of Asian though.

Food.

jokerdino

O_o

tchrist

Asian restaurants.

Very veggie.

The Mad Cow thing.

Much easier not to eat meat in the UK than in Germany.

Robusto

@tchrist Do vegans eat vegina?

tchrist

3:22 PM

Germany: Where a normal meal is two porkchops, and a vegetarian meal is only one.

jokerdino

If you don't mind me saying this, you guys are very interesting. Now I am leaving.

tchrist

@Robusto These things have been known to happen.

Hah.

The interesting question is vegan fellators.

Spit or swallow?

Robusto

Fell, ate, and leave.

tchrist

Hm. Does fellator cover both genders, or must I really use fellatrix?

Well, lightly use.

Robusto

Silly rabbit, fellatrix is for kids.

tchrist

3:26 PM

Careful, the parents are watching.

I could teach a fellatrix.

For free.

Like juggling.

Robusto

3:42 PM

You seem suited to be a juggalo.

KitFox

4:02 PM

@tchrist Some spit, some swallow, just like the non-vegans.

Robusto

4:37 PM

0

Q: At the "hospital" or "at the hospitalary unit"?

Should you use "at the hospital" or "at the hospitalary unit"? (does this even exist)? Put into context: The study allowed us to visualize the need for the renegotiation of contracted goals, but for this to happen there is work to be done, internally, at the hospital, to define its real prod...

meaning

Someone should provide an epistolary answer to this.

Matt Эллен

Asserting your second amendment rights?

Robusto

I will shoot them with my ePistols, yes.

@KitFox Hey, careful, man .. there's a beverage here.

MετάEd

Some of João Paulo's questions remind me of Nortonn S. I'm pretty sure they are different individuals; they just seem to be asking some similarly bizarre questions.

KitFox

4:55 PM

@Robusto Damn sniggity.

tchrist

@MετάEd A lot of questions that I know for certain are not NS remind me of him.

MετάEd

5:10 PM

@tchrist I wonder if it's balrogs? On the Internet, nobody knows you're a balrog.

tchrist

Wager: João will very soon get auto-suspended.

MετάEd

@tchrist What is the criterion for auto-suspension?

tchrist

Too many closed and/or deleted and/or downvoted postings. Yes, I don’t know the exact set.

MετάEd

@tchrist I do find a reference to a mod flag that is automatically set if too many of your posts are closed or downvoted. But nothing about automatic suspension. Over at Programmers.SE, one of the mods says the usual practice is to warn on the first such flag, suspend on the second.

KitFox

Usual practice meaning you get scolded if you don't.

tchrist

5:23 PM

Coupla ways to read that one. :)

KitFox

Who in the hell wrote this asinine code?

tchrist

Rhetor, clearly.

KitFox

No, no, no. Rhetor wrote the kweschun.

Gigili

5:40 PM

Now that you starred random comments, mine is not on the star wall any more. Dangit.

5

Ah, hello @cpx.

tchrist

João keeps answering his own questions.

cpx

@Gigili Hi.

Gigili

He's supposed to ask his own questions only.

dies of happiness, by the way.

tchrist

@Gigili Been a long time since that’s happened to me.

Gigili

@cpx Is everything OK? Haven't seen you here for quite a while.

Look:

-1

Q: What is more widely used in UK English: -ise or -ize?

I was asked on a translation assignment to use UK English but with -ize spelling. What is the more widely used spelling in use in UK English? What is the more correct form of using it: -ize or -ise? You might like this link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_and_British_English_spelling_di...

orthography

3

Q: The use of -ize and -ise in the UK?

I got a translation assignment where I am to use UK English but with -ize spelling. The European Union switched from -ize to -ise some years ago in its English language publications, meaning that -ize spellings are found in older legislative acts and -ise spellings in more recent ones. Source: ...

orthography

David Wallace

5:55 PM

Morning everyone

cpx

@Gigili Yes, I'm good. I have been reading about various other subjects so I had kind of lost my touch with improving my English. I'm glad that you asked.

Morning.

David Wallace

@Gigili Hah! Each one should be closed as a duplicate of the other.

Gigili

Oh I didn't recognize you @DavidWallace.

David Wallace

That'll learn them.

Gigili

But I have to go now. By.

David Wallace

5:58 PM

Hmm. (checks armpits)