English Language & Usage: Multi-Layered Discourse Room

1:15 AM

@JohanLarsson Dirty how? Gravelly?

2:59 AM

Hello.

Mahnax

3:28 AM

Hi.

I had a dream that I took someone from this chat on a tour of my city and they were very unimpressed.

But I don't remember who it was. It was so weird.

4:59 AM

@Mahnax Aww poor you!

I'm sure it would be completely different in reality.

Mahnax

5:16 AM

@Cerberus I hope so!

I'm sure you have cool stuff!

LWTBP

6:27 AM

This may not be a message meant for here... but could someone confirm is exclusively following the “style guide” of the website gsbe.co.uk be a good idea for someone wanting to follow British English?

6:46 AM

@Robusto as remember it it was in a Sly Stone way.

Limerick Machine: There once was some very loud bass Pumping loud noise at my face It was the loud sub That w…

8:20 AM

@LWTBP Listing Italics under Grammar is a bit odd there. Following any single guide exclusively is probably not a good idea, because you have nothing to validate it against.

LWTBP

9:14 AM

@AndrewLeach Thank you Andrew. Appreciate it.

Stack Exchange

9:34 AM

posted on July 12, 2014 by sgdi

There once was some very loud bass Pumping loud noise at my face It was the loud sub That was the rub The other amps couldn’t keep pace

2:37 PM

@JohanLarsson @Rob this is interesting.

user44517

hey

Hiya.

@cornbreadninja麵包忍者 pretty nice, not sure about the song/voice, getting a feeling he does not know the lyrics

3:00 PM

@cornbreadninja麵包忍者 cool. Sounds like they have also been influenced by Dispatch:

@Robusto whoa.

@cornbreadninja麵包忍者 Whoa?

Playing the music game with Rob always ends 1 - 7

2

@Robusto it's interesting.

You've not heard Dispatch before?

3:04 PM

Naw.

Hiatus maxime deflendus.

Die fledermaus.

C'mon, ya gotta check out Dispatch. It's in the rules somewhere.

I did. I have.

Twice.

Ha.

I'm looking on YouTube for a particular one of their songs of which that Sunny Day group is very redolent.

Ah, here we go:

3:08 PM

Brasil has a lady Noguiera who is talking shit on Ronda's jiu-jitsu game.

@cornbreadninja麵包忍者 haha, funny.

Ronda gonna waste dat bitch.

I thought they were on the roof of a van at first.

I don't know, man. She fights at 163 and came down to fight MMA at 145.

My son saw them live. Said it was one of the best concerts he's ever been to.

Now she's cutting to 135.

Now their voices sound familiar.

Like I've heard them on a radio somewhere.

Probably have.

The guy in the middle there, Chad Ulmsted, formed State Radio, which I've tried to get @Johan into, but so far he is resisting the inevitable.

3:13 PM

mmafighting.com/2014/7/11/5884023/…

> Maybe I defeat her with an armbar.

Yeah. That's, like, Ronda's signature move.

What does one do about this matter?

I’m not used to the idea of “googling” for a definition. You mean it provides no references? Can’t you at least provide the link? Google is extremely suspect as a source of definitions, since you don’t know where they come from or what the publication date, which makes it extremely difficult to produce a verifiable citation for. — tchrist 2 mins ago

@Robusto nice one, lyrics sound ok also.

@tchrist I don't know. Flag?

That just pushes it off on somebody else.

3:16 PM

> A blind man walks into a bar, and a table, and a couple of chairs.

@tchrist What other options do we have?

This whole Google is the font of all knowledge thing is bad enough, but now this.

@JohanLarsson yark yark

@tchrist Well, LMGTFY is not a citation. It's a dodge.

Well, I would at least like a link and a retrieval date. The problem is that these things change without notice nor attribution.

Sigh. I fear another meta question coming on. Rather tiring of those.

@Robusto gonna try it on gf, she likes Coldplay.

3:21 PM

I think google fetches its definition from the Oxford American College Dictionary if you use the define operator.

@JohanLarsson Not all of Coldplay sucks. Just most of it.

It is right between Dylan and Coldplay

And it seems it doesn't define dabbler.

@JohanLarsson Nah. Listen to more and you'll see it's pretty far from Coldplay.

You do get a definition if you use define:dabbler

3:22 PM

yeah Coldplay are ok, no fun admitting it though :)

But that's from princeton.edu.

Not from its default dictionary (believed to be OACD)

@JohanLarsson I've always thought of Coldplay as Oasis Lite.

I am rather subplussed about this approach.

@JohanLarsson Seriously, you can play any Coldplay keyboard track by ear in five minutes. You don't even have to move your hands on the keyboard.

user116848

Hey folks :)

3:26 PM

hej

@tchrist How do you get dabbler upon searching for complacent?

@tchrist I don't think it's an acceptable citation. I mean, there's no transparency. We just have to take Google's word for it.

@Alraxite I just backed up a screen.

@Robusto This is what bothers me.

Also, it could change at any moment.

Yep. Any millisecond, in fact.

Again and again I find that Google produces different results for different people.

3:27 PM

Well, that too.

@tchrist backed up a screen?

And different depending on where you log in from.

Oh, wait

I have no idea how to tell it my primary language is something other than English, but I wonder what would happen if it were.

so you changed the query in the search box

after searching for dabbler

3:28 PM

@Alraxite Yes.

@tchrist Most of the time, you won't get any definition.

These days, "Googler" is enough to define that concept. — Robusto 9 secs ago

I suspect it's all of the time.

You can change your language by going to the gear icon on the right hand side.

Like googlefight.com refuses to talk to me except in French.

Google Dictionary

Google Dictionary was an online dictionary service of Google, originating in its Google Translate service. The Google Dictionary website was terminated on August 5, 2011 after part of its functionality was integrated into Google Search using the define: operator. It was believed that, until August 2010, Google used definitions from Collins COBUILD. COBUILD entries were easy to recognize by their characteristic full-sentence definitions as well as rather cryptic grammar codes such as [N-VAR], which in Google Dictionary went unexplained. In August 2010, a blog site reported that Google ...

The Languages section.

3:30 PM

@tchrist Just make a moue at it.

@JohanLarsson Haha.

went to the beach again today, we had a bay that was ~300m wide, puppy used it like a velodrome for four hours without pause. He is insane.

Puppies are like that.

user116848

How old is your puppy?

3:33 PM

1,5 years so not technically a puppy anymore. I just call them puppy until I get a new one.

@Robusto Have you met a pointer?

user116848

:)

He is like an anaconda with fur, rock solid wherever you poke him.

Suspect he has a solid cranium also :)

user116848

anaconda? That seems big :)

¿Qué coño son estas «Définitions web»?

--google until google < "Inf"

user116848

3:38 PM

@tchrist Are you writing in Spanish? You know the language?

@Arrowfar Yes, of course. It’s for cursing.

user116848

I see

Basically I said “WTF are these. . . ?”

But look at dilettante.

I’m sorry, but “Googling a definition” does not work.

user116848

Oh, Great! I hadn't seen your profile before. Nice work dude :)

There is a pattern though. When we search for a word, google shows the definition accepted by OED or MW and if it doesn't then it will mention the source. Consider the case of "complacent" where the source isn't mentioned because the definition is available in the popular dictionary, oxford online. In case of dabbler though, it mentions the source site below the definition, which is princeton.edu. Thus, we can say that all of its definition are feom OED or MW. And when it comes to why I didn't mention the source, it's because I can't. I use the mobile site on a mobile phone that doesn't suppo — vickyace 3 mins ago

3:41 PM

You'll probably get different definitions if you use a different language.

I don’t know what that last sentence would have been.

@Alraxite But I didn’t. I typed an English phrase in.

But saying you didn't mention the source because you cannot is a bad sign.

How is your 'about results' part also in French?

In either case, it's not a reliable source, because people might be using different langauges.

If you ask in French about a French word, it gives you a French answer. If you ask in English about an English word, it gives you a French answer.

3:44 PM

And there are variations when you use the English version too.

@Alraxite That’s what I am afraid of.

It seems to pull something out of somebody’s butt, but you never know whose.

@tchrist So is this another one of your backing ups?

Because the query is in English

@Alraxite No, it is not!

But I get an english def

I said "define dilettante" for the first one, then "définir complaisant" for the second.

3:48 PM

You may call me méfiant if you will, but this seems dodgy.

You probably have french as you language for google. You can change that by going to the gear icon on the right hand side of the search page.

It is dodgy.

Yes, yes. I have just come from having done that very thing.

Thanks for telling me how.

If it doesn't get a definition from OACD, it gives you a definition from other sources.

So, there's no way to know from where a google def comes from

Unless the author explicitly states that

3:53 PM

It will always fetch definitions from sources other that the default OACD if you use a different language

which is apparently wikipedia

Wow, this gets sillier the more you poke at it:

I was expecting either the Spanish definition for todo, which means “all” in English, or the English definition for a to-do list.

I got . . . something else.

About TODO files.

I’m afraid we’re not in Kansas anymore.

Now let me go back to English and get it to give me more nonsense.

I’m kinda bothered by its fake IPA, too.

> com·pla·cent /kəmˈplāsənt/

I don’t like that it doesn’t always tell you where it got it from.

No, gidiot, I did not mean “define sciuromorpha”!

4:15 PM

My "nonce" looks very different. Hang on...

@AndrewLeach Really? That is very interesting.

Well hey there, at least that one I can actually read.

That's using google.co.uk.

But it still doesn’t seem citable.

And different people are going to get different answers.

4:18 PM

@tchrist There must be a down arrow for you to get the etymology

Mine looks like Andrew too

Um... Andrew's, I think. Otherwise I look like a nonce.

Haha

Anansi Boys

Anansi Boys is a novel by Neil Gaiman. In the novel, "Mr. Nancy", an incarnation of the West African trickster god Anansi, dies, leaving two sons, who in turn discover each other. The novel follows their adventures as they explore their common heritage. Anansi Boys was published on 20 September 2005 and was released in paperback on 1 October 2006. The book debuted at number one on The New York Times Best Seller list, and won both the Locus Award and the British Fantasy Society Award in 2006. The audiobook was released in 2005, narrated by Lenny Henry. Plot Anansi Boys is the story o...

So why do you get something palatable but I get crapola?

Google is playing favorites again.

@tchrist Hmm. But in BrE the o in nonce is completely different to the a in nancy.

As I said, there should be a down arrow

at the bottom of the definitions

4:22 PM

Perhaps try using google.co.uk, or setting your browser to British English.

@AndrewLeach I know, but the stupid non-IPA version had /ä/.

@AndrewLeach It doesn’t give anything but English as a language choice, no regions.

Stupid browser.

A: What word means someone who’s satisfied with superficial knowledge?

Yes.

1

How about wiseacre? According to Google: a person with an affectation of wisdom or knowledge, regarded with scorn or irritation by others; a know-all Sciolist fits your need best, except that I have never come across the word before. Why, even the spell-check in this text box flags it as a...

Oh.

I guess “According to Google” is thunk of as a citation by interkids. Do I need to refine my sensibilities? Or just dull them?

4:24 PM

It might be alright if the definition given matched what was asked for.

Where's the Help page with "Stack Exchange is NOT a discussion forum" in huge letters?

looks

> If your motivation for asking the question is “I would like to participate in a discussion about ______”, then you should not be asking here. However, if your motivation is “I would like others to explain ______ to me”, then you are probably OK. (Discussions are of course welcome in our real time web chat.)

Our real-time web chat!!

It's super hip.

And happening.

@Cerberus No no no, it’s really a time-web chat.

Whadda?

I'm in no time web.

The english.se help center doesn't seem to explicitly state the forum thingy

4:29 PM

Nouns in Collision, by Noamikovsky.

Blog - Stack Exchange: Stack Exchange is not a forum: the role of “niceness” on a Q&A site

there is however this:

Shog9 on August 08, 2012

It’s been a few weeks now since Joel kicked off our “summer of love”. There’ve been some excellent discussions in the blog comments and on Meta, and we’ve tried to present some hard data on how objectively “nice” we are. But it’s high time to talk about what place “niceness” really has on Stack Exchange. And to do that, we need to start by talking about you:

You, sir, are a jackass.

And that’s ok.

Stack Overflow wasn’t created to be some utopian ideal of peace and love. When Jeff & Joel set out to create this system, they knew full well the sort of problems that face online commun …

Well, that one-boxed well.

Whoa!

That’s Sir Ian McKellen playing Gandalf.

@Shog9 Your picture and your quote are a super-mismatch!

Sir Ian never played Bumblebuns or whatever his name is. That bee-mage.

@Cerberus where is it?

Here!

The quotation says it's Dumbledore.

4:32 PM

This room is very happening right now.

The picture is of Sir Ian as Gandalf.

But I must be off.

Later!

Bye, Karl!

Karl?

Orff.

4:34 PM

composer

I heard your posh accent coming through.

@Alraxite Yes, I know. It’s an old word for bumblebee.

Nov 2 '12 at 0:08, by tchrist

He battled with the Dumbledors,
the Hummerhorns, and Honeybees,
and won the Golden Honeycomb;
and running home on sunny seas
in ship of leaves and gossamer
with blossom for a canopy,
he sat and sang, and furbished up
and burnished up his panoply.

Cerb is a spiceboy.

Which one?

Posh spice

Ah.

4:38 PM

Oh, Orff.

Is he posh?

But bye!

poof

user116848

So have you guys watched the 'Hobbits' movie? Pretty boring stuff.

The quote wasn't even said by Dumbledore.

So.

It is a mismatch.

That's three movies in one.

in Lounge<C++> on Stack Overflow Chat, 57 mins ago, by Borgleader

Visualizing Algorithms

I’m afraid that “According to Google” doesn’t really work as a citation. Different people get different answers, there’s (often) no actual source named, and it is subject to change without notice. — tchrist 59 secs ago

Google is the new Bible.

> In the beginning, Google.

What did we do before Google?

4:46 PM

We (they) learned stuff I think

It is even similar in construction: two syllables, first stressed, starts with a voiced stop then a long vowel or diphthong then repeats the initial voiced stop then a syllabic L.

@AndrewLeach Scholarship.

5:04 PM

!!define assess

Jarvis the Bot

@JohanLarsson assess (transitive) To determine, estimate or judge the value of; to evaluate

5:19 PM

My goodness, the indictment against Aaron Burr is just one single sentence!!!

> The grand inquest of the United States of America, for the Virginia district, upon their oath, do
present, that Aaron Burr, late of the city of New York, and state of New York, attorney at law,
being an inhabitant of, and residing within the United States, and under the protection of the laws
of the United States, and owing allegiance and fidelity to the same United States, not having the
fear of God before his eyes, nor weighing the duty of his said allegiance, but being moved and
seduced by the instigation of the devil, wickedly devising and intending the peace and tranquility

@Kit Please don’t read that, lest you should pass out from lack of air!

Somebody feed that one to a parser, why doncha? :)

user116848

5:46 PM

@tchrist So tchrist in your opinion how different is Portuguese and Spanish languages?

user116848

I mean they sound same.

@Arrowfar Um, no they don’t. They sound nothing like each other.

user116848

You think?

They look a great deal alike, but they sound utterly different.

user116848

I see. So I guess you Speak Spanish that's why you could understand it as well to detect any differences.

5:48 PM

Spanish is more syllable timed, while Portuguese is more stress timed. This guarantees that they will sound very different. Furthermore, each has phonemes that the other lacks.

user116848

nods

user116848

So have you studies Portuguese as well?

user116848

You a Italian?

@Arrowfar Yes.

@Arrowfar huh?

user116848

@oerkelens Hi Mr oerks :)

oerkelens

5:51 PM

Hi :)

user116848

@tchrist I mean are you from Spain----> Italy?

I am an American principally of English and Danish extraction.

user116848

Oh, I see. I thought you were Italian :)

Non sono italiano.

user116848

Si'

user116848

5:54 PM

:)

user116848

Al least I know "si" haha

Si could be French, Italian, or Spanish. In Portuguese though it is sim.

user116848

I didn't know that.

The Portuguese pronunciation is /sĩ/.

The others are not.

user116848

I should google the pronunciation for sim

5:56 PM

It’s just a nasalized /i/.

user116848

So pretty much 'si', right?

6:12 PM

@Arrowfar No.

/si/ and /sĩ/ are phonemically distinct in Portuguese.

user116848

Yeah I read it is pronounced as a half of 'sing' word.

Kinda.

The word for “if” is pronounce /si/; the word for “yes” is pronounced /sĩ/.

If you pinch your nose on the first one, the sound is unaltered. If you do so on the second one, it is either cut off entirely or drastically altered.

Nasality of vowels is phonemic in Portuguese.

Since se and sim count as a minimal pair: /si/ versus /sĩ/.

user116848

I see.

Anonymous

@Arrowfar Although that's not a precise technical description, it kind of makes sense, assuming you mean English sing, because in English, we tend to (allophonically) nasalize vowels before nasal consonants such as [ŋ] (which is the sound often spelled ⟨ng⟩ in English).

Anonymous

So if you can nasalize the vowel without pronouncing the following consonant, you get [ĩ] instead of [i] (which is not contrastive in English, so I've placed it in square brackets, but is contrastive in Portuguese as tchrist has kindly explained, so he has written it in forward slashes).

user116848

6:19 PM

@snailboat Hi again Ms Boat :)

Anonymous

Hello!

user116848

I see.

Anonymous

English speakers tend not to notice nasalization of vowels because we don't have any minimal pairs that distinguish the two―that is, we don't need to pay attention to the difference to distinguish any pair of words

Anonymous

But phonemic nasalization is a fairly common feature in other languages.

user116848

nods

Shog9

6:35 PM

@tchrist themarysue.com/trollquotes-troll-geeks/#geekosystem

Aaaah! You can't do that! Not 21 and 29 anyway. Or 16, actually.

Oh. I might just have given too much away.

@AndrewLeach You gave nothing away that was not already in evidence.

Phew.

I think.

6:50 PM

Hey, there's a pretty strong scent of geek emanating from anyone who uses an SE site anyway. The rest can be inferred.

Anonymous

I'm at least a couple sorts of geek.

See? For me, nothing pejorative attaches to the term geek.

Oh, I know. I'm very settled in my geekdom.

Anonymous

That makes it sound like a place.

And it's not?!

Anonymous

6:56 PM

Oh!

Anonymous

> Welcome to my geekdom!

Exactly.

> Welcome to my world!

Anonymous

Hooray!

笑っています。

user116848

So, only geeks using SE sites. I don't think so. Ninjas and MMa fighters also use this site. :D

Anonymous

7:07 PM

@Arrowfar Probably more perl ninjas than actual assassins.

user116848

@snailboat haha

user116848

I meant cornbread ninja and other guys :)

Anonymous

Oh! I forgot we had a resident ninja. I'm not quite a regular in this chat room

user116848

:)

A: Placing the object of an infinitive before it instead of after it

0

Yes, it is correct as written. It is a stylistic choice used to draw attention to some portion of the sentence. This is the rhetorical device called anastrophe, itself a type of hyperbaton. Anastrophe is defined by the OED as: Inversion, or unusual arrangement, of the words or clauses of ...

But I couldn’t bring myself to close it as a dupe of our various hyperbaton questions.

@Shog9 I only read your magazine for the centerfolds.

7:21 PM

@Reg I think bra 2 ned 1, looking forward to the game

user116848

So why there are so many rooms with ice girl in it? I don't get it. Not that I have a problem with it or anything. She seems nice.

A: Is there a word to describe someone who tends to disagree with others only to upset them?

Although to be honest, it actually is a dupe. Darn it.

sighs

user116848

7:39 PM

So any thoughts on why my answer was not very popular here?

user116848

-1

I'd go with the word schadenfreude. Although a fancy word but it conveys the same meaning you are looking for. Everyday life produces many instances of other people suffering pain and misfortune. Clearly, one reason that we are drawn to other people’s suffering is that we feel empathy for them (...

user116848

So should I change my answer then? I researched it though.

7:52 PM

Probably because Schadenfreude doesn’t really match “someone who tends to disagree with others only to upset them”.

Anonymous

@Arrowfar Do you remember our discussion of the term from yesterday?

Anonymous

in English Language Learners, 23 hours ago, by snailboat

More precisely, to take pleasure in the misfortune of others

user116848

@snailboat Yeah I do. I posted this answer some four days ago.

Anonymous

(Although I suppose I phrased it as though it's a verb, which it's not)

Anonymous

Let's take a look at your answer

Anonymous

7:55 PM

Ah, there's a sign in your answer that you've quoted material without properly indicating it as being quoted

Anonymous

> Batson, 1991; Decety, Michalska, & Akitsuki, 2008; de Waal, 2008; Hoffman, 1981; Wispé, 1991

Anonymous

These short form citations indicate to the reader that later, perhaps at the end of the paper or book, there is a references section which gives full citations for each

Anonymous

You did link to a source, though, so I loaded it up, and surely enough, a good portion of the answer is taken from that source.

Anonymous

Quoting sources with attribution is fine, of course. Please make sure that when you do so, you indicate to the reader that they're quotes, for example using the > syntax

Anonymous

Here, you should not only indicate which sentences are quoted, but indicate any alterations you've made, including when the quoted sections are not contiguous

user116848

7:58 PM

@snailboat I don't get it. How should I have written the citations? With > ?

Anonymous

In answers on Stack Exchange, if you place the > symbol at the beginning of a line, it formats it as a block quote.

Anonymous

> This also works in chat.　←　This line is formatted as a quote.

user116848

> Batson, 1991; Decety, Michalska, & Akitsuki, 2008; de Waal, 2008; Hoffman, 1981; Wispé, 1991

user116848

I see.

Anonymous

You can indicate that you've left out parts of the quote by placing an ellipsis in place of the deleted material

user116848

8:00 PM

How?

user116848

If you please? :)

Anonymous

> Everyday life produces many instances of other people suffering pain and misfortune. Some of these events hit very close to home, but most are simply the common part of what is covered in the news. It is hard to imagine the media without its instant coverage of disasters, murders, and scandals (Percy, 2000). Clearly, one reason that we are drawn to other people’s suffering is that we feel empathy for them…

Anonymous

> Everyday life produces many instances of other people suffering pain and misfortune. Some of these events hit very close to home, but most are simply the common part of what is covered in the news. It is hard to imagine the media without its instant coverage of disasters, murders, and scandals (Percy, 2000). Clearly, one reason that we are drawn to other people’s suffering is that we feel empathy for them…

Anonymous

> Everyday life produces many instances of other people suffering pain and misfortune … Clearly, one reason that we are drawn to other people’s suffering is that we feel empathy for them…

Anonymous

There's a meta thread on the English SE about exactly how to format ellipses

Anonymous

8:01 PM

1

Q: About formatting ellipses

So there is a debate about how to edit ellipses in posts on the site. This has come to a head in this latest post. Here is what needs to be decided as an official policy so that we don't end up with edit wars/community wikis from too many edits. What do we want for a site policy? 1. use three ...

Anonymous

But formatting details aside, just indicating that you've left something out is what's most important.

Anonymous

That, and indicating that it's a quote in the first place.

Damkerng T.

Oh, my! This year is really not for Brazil!

Anonymous

Oh, no!

Anonymous

My brother told me something about sports yesterday.

Damkerng T.

8:05 PM

0-1 in less than 3 minutes!

user116848

@snailboat So Ms Boat all of my answer should have been in quote? Like >

Anonymous

I didn't listen carefully, though, so all I remember is that it was about Brazil.

Anonymous

@Arrowfar Which parts did you write? The first line?

Anonymous

Anything you did not write should be in quotes.

user116848

@snailboat I wrote all from the source doc

user116848

8:06 PM

I see.

Anonymous

(Well, marked as a quote. Not necessarily in "quotes". The > block quote syntax we discussed is good, usually preferred if the quote is lengthy.)

user116848

Good thing you told me. I'll try to quote it then :)

Anonymous

@Arrowfar You can keep it in mind for future answers.

user116848

Yeah :)

Anonymous

@Arrowfar You can probably save yourself the work this time around and remove the answer, since it doesn't really answer the question.

Anonymous

8:08 PM

Schadenfreude is not a word that describes "someone who acts arrogantly and always disagrees with others unreasonably in order to upset people around him/her"

Anonymous

Although I see someone mentioned it in a comment, too.

Anonymous

If you decide to keep the answer, marking the quote as being a quote is common courtesy.

Damkerng T.

History is repeating itself. 0-2, in 17 minutes!

user116848

@snailboat Thanks :)