English Language & Usage: Multi-Layered Discourse Room

tchrist

00:28

Bad @Mitch. Naughty @Mitch. You’ll have The Lawler on your tail for that one.

Why? Because English doesn't always spell things the way they sound. So it is easy to make spelling mistakes. — Mitch 33 mins ago

@Mitch s/always/ever/; that is, English never spells things “as they sound” — the very notion makes no sense! Depending on local dialect, we’ve like 40–48 phonemes in English: things you can find minimal pairs for. Now multiply those 40-odd phonemes by some smallish real number above 1.0 to account for the various phonetic allophones (“phones”) each phoneme can take on, again varying by region, register, and speaker. With barely 26 undiacriticked letters left in the modern English alphabet, these many-to-many-to-many mappings render any spell-by-sound idea sheer nonsense. — tchrist 2 mins ago

Cerberus

02:27

@Robusto I confess. @Mr.Shiny is my sock puppet.

I thought you knew.

But that Iphone? Eww.

@tchrist All I know is that a morgen was different depending on the town you were in.

Also called margen or mergen.

Certain kinds of soil took longer to plough, and different towns have different customs.

tchrist

@Cerberus That’s like a league on the plains being farther than a league in the hills.

Cerberus

Indeed.

Any measurement was different from one town to the next.

And by a large percentage, sometimes many hundreds.

tchrist

@RegDwigнt This one’s for you, wherever you are. . . .

►

Robusto

02:45

Reminded me of Magrittes "The Empire of Light".

Cerberus

Nice but random. Like life.

Robusto

I was on my walk and I just had to snap that.

Cerberus

Bravo G2.

Robusto

Life would be boring if it weren't for random.

@Cerberus That's 50% scaled down, too.

Cerberus

Of course.

It looks like...dawn?

I'm also a bit tipsy.

Robusto

02:48

Dusk. Sunset actually.

Cerberus

Huh dusk is nearly always reddish here.

Robusto

Masked by clouds.

That's facing southwest.

Cerberus

Hmm.

Robusto

I love interesting sky textures.

Cerberus

You're like...a Dutch painter.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

03:09

@Cerberus yeah it's a bit eww. Not only is it an iphone, but it's an OLD one, and old technology is always yuckier.

Cerberus

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 I don't know, at some point it becomes quaint...

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Cerberus yeah, when it's old enough to be retro

Cerberus

Exactly.

Robusto

@Cerberus You mean an Old Master.

Cerberus

And Iphones are pretty outdated, right?

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

03:11

But the iphone is lagging Android in almost everything all the time, so even the new one is retro

Cerberus

@Robusto Not just any old master...but sure.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Jinx.

Robusto

Cerberus

What's that?

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Robusto so I watched one more episode of BB. The one that ends with a gunfight. I really wanted to start the next one right away but ... must.... write!

Cerberus

Oh, dear.

BB Cupid has struck you, too?

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

03:13

well, not exactly

It's a good show

I don't love it as much as most fans

I have three episodes left

Cerberus

Hmm.

Left of the last season?

> Western Digital raadt klanten met Apple-computers af te updaten naar OS X Mavericks.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

yes

Cerberus

OK.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

> Western Digital recommends updating to OS X Mavericks. Customers with Apple computers off

That's GT.

Cerberus

Haha. Hilarious.

Not only is it nonsense, it is the opposite of what it means.

Afraden = to recommend against.

Apparently, Mavericks causes serious problems with WD software.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

03:16

@Cerberus I don't know what its opposite would be since it's so nonsensical.

Cerberus

"WD recommends updating" should be "WD recommends against updating".

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

well, I should be off. There's still a few minutes left in this day to bring up my word count.

Cerberus

Good luck!

Robusto

03:30

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 You have two episodes left. That is all.

And so to bed.

Cerberus

You're all going to bed rather early for a Saturday night!

I only came home less than an hour ago.

cornbread ninja 麵包忍者

Which is interesting, because we gain an hour tonight.

Cerberus

Ah.

We've already gained ours.

cornbread ninja 麵包忍者

How is it?

Cerberus

It's...there.

EnglishMaster

03:42

I thank universities around the world for putting up books and resources for free on Internet. Now I can read it without ordering it on Amazon and wait for 10 days.

cornbread ninja 麵包忍者

Hmpf.

Well. Good talk.

EnglishMaster

Good talk

Do you know how to find good books to read? there are few steps involved.
1) Find name of a book, for example "Hackers: heroes of the computer revolution". Then find this book on Amazon.com and scroll down to "What other people also searched for" section. Usually this section has other epic books listed as well.

2) Pick an epic book (with epic rating) and search the name on Google by "Epic book.pdf"

Then look for a link to university site

Easy ^_^

I should write a book called "How to pirate like a boss in 100 ways"

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Robusto I think I have three left... pretty sure that was episode 13.

@Cerberus, I need help finding a word.

Cerberus

?

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

I'm looking for an adjective that means "thousands of years long"

Cerberus

03:57

Uhh...

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

specifically, to describe a journey that a spaceship might take if it can't travel ftl

Cerberus

Millennial?

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

That's what I wrote but it seems wrong somehow.

Cerberus

It probably means "a thousand years long".

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

the OED says "a thousand years old"

or "thousands of years old"

Cerberus

03:58

Or that, yes.

"Having to do with a thousand years".

EnglishMaster

Guys, I noticed in the book, the author introduces other associative authors and tell what books they have written in the past. Do you think it's a form of advertising or just letting people know about their achievements?

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

could be both

EnglishMaster

Oh

Cerberus

But a millennial journey I would be willing to read as "a thousand years long".

You could say "plurimillennial".

> χῑλίωρος, ον, (ὥρα) of a thousand years, χρόνος Lyc.1153.

Apparently, chilioran could be a word.

Or chiliorous, chilioric...

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

chilioran isn't in the OED.

Cerberus

04:04

Yeah I'm making it up based on the Greek.

> Millennarian 2. In the etymological sense: Relating or pertaining to a thousand. In mod. Dicts.

I think millennarian is the best option so far.

> The ship set out on a millennarian journey.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

I think I'm just going to rewrite the sentence.

Cerberus

Or that.

EnglishMaster

Gosh, I hate korean employers =( They only pay me 6.5 dollars an hour but I was being paid at least 18 dollars in Australia

I have to be very nice and well to American customers to get some tips from them otherwise I end up earning peanuts after hard labouring =(

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

restaurant work?

EnglishMaster

ya

I'm quitting soon any ways, my job is the best joke in 2013

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

04:15

hm, good luck

2546 words! that's it for tonight.

bye

EnglishMaster

bye

Frank

07:07

Could this site use a "statistics" tag? I see that it has a ton of questions (~400) including the word "random"...

EnglishMaster

[3:45:55 PM] Jason Larsen: "This will allow trainers to give detailed lectures on specific functions ________ to each department."

a) appropriately
b) appropriate
c) appropriateness
d) appropriation

Guys answer is a) right?

because you need to pick an adverb of the verb "give"

which is appropriately

EnglishMaster

07:57

Can anybody answer?

Stack Exchange

12:07

Limerick Machine: Gaseous companions

posted on November 03, 2013 by sgdi

You see the flatline on the chart The ending of somebody’s heart The beep’s now a tone In the end you’re alone But you’re never alone with a fart

Cerberus

13:42

Hi.

@EnglishMaster It's B, appropriate, because it should modify lectures, not the verb.

EnglishMaster

Damn it, i told everybody im a dumbass cunt if i get this wrong

I even asked 15 years old american kid to make sure i am right

Cerberus

I'm afraid it really has to modify lectures or functions.

EnglishMaster

13:59

Does it still make sense if you wrote the sentence like this "to give 'appropriate 'detailed lectures on specific fuctions"

Cerberus

What are those single quotation marks doing there?

EnglishMaster

I just wanted to point out that word

Cerberus

You could use appropriate there: then it means lectures that are appropriate and detailed. But it seems more likely that you want appropriately: then it modifies detailed, so the lectures will be appropriately detailed.

EnglishMaster

Sorru

How did you figure out the answer is b)

?

Are there any general grammar rule regarding to this?

Cerberus

Long adverbs on -ly are less likely to be followed by a prepositional phrase that specifically modifies the adverb, I would say.

To each department would have to modify appropriately, but that is uncommon.

It is a bit iffy.

Using an adjective with a prepositional phrase, however, is very common.

I also think, in this case, it is more likely for the lectures or functions to be appropriate for each department than for the action of giving the lectures to be done in a way that is appropriate to each department. But that is a very subtle distinction.

EnglishMaster

14:44

Thx, I told people I am not ashamed about it at all since I was able to give an reasonable answer

although it was wrong

Cerberus

Heh.

tchrist

Who didn’t learn to write an x that way?

Cerberus

15:15

That was not how we were supposed to do it.

Sometimes we had to do it like this, the x.

Like two c's, one mirrored.

At other times, it was like this capital x (but smaller and without the flourish): all in one stroke.

I'm not sure whether I sometimes do it like your x too.

tchrist

I think I’ve tried the mirrored-C version for the uc variety when I’m trying to add more swash, but I normally just come back to the stroked version instead.

@Cerberus Those are definitely nice swashes.

Bickham Script Pro has some of the nicest swash alternates.

Even the free/regular Zapfino has quite a good number of them, and the fuller set is just boundless.

There are fonts made just for their swash italic capitals.

Too many people making a would-be italic face wimp out and instead use an oblique roman where the swash italic should be.

The font designers may well have included the swash versions, but they are not in the normal place and you have to do something special to get them.

There are the same face, Arno Pro Italic Display, showing first the default obliques for what should be italic capitals and then the swash alternates which are what you actually want to use:

See what I mean?

Most italic fonts do not use italic capitals, but some allow you to do so if you beg hard enough.

In contrast, a “script” face always has swash capitals: it has to.

So here is Bickham Script Pro, first with the normal uc versions:

Which, being a script face, are already swashy. Those are what I like to use as the normal capitals in an italic face.

But wait till you see this: Bickham pro has two levels of swash alternates: one really swashy and the other super swashy:

Just crazy, I know.

There is a font made solely for its swashes, but I forget its name just right now. It’s not Zapfino, which is a script face.

Here are the regular Zapfino uc versions; notice all the conditional alternates:

I like how he has sorted his sorts (so to speak :) so that you can see your different alternatives all in next to each other.

His many ligatures are really cool, too:

Those are all “typographic” (read: automatic) ligatures, not lexical ones like Æ or Œ.

@Cerberus Now see what you’ve gone and made me do! Well, @cornbreadninja麵包忍者 probably enjoys it, at least.

Another thing: any face with “chancery” in its name it apt to have true italic capitals.

Remember that a “chancery Greek face” is one simulating a very flourishy hand, full of ligatures and other curly-cue like ornaments.

Cerberus

16:10

@tchrist Nice. One would only use those sparingly in a manuscript, perhaps at the start of a paragraph.

tchrist

Yes, exactly.

Cerberus

Or at the start of the intitulatio and in signatures.

Meanwhile, I have chocolate-chip cookies in the oven! @Mr.ShinyandNew安宇

I'm baking them for 10 minutes at 180 °C. What do you think?

How can I tell when they're done?

tchrist

Here is what Apple Chancery, which is a purely italic race, has in the default positions for the uc Latin letters. Notice they are all “cursive”.

The surest way to tell is to look at the capital I.

Cerberus

Every so slightly.

tchrist

But those are still pretty sedate.

It has proper swashes set lower in the font:

Not my fave, but worth nothing. I don’t know if I have any other chanceries on my box.

Often unless you have the “Pro” version, you will be lacking a lot of swash alternates and ligatures.

Let alone the complex conditional ligs that in an OpenType face obtain.

Cerberus

16:18

What do I see after the first w? Is that fi and fl?

tchrist

Yes.

I have no earthly idea why the font designer ordered his alternate sorts that way.

Herman Zapf does it the right way, putting like things together.

Richard Slimbach’s Minion Pro’s swash italics aren’t bad. In fact, some people prefer them to those from Slimbach’s more recent Arno Pro, which some think are a bit too fancy.

Cerberus

I do wonder what one uses those ligatures and straight s's for in print.

One does not transcribe manuscripts by using old shapes or characters.

tchrist

Whether, for the ligatures it depends. Bringhurst is really annoyed that people keep putting the "Th" ligature in the “normal” ligature set rather than the “historical” set of ligatures.

Ligatures are supposed to be automatic. You don’t transcribe them.

You transcribe IJ or ffl or ch or whatever, and when output in that font using the normal ligature set, those just kick in automatically.

Cerberus

Yes, but why use them in print anyway?

tchrist

So it doesn’t look like shit.

Cerberus

16:26

Meh.

tchrist

The font was designed to need them.

No, really.

Cerberus

We never use a ligature for ij in Dutch.

tchrist

Er, yes you do.

You just don’t realize it.

Cerberus

Only in manuscript.

I have no key for it.

tchrist

I think I am using the wrong words.

You should not have a key for it. That is the point.

Technically, that "IJ" is “differently” kerned for Dutch than it would be in English.

You have to do this with may languages. For example, the kerning on L’étoile must be different in French than one normally do it in English.

Cerberus

16:29

tchrist

If you show me some examples, I can show you the difference it makes.

You are misunderstanding.

Cerberus

You see the ij's?

Maybe the kerning is different, but it's not a ligature.

But anyway, I really mean ligatures or characters that are only used in older print.

Why use them now?

tchrist

Please give me some example words or sentences, preferably in Dutch, that use things like "ij", "IJ", "ch", "Th", "fb", "fj", "fk", "fi", "ffl", etc.

And I will show you what happens both ways.

Cerberus

IJsselstein, Thearchie, lafbek, afjagen (rare), bofkont, fiets. "Ffl" is impossible, except perhaps in abbreviations. Perhaps the plural of fl. is ffl.

Ffl. exists, but I get only a few hits.

tchrist

Good.

Cerberus

16:50

Note also than fb, fj, and fk cannot occur in a single syllable or morpheme.

Why are the church bells ringing?

It's 5:51.

tchrist

@Cerberus That's a bad sign.

Cerberus

I suppose.

They've stopped now. Instead, we have rain.

tchrist

Varys: I've always hated the bells. They ring for horror, a dead king, a city under siege.
Tyrion: A wedding.
Varys: Exactly.

Rain, in November? Where are you, Egypt?

Perhaps the winds of November blow not early where you live.

►

@Cerberus Regarding your Dutch, this is the best I’ve managed to do, because I don’t have InDesign installed. But it should give you an idea.

Cerberus

17:10

@tchrist Haha.

tchrist

Some of quite subtle, of course. But the point of typographic ligatures is that they are just something a font does to make it look nicer. It is (usually) not some key that you key in.

Cerberus

@tchrist You have no rain in November? It is possibly the wettest month of the year.

tchrist

@Cerberus For us November is tied for the second-wettest with May, April being the wettest.

Cerberus

@tchrist I have seen that, and it is indeed quite subtle.

tchrist

It makes more of a difference at display sizes, of course.

Cerberus

17:11

Hmm I don't know, I think our autumn is wetter than our spring.

tchrist

Like in a book cover’s title.

@Cerberus Now you’ve sent me haring off again!

Cerberus

Why?

November wins.

And december will be partly snow.

Turns out april is our driest month.

I'm surprised juni and juli are so wet, though.

tchrist

Interestingly, the three winter months are our driest ones.

Cerberus

You have a lot more variance than we.

tchrist

And that does not include this year’s data.

@Cerberus The North Sea is a thermal buffer for you.

Cerberus

17:15

The Gulf Stream.

tchrist

Really?

I thought it petered out at the British Isles.

Oh, they have a non-English option. Here, try this:

Cerberus

Nah, it tempers the climate all over Western Europe.

tchrist

@Cerberus You main more variation in temperature, in precipitation, or both?

Cerberus

Less variation in temperature.

To temper = to moderate, n'est-ce pas?

tchrist

Tell that to the steel.

Cerberus

17:20

@tchrist That's a different sense of the word.

And it must be related to evening out the steel in some way.

tchrist

Nice color.

Cerberus

(As you can see, november is particularly wet for the west coast, including mon domicile.)

Stupid French sexes.

tchrist

Ah, I call our East Coast the Wet Coast because it is so humid there in comparison to our West Coast.

Here, this is current from now back to A.C. (ante Cerberum):

November and December are blank at the end there for the current year.

The "Tr" in May of 1974 must mean trace, I’m guessing..

The only good part about this year is that is hasn’t been windy.

> The highest sustained wind speed was 37 mph, occurring on September 18; the highest daily mean wind speed was 14 mph (March 19); and the highest wind gust speed was 51 mph (May 14).

@Cerberus You in 2010:

Versus me in 2010:

Those are respectively Amsterdam and Boulder, from here.

@Cerberus I see you mean about the variation. The mean distance between your red line and your blue line is perhaps half my own.

Cerberus

17:42

Yeah.

That is the effect of any nearby sea.

But the effect of the Gulf Stream is that our entire graph is flatter.

I have to run now. Later!

tchrist

18:43

@Cerberus Pick one. :)

@cornbreadninja麵包忍者 See above.

tchrist

19:19

New York Times: “No Morsel Too Minuscule for All-Consuming N.S.A.”. It’s long and depressing. To minimize the depriment effects, quit reading partway through — if you dare.

What is with Safari lately? It keeps underlining perfectly fine words (like depriment) as though something were amiss.

tchrist

19:38

I’m finding myself strangely bemused by þā Enᵹliꞅcan Ƿikipǣꝺie today. There’s even a much-better-than-average translator here.

tchrist

20:20

You know, I rather like a more poetic adaption of the Middle English above. "All mankind's beings are born free and alike in worthiness and rights. They are gifted with rede and conscience, and should behave towards one another in a mood of brotherhood." (assuming one no longer knows what inwit means).

I haven’t found an Ænᵹliꞅcan version of the UDHR yet, though.

Oh, here’s a Middle English wordbook to supplement the Old English traducter given above.

The ME one hasn’t cottoned to Unicode yet, alas.

You know, those links really should go on our resources page.

And is it just me, or do other people prefer acutes instead of macrons for OE long vowels?

tchrist

20:43

@Cerberus Surely you jest! Mr. Ed the Talking Horse says that an acre’s an acre’s an acre.

Good thing he doesn’t speak Welsh.

Since per The Horticultural Notebook by Newsham and Sherwell-Cooper first published in 1905 and then republished in 1950. . . .

One English acre measures 4,840 square yards.
One Scottish acre measures 6,150 square yards (or 1 English acre, 1 rood and 1 ⁴⁹³⁄₆₂₅ square poles).
One Irish acre measures 7,840 square yards (or 1 English acre, 2 rood, and 10 ²⁷⁄₁₂₁ square poles).
One Welsh acre measures 9,680 square yards (or 2 English acres).
The Devonshire (customary) acre measures 4,000 square yards.
The Lancashire acre measures 7,840 square yards.
The Cheshire/Staffordshire acre measures 10,240 yards (the Cheshire acre is sometimes given as the same as a Welsh acre, however)

Apparently the strength of local oxen varied a great deal.

Transcript for

English Language & Usage: Multi-Layer…