English Language & Usage: Multi-Layered Discourse Room

Robusto

14:02

I just noticed in @snailboat's comment to that question she cites kyoumibukai 興味深い for "interesting"; I would say that is a comparative form. If something is 興味深い it is very interesting. By comparison, something that is omoshiroi is casually interesting, which could be construed as amusing in some sense. But the point is, the statement in the question is at least misleading if not downright wrong.

Anonymous

@Robusto Well, 興味深い isn't the usual word, but it has the appropriately narrow meaning corresponding to English interesting, relative to the general 面白い

Anonymous

That's why I used it--I thought it would make sense to a native speaker

Robusto

Yeah, and I agree with you.

What is wrong is the statement that fun and interesting are inextricably interlinked in Japanese.

Johan Larsson

in Lounge<C++> on Stack Overflow Chat, 16 hours ago, by Cat Plus Plus

Smart people are a lie

I feel it should be is

Robusto

@JohanLarsson Smart people are the cake.

Anonymous

14:05

@JohanLarsson What? "Smart people is a lie"?

Johan Larsson

yeah

Anonymous

The verb agrees with the subject, generally, so are

Johan Larsson

ok :)

Damkerng T.

I don't know if any of you have heard a Japanese say something like "Suddenly, I thought of fun, so I picked up that book..."

Anonymous

@DamkerngT. Are you translating into English from a translation into Thai?

Damkerng T.

14:07

Yes

Robusto

@snailboat Except if you put it in quotes. Then the notion of "smart people" could be a lie. "Smart people" is a lie. Or it can be achieved through ellipsis and an implied plural: [The notion that there are] smart people is a lie.

Anonymous

@Robusto But that's cheating. You can turn anything into a singular noun that way. :-) I don't think that ellipsis is valid

Robusto

You have a problem with cheating? How did you get that fetching milliner's hat?

Anonymous

Haha.

Johan Larsson

it can not be read as that the (one) concept of smart people is the lie?

Robusto

14:11

I understood the intention. I wouldn't use that phrasing in a dissertation or a peer-reviewed journal, though.

Anonymous

@JohanLarsson You could do it. You generally wouldn't

Anonymous

Notice that I keep hedging :-)

Johan Larsson

my-feeling-so-wrong

Robusto

Take Sartre's statement in No Exit that L'enfer c'est les autres. You could render that as "Hell is other people" or turn it around as "Other people are hell"; but you would probably not say "Other people is hell" except in unusual circumstances.

Anonymous

Well, in a copular construction, when both thingies could be construed as the subject, we usually read the one in basic position (on the left) as the subject.

Anonymous

14:15

On the other hand, if you stick an adjective on the left, we generally figure out the one on the right is the subject

Robusto

And if the adjective won't stick on the left, use duct tape.

Anonymous

Usually we use grammatical agreement: the verb agrees with the subject's grammatical number.

Anonymous

Sometimes we use notional agreement, where we decide to ignore the grammatical number of the subject and choose the form of the verb on whether we're thinking of the subject as singular or plural.

Anonymous

Commonly in measure expressions ("Two hundred miles is a long way to go")

Anonymous

In BrE (and to a lesser extent in AmE) with collective nouns ("The committee have come to a conclusion")

Robusto

14:19

Is kibbutz a collective noun?

Anonymous

I only know the verb kibitz...

Anonymous

What's a kibbutz?

Anonymous

Wikipedia to the rescue!

Robusto

I was just being interesting (i.e., funny).

Anonymous

Yabbut, I wanted to know! :-)

Robusto

14:22

A kibbutz is a collective. It is also a noun.

Anonymous

Hehe!

Anonymous

Now I get it.

Anonymous

Jokes are always better once you've explained them

Robusto

That's why we go over this stuff.

Johan Larsson

@snailboat :)

Damkerng T.

14:27

How should I translate that phrase: thought of fun into English?

In Thai, it is นึกสนุกขึ้นมา. Google Translate translated it as "given up".

Anonymous

@DamkerngT. Can you paraphrase it?

Damkerng T.

Not something even remotely close.

This is really hard.

Because, it's quite idiomatic, some kind of a set phrase.

Anonymous

When would you say it, then?

Damkerng T.

out of a joyful thought, maybe

When we suddenly have some fun (not funny) idea popped up in our heads.

Anonymous

Thought of something fun?

Damkerng T.

14:31

It's not about something that is fun. It's the thinking itself (I believe) that is fun.

Just thinking of something (that might be interesting) is fun.

Johan Larsson

happiness?

Damkerng T.

Not quite.

Anonymous

"I just had a fun thought." ← I can't tell whether this is even in the ballpark, I'm afraid. I'm lost! :-)

Damkerng T.

It's a set phrase before we might go out and try something we never tried before.

Johan Larsson

bliss|pleased?

Damkerng T.

14:33

Bliss (as a verb) is a bit too much I think.

It's usually about some small stuff in life.

Anonymous

Hello, @IQAndreas! We talked about the fun versus interesting question in here. :-)

Damkerng T.

Like going out for a nice meal, reading some nice book, go to some place nice, and so on.

Anonymous

@DamkerngT. I'm only familiar with bliss as a noun

IQAndreas

@snailboat Neat, I was just thinking this would be a great place for it; the comments area was getting a bit long.

Anonymous

@IQAndreas Sorry about filling up the comments on the question like that :-)

Anonymous

14:35

I made assumptions about the question which turned out to be false

Damkerng T.

@snailboat Me too. (I just looked up Google to make sure that it can be a verb.) In Thai translation, they use only three words: [think-fun-up]

Anonymous

@DamkerngT. Collins doesn't have bliss as a verb. The OED does, though.

Damkerng T.

I'm sure that [think-fun-up] makes no sense in English.

Anonymous

@DamkerngT. "I just had a fun thought." / "I just thought of something fun." are still my best guesses.

Damkerng T.

@snailboat On my second thought, I think it's really close.

And usually (Japanese) people who said this usually make a face of someone who was aroused by their own curiosity.

I wished I could star my last sentence. Too many grammatical errors beyond cure. :)

Anonymous

14:49

@DamkerngT. Hmm. Well, for starters, you can get rid of one of the "usually"s

Damkerng T.

Thank you. Second try: Usually, Japanese people who said this would make a face of someone who was aroused by his or her own curiosity.

Anonymous

Make a face like someone, perhaps? I think you could ellipt who was, and I think their is better than his or her

Jasper Loy

Hi, not many chatters in the other rooms.

IQAndreas

Just curious, is it common around here to have a firm grasp of English, together with knowledge on intricacies and nuances of both Taiwanese and Japanese, or is it just you guys?

Damkerng T.

@JasperLoy Hi

Jasper Loy

14:55

@DamkerngT. Are you from Thailand?

Damkerng T.

Yes

Jasper Loy

Ah, I am quite near you, in Singapore.

Damkerng T.

My first language is Thai. English is my second language.

Yo!

Jasper Loy

English is my first language. Chinese is second.

Damkerng T.

Nice!

Are you a Singaporean, or moved there because of work?

Jasper Loy

14:57

I have always been here.

I went to Bangkok a few times long ago. The four-faced Buddha there is famous.

Anonymous

I'm a native speaker of American English. Unfortunately, I don't really have a knack for language, so I try to make up for this lack by throwing effort at it.

Anonymous

Language is fun to me, maybe, because it's challenging :-)

Jasper Loy

@snailboat So the snail you showed us is your pet?

Anonymous

@JasperLoy I have three pet snails! Two are adults, and one is a baby.

Damkerng T.

That cute little things.

Anonymous

15:00

2

Jasper Loy

I seldom see the two of you in this chat. You guys came here only recently.

Damkerng T.

I've just subscribed to ELL for five weeks.

Jasper Loy

I have actually been on SE for a few years. I deleted my old accounts and created new ones. =)

Damkerng T.

Just only the last week, I started to chat. :)

IQAndreas

Am I half of the "you two" or are you referring to someone else?

Jasper Loy

15:01

@IQAndreas Oh, you are the third then.

Anonymous

I join chat every now and then, usually for a little while when I do.

Anonymous

Chatting is fun!

Jasper Loy

It's more crowded during the weekdays. People come to chat to slack from work.

Anonymous

I imagine a lot of people aren't working very hard on this particular week.

IQAndreas

I have been StackOverflow for maybe two years, yet this is the first time in chat, not sure why I never stopped by here.

Jasper Loy

15:03

I think this is the room with the most random topics.

badass

May I be the fourth?

Damkerng T.

:)

badass

:)

Don't let the name scare you.

Jasper Loy

@Mahnax Boo!

Anonymous

I've been spending too much time on ELL lately.

Damkerng T.

15:06

@snailboat I'd love to see you there very often. :)

Mahnax

@JasperLoy Hi!

badass

Me too.

Damkerng T.

Seems like we have many mathematicians in the room! :)

Jasper Loy

I still think ELL and ELU should be merged.

I think I have said that 9000 times.

Damkerng T.

I'm too new to comment on that. But I think most ELL users are ESL learners.

badass

15:10

People who teach ESL students don't like the abbreviation ESL.

Johan Larsson

@JasperLoy I agree, tags could handle the difference. Don't see a point in framgmentation.

Jasper Loy

@JohanLarsson Yes, also because the level of difficulty of a question can be deceiving.

Damkerng T.

@badass Hah. Is that specifically in the US or in the UK, or everywhere?

badass

everywhere that they're teaching English as a second language.

Damkerng T.

That's new to me. Thank you.

IQAndreas

15:12

@badass Is there an (what's the opposite of abbreviation?) for ESL that I don't know of?

Jasper Loy

@badass What do they use then?

badass

ELL

Jasper Loy

Hahaha.

Johan Larsson

@JasperLoy I have never visited ELL and ELU only a handful of times so don't know. Still felt i had an opinion :)

could expansion be the opposite of abbreviation?

badass

elaboration?

Jasper Loy

15:15

Hmm, I don't know the opposite of abbreviation.

Johan Larsson

maybe just the unabbreviated value

Jasper Loy

Perhaps we can ask on the main site, or maybe it has been asked.

Anonymous

@JohanLarsson I'd say expansion if someone forced me to answer the question

badass

in full detail

I still like elaborate

Jasper Loy

Are you still coaching ice girl @badass?

Anonymous

15:17

Elaborate is a good word, but I don't think it would be readily understood in this context

IQAndreas

@JasperLoy Couldn't find one, so I'll open one.

Johan Larsson

@badass it makes sense

badass

usually people ask what does that abbreviation stand for?

Damkerng T.

google.com/search?q=abbreviation+meaning says expansion is an antonym of abbreviation.

badass

What is the expansion of that abbreviation.

@IQAndreas Good question :-)

Damkerng T.

15:20

J.R. just posted an answer to my "shoulder of the hill" question, with picture :) Gonna read that.

Jasper Loy

@badass You may wish to post your answer.

badass

It is unabbreviated from the unabbreviated OED

Could you unabbreviate that

Jasper Loy

Anyway, I have switched to Linux Mint.

Anonymous

Unabbreviate is not commonly used

Anonymous

Which doesn't mean that you can't use it, of course.

badass

15:23

@snailboat could you elaborate on that abbreviation

IQAndreas

@DamkerngT. The problem is "What is the expansion of ELL?" might not be very clear, but perhaps that's just because the word isn't commonly used in that way.

badass

What does ELL stand for

Damkerng T.

English Language Learners.

Anonymous

@badass That has my vote.

Damkerng T.

But sometimes I think it can mean English Language Learning too.

badass

15:25

we are looking for a general word

Anonymous

ELLing.

2

IQAndreas

Can someone think of a more well known abbreviation; for some reason I just came up dry. :P

Anonymous

@IQAndreas What sort of abbreviation? Another acronym?

Anonymous

NaNoWriMo!

IQAndreas

@snailboat Yeah, sorry, another acronym.

badass

15:27

acronym is a special type of abbreviation

one that makes its own word

like LASER

SCUBA

Anonymous

Or Nabisco.

badass

could you expand that?

Anonymous

National Biscuit Company.

Damkerng T.

Yum

badass

thank you

:-)

Damkerng T.

15:30

Gotta go. BBL

badass

later

IQAndreas

How about a recursive acronym, like GNU or WINE?

badass

could you expand that?

Anonymous

No

IQAndreas

"GNU is Not Unix" and "WINE Is Not an Emulator"

Anonymous

15:33

Keep going :-)

badass

Recursive acronym

A recursive acronym is an acronym that refers to itself in the expression for which it stands. The term was first used in print in 1979 in Douglas Hofstadter's book Gödel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid, in which Hofstadter invents the acronym GOD, meaning "GOD Over Djinn", to help explain infinite series, and describes it as a recursive acronym. Other references followed. Computer-related examples In computing, an early tradition in the hacker community (especially at MIT) was to choose acronyms and abbreviations that referred humorously to themselves or to other abbreviations. P...

IQAndreas

"GNU is Not Unix is Not Unix is Not Unix is Not Unix"

Johan Larsson

@IQAndreas NSA, CIA

Anonymous

Oh, no! I've put IQAndreas into an endless loop. :-(

2

IQAndreas

function gnu():String { return gnu() + " is Not Unix"; }

Anonymous

15:35

Yay, tail recursion! ;-)

badass

English-language learner

An English language learner (often capitalized as English Language Learner or abbreviated to ELL) is a person who is learning the English language in addition to their native language. The instruction and assessment of students, their cultural background, and the attitudes of classroom teachers towards ELLs have all been found to be factors in ELL student achievement. Some ways that have been suggested to assist ELLs include bringing their home cultures into the classroom, involving them in language-appropriate content-area instruction from the beginning, and by integrating literature into...

English as a second or foreign language

English as a second language (ESL) is the use or study of English by speakers with different native languages. English is a language which has great reach and influence; it is taught all over the world under many different circumstances. In English-speaking countries, English language teaching has essentially evolved in two broad directions: instruction for people who intend to live there and for those who do not. These divisions have grown firmer as the instructors of these two "industries" have used different terminology, followed distinct training qualifications, formed separate pro...

Anonymous

To be honest, the ELL vs ESL debate goes a bit over my head.

badass

The second article is very elaborate.

Anonymous

Oh, it lists EFL (English as a Foreign Language). I've seen that used as well

badass

people get the F confused with "First"

Anonymous

15:43

Oh, I suppose I can see that happening

Anonymous

I like the terms L1 and L2 for native languages and non-native languages

Damkerng T.

15:55

I'm curious about the license of contents of SE sites. I've noticed that there are some websites mirror SE's contents (for example, the whole of EL&U and ELL), claiming their copyright under CC license. Is that allowed?

tchrist

@DamkerngT. No.

Post on ELU's meta about it.

Damkerng T.

Thank you for the advice.

badass

meta is a political battle ground

imo

IQAndreas

@DamkerngT. I'm assuming they at least include attribution?

Damkerng T.

It seems like some of them were already reported.

28

Q: Is http://englishqna.blogspot.com violating EL&U (or YOUR) copyright?

The site http://englishqna.blogspot.com seems to be reposting all our questions and answers. Now, I understand that the data is under a permissive license, but the attribution requirements don't seem to be met.

IQAndreas

15:59

Does the CC used by StackExchange also require "no money earned" from the copied work?

Damkerng T.

That's exactly what I don't know.

Anonymous

Blog - Stack Exchange: Attribution Required

Jeff Atwood on June 25, 2009

All the content contributed to Stack Overflow or other Stack Exchange sites is cc-wiki (aka cc-by-sa) licensed, intended to be shared and remixed. We even provide all our data as a convenient data dump, seeded by us.

But our cc-wiki licensing, while intentionally permissive, does require attribution.

Attribution — You must attribute the work in the manner specified by the author or licensor (but not in any way that suggests that they endorse you or your use of the work).

I thought it was pretty clear what “attribution” meant, but given the semi-scammy way the content is popping up in some seedier areas of the internet, maybe not: …

2

badass

we need a Law.SE

:-)

IQAndreas

@badass There's an Area 51 for Licenses, but I can't remember if that includes copyright, or if it's restricted to software licenses.

tchrist

We've finally beaten Web Apps in the Network-Wide Leaderboard, making us #10 overall.

4

Anonymous

16:02

Yay!

Anonymous

I have 14 hats on ELU now.

Damkerng T.

Yeah!

I have 12. :)

Anonymous

@DamkerngT. We're contributing to the cause!

Damkerng T.

16:20

This is one of them: 3mr.me

Their disclaimer: Except for third party materials and otherwise stated, this content is made available under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.0 Licence. The original Author/Publisher name is mentioned above.

Johan Larsson

@badass I think I saw two suggested, dunno if they died

badass

icic

badass

16:32

28

Copyrights

Proposed Q&A site for questions relating to copyright and distribution of music, books, scripts and all protected intellectual property.

Currently in definition.

Anonymous

17:01

Oh... Actually, I have more than three snails.

Anonymous

Apparently I missed some eggs.

Anonymous

I just noticed approximately a zillion tiny babies in the tank. :-)

Anonymous

Whoops!

MosheK

17:27

What's the proper spelling for "childrens names" ?

tchrist

@MosheK That depends on the child.

badass

children's names

MosheK

many children many names

Anonymous

@MosheK Generally, 's after irregular plurals, such as children

tchrist

@snailboat Well, that’s not really the rule.

The regular rule is that if the plural already ends in s, add a bare apostrophe, but if it doesn’t end in an s already, add an apostrophe plus an s.

MosheK

17:36

awesome, thanks alot guys

tchrist

sg: this single phenonenon’s single origin VS. pl. these many phenomena’s various origins.

end of this crisis > this crisis's end BUT ends of those crises > those crises’ ends

This is one of most Frequently Asked Questions hereabouts.

54

A: What is the correct possessive for nouns ending in "‑s"?

Your example sentences confuse two different problems. For nouns that are plural (such as "boys"), the possessive formed in writing by adding an apostrophe after the plural -s. This is pronounced the same as the plural and the singular possesive: The boys' books [boys' sounds like boys] Fo...

12

Q: Which singular names ending in “s” form possessives with only a bare apostrophe?

Many questions already ask about this topic (What is the correct possessive for nouns ending in s? , Adding apostrophe-s to a singular noun already ending in “s”, etc.) and their answers vary, but they always give exceptions to the apostrophe-s rule, for example: 6.24 The general rule for t...

possessive names

badass

17:53

possession is 9 tenths of the law ;-)

tchrist

The actual invariable rule with no exceptions, which somehow the Anglophone educative system has forgotten (or perhaps it’s just the media), is that the spelling should reflect the pronunciation. There are no exceptions to this where possessives are concerned.

Anonymous

Hmm.

tchrist

Just please don’t bring up imports like attorneys general or casus belli. However, the man coming down the chimney’s merry laugh is an acceptable discussion topic.

Anonymous

I was just looking at the flowchart in Quirk et al. (p.320)

Anonymous

It ends up with most words clearly either 's or ' based on pronunciation, but!

Anonymous

18:06

Toward the center of the chart is a small range where they say there's variation in pronunciation and spelling

Anonymous

They claim that in print Dickens' is the usual form and in speech /ˈdɪkɪnzɪz/ is the usual form, while Dickens's and /ˈdɪkɪnz/ are minority (but acceptable) forms

Damkerng T.

What is the house of Bilbo Baggins? Baggins's or Baggins'?

Found Baggins's used in a blog post at The Guardian.

tchrist

18:30

Bilbo lives at Bag End.

How many Bagginses have lived there since time immemorial, I have no idea.

badass

18:50

Can you have less than no idea?

Johan Larsson

negative idea? (be wrong but sure)

badass

So a negative idea is a wrong idea?

Johan Larsson

that was my thinking

badass

How about a bad idea?

Johan Larsson

sounds like a synonym to wrong but guess it is relative, could just be worse than the optimal maybe.

badass

18:56

So now we have the optimal idea or best idea.

And the worst idea and no idea.

Johan Larsson

what was the initial question? :)

badass

Can you have less than no idea?

Johan Larsson

no idea meaning not knowing?

Anonymous

@badass You could say that if you were trying to insult someone, but I don't think it's something people would normally say. You might have to think about it for a moment to decide what it actually means

Anonymous

(Presumably believing something incorrect, rather than knowing nothing?)

Anonymous

19:02

That's what I think, anyway.

badass

No idea meaning that the set of ideas is empty.

So when somebody says "I have no idea" you can ask "at least give me a bad idea :-) " that IMO is better than nothing.

Anonymous

@badass Well, they might not have negative ideas either. :-)

badass

Then we are stuck.

But at least we have exhausted all the ideas.

Johan Larsson

I still think negative ideas makes some sense

badass

They do. They are the bad ideas.

Johan Larsson

19:15

Say it is a brainstorming session and that one guy is wrong but really sure about that a good idea will not work for example.

then he could cancel a good idea

badass

All I'm saying is to exploit the concept of opposites when dealing with ideas :-)

Where "no idea" = 0.

Noah

Good morning everyone

badass

Hi

Noah

how are you @badass

Where is the Swed?

@JohanLarsson

badass

Fine thanks. How are you?

Noah

19:24

And the boat snail.

Johan Larsson

@Noah hej

Noah

I am doing fine. Thanks for asking.

You mean that's where you are? Hej?

Seems like a funny place to me. No offensive. I am sorry if you have already been offended.

Johan Larsson

not following, hej means hi

Noah

Hej is also a village in Sweden.

Johan Larsson

pretty hard to offend me online, don't think it ever happened

Noah

19:26

I thought you were there.

Johan Larsson

@Noah must be small, never heard of it

badass

How do you defend against being offended @johanlarsson ?

Noah

!!SoxFox wiki Hej

What is the name of the bot?

that bastard version of Fox.

badass

KitSox

Noah

>Hej is a village in Jörns socken in the north-west part of Skellefteå Municipality, Västerbotten County, Sweden.

The village got its name in the 19th century when a geographical surveyor played with the childish rhyme Snipp, snapp, snorum, hej basalorum. Snipp, Snapp, Snorum and Basalorum are four other villages in the vicinity.[1]

!!KitSox wiki hej

badass

19:29

It is off line due to the power outage.

Johan Larsson

@Noah not that far from where I was born.

Noah

I see.

See. I knew you were there.

Johan Larsson

@badass I just don't get angry or offended for some reason.

Noah

It's a pretty decent place.

@JohanLarsson You should be President. That way even when people try to disrespect you won't get offended.

Johan Larsson

:)

badass

19:32

In general @johanl

What did you think of my "opposites " discussion ? @johanl

Johan Larsson

think I agree if we meant the same thing :)

badass

Yay it is hard to get into all the details here :-$

Transmission from

"The world is beautiful, but has a disease called man."

Internet meme or really Nietzsche?

Johan Larsson

I guess meme

badass

Meme

Transmission from

19:44

@badass You're guessing too?

Johan Larsson

goodreads.com/quotes/…

not sure if it is a good source

Friedrich Nietzsche is pretty hard to spell btw

Transmission from

@JohanLarsson The problem is, there doesn't appear to be a good source.

badass

Yes, I guessed.

Transmission from

4

Q: Source for "The world is beautiful, but has a disease called man"?

It seems resonant with certain elements of his philosophy, and is generally attributed to Nietzsche, but I cannot seem to find the precise source anywhere. I was struck, in passing, by the variety of different critical or theoretical enterprises which were using this quote in different senses o...

reference-request history-of-philosophy nietzsche

badass

Such an opinion are pure philosophy.

Transmission from

19:51

@badass What?

Ice Girl

@badass do you have time to answer my questions?

Anonymous

Hello, @StackExchangeOwner

Anonymous

Please feel free to change your name :-)

3

Johan Larsson

haha

StackExchangeOwner

@IceGirl hii ice girl :) don't you feel cold in this season :P

Transmission from

19:53

@snailboat The world is beautiful, but has a disease called sailboat.

Anonymous

@Transmissionfrom Cries

StackExchangeOwner

@snailboat hahah..why :P

badass

The content of the sentence. @transmission

@icegirl ask away :-)

Ice Girl

@StackExchangeOwner Hi

@badass np

StackExchangeOwner

@IceGirl can you tell me reason behind intresting nick name?

Ice Girl

19:56

@StackExchangeOwner not special reason. just i like it so much. that's it

StackExchangeOwner

@IceGirl are you too cold like ice? :P otherwise girls are always hot ;)

Transmission from

►

Gigili

When you see the "~~" signs, expect to see a joke inside. TIL.

@jwpat7 - I couldn't care less if you up-vote – or if the answer is picked. It was a joke (hence the ~~ markings), riffing on her being too compliant to one's requests. The quote is ..me. I'm quoting me. I'm quoting me saying what she might be saying of herself. — ipso 59 mins ago

Ice Girl

@StackExchangeOwner is it important for you to know this?

Transcript for

English Language & Usage: Multi-Layer…