English Language & Usage: Multi-Layered Discourse Room

Cerberus

12:08 AM

Hello people!

@MετάEd Is that a non-Jew?

Mitch

12:52 AM

@MετάEd Dude, I just want to know where not to step.

Robusto

I have just four words for winter: Fuck. This. Snow. Shit.

Jez

we aren't getting snow, just really, high winds and rain

KitFox

@Robusto inorite.

I need some egging on. Please egg me.

Robusto

eggs

Can't these people do math? Who cares if you reduce the mosquito population by 80%? The other 20% will just breed it back up to capacity in one or two generations.

KitFox

1:08 AM

That felt good. Thanks.

drinks more rum

Jez

> The 'egg' of 'egg on' is a straightforward variant of 'edge', so to 'egg someone on' is to edge, or urge, them forward.

curious, didn't know that

KitFox

I just learnt it a few days ago.

Robusto

@Jez I'm sure that years from now (if not weeks) hone will have supplanted home in the expression "home in on" for the same reason.

I can't tell you how many people I hear saying "hone in on [something]" these days.

Cerberus

@Jez Wow, I didn't know that either!

I never hear "edge on", actually. But I shall use it from now on.

@Robusto Oh! I have heard people say hone in on, and I intuitively knew what they meant, but I never connected it with home in on.

It did seem...strange, etymologically.

Cerberus

1:36 AM

Did you know the word bothy?

Robusto

No. Never heard of it.

Scottish, is it?

Cerberus

That would make sense: I heard this in a game review, which takes place in Scotland, and the reviewer's accent might or might not have sounded somewhat Scottish...

Robusto

Here's a game for ya.

The script is hard to read, but the words are easy. It's the story of Snow White done as a comic book noir.

Cerberus

1:57 AM

Oh, funny.

Yeah it's easy to read.

Robusto

Well, nighty-night.

Cerberus

Night!

MετάEd

3:46 AM

@kitfox Ova.

krikara

6:56 AM

Hey guys, I have a question. If my Y axis on a graph is Total time spent on a computer (across 10,000 users) and my x axis is each hour in a day, what do I title the graph?
For example, the at 7pm(x axis), it is a bar going up to 50,000 hours. At 8pm, the bar only goes up to 20,000 hours
The original title was duration, but that doesn't seem to make sense....

Cerberus

> Total time spent using a computer, per hour of the day, for 10,000 users

That would be the most...complete?

krikara

Seems confusing though

Cerberus

Yeah?

The shorter alternative would seem to be Total time spent using a computer.

Matt Эллен

10:32 AM

@Cerberus there can be only two values: too much or not enough

Matt Эллен

11:33 AM

I wonder if I would get good at programmer Portugese from the new Stack Overflow in Portugese

RegDwigнt

New?

Matt Эллен

well, I didn't know about it until just now

or I'd forrgotten about it until just now

RegDwigнt

I thought it was over umos anos old already.

Matt Эллен

> Two weeks ago, we announced the public launch of Stack Overflow in Portuguese

that was on 02-13-14

so about a month ago

RegDwigнt

Oh.

63 days in beta.

Matt Эллен

11:36 AM

six weeks, in fact

RegDwigнt

Hm. I remember seeing it during the Winter Bash.

Matt Эллен

yeah, it would have launched in the last few days of winter bash

RegDwigнt

That would explain something. Now sure what, but something.

ЯegDwight, Europe, GMT+1

101 2

> membro de 47 dias

But I must be off to watch curling.

Lators.

Matt Эллен

have fun! you and badp

apparently GB are winning

Jasper Loy

12:49 PM

@MattЭллен Boo!

Matt Эллен

Hi, @JasperLoy

Português is making reading preguntas difficult

Jasper Loy

@MattЭллен So the ship carrying my books from amazon has stopped at the port for 6 days. I hope nothing is going wrong. I thought it would have sailed from it by now...

Matt Эллен

@JasperLoy Singapore port?

or US port?

Jasper Loy

@MattЭллен No, one in New Jersey. My first package arrive a week before expected, so I am wondering about the second one. They split it into two.

Matt Эллен

maybe they're waiting for it to be a full load

it's more economical that way

Jasper Loy

12:51 PM

The first ship sailed off within a day only.

Matt Эллен

It was probably full

Jasper Loy

Yeah, I hope so. I don't want my books to go missing. It's over a thousand USD...

Matt Эллен

They'll be fine!

Jasper Loy

So how did you spend V day?

Matt Эллен

at work, then at home!

Jasper Loy

12:53 PM

I spent it alone as usual, lol.

And yes, I have never ever gone on a date, lol.

Matt Эллен

It's still valentimes day here

Jasper Loy

Oh, it is here too, lol.

Matt Эллен

I think it's becoming less fashionable as time goes by

it is quite obviously a consumerist ploy

Jasper Loy

Yeah. Anyway both of us are considered "old" since we are past 30!

Matt Эллен

indeed :D

Jasper Loy

12:55 PM

If only we could remain in your 20s forever!

Matt Эллен

ha!

I don't mind getting older

Jasper Loy

I don't mind either provided there is rebirth.

Matt Эллен

I just wish I also got wiser

Jasper Loy

I wanna start all over again,

Matt Эллен

surely you wouldn't know if you started over?

Cerberus

12:57 PM

@MattЭллен Is that really what life is all about?

Jasper Loy

Yeah, we mostly have no recollection of our past lives.

Cerberus

Hi.

Matt Эллен

Hi.

Jasper Loy

When people ask why we cannot recall our past lives as an argument against the possibility of rebirth, the answer is that we cannot even remember what we ate for breakfast last year.

Matt Эллен

@Cerberus that's what the data tell us

Jasper Loy

12:58 PM

Of course, that doesn't prove that there is rebirth, but it does counter the argument against rebirth.

Cerberus

@MattЭллен How disappointing.

Matt Эллен

I can. it was the same as breakfast this year

@Cerberus that's life

Cerberus

@MattЭллен Haha same here!

Matt Эллен

:D

Jasper Loy

Also, the argument that there is God because time must have a beginning is flawed.

Cerberus

12:59 PM

@JasperLoy Then again, a life is kind of a big deal. You'd think we would remember...

Jasper Loy

In the first place, time need not have a beginning.

Matt Эллен

time is made up of timitons, each a Planck's constant in size.

Jasper Loy

To me, only the Buddha truly understands space and time...

Matt Эллен

at the beginning of the universe all the timitons were bunched up, which is why there was such rapid expansion. the older the universe gets, the slower time flows because the timitons are more spread out.

Jasper Loy

This timiton theory sounds pretty plausble, lol.

Matt Эллен

1:02 PM

:D

that's what's great about theoretical physics. even I can make things up and it will sound plausible

Jasper Loy

The bad thing about such physics is that it could all be wrong in the end.

Matt Эллен

my theory is testable, too. if you find a place where time seems to be speeding up, say in orbit around a planet c.f. being on the surface of the planet, then you should be able to detect timitons using some unforseen detector

Jasper Loy

I think Stephen Hawking would not be so famous if not for his disability.

Similarly for John Nash.

Matt Эллен

maybe.

Jasper Loy

Anyway, I can log into chat without logging into any SE subject site.

I just need to log into SE itself first!

Matt Эллен

1:08 PM

I see

that's convenient if you don't want to use any of the QnA sites

Cerberus

@MattЭллен That's pretty big.

Matt Эллен

@Cerberus it's the smallest anything can be

Cerberus

@MattЭллен Are you criticising theoretical physics??

@MattЭллен How about half a Planck constant?

Jasper Loy

I have lost interest in physics because there is too much pure math alone to study.

Cerberus

Understandable.

Matt Эллен

1:10 PM

@Cerberus the universe won't allow it. it will break your cutting implement

Cerberus

What if I hide it?

Matt Эллен

the universe is everywhere

Cerberus

And what if my cutting implement is my mind?

It's razor sharp.

Matt Эллен

true

Cerberus

Yay!

Matt Эллен

1:11 PM

but it is not indestructible

Cerberus

No.

Jasper Loy

Wow, metaed has 10 stars!

Cerberus

Unless you believe in Jasper's theory.

Jasper Loy

My theory? What is it?

Cerberus

Reincarnation.

Jasper Loy

1:12 PM

Oh, I see. It's usually called rebirth in Buddhism though.

Cerberus

But not elsewhere.

Jasper Loy

But I first came across the term reincarnation.

Cerberus

Well, sure, you can call it rebirth in other cultures, too.

Jasper Loy

@Cerberus So do you have any dates today?

Mitch

@Cerberus "is that all there is to life?" of course not. There's cake!

Jasper Loy

1:15 PM

@Mitch Cake makes everything alright.

Matt Эллен

@Cerberus it could do with a little criticism if anyold layperson can sound convincing

Cerberus

@JasperLoy Nope! Just a birthday. You?

@Mitch What kind?

Mitch

@JasperLoy It's pretty cool how making stuff up in our heads actually works out so well. Anyway most modern physics is indistinguishable from mathematics.

Jasper Loy

@Cerberus Nope! I am always single and available!

Cerberus

@MattЭллен Heh. I personally have no opinion on th. ph.

@JasperLoy I told you, get on a dating site...

Matt Эллен

1:18 PM

I like it, but it can get quite fanciful

not that I know much about it. just what I read in New Scientist

Cerberus

By the way, I just got a message from a (not very close) friend through a certain medium, which means he must be gay (I'm not extremely surprised).

Matt Эллен

grindr?

Cerberus

I think he didn't recognise my picture.

@MattЭллен Maybe...

Matt Эллен

I see

Jasper Loy

Can someone tell me what grindr is?

Matt Эллен

1:19 PM

it's a certain medium

like a fortune teller

Jasper Loy

LOL

Cerberus

I don't want to scare him: he may be partly in the closet, although I have heard gossip.

Mitch

@JasperLoy I know! Pie is pretty good too.

Matt Эллен

:D

Cerberus

@MattЭллен Haha, exactly!

Jasper Loy

1:20 PM

What if one has no closet at home?

Matt Эллен

@Cerberus ah gossip. the only reliable currency

Cerberus

Haha.

Indeed!

Matt Эллен

have you head about the antics at the Silk Road 2 website?

Mitch

@Cerberus Whatever kind you like best. Or if you like chocolate sprinkles in your dulce de leech yogurt, go with that. When you get reincarnated I'm sure they'll have something comparable.

Cerberus

But I have to say I always liked him, platonically.

Jasper Loy

1:22 PM

@MattЭллен No.

Matt Эллен

apparently the owners have run off with everyones BTC

Cerberus

@MattЭллен Oh, that they stole everybody's bitcoins?

Yeah.

Matt Эллен

in The Bridge, 8 hours ago, by LessPop_MoreFizz

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA AHAHAHAGAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAGAHAHAHAHA AGAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHZHAHAHZHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH

Cerberus

@Mitch Stop it! No yoghurt.

Matt Эллен

that links to a story about it

Jasper Loy

1:22 PM

Silk Road reminds me of Kitaro the musician.

Have you guys heard Kitaro?

Matt Эллен

The name rings a bell

Mitch

That's not antics, that's .... Going to upset a lot of very bad people.

Jasper Loy

He is Japanese and has long hair, lol.

Cerberus

@MattЭллен Why do people even have wallets on SR2?

Matt Эллен

I do not know

Jasper Loy

1:24 PM

@MattЭллен I wonder what the G is doing there.

Cerberus

Why not buy and sell directly?

I have never had a wallet on Mt Gox either.

Matt Эллен

maybe there was some incentive?

Mitch

@Cerberus What? Oh. What's your dessert of preference then?

Cerberus

Could be...

@Mitch What isn't!!

Jasper Loy

@Mitch Mine is tiramisu.

Cerberus

1:24 PM

Tarte au citron, perhaps.

Or chocolate cake.

Or crème brûlée.

Or or...

Matt Эллен

I realy like chocolate brownies

Jasper Loy

@Mitch I like my question "just deserts" or "just desserts", lol

Yeah!

and bread pudding

Less so.

1:25 PM

The cheese plate? I still don't get that. I feel that should be an entire snack by itself, not to cap off a meal.

Matt Эллен

and christmas pudding

Jasper Loy

@MattЭллен I make those in the toilet every day.

Cerberus

@Mitch I want a cheese plate about half an hour after dinner, not immediately after.

Matt Эллен

that's an odd place

Cerberus

And do you do fromage, fruit, dessert? Or I think that's French...

English is fruit, dessert, fromage?

Matt Эллен

1:26 PM

@Cerberus yeah. cheese as dessert doesn't really make sense. it's not sweet. that is the number one rule about dessert!

Jasper Loy

I learnt recently that ladyfinger is a cake, and different from ladies' finger which is a vegetable.

Cerberus

Exactly!!

Don't get me wrong, I love cheese more than puppies.

But.

Matt Эллен

yeah

Jasper Loy

I do not like puppies or kittens.

Cerberus

@JasperLoy Huh really? I thought a ladyfinger was a kind of cookie.

@JasperLoy !

Jasper Loy

1:27 PM

@Cerberus I find it weird that people hug kittens and puppies but eat chickens and ducks.

Matt Эллен

ladyfingers are the biscuits they put in tiramisu, right?

Cerberus

@JasperLoy They also hug ducklings and chicks.

Jasper Loy

I think people who keep pets should be vegetarians.

Cerberus

@MattЭллен Yes! At least, to me.

Jasper Loy

@Cerberus Maybe you are right, let me check.

Matt Эллен

1:28 PM

the old cake vs biscuit debate rears its head!

Jasper Loy

oald8.oxfordlearnersdictionaries.com/dictionary/ladyfinger

Cerberus

Lady finger

Lady finger, ladyfinger, or lady's finger may refer to: Food * Ladyfinger (biscuit), light and sweet sponge cakes roughly shaped like a large finger * Lady Finger (cocktail), an alcoholic mixed drink that contains three or more ingredients Biology * Lady's fingers, another name for the okra plant * Ladyfinger cactus, a common name for the cacti Mammillaria elongata or Echinocereus pentalophus * Lady Finger banana, a variety of banana also known as Sucrier, Sugar banana, or Date banana Other uses * "Ladyfingers", a song by Luscious Jackson from their 1999 album Electric Honey * Lady...

@MattЭллен Ah, fuck.

I love how they have "Lady finger (biscuit): light and sweet sponge cakes".

Choose, lady!!

Make a fucking choice.

Jasper Loy

So cake=biscuit, QED.

Matt Эллен

@Cerberus hahaha. the picture at the bottom is captioned "Ladyfingers, loose". On some kind of spree, no doubt.

Jasper Loy

I cannot believe the movie Pearl Harbour is over three hours long, lol.

It's showing on tele tonight.

Matt Эллен

1:35 PM

I can't believe I'm still at work!

toodle pip

Cerberus

@MattЭллен Haha OMG they have escaped!

Bye.

RegDwigнt

@MattЭллен I can't believe you're not butter.

Mitch

1

A: Is accepting your own answer feasible?

Yes, you can accept your own answer.

@MattЭллен: You're not a sock puppet for the questioner, are you?

@Cerberus ?? It is both light and sweet, you get both. No need to choose.

@Cerberus one of those at most, and not the cheese. After a big meal I don't want to have one last tiny tidbit that is also heavy, like cheese.

KitFox

Hi.

Mitch

@JasperLoy mmm...I love tiramisu! It's cake with extra stuff!

@KitFox Hi.

KitFox

1:48 PM

Tiramisu? Is there some? looks around hopefully

Mitch

uh... wipes crumbs off face

No. There's no tiramisu. I think you should wipe that thought out completely.

moves tiramisu behind back

Besides I've heard it's not good for you.

holy crap tiramisu is the best thing ever for you

@MattЭллен Uh... I think your premise is sadly mistaken, There's no debate at all.

@Cerberus Whoa dude. I mean ladyfingers are pretty darn good, especially in tiramisu, of which I haven't had any in a while and there's none around here at the moment.. But better'n puppies? Are you mad? Were you dropped on your head as a child, one too many times?

Cerberus

2:04 PM

@Mitch Hah, well, it's traditional...

@Mitch I said cheese, not ladyfingers!

Mitch

@Cerberus Oh. Hm... OK. I get it. But I think there is room for puppies. How about cheese and puppies?

Cerberus

You're asking for too much.

Mitch

It's a small puppy. How about now?

Cerberus

2:27 PM

Aww so cute. OK.

Mitch

Nice.

So it'll be braised boneless baby puppy en croute with a tarragon infused cheese sauce. It'll be served momentarily.

I recommend a zinfandel.

Cerberus

Yay!

Make sure to boil them alive.

Mitch

2:54 PM

Il faut souffrir pour manger a really good meal.

Cerberus

3:05 PM

Un très bon repas, oui!

MετάEd

Bom dia!

Matt Эллен

@Mitch I am not

tchrist

@Mitch Hush, puppy!

@Mitch Mais il ne fallait pas que ton repas même souffrît, tu sais bien.

KitFox

@MattЭллен He's your sockpuppet, right?

Wait, but you're Reg's sockpuppet. And my mental twin...

draws diagram

This is so confusing.

tchrist

3:21 PM

@KitFox Ahah! This explains the breast thing. Alles klar.

MετάEd

I guess I missed something.

Will it help if I read the entire chat history?

Matt Эллен

@KitFox and isn't Reg your sockpuppet?

tchrist

@MattЭллен You have the O and the U swapped in that last word.

Matt Эллен

tchrist

@Cerberus And here I always thought the customary formulation was Be not quick to ascribe to malice those matters more readily ascribed to stupidity or sloth.

Cerberus

3:40 PM

@tchrist Bah, that's too simple.

Varietas delectat.

MετάEd

@tchrist Nice.

@tchrist I think Cerb's motto can be simplified even further to "never reason".

Mitch

@tchrist I've actually heard French people (OK just one) say something to the effect that all food is suffering (or something like of 'course the animals suffer, you can't have good food without it')

@MετάEd or to '...'

MετάEd

@Mitch Now that is great proscriptive advice.

I wish more people would give advice like that.

Mitch

...

There's some nuance to be added to that. maybe '..'

Cerberus

4:19 PM

@MετάEd You mistook your motto for mine.

MετάEd

4:38 PM

@Cerberus I'm not following you.

Jasper Loy

@MετάEd I thought you would change your avatar for V day, lol.

MετάEd

@JasperLoy Oh, thank you for the reminder. I have one all queued up.

Jasper Loy

@MετάEd Good good. Let's put it on!

MετάEd

@JasperLoy In fact I think this marks the second year I've used this one. So I've done this for more than a year now!

Cerberus

@MετάEd I thought your motto was "never reason", but that could be my mistake...

evil grin

MετάEd

4:43 PM

Is "Never ascribe to reason" your motto? I thought it was prescriptive advice (for other people).

KitFox

giggles

Cerberus

I think you're now ascribing my utterances to reason.

Or the other way around.

RegDwigнt

5:53 PM

I don't find it exceptionally hard to bring this under 600 characters, as most of it is chatter best suited for chat. The rest can be summed up in exactly one sentence: "I do not agree with Mitch". — RegDwigнt 4 mins ago

@KitFox.

KitFox

kthx

RegDwigнt

Srsly. "Hey Mitch where are you from" is a better fit for match.com.

But it's back to Sochi for me.

Au reservoir.

KitFox

Well, thanks. I'd forgotten I was going to do that.

MετάEd

7:05 PM

@Cerberus I offered to shorten your proscriptive advice. That is all.

You were supposed to chuckle.

Apparently you took it as a possible attack on your reason, which I regret. That seems to be why you turned it back on me, which I regret also ...

Jez

ugh. i just totally fucked up an interview. very disappointed.

should've know way more technical stuff than i did but my mind kept going blank

KitFox

I hate it when that happens.

Jez

couldn't properly explain what the difference was between a value and a reference type

couldn't remember what loose coupling was

couldn't explain properly why to use an interface over inhertiance

KitFox

I like your rose, @MετάEd.

Jez

couldn't explain properly what dependency injection was and why it was used

(doesn't help that none of the stuff i've worked on has really used much dependency injection)

KitFox

7:18 PM

Ouch, @Jez. You should have attempted to faint halfway through and then told them you were coming down with flu and had to leave quickly.

Jez

heh

and then they asked me about how to avoid deadlocks in databases - i said to use transactions

i was informed that they were what actually caused deadlocks

RegDwigнt

Wow, the top question on Maths and indeed on the entire network is "what is the logic behind Pythagoras' theorem".

WTF.

And the answers are just a bunch of the most common one-liner proofs available anywhere at all.

Would have been closed as gen-ref here.

And the OP rep capped and got a bunch of badges out of not caring for spelling "I" correctly. Oh the humanity.

Sochi is more fun. Lators.

MετάEd

7:41 PM

@KitFox Thank you.

And thank you @JasperLoy for remembering.

RegDwigнt

7:57 PM

0

A: What is more appropriate to say “pay especial attention to” or “pay special attention to”

The actual usage stats from the Corpus of Contemporary American English (COCA) and the British National Corpus (BNC) look as follows: COCA BNC pay especial attention to 0 0 pay special attention to 129 30 ratio (%) ...

Not sure what the deal is with that question.

600 views, 5 votes, but no attention for the answers, and indeed the most obvious answer had to be posted by myself, and only because I ran out of space for a comment.

Weird.

But I am not here. Black Sea awaiteth.

Cerberus

8:16 PM

@MετάEd I interpreted it as a joke, and joked back, or so I thought...no drama!

MετάEd

@Cerberus See, there you go again, looking for no drama.

Cerberus

looks

I don't see it.

Perhaps the drama edramen, i.e. "ran (off)".

MετάEd