English Language & Usage: Multi-Layered Discourse Room

12:08 AM

Erm, I am not sure what you mean exactly.

If you are asking whether the same verb that belongs to a group of synonyms that all mean die would be used in both of those sentences, then it depends on what exactly you want to say.

On the other hand, I can only remember two other words other than умереть that aren't offensive or rude (namely, скончаться and гибнуть) off the top of my head, and they are rather restricted in use compared to the head synonym.

So I guess the answer might be yes.

Nope, not two. Just remembered a few more words, but those are even more obscure/rare.

Note the might because солдаты гибнут каждый день в Афганистане is a perfectly legit sentence, but again, it depends on what exactly you intend to convey.

Погибать has a very strong connotation of 'dying of unnatural causes'.

Violent death, if you will; even though погибнуть от холода (≈ to have been frozen to death) is conceivable.

Cerberus

12:24 AM

I think David means whether you use the same verb stem to describe a repeated action and something that happened once in the past?

Vitaly

Why not. Солдаты умирают каждый день в Афганистане and Джон Леннон умер в 1980 году.

Cerberus

He said that in certain Slavic languages two different verbs would be used.

But I am not sure whether he counts the perfective/aorist stem of a verb as a different verb or not.

Joseph Weissman

What is "aorist"?

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

Good evening all

Joseph Weissman

That's an astoundingly awesome word.

Aloha @MrShinyandNew

Cerberus

12:30 AM

Hello!

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

Aorist

Aorist (; abbreviated ) is a philological term originally from Indo-European studies, referring to verb forms of various languages that are not necessarily related or similar in meaning. In Indo-European languages such as Greek, Sanskrit, Armenian and Macedonian, as well as languages influenced by the Indo-European tradition, such as Georgian, the term is usually used for forms that express perfective aspect and often refer to past events. "Aorist" comes from Ancient Greek aóristos "indefinite", because it was the unmarked (default) form of the verb, and thus did not have the implications ...

Cerberus

Greek horizô = "separate, cut off".

Horizon = that which cuts off the sky from the land.

Vitaly

Hello.

Cerberus

A- = "not".

And ehm...

Wait, why is it called that again?

Joseph Weissman

en.wiktionary.org/wiki/aorist#English

No oneboxing wikitionary, really?

Cerberus

12:32 AM

Oh, yes, "cut off" in the sense of define.

> ... because it was the unmarked (default) form of the verb, and thus did not have the implications of the imperfective aspect, which referred to an ongoing or repeated situation, or the perfect, which referred to a situation with a continuing relevance, but described an action "pure and simple".[2]

Joseph Weissman

We lack a perfective past :(

Cerberus

Not sure about perfective, but we definitely can't express what the aorist can.

So it seems the folks at Geographic Information Systems aren't very chatty.

Or into games.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Cerberus can't express it?

Cerberus

Not really, not in one word.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

sure, not in one word, but what about in one sentence?

Cerberus

12:37 AM

She opened the door [imperfect]: she opened the door, and it was not instantaneous, as far this story is concerned.

She opened the door [aorist]: she opened the door, and it was instantaneous.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

hm

Cerberus

So you could say an arrow hit her in the chest while she was opening the door [imperfect], but not with the aorist.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

Unless you put some time-words in

Cerberus

?

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

well, I guess you wouldn't be able to use imperfect

at the instant that she opened the door, an arrow hit her in the chest

Cerberus

12:39 AM

If you used the aorist there, it would mean as soon as she had opened the door, ...

Vitaly

just spotted the verb versing in the wild

Cerberus

If you used the imperfect, it wouldn't be an exact instant, but perhaps a very short period of time.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Vitaly as in "to be faced off against in competition"?

Vitaly

yep

Cerberus

It is not uncommon...

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

12:41 AM

@Cerberus I've never heard it

Cerberus

No?

Vitaly

I've never encountered it prior to the LL article

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

same here

Vitaly

and now, a week later, a genuine use of it in the wild

FTW

Cerberus

It sounds like something kids would say to each other in an on-line game forum.

@Vitaly I presume you know the name(s) of this phenomenon?

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

12:42 AM

Could be, I don't ever go to online game forums or hang out with kids who compete

Cerberus

There you go.

Meanwhile, I'm making cheese cake!!

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

I'm not disputing that it exists, I just don't know how "common" I'd consider it. common among a subset of english-using children, I guess. But who knows what other untoward things the kids are doing to the language.

@Cerberus mmm cheese cake

We eat "cheese cake" here... my son is allergic to milk, so it's dairy-free. Still, it's not bad.

Cerberus

@MrShinyandNew安宇 Oh haha. Then what do you use?

@MrShinyandNew安宇 All right, gramps.

@MrShinyandNew By the way, do you add sugar to the cheese? Or just to the crust and/or glazing?

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Cerberus Well, we buy pre-made ones. They are soy-based. But you can supposedly make them using tofu and tofu-cream-cheese.

Cerberus

Oh I see.

I think that perhaps no sugar or very little would be nice?

I can always put some extra sugar on it later if needed.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

12:47 AM

@Cerberus my dad's recipe for cheesecake, which is actually different from a standard cheesecake, was something like softened cream cheese, sweetened condensed milk, and lemon juice. You mix it all together, and the milk is sweet enough, and the lemon makes it curdle slightly so that it sets into a nice thick consistency.

Cerberus

Oh I see.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Cerberus Most cheesecakes I've eaten are pretty sweet.

Cerberus

Hmm.

I'll try it with very little sugar, see how it goes.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

The cream cheese has a strong flavour and isn't sweet at all, at least, the kind we get here is like that.

@Cerberus Maybe make two smaller ones, one sweet, one not?

I made a pretty good cheesecake once that was half chocolate, half white, and you swirl the two halves together to make a nice pattern, then bake it. It was pretty awesome.

Hmm... I am also thinking of a new invention: I make these chocolate truffles, which are essentially chocolate, butter, and sugar (plus coffee, rum for flavour). I bet they would taste pretty damn good if they were cream-cheese instead of butter

In fact... the tofu cream-cheese might work too

Cerberus

@MrShinyandNew安宇 Too late!

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

12:52 AM

Chocolate truffle recipe (I usually omit the eggs now)

@Cerberus It's never too late. There's always time for more cheesecake later

Cerberus

@MrShinyandNew安宇 Oh, nice!

David Wallace

Sorry, I asked a question, then I AFK'ed.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Cerberus The process is time-consuming but simple. And well worth it.

Cerberus

I like the idea.

I have never seen truffles like that.

David Wallace

"Aorist" is a different tense. One must use a perfective verb to say "John Lennon died". I was asking whether we need a non-perfective verb to speak of soldiers dying in Afghanistan.

Cerberus

12:55 AM

They usually have some kind of white egg-creamy filling.

David Wallace

So I meant aspect, not tense.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

I also experimented with making melted chocolate coatings for them. That was a bit too tricky for me.

Cerberus

@DavidWallace And you didn't mean different verbs, but different aspects, right?

David Wallace

However, I seem to have found myself in the Cooking room, not the Russian room.

Cerberus

Yes, oddly.

David Wallace

12:57 AM

Umm, I'm fairly sure that in Slavic languages, the majority of verbs can be EITHER perfective OR imperfective, but not both.

Cerberus

What is a "verb"?

Vitaly

Ah, yes, умереть is perfective and умирать is imperfective, but they have the same stem.

David Wallace

For example, in Bosnian, pojesti = to eat in the perfective aspect, jesti = to be eating.

Cerberus

Ah, some kind of evolved reduplication?

David Wallace

Right, so would I use umeret' or umirat' to speak of soldiers dying?

Vitaly

12:58 AM

The latter.

David Wallace

(Sorry, it's too hard for me to type cyrillic characters)

Vitaly

32 mins ago, by Vitaly

Why not. Солдаты умирают каждый день в Афганистане and Джон Леннон умер в 1980 году.

David Wallace

Right, but I would use the former for John Lennon. That's all I wanted to know.

Cerberus

in The Frying Pan, 6 hours ago, by rumtscho

In Bulgarian, it is "umryal" and "smurt" - no strange mix-ups

Isn't this a funny coincidence?

Those are nouns, but still.

David Wallace

@Vitaly Right, I saw that comment. I was trying to work out whether they were different verbs, or different endings on the same verb. The two verbs are quite similar.

Vitaly

1:00 AM

Oh, OK.

Cerberus

@DavidWallace So a verb is anything within the same conjugation?

Or anything with the same aspect stem?

David Wallace

@Vitaly and then my wife came home and I ate lunch.

But I ate it perfectively.

Vitaly

@DavidWallace en.wiktionary.org/wiki/… en.wiktionary.org/wiki/…

David Wallace

@Cerberus That's a really good question.

See, Greek ends up being very similar to the Slavic languages in its handling of aspect; except that if you learn Greek, you learn the verb pairs as different sets of endings of the same verb.

Whereas if you learn a Slavic language, you learn that the two verbs in a pair (with the same meaning but different aspect) really are different verbs.

I fail to see the distinction, but I'm sure a sufficiently clever linguist would be able to tell me.

Cerberus

Right: the boundaries between what counts as verb x and verb y are not always clear.

David Wallace

1:04 AM

Or maybe my nephew (who is native in a Slavic language, but has learnt Greek).

Cerberus

@DavidWallace It is a matter of definition.

In Greek, there are several very common suppletive verbs.

Vitaly

I don't know about the general case, but умирать and умереть clearly have quite different verbal paradigms.

David Wallace

So, a Russian might perceive umeret' and umirat' as the same verb, but a Bulgarian is less likely to perceive umryal and smurt as the same.

Cerberus

No doubt they were once considered completely different verbs, but at some point they came to be felt as one conjugation.

David Wallace

Or, no, maybe a Russian wouldn't perceive umeret' and umirat' as the same verb. I don't know. I'd have to ask one.

But a Greek would (for the corresponding Greek verbs).

Vitaly

1:05 AM

I'm on the fence myself about that.

Cerberus

@Vitaly Can you make a future form of both?

David Wallace

Yes.

Cerberus

And the future forms would be different?

David Wallace

Paul McCartney will die tomorrow. Soldiers will be dying every day next year.

Cerberus

Well, that was actually the wrong question.

Vitaly

1:06 AM

@Cerberus Yes, with the help of another word with умирать, purely through conjugation with умереть.

Cerberus

"Another word with"?

David Wallace

an auxiliary verb

Cerberus

You mean a particle of sorts?

Oh.

David Wallace

Sorry, I shouldn't be answering questions about Slavic languages when they're addressed to Vitaly.

Cerberus

@Vitaly Okay, I know the ultimate test. Suppose you take a foreign word verb. Can you produce two fairly complete paradigms of it, corresponding to the two aspects you described above?

Vitaly

1:08 AM

@Cerberus Huh?

Cerberus

(I presume you have some loan verbs.)

@Vitaly What is "to fax" or "to e-mail" in Russian?

@DavidWallace No, it is valuable information.

Vitaly

You mean, would I be able to produce different paradigms for the perfective and the imperfective forms of a foreign loan verb?

David Wallace

My question about soldiers came from Tames' question about whether it mattered that each soldier only dies once. It wasn't clear to me whether to use an imperfective or a perfective verb; or even that there was an imperfective verb meaning "die".

Cerberus

@Vitaly Yes.

Vitaly

Hmm, let's see…

Cerberus

1:10 AM

(Although whether or not they are complete depends on the premises, but OK.)

David Wallace

@Cerberus In Bosnian, you can.

There is a standard way of forming an imperfective verb from a foreign word, and a standard way of forming a perfective verb from a foreign word.

Vitaly

(And no, to fax in Russian is отправить факс or принять факс, same with to e-mail.)

Cerberus

@DavidWallace So what would it look like? I e-mail her last year v. I e-mail her ever day.

@Vitaly All right, do you have any loan verbs?

Vitaly

I'm trying to come up with one.

Cerberus

Or can you produce a new verb, based on a noun or and adjective, or whatever?

David Wallace

1:11 AM

факс sounds like swearing.

Cerberus

Hah.

Vitaly

OK, let's try it with церберить

Cerberus

Heh.

David Wallace

That's a real word?

Vitaly

No, I just made it up

Cerberus

1:12 AM

Let it mean bark.

Vitaly

The perfective form would be сцерберить

Cerberus

So I barked last week v. I bark every week?

David Wallace

I find that difficult to say.

Cerberus

How do you pronounce ть, by the way?

Like ch?

Vitaly

That's a soft t

Anyway, taking the Wiktionary layout for paradigms as an example:

сцерберю сцерберим
сцерберишь сцерберите
сцерберит сцерберят
сцербери сцерберите

сцерберил сцерберили
сцерберила
сцерберило

буду церберить будем церберить
будешь церберить будете церберить
будет церберить будут церберить
цербери церберите

церберил цербелили
церберила
церберило

The буду, будем etc is the auxiliary verb for the future form of the imperfective

The past forms of the imperfective and the perfective apparently don't take different endings (they do with умереть and умирать)

Whereas the future forms are quite different

David Wallace

1:18 AM

Interesting. Bos/Ser/Cro has no such difference.

Vitaly

@Cerberus Not what I had in mind but OK. :P

David Wallace

Bos/Ser/Cro conjugations are probably more consistent. There are two tenses that only exist in one aspect - the aorist (which only exists for perfective verbs) and the imperfect (which only exists for imperfective verbs).

Cerberus

@Vitaly How about the present forms?

David Wallace

But all the other tenses are conjugated the same in both aspects.

Vitaly

@Cerberus Russian has no present form for the perfective. The present infinitive form of the imperfective is церберить.

David Wallace

1:20 AM

Do you not have that the wrong way around?

Vitaly

Yeah, thanks. Just fixed.

David Wallace

Oh, all right, fix it then and make my comment sound like nonsense!

Vitaly

But I fixed it before your comment popped up, so. :P

David Wallace

Not for me you didn't.

Vitaly

церберю церберим
церберишь церберите
церберит церберят

David Wallace

1:22 AM

I think the chat room has a lag between when it shows one one's own comments and when it shows other people's comments.

Vitaly

^ the present-form paradigm of the imperfective

Cerberus

@DavidWallace Yes.

David Wallace

But what happens if I want to ask "Would Robusto jump if Cerberus barks?" Surely, I would need the present tense of the perfective aspect for that?

In Bosnian, perfective verbs have present tenses, but they only show up in subordinate clauses.

Vitaly

Подпрыгнет ли Робусто если Церберус сцерберит? (Both verbs are in the past. That's how we do that in Russian.)

Cerberus

So anyway, I can't look at Russian verb forms and analyse them. If you can create different forms for the perfective and non-perfective from the same root in Russian, then I would say the two together are probably best considered a single verb, not two verbs.

David Wallace

1:25 AM

@Vitaly So that looks like the present tense of a perfective verb to me!

@Cerberus and thus you fly in the face of all the linguists who have analysed the Slavic languages.

Cerberus

@DavidWallace So be it. It is immaterial anyway.

David Wallace

Thus cerberited Cerberus.

@Vitaly That's the past tense?

Cerberus

I suppose you could say the different aspects are made by suffigation, not conjugation, and therefore they should be considered separate verbs; but this is inconsistent with most other languages, because aspects are usually seen as existing within a conjugation, not separating conjugations.

David Wallace

Oh, sorry, I misspoke then.

What tense would I use for "rains" in "I will carry my umbrella if it rains"?

Cerberus

The only thing that matters is that it must be clear to you and your readers where you put the boundaries between one verb and another.

Vitaly

1:29 AM

@DavidWallace Yes. The conditional in Russian is constructed using the past tense or the pluperfect.

David Wallace

@Vitaly Fascinating!

I'm trying to work out what Carlo would make of it all. Pluperfects with future meanings.

@Cerberus Do you mean affixation? I don't know what "suffigation" means.

And it's not always done with affixes. Return to the "die" example and contrast umeret' with umirat'.

Vitaly

Carlo?

Mahnax

@Vitaly See Meta EL&U's most recent questions for examples of Carlo.

Cerberus

@DavidWallace In this case, both describe the same thing.

It means sticking a suffix after something.

David Wallace

But in the cerberit' example, it's a prefix, not a suffix.

Mahnax

1:33 AM

Hello everyone.

Cerberus

Oh, OK.

Hello!

Vitaly

@Mahnax I know. But why would David bring him up now?

David Wallace

Hello Matthew.

OED doesn't know "suffigation" either.

Mahnax

@Vitaly shrugs

Vitaly

TIL that suffigance is a valid Scrabble word.

David Wallace

1:38 AM

OED doesn't have suffigance.

Vitaly

Chambers does.

David Wallace

I know this, because it's not on the same page that suffigation isn't on.

user19161

@david I see your answer has been downed on the queen.

David Wallace

It took seconds! Somebody must have been sitting there waiting to pounce!

Hopefully they'll justify themselves with a comment.

Cerberus

It is an uncommon word.

user19161

1:44 AM

I don't know anything about empires so I have no comment.

Cerberus

It's probably just that some people didn't find suffixate a terribly good-looking word.

David Wallace

@JasperLoy Are you saying it was you?

Cerberus

It should either be suffixion or suffigation if you want the very best.

Actually suffixion is better. But hey.

David Wallace

OED has suffixation. I see no point in having any variant.

user19161

@DavidWallace No, I did not downvote. How can I downvote when I cannot judge the answer?

Cerberus

1:46 AM

Suffigation may be older.

David Wallace

It sounded like your "I have no comment" comment was a response to my lamentation at the lack of a comment to accompany the downvote.

Cerberus

> Only relatively recently in our own culture, five hundred years or so ago, did a distinction arise that cut society in two, forming separate classes of music performers and music listeners.

Why do they let cognitive scientists write about history?

snoutdesk

Vitaly

Someone please shut down the Internet, k thx. I've been trying to read anything the length of a book for a while now (as opposed to using one as a reference). No luck.

Cerberus

Read in bed.

Snuggle up with a good book.

Vitaly

But I have the Internet there, too.

On the ceiling.

As you might remember.

Cerberus

1:49 AM

Oh, that.

user19161

@Vitaly You may shut down the computer. QED.

Cerberus

Turn it off.

David Wallace

I might remove it. It has been said that the British Empire ceased to exist in 1947. So Elizabeth's father was an emperor, but apparently not she.

Cerberus

Grab a book.

@DavidWallace Uhh empire ≠ emperor.

There was never an emperor.

I believe I have had this discussion before.

With someone here or there.

Oh yes, in the Cooking room.

user19161

@Cerberus There is an emperor in Star Wars, and also in ancient China.

Journeyman Geek

1:50 AM

er

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Cerberus No, you're thinking of the time when Carlo_R tried to convince everyone that the difference between a king and an emperor was the moustache.

Cerberus

Empire has different meanings.

Journeyman Geek

actually the british empire did have an emperor

Cerberus

@MrShinyandNew安宇 Uhh what?

@JourneymanGeek ?

Like whom?

Journeyman Geek

Or more specifically the british king had as one of his titles, the title of emperor of india

Cerberus

1:51 AM

Yeah OK.

Journeyman Geek

the british empire, as such ended when india became independant

Cerberus

I knew you were going to say that.

Journeyman Geek

(technically it should have been the INDIAN empire, but that pisses off the brits so much)

Cerberus

However, that is not directly related to having an empire.

The British kings never called themselves emperors except with respect to India.

Journeyman Geek

contrast this to the germans who had keiser und konig - the German Emperor was the King of Prussia.

Cerberus

1:52 AM

They were always kings.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Cerberus Sorry, it was beards he said

Apr 3 at 17:13, by Carlo_R.

Let us consider what John Lawler said "Essentially, the difference between King and Emperor is like the difference between wonderful and terrific -- both are good, and one may be better than the other; but opinion differs about which is which." If so, is "Actually the real difference is that the Emperator has the beard while the King does not have the beard" a good answer?

Journeyman Geek

@Cerberus: The british empire, as such was a misnomer

and that the british emperor was technically the inheritor, by conquest of the mugal empire.

Cerberus

@JourneymanGeek The thing is that an empire doesn't need to have an emperor.

The Dutch empire, for example, never had anything to do with imperial titles.

Journeyman Geek

@Cerberus: au contrare. The british empire is a myth ;)

David Wallace

I've just read the Wikipedia page on the British Empire.

Cerberus

1:53 AM

Uh...

@MrShinyandNew安宇 Uh...

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

Apr 3 at 17:25, by Carlo_R.

I do not know. But I know that no King has the beard.

Cerberus

Haha.

David Wallace

It has this delightful sentence re Hong Kong ...
The handover ceremony in 1997 marked for many, including Charles, Prince of Wales, who was in attendance, "the end of Empire".

Cerberus

Yes.

David Wallace

So maybe Elizabeth no longer considers herself an empress.

Certainly I learnt in school that she was, but that was before 1997.

Cerberus

1:55 AM

I guess you could say "empire" is often used metaphorically, as with the British empire.

@DavidWallace Ugh, the British kings never considered themselves emperors either, not as their main title!

Journeyman Geek

I think being an empire is the 18th century equivilent of an e-peen ;p

David Wallace

How is that metaphorical? Britain had a real empire!

AFK

Journeyman Geek

@DavidWallace: Indian Empire!

Cerberus

@DavidWallace It is metaphorical insofar as it wasn't an empire ruled by an emperor, but just a large realm.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@JourneymanGeek What about Canada, Australia, the US colonies, New Zealand, and all the other british holdings?

Cerberus

1:57 AM

No title "Emperor of the British Empire" ever existed.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Cerberus What is the difference between a king and an emperor?

Journeyman Geek

All holdings of His or Her Majesty, the Emperor/Emperess of india

AFK

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

Well, it was still an empire, and still british.

Cerberus

@MrShinyandNew安宇 There is no very definite difference, except that they two are different words.

And therefore different titles.

@MrShinyandNew安宇 Yes. "The British Empire" is correct; "the British Emperor" is not.

Just as the Dutch Empire never had an Emperor—it wasn't even a monarchy.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Cerberus I would argue that despite not actually having the title per se, the head of the british empire is de facto an emperor

Cerberus

1:59 AM

@MrShinyandNew安宇 It goes against convention to call someone an emperor who does not call himself so.

Vitaly

But would you win?

Cerberus

The use of "empire" for any very large realm, regardless of whether it was headed by an emperor", is fairly new.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Cerberus enh, maybe it goes against convention to call them that. But wouldn't they BE that? Or is the word "emperor" really kinda useless, since its definition is so vague that you can't even use the word when you see one in action

Cerberus

@MrShinyandNew安宇 What does it mean to "be" a title?

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Cerberus you don't "be" a title. you "be" the role that the title is attached to.

Cerberus

2:02 AM

(And this newer and, as I call it, metaphorical, meaning sometimes interferes with the older meaning, still in use, of a realm ruled by an emperor.)

Vitaly

on that note, AFK

Cerberus

@MrShinyandNew安宇 And what is this role?

@Vitaly Yes, well, in this case it is simpler: it's just convention.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Cerberus Being the head of an empire, which is different than the head of a nation, in that an empire is bigger than a nation. And while the boundary between "big nation" and "nation + other, non-nation stuff comprising an empire" is blurry, "multiple nations under one ruler" is pretty clearly an empire

Cerberus

@MrShinyandNew安宇 I think you are using two different meanings of "empire" without making a clear distinction. The essence of the feudal title is simply having the title, and nothing else. The essence of the "metaphorical" use is "that which we normally associate with empires", which is a very large, pluriform realm.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

I would add that modern governments who don't have such powerful heads of state, i.e. a prime minister/president as opposed to a king, would arguably not have an emperor even if they form an empire, because my definition of an emperor is someone who rules for a long time or life, and who isn't subject to, say, elections

Cerberus

2:06 AM

@MrShinyandNew安宇 The feudal title is completely independent of power or elections. The HRE was elected.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Cerberus The holy roman emperor? Who was neither holy, nor roman, nor an emperor?

Cerberus

Can't you see how you should separate the two meanings of the word "empire"?

@MrShinyandNew安宇 Exactly.

In "the HR Emperor was not an emperor", you can see the paradox; and paradoxes are always caused by a word's having two different meanings.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Cerberus I don't really count the definition of the word "empire" where it's an arbitrary label someone used to puff up their own importance. Just like the NZ company that calls their translucent things opaque, calling yourself an empire or emperor when you are not is just mis-use of the word

So, to be clear, I'm talking about real empires which are political bodies that are bigger than nations.

Cerberus

@MrShinyandNew安宇 Then you are flouting millennia-old conventions that are still 100 % upheld by historians.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

how much bigger is subject to debate, of course.

Cerberus

2:09 AM

What this discussion is about was this:

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Cerberus Just because something is old doesn't mean it is right or even makes sense at all

Cerberus

20 mins ago, by David Wallace

I might remove it. It has been said that the British Empire ceased to exist in 1947. So Elizabeth's father was an emperor, but apparently not she.

@MrShinyandNew安宇 More right than you.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Cerberus how does that follow?

Cerberus

You decide that you want to use a word in way that defies convention. Fine.

Then we have nothing more to discuss.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Cerberus Yes, and we already agreed that the british empire was a real empire, undisputably, and not just a title attached to a plain-old vanilla nation

Cerberus

2:11 AM

You are free to do as you wish.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Cerberus No, I am just deciding to ignore all of the uses of the word that are not important. What does the HRE have to do with the british empire and whether or not Elizabeth or her ancestors were emperors?

Cerberus

There is no "real" meaning: there is just the basic meaning of empire and the extended meaning; and the noteworthy fact is that there is no parallel extended meaning for "emperor".

That is why I questioned David's use of "emperor" there.

You can use any word in whichever way you like.

Okay, bed time.

Bye.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Cerberus cya

Cerberus

Bow before your Emperor!

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Cerberus I don't recognize an emperor's dominion over me.

Cerberus

2:24 AM

Off with your heads, then!

Oh, but you have only one.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

And it goes back on easily since it's made of Lego

Cerberus

All right, chop.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

2:40 AM

places head back on body

I keep a box of spare heads, just for this very purpose.

Cerberus

While you're at it, why don't you test whether your new head has less silly ideas.

2

Make it try to describe the history of the Roman and Byzantine Empires.

Was the RE an empire an empire in 100 BC, and did it have an emperor? In 100 AD? And how about the BE in 1400? Was it an empire to you? And was there a Byzantine Emperor?

You need to stick with the conventions or go crazy.

They aren't there for nothing.

Really bye!

Journeyman Geek

3:07 AM

yes yes and yes. ;p

user19161

I have 7 red badges now, yay!

David Wallace

3:53 AM

My ELU rep is now 2999! I don't get to do anything special just yet.

David Wallace

4:33 AM

physics.stackexchange.com/questions/31222/… - It's taking all my self control not to post "stand on your head" in response to the question that's inside the body of the question.

stuff.co.nz/national/7219667/… - fast forward to about 40 seconds unless you like organ music.

Gigili

6:16 AM

Am I a 10k user?

Now?

And now?

What about now?

Umm, no. 9813!

Mahnax

It would appear not.

Am I?

Huh?

David Wallace

How to entertain yourself for hours, the Gigili way!

Mahnax

glares

Let's try this again.

Lemon zest.

David Wallace

Why?

Gigili

Are you?

Mahnax

6:19 AM

How is everyone?

Gigili

Should I flag @DavidWallace?

David Wallace

Yes.

Mahnax

No, that won't be necessary.

I would just mark it invalid, no offence.

David Wallace

I'm AFK people.

Mahnax

Unless he actually said something awful.

Gigili

6:20 AM

Umm, whatever he says is awful.

David Wallace

6:41 AM

I'm awful like that! No, wait, that doesn't sound quite right.

Journeyman Geek

@DavidWallace: You're awful in other ways too?

David Wallace

Apparently, everything I say is awful.

Mahnax

@DavidWallace gasps That's awful!

user19161

Awfully good is awesome. QED.

Gigili

7:47 AM

I'm awfully awesome, yes.

Matt Эллен

8:13 AM

This might be valid for reopening:

-1

Q: Difference between "swims among turtles" and "swims among the turtles"?

I was wondering which of the following is the proper sentence: The woman swims among turtles, or The woman swims among the turtles. Or are they both valid under different contexts? The above is from a duolingo.com exercise to translate a Spanish sentence. So, unfortunately, there is no conte...

@KitFox You couldn't hide from me forever!

user19161

@MattЭллен You can run but you cannot hide. QED.

user19161

@Gigili Why?

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