« first day (4356 days earlier)      last day (861 days later) » 

CowperKettle
CowperKettle
02:39
@Cerberus But it can increase its production. Or oursource to North Korea and Iran.
> With the Muslim conquest of Persia in 644 AD, the Alexander romance found its way into Persian literature—an ironic outcome considering pre-Islamic Persia's hostility towards the national enemy who conquered the Achaemenid Empire and was directly responsible for Persian domination by Hellenistic foreign rulers
Theories about Alexander the Great in the Quran
The story of Dhul-Qarnayn (in Arabic ذو القرنين, literally "The Two-Horned One"; also transliterated as Zul-Qarnain or Zulqarnain), is mentioned in the Quran.It has long been recognised in modern scholarship that the story of Dhul-Qarnayn has strong similarities with the Syriac Legend of Alexander the Great. According to this legend, Alexander travelled to the ends of the world then built a wall in the Caucasus mountains to keep Gog and Magog out of civilized lands (the latter element is found several centuries earlier in Flavius Josephus). Several argue that the form of this narrative in the Syriac...
Cerberus
Cerberus
@CowperKettle Well, from what I have heard that will be difficult, if only for a lack of computer chips?
If anything, perhaps production will be lower than in earlier years, not higher?
CowperKettle
CowperKettle
@Cerberus Computer chips are small, easy to smuggle
user image
> - Lads, I'm almost dead, what do you want?
- Here's your draft notice.
Russia has the longer overland border than almost any country in the world. So many ways to smuggle something tiny, like a computer chip.
Ukraine will surely get more air defense systems, but it will take months.
The IRIS-T can cover some 100 km lengthwise, while the battlefront alone is 1100 km in length, and there is the Black Sea, and there is Belarus.
So Ukraine would need dozens of IRIS-T batteries to be fully safe.
And it will get only three next year.
The letters are still blurry in the mornings, although I downed my venlafaxine to 112/day. And I'm feeling tired.
user image
> Here's a lifehack. Buy a set of military-looking clothes, and use them for walking in the streets. Nobody will think of foisting a draft notice on you.
CowperKettle
CowperKettle
03:52
Word of the day: a technical ( a light improvised fighting vehicle, typically an open-backed civilian pickup truck or four-wheel drive vehicle, mounting a machine gun, anti-aircraft autocannon, rotary cannon, anti-tank weapon, anti-tank gun, ATGM, mortar, multiple rocket launcher, recoilless rifle or other support weapon)
 
2 hours later…
CowperKettle
CowperKettle
06:03
Word of the hour: fletching - vanes or feathers at the back of the arrow for stabilization in flight (from French flèche (“an arrow”).)
CowperKettle
CowperKettle
06:59
> Never trust a train. They have loco motives.
 
2 hours later…
user4539917
user4539917
08:48
Time has no meaning at the North Pole
 
1 hour later…
M.A.R.
M.A.R.
10:14
So says "BsAxUbx5KoQDEpCAqSffwGy554PSah" — CGCampbell 20 hours ago
CowperKettle
CowperKettle
10:36
Word of the day: to warm the cockles of someone's heart (Corruption of Latin cochleae (“ventricles”) in cochleae cordis (“ventricles of the heart”).)
 
2 hours later…
CowperKettle
CowperKettle
12:08
> - Why Erdogan won't be able to reach Nirvana?
- Kurd Cobain won't let him.
CowperKettle
CowperKettle
12:28
Word of the hour: bulrush
> Where will-o'-the-wisps and glow-worms shine,
In bulrush and in brake;
Where waving mosses shroud the pine,
And the cedar grows, and the poisonous vine
Is spotted like the snake
Robusto
Robusto
12:50
#Worldle #267 1/6 (100%)
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🎉
https://worldle.teuteuf.fr
#Worldle #267 1/6 (100%)
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🎉
⭐
https://worldle.teuteuf.fr
#Worldle #267 1/6 (100%)
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🎉
⭐⭐
https://worldle.teuteuf.fr
#Worldle #267 1/6 (100%)
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🎉
⭐⭐⭐
https://worldle.teuteuf.fr
🌎 Oct 15, 2022 🌍
🔥 45 | Avg. Guesses: 5.87
🟧🟨🟥🟩 = 4

#globle
Wordle 483 5/6

🟨⬜⬜⬜⬜
⬜🟨⬜⬜⬜
🟨🟨🟨⬜⬜
⬜🟩🟩🟩🟩
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩
CowperKettle
CowperKettle
13:07
Word of the minute: small clothes (knee-length breeches of the 18th century)
user image
Robusto
Robusto
I'm waiting for word of the Planck Time.
> The Planck time tP is the time required for light to travel a distance of 1 Planck length in a vacuum, which is a time interval of approximately 5.39×10−44 s.
No current physical theory can describe timescales shorter than the Planck time, such as the earliest events after the Big Bang,[23] and it is conjectured that the structure of time breaks down on intervals comparable to the Planck time.[40] While there is currently no known way to measure time intervals on the scale of the Planck time, researchers in 2020 found that the accuracy of an atomic clock is constrained by quantum effects …
CowperKettle
CowperKettle
13:22
There will be too much dark energy in such words.
CowperKettle
CowperKettle
13:39
On Ukrainian TV, the host asked a Ukrainian military man whether they have started an advance towards Khersoh. The man said "I'm not allowed to disclose sensitive information", and started eating a piece of watermelon. Kherson has been always famous for its watermelons.
user image
Now he has become a meme.
jlliagre
jlliagre
13:52
#Worldle #267 1/6 (100%)
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🎉
⛄
https://worldle.teuteuf.fr
🌎 Oct 15, 2022 🌍
🔥 1 | Avg. Guesses: 7.11
🟧🟥🟥🟥🟩 = 5

#globle
Wordle 483 6/6

⬜⬜⬜🟨🟨
⬜🟩🟩⬜⬜
⬜⬜⬜⬜⬜
⬜🟩🟩🟩🟩
⬜🟩🟩🟩🟩
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩
Robusto
Robusto
@jlliagre You didn't do the (very easy) bonus rounds!
jlliagre
jlliagre
Ah, I was wondering what these stars were about!
#Worldle #267 1/6 (100%)
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🎉
⭐
https://worldle.teuteuf.fr
#Worldle #267 1/6 (100%)
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🎉
⭐⭐
https://worldle.teuteuf.fr
#Worldle #267 1/6 (100%)
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🎉
⭐⭐⭐
https://worldle.teuteuf.fr
Robusto
Robusto
Bravo!
jlliagre
jlliagre
Dead easy.
Robusto
Robusto
Yup.
It will get harder as the countries get more obscure.
jlliagre
jlliagre
14:06
"Dear corpse", said he. I wasn't aware such inversion existed in English. It is mandatory in French (Cher cadavre, dit-il.)
@Robusto Yes: identify three border countries of Saint Helena...
CowperKettle
CowperKettle
14:34
I've downloaded the movie Le Roi de cœur
Robusto
Robusto
@jlliagre That is very common in English, and not only for reporting on dialogue. But it is most often used in that way.
It can be used to vary prose delivery, for example.
1. Kant argued that space and time are merely forms of intuition.
2. Space and time, argued Kant, are merely forms of intuition.
3. Argued Kant, space and time are merely forms of intuition.
Still, even in dialogue the inversion has a specific "feel" to it. It can be construed as a special form of emphasis.
"The pizza will be here in thirty minutes," John said.
"The pizza will be here in thirty minutes," said John.
The latter is a bit more mannered and abrupt, but in a subtle way. It can be used as a contradiction, but it always has (to me, at least) an introductory feel. Someone is introducing a new idea, that sort of thing.
Michael Rybkin
Michael Rybkin
14:55
youtube.com/watch?v=WeXR3LekM68@t=56s We are prepared to live without light, heating, water _______ as long as we can live without the Russians. (what's she saying there?)
Robusto
Robusto
15:07
@MichaelRybkin Unintelligible to me. "Water retex" or "water veetex" is what it sounds like, but that makes no sense. It could be something got abridged and what she really said was something like "air raid attacks"—but that's a stretch.
By the way, when you want people to listen to a video, link to the exact time in the video to avoid wasting the time of people whom you want to help you.
Example: youtube.com/watch?v=WeXR3LekM68&t=59s
Cerberus
Cerberus
@CowperKettle That is a good point, and I have no answer. Even so, experts keep saying Russia will probably not be able to get (the right?) chips in the right quantities.
Perhaps they also need to be installed by technicians from the manufacturers?
I have no idea.
@CowperKettle Huh, but Ukraine is already receiving the latest anti-air systems? One was delivered from Germany this week—one so novel it has not been tested in real battle yet.
@CowperKettle From what I read, an infinite number of systems would be needed to fully protect Ukraine.
Even for all of Kiev, a very large number would be required.
In practice, it is more about reducing the number that strike, rather than giving 100% protection.
The systems are distributed to protect cities, critical facilities, and the front-line troops.
There will never be nearly enough.
@Robusto "Whatever it takes". @MichaelRybkin
Non-native accents are the most difficult.
@jlliagre It is also mandatory in Dutch. Whenever a sentence does not begin with the subject, verb and subject are inverted, with very few exceptions.
So I'm surprised this is also mandatory in French.
In English, I believe it used to be mandatory, too, or at least stylistically superior.
@CowperKettle As to North Korea and Iran, they have no better access to computer chips than does Russia.
@CowperKettle Pretty smart.
@CowperKettle See also fletcher. Via French ultimately of Germanic origin, probably. Possibly related to fly.
CowperKettle
CowperKettle
15:55
@Cerberus Curious. So it's always "Good morning", said he. And never "Good morning", he said
Cerberus
Cerberus
@CowperKettle Goedemorgen, zei hij.
Goedemorgen, hij zei this would just be wrong in every way.
People would ask, hij zei wat?
The object is missing.
A normal Dutch pattern is this:
> Hij was boos. (He was angry.)
> Vanmorgen was hij boos. (He was angry this morning.)
Basically if anything comes before the subject (except some conjunctions and some special cases), subject and verb must be inverted.
CowperKettle
CowperKettle
In Russian, '"Good morning", he said' also looks weird. I would strongly prefer "said he".
Cerberus
Cerberus
Ah!
Could this be some Indo-European pattern?
CowperKettle
CowperKettle
I never thought of this before.
Cerberus
Cerberus
Word order is 'invisible'.
So we rarely think about it except when it's wrong.
CowperKettle
CowperKettle
16:14
> That what we have we prize not to the worth
Whiles we enjoy it, but being lack'd and lost,
Why, then we rack the value, then we find
The virtue that possession would not show us
Whiles it was ours.
Cerberus
Cerberus
Indeed.
CowperKettle
CowperKettle
@MichaelRybkin Not water, but whatever it takes ))
Michael Rybkin
Michael Rybkin
16:37
Thank you. Sounds like it. She's a British speaker, I think. She's not a nonnative speaker.
CowperKettle
CowperKettle
Where was a 60s movie, "Kes!", in which I could not understand almost anything without subtitles, their British accent was so thick))
Michael Rybkin
Michael Rybkin
Yes, I do try to use exact timing when posting YouTube links here. For some reason, sometimes I mistype things and they get lost.
Cerberus
Cerberus
@MichaelRybkin It does not sound like a native accent to me.
Probably Slavic.
Michael Rybkin
Michael Rybkin
That could be it.
Mitch
Mitch
16:56
@Cerberus @MichaelRybkin There's a mix of accents by the translators, some really good American accents (with only a few non-American sounds), and then this woman that has very understandable but still Slavic colored accent. But yes as Cerb said, 'whatever it takes' is what she is saying
@MichaelRybkin the timing was in the link you gave but it also started at the beginning for me when I played it. I blame ... Youtube?
@jlliagre '"..." said he." sounds either old-fashioned or dialectical. But note that there is a difference between reported speech in a novel and what people say to each other in real life.
Cerberus
Cerberus
@Mitch You have a strange intuition there.
Mitch
Mitch
by dialectical... local British accents, I can't think of an American one that does that.
Cerberus
Cerberus
Not everyone writes like you.
Mitch
Mitch
@Cerberus It could be the pronoun. I'm having a hard time bringing up in my mind how it's done naturally in English novels.
Cerberus
Cerberus
Maybe read more?
Mitch
Mitch
17:02
@Cerberus Certainly. But that is the case for everyone.
@MichaelRybkin Oh I see now. YOu had an '@' before the 't=56s' parameter, but the correct syntax is '...&t=56s'
> “We are not in a way to know what Mr. Bingley likes,” said her mother resentfully...
Jane Austen. Sounds oldfashioned to me.
user image
Ignore the weird spike
Cerberus
Cerberus
Do stops even work there?
Mitch
Mitch
For the most part 'he said.' (he said at the end of a sentence) is more popular than "said he."
Cerberus
Cerberus
And I thought quotation marks were an error?
Mitch
Mitch
@Cerberus Yes on Google NGrams. NOt on regular google search
Cerberus
Cerberus
I would not at all draw any conclusions based on that Google page.
Mitch
Mitch
17:12
It's just a hint. We'd have to do more to confirm (like look at the results
Cerberus
Cerberus
Or just read Fowler.
Mitch
Mitch
(but for some reason NGrams is not giving hits to look at there when it usually does)
@Cerberus Fowler? Isn't he some old dude?
Cerberus
Cerberus
Mistake: those links NEVER show what Google's graph is based on. The results from Google Books are unrelated to the Ngrams data query!
They work very differently.
@Mitch The best style guide.
Mitch
Mitch
@Cerberus ?? Google books -is- the NGrams repository
Cerberus
Cerberus
A good style guide can actually help people write better, as opposed to statistics.
@Mitch No!
They use the same source material.
But the database is different.
Mitch
Mitch
17:15
@Cerberus Right, the same corpus
how are the corpus and the database different?
or source?
Cerberus
Cerberus
One thing is puntcuation.
But there is a ton more, not all of which known.
The results you get in Books are NOT the results that Ngram uses.
But, if you don't know this, you will never find out, because the databases behind both are secret.
In other words, the results you get in Books tell you little about the hidden results that Ngram finds in its index.
Mitch
Mitch
@Cerberus That still doesn't make sense to me. 'results' are what you get from the 'source'. The source data (what I am calling 'corpus') is what NGrams searches on and what Google Books searches on.
Cerberus
Cerberus
You are confusing corpus with database.
The corpus may be a database, but there are different search databases, indices.
Mitch
Mitch
@Cerberus You can download a lot of stuff from NGrams (their entire index of ngrams for n = 2 through 5)
Cerberus
Cerberus
Ngram indexes the corpus in one way, and processes your query in a certain way.
Books indexes the corpus in a different way, resulting in a different (hidden) database, and your query is processed in a different way, giving you different results, sometimes very different.
Mitch
Mitch
17:20
@Cerberus OK. I don't know that the database index is different between Books and NGrams (and everything they say on the google Books website and NGrams leads me to believe that they are the same.
Cerberus
Cerberus
Nope.
We found this out many years ago.
Mitch
Mitch
@Cerberus hidden dtabase? that's a strange hypothesis to make.
That's not how databases work
Cerberus
Cerberus
The very fact that you do not get results for punctuation in Books should make that clear enough.
You do NOT get the same results.
Mitch
Mitch
But can we agree it's the same set of source text?
Cerberus
Cerberus
Yes.
tchrist
tchrist
17:22
Quotative inversion is somewhat less common with pronominal subjects, but it is still the literary standard, pace violations from the New Yorker magazine.
languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=1848
literalminded.wordpress.com/2007/08/31/…
Cerberus
Cerberus
Yeah.
Mitch
Mitch
nice thanks
@Cerberus "...said Jane." sounds fine to me, but "... said he." does not.
tchrist
tchrist
onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/synt.12121
Mitch
Mitch
Is that a strange intuition?
'said he.' is what sounds old-fashioned to me.
Cerberus
Cerberus
Yes, strange.
Read less Twitter!
tchrist
tchrist
17:26
Try this one for quothatative inversions.
Cerberus
Cerberus
Another difference is that Books does not index capitalisation.
And there is this:
> Unlike the 2019 Ngram Viewer corpus, the Google Books corpus isn't part-of-speech tagged. One can't search for, say, the verb form of cheer in Google Books. So any ngrams with part-of-speech tags (e.g., cheer_VERB) are excluded from the table of Google Books searches.

The Ngram Viewer has 2009, 2012, and 2019 corpora, but Google Books doesn't work that way. When you're searching in Google Books, you're searching all the currently available books, so there may be some differences between what you see in Google Books and what you would expect to see given the Ngram Viewer chart.
And there are other ways in which your will get different results.
You just cannot use Google Books to prove that results from Ngram are convincing.
Ngram also has various weird artefacts that you'd never have thought of, and that you'll never see, because you don't see the actual results. Everything might look fine when you search for the same query in Google Books, but that proves nothing.
Mitch
Mitch
You seem to not care for NGrams.
tchrist
tchrist
Lies, damned lies, and statistics.
Popularity breeds contempt.
Cerberus
Cerberus
@Mitch It can be useful, but it is very limited.
In so many ways that people to do realise.
And which I do not know either.
Whenever I post a screenshot of it, I feel disingenuous...
Mitch
Mitch
And you prefer instances from Google Books?
Cerberus
Cerberus
17:31
It works better to support some hypotheses than others.
@Mitch There you can look at the context. That changes everything.
But I would not trust any numbers from Books, no.
Mitch
Mitch
(Usually) you can look at the result of NGrams.
Cerberus
Cerberus
Waaaahh no!
Or, if you have found a way, I'd like to see it.
Mitch
Mitch
So you don't trust either of those sources? (I'm humoring you here, I consider them the same source)
tchrist
tchrist
Written English is not every twitterer's strength.
Cerberus
Cerberus
@Mitch That is an odd statement.
You must use the tools at your disposal in ways that suit them.
tchrist
tchrist
17:33
> Quotative inversion
In literature, subject-verb inversion occurs with verbs that attribute speech to a character. The inversion follows an instance of direct speech that typically occurs in quotation marks:[5]

a. "We are going to win," Bill said.
b. "We are going to win," said Bill. - Quotative inversion
c. *"We are going to win," said he. - Quotative inversion less likely with weak subject pronoun
a. "What was the problem?" Larry asked.
b. "What was the problem?" asked Larry. - Quotative inversion
Mitch
Mitch
One attempts to give corpus statistics and the other gives instances. Both problematic.
Cerberus
Cerberus
You cannot use Ngram to prove something, in most cases where I see people try to do so.
@Mitch Real corpus searches have both.
Though on a much smaller scale.
Mitch
Mitch
The bigger the source data, the more reliable the statistics.
@tchrist what was the source of this?
Cerberus
Cerberus
But they lack the combination that real corpus search has.
It is typically Google.
Mitch
Mitch
@Cerberus what combination?
Cerberus
Cerberus
17:37
Statistics and context.
Mitch
Mitch
What do you mean by context?
Cerberus
Cerberus
Being able to see the context of each instance.
Read the paragraph in which each instance of a result was found.
As in Books.
Ngram does not let you do that.
In addition, its corpus is not properly checked the way professional corpora are.
tchrist
tchrist
@Mitch Some anonymous yahoo. You have to dip into the professional literature for more.
Cerberus
Cerberus
So the quality is not always good, of the statistics in Ngram.
Mitch
Mitch
@Cerberus results from NGrams in context - use links at the bottom
tchrist
tchrist
17:40
onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/synt.12121
Oh I did that one already. There are others.
Mitch
Mitch
That doesn't always work (see my screen shot from before where no links are given).
Cerberus
Cerberus
@Mitch It seems I have not made myself clear.
The links to Google Books do NOT show you the results that Ngram uses for its graph.
See above.
tchrist
tchrist
scholar.google.com/…
Mitch
Mitch
@tchrist While wikipedia is not necessarily reliable, I can at least agree with the examples that you gave with respect to 'acceptablitity'. "said he" is weird to me but the others OK. And that's how this all started, with Cerb's reply being that that intuition was strange.
@Cerberus OK. I don't find that to be something that makes me disregard either, and I don't think of it as an important difference.
@Cerberus There are a lot of caveats for sure.
Cerberus
Cerberus
@Mitch That is a mistake.
You must use the right tool for the right job.
Mitch
Mitch
17:45
There are lots of dating errors. and weird artifacts (like that weird bump in "he said." in the 2000's.
Cerberus
Cerberus
If you ever find a way to display results from Ngrams, let me know.
That would greatly improve their usefulness.
But I think Google does not allow it because it would burden their servers too much.
Books probably has a much smaller index.
Since you get far fewer results.
So it's easier to process and display.
Mitch
Mitch
I only use NGrams as a convincing part of an argument if there are orders of magnitude difference. (I was expecting he said and said he to be about the same, but he said was hugely more frequent than said he. Not a proof, but a good push in the direction I was trying to show.
@Cerberus I gave you a link to an example that does just that.
sometimes the links show, sometimes they don't, I don't know why. That is a problem with NGrams UI.
Cerberus
Cerberus
@Mitch I must somehow be wrong, but the impression I get is that you have not read my repeated assertion that Books and Ngrams do not give the same results.
Mitch
Mitch
@Cerberus The job was 'Show Cerb that I'm not strange in my intuition about "said he."
And so I guess you're right, it failed miserably in that.
Cerberus
Cerberus
I have also posted a quotation from Google itself saying they are not the same in several different ways.
Mitch
Mitch
17:49
Did the wikipedia page that @thrist quoted convince you?
tchrist
tchrist
books.google.com/ngrams/…
Cerberus
Cerberus
And yet you keep saying that they are the same.
So I don't think I have more to say at the moment.
Mitch
Mitch
(convince you that I am not strange, that is. You can certainly say that 'said he' is preferred or prescribed and I wouldn't be able t argue against that.
Cerberus
Cerberus
If you think that "said he" is wrong or strange, then, yes, I find that strange.
But to each his own.
You write as you like it.
Just don't be surprised to see other people use it.
tchrist
tchrist
user image
Mitch
Mitch
17:51
Here is what I said:
52 mins ago, by Mitch
@jlliagre '"..." said he." sounds either old-fashioned or dialectical. But note that there is a difference between reported speech in a novel and what people say to each other in real life.
tchrist
tchrist
It's a written form, says me.
Mitch
Mitch
@Cerberus So you disagree with the wikipedia excerpt? (in terms of acceptability?
tchrist
tchrist
It's not "dialectal" nor "dialectical". It's literary English, a dialect with which you may little lorry have.
Cerberus
Cerberus
I haven't seen Wikipedia.
Mitch
Mitch
The part that tchrist exceprted above.
Cerberus
Cerberus
17:53
I agree that it is more frequent in English overall with a name rather than a pronoun.
Mitch
Mitch
20 mins ago, by tchrist
> Quotative inversion
In literature, subject-verb inversion occurs with verbs that attribute speech to a character. The inversion follows an instance of direct speech that typically occurs in quotation marks:[5]

a. "We are going to win," Bill said.
b. "We are going to win," said Bill. - Quotative inversion
c. *"We are going to win," said he. - Quotative inversion less likely with weak subject pronoun
a. "What was the problem?" Larry asked.
b. "What was the problem?" asked Larry. - Quotative inversion
Cerberus
Cerberus
But old fashioned is your judgement.
tchrist
tchrist
The asterisk is improperly used.
Cerberus
Cerberus
Or dialectical.
@tchrist I agree.
Mitch
Mitch
@tchrist Probably should be a '?'
Cerberus
Cerberus
17:55
No, it is completely fine and normal.
Though I'm sure you'll find it less in Whatsapp speak.
Mitch
Mitch
It sounds like Popeye or L'il Abner "He sez I'm fat sez he"
Cerberus
Cerberus
Just read something nice.
Mitch
Mitch
@Cerberus I feel Twitter and WhatsApp are being used as aspersions!
tchrist
tchrist
> 'Where was I?' said the landlord, pausing and snapping his fingers. 'Ah, yes! Old Gandalf. Three months back he walked right into my room without a knock. Barley, he says, I'm off in the morning.

Will you do something for me? You've only to name it, I said. I'm in a hurry, said he, and I've no time myself, but I want a message took to the Shire. Have you anyone you can send, and trust to go? I can find someone, I said, tomorrow, maybe, or the day after. Make it tomorrow, he says, and then he gave me a letter.
Cerberus
Cerberus
@Mitch I suppose so.
Mitch
Mitch
17:58
@Cerberus That seems out of character for you.
tchrist
tchrist
> He ceased, but at once Boromir stood up, tall and proud, before them. Give me leave, Master Elrond, said he, first to say more of Gondor; for verily from the land of Gondor I am come. And it would be well for all to know what passes there. For few, I deem, know of our deeds, and therefore guess little of their peril, if we should fail at last.
Cerberus
Cerberus
@Mitch Really?
Mitch
Mitch
Yes
Cerberus
Cerberus
I love Twitter and think it is the pinnacle of modern literature.
tchrist
tchrist
Written on the bathroom stalls, and tenement halls.
Mitch
Mitch
18:01
@Cerberus You have no idea!
Cerberus
Cerberus
I'd like to keep it that way.
Mitch
Mitch
@Cerberus I wouldn't dream of trying to convince you otherwise.
Well
maybe I could dream
but I'd keep the dream to myself
no one likes to hear other people's dreams
unless
I mean if it's a good story
or involves people I know about.
Cerberus
Cerberus
You shall dream of Trump.
He is the epitome of Twitter.
Mitch
Mitch
@Cerberus He's not on Twitter
Cerberus
Cerberus
So?
Mitch
Mitch
18:10
But I do agree that he might be considered its epitome
@Cerberus That can only be considered a curse
user4539917
user4539917
18:22
Would that, sir @Cerberus, make Trump the pinnacle of modern literature?
Cerberus
Cerberus
Apparently so.
user4539917
user4539917
Seems ironic..
Cerberus
Cerberus
So it might.
user4539917
user4539917
Modern irony.
Post pandemic irony
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post-irony?wprov=sfla1
Cerberus
Cerberus
18:48
@user4539917 Hmm it is my impression that American mass-media always try to make their irony super obvious, and are confused when it isn't.
user4539917
user4539917
That's my impression also. I think the British prefer a more subtle sarcastic irony.
Cerberus
Cerberus
Indeed, and so do most cultures I know.
I think part of the difference is the degree of commercialism and puritanism.
user4539917
user4539917
Big business meets Big religion = Big politics
Cerberus
Cerberus
Yeah.
user4539917
user4539917
In Texas they like everything Big.
> Because everything IS bigger in Texas. The trucks, the hats, the cows... a five-minute conversation takes twenty-six minutes...
Cerberus
Cerberus
19:02
Fun.
user4539917
user4539917
TIL
10 hours ago, by user4539917
Time has no meaning at the North Pole
I guess I never really thought about it...
tchrist
tchrist
19:20
0
A: What is the origin of several pronunciations of "the"?

tchristWeak Forms vs Strong Forms The is not special in this regard, and it has no unique pronunciation history of its own. You just have to know when to use its weak form and when to use its strong form, something we see all over English with many, many other words like this. The Wikipedia article ment...

Robusto
Robusto
@Cerberus Good one. I Your ears are better than mine, apparently.
tchrist
tchrist
The asker is obsessed with English spelling, but really does not understand English pronunciation.
And she keeps asking the same sorts of questions that attempt to connect the two deductively in ways that make no sense.
I bet she needs to spend more time with the Pink Panther.
So she doesn't sound like a rowbought.
Cerberus
Cerberus
@Robusto More like mood and luck, I think.
tchrist
tchrist
@user4539917 Yet its antipodal station runs on Kiwi time, oddly enough.
user4539917
user4539917
Indeed, sir.
tchrist
tchrist
19:30
I wonder how the 180 degrees East thing works out.
Amundsen–Scott South Pole Station
The Amundsen–Scott South Pole Station is the United States scientific research station at the South Pole of the Earth. It is the southernmost point under the jurisdiction (not sovereignty) of the United States. The station is located on the high plateau of Antarctica at 2,835 metres (9,301 ft) above sea level. It is administered by the Office of Polar Programs of the National Science Foundation, specifically the United States Antarctic Program (USAP). It is named in honor of Norwegian Roald Amundsen and Briton Robert F. Scott, who led separate teams that raced to become the first to the pole in...
If you're at 90 degrees North or South, don't you by definition have no East or West?
Cerberus
Cerberus
None, indeed.
tchrist
tchrist
> Location of Amundsen–Scott Station at the South Pole in Antarctica
Coordinates: 90.0000°S 180.0000°E
Confuses me.
user4539917
user4539917
I think the definitions create meaningless questions when you're at the poles of the Earth, sir. As Hawking says, asking "What is North of the north pole?"
tchrist
tchrist
The stars.
user4539917
user4539917
What is North of the north star?
Cerberus
Cerberus
19:36
North or above?
user4539917
user4539917
The direction "North."
Cerberus
Cerberus
Is the pole star northerner than the north pole?
user4539917
user4539917
The north star is the star you travel towards if you want to go North.
Cerberus
Cerberus
Indeed.
user4539917
user4539917
But once you get to the north star, "North" has no meaning.
At the poles the 24 time zones converge to a single point.
What time zone are you in has no meaning.
Robusto
Robusto
19:52
55
Q: Should we allow Google NGrams to be presented as statistical evidence without qualification? Should we define a set of standards for their usage?

Robusto "There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics." — Benjamin Disraeli, attr. by Mark Twain "If you torture the data long enough, it will confess." — Ronald Coase For some time now, contributors to EL&U have offered NGrams in support of their arguments. Now, there is nothi...

discussion ngrams
user4539917
user4539917
If you torture the data long enough, it will confess to anything
iirc
Robusto
Robusto
OK, OK, I confess.
user4539917
user4539917
:D
Robusto
Robusto
I edited the post.
And blamed you for it.
user4539917
user4539917
thnx
 
1 hour later…
M.A.R.
M.A.R.
21:08
If you gather data about torture, he will fish for life.
Cerberus
Cerberus
@Robusto Right!
M.A.R.
M.A.R.
Fool me twice, I will confess to anything

« first day (4356 days earlier)      last day (861 days later) »