English Language & Usage: Multi-Layered Discourse Room

alphabet

00:08

"Upset the order of things" in what way? Changing peoples' minds? Causing interpersonal drama?

"Shuffle the deck" and "change the game" might be what you're thinking of.

CowperKettle

> Fine-tuned Meta Code Llama outperforms GPT-4 in key benchmark. In the first run, the fine-tuned standard and Python models scored 67.6 and 69.5 percent, respectively. OpenAI's GPT-4 scored 67 percent on the same benchmark when it was released in March. the-decoder.com/…

AI has improved its programming skills by .6%

alphabet

00:38

^ sorry, above was supposed to respond to @s.H.a.R.p.R.i.F.t

Robusto

01:27

Daily Sequence Octordle #579
5️⃣6️⃣
7️⃣8️⃣
9️⃣🔟
🕚🕛
Score: 68

CowperKettle

02:04

Word of the morn: anther (A stamen typically consists of a stalk called the filament and an anther which contains microsporangia)

CowperKettle

03:27

Блакитна Панна, пісня - ПИРІГ І БАТІГ, вірші - Микола Вороний, текст. Концерт.

►

A 1912 poem Blue Lady (dedicated to Spring) by Ukrainian poet Mykola Voronyi put to music

This reminds me of E.A. Poe somewhy.

> In 1938 he was executed in Odesa by the NKVD troika on accusations of belonging to the Ukrainian militarist and nationalist organization.

Maybe the poem reminds me of some meter used by Edgar Allan Poe

A nice poem, I'm trying to decipher it. Some words are a bit dated.

The text of the poem is here: ukrlib.com.ua/books/printit.php?tid=4505

I feel like EA Poe used a similar meter, but I can't put my finger on it.

> Hear the sledges with the bells—
Silver bells

> Має крилами Весна
Запашна

Vikas

05:44

> By a landslide, America is the most polluting country in the world. Carbon Brief's data shows that the US has generated a staggering 509.1 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide since 1850, almost 225 billion tonnes more than China.

USA is at top here also.

Top three countries are USA, Russia, China who don't like each other. So this problem will be hard to solve.

CowperKettle

05:59

Maybe humanity should drastically curb air travel and private car ownership, in favor of rail travel, and maybe dirigibles.

Criminalize the use of plastic for disposable household items.

Otherwise, we are dooming today's children to a very harsh life.

CowperKettle

06:34

Xanne

07:42

Wordle 799 5/6

🟨⬜⬜⬜🟩
⬜⬜🟩⬜🟨
⬜⬜🟨🟨⬜
🟩⬜🟩🟩🟩
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩lpp

Xanne

08:40

@alphabet SE seems to me to be an almost entirely negative, cautionary kind of medium with little enthusiasm for what different people may have to offer. If you like to be criticized scolded, admonished, put down, denigrated, etc. this is for you. And then someone says “Remember this great code of conduct we wrote and be nice!”. Not even the bots are courteous.

I don’t think most people here even know how do write something of varying degrees of encouragement vs. criticism.

CowperKettle

08:59

> Machine-learning system based on light could yield more powerful, efficient large language models. MIT system demonstrates greater than 100-fold improvement in energy efficiency and a 25-fold improvement in compute density compared with current systems. news.mit.edu/2023/…

Some more AI hype

M.A.R.

@Xanne you have impossible standards for an interactive online medium

IME the 'friendlier' places are either private, I.e. not everyone can participate, or are quickly dragged down by people who can't contribute much and are not told off

@Vikas USA! USA!

@CowperKettle this brings back horrible memories

CowperKettle

@M.A.R. Memories of school biology lessons?

M.A.R.

Plant anatomy is generally very uninteresting

CowperKettle

@M.A.R. Word of the day: Eternal September

M.A.R.

@CowperKettle exxxactly

jlliagre

09:17

Wordle 799 5/6

🟩⬜⬜⬜⬜
⬜⬜🟨🟨⬜
⬜⬜🟨⬜⬜
🟩🟩🟩🟩⬜
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

#waffle583 2/5

🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩
🟩⭐🟩⬜🟩
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩
🟩⬜🟩⭐🟩
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

🔥 streak: 21
🏆 #waffleelite
wafflegame.net

Dannyu NDos

11:53

Hi everyone.

My native language is Korean, and I'm very fluent in English.

Yet I've come up with a concern about English today.

It's my R-colored vowels. I cannot pinpoint mine as neither British nor American.

To analyze them: NURSE [nɚːs], START [stɑʕt], NORTH [noɻθ], FORCE [foɻs], NEAR [nɪə], SQUARE [skʷɛa], and CURE [kʲʉɹ].

I dunno how (nor why) they've become like this, but which dialect of English would they be analyzed/judged into?

Robusto

12:13

#Worldle #583 2/6 (100%)
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟨↖️
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🎉
⭐⭐⭐🪙
https://worldle.teuteuf.fr

🌎 Aug 27, 2023 🌍
🔥 12 | Avg. Guesses: 4.37
🟥🟩 = 2

globle-game.com
#globle

Wordle 799 5/6

🟨⬛⬛🟨⬛
⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛
⬛⬛⬛🟨⬛
🟩⬛🟩🟩🟩
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

jlliagre

12:43

#Worldle #583 1/6 (100%)
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🎉
⭐⭐⭐
https://worldle.teuteuf.fr

🌎 Aug 27, 2023 🌍
🔥 1 | Avg. Guesses: 6.36
🟥🟥🟥🟥🟥🟥🟩 = 7

globle-game.com
#globle

Robusto

@jlliagre I had a brain cramp at first.

Daily Quordle 580
7️⃣5️⃣
4️⃣6️⃣
m-w.com/games/quordle/

Robusto

13:12

Daily Octordle #580
🕐🔟
8️⃣9️⃣
7️⃣🕚
6️⃣5️⃣
Score: 69

jlliagre

13:36

@Robusto Last time I visited that country, it was a different one.

Daily Octordle #580
9️⃣8️⃣
7️⃣🔟
5️⃣🕛
6️⃣🕚
Score: 68

Mitch

International Phonetic Alphabet chart for English dialects

This chart shows the most common applications of the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) to represent English language pronunciations. See Pronunciation respelling for English for phonetic transcriptions used in different dictionaries. AmE, American English AuE, Australian English BahE, Bahamian English BarE, Barbadian English CaE, Canadian English CIE, Channel Island English EnE, English English FiE, Fiji English InE, Indian English IrE, Irish English JSE, Jamaican English NZE, New Zealand English PaE, Palauan English ScE, Scottish English SIE, Solomon Islands English SAE, South African English...

That's my.favorite place to distinguish accents.

jlliagre

Daily Quordle 580
🟥4️⃣
7️⃣6️⃣
m-w.com/games/quordle/

Mitch

@DannyuNDos Of course there are multiple ways to IPA the same vowels

But what you've said of yourself, it looks like you are rhotics except for NEAR and SQUARE.

and that really doesn't fit exactly in the chart.

I think most dialects are either all rhotic or all non-rhotic

In the chart you'll notice that '(r)' seems to mean there is -some- slight r color, or that some speakers are thotic and some not. I would take it to mean that the sound is pretty much non-rhotic.

One more doubt about the chart... I don't know how reliable it is given that there are two columns for Mid-Atlantic. That just seems weird.

Back to rhotic vs non, most speakers in the UK from whatever historic area are non rhotic (rhotic dialect areas, while maintaining vowel differences have been dropping their R's since the 1950's

And most American accents are rhotic. (When I say 'most' I really want to say 'all' but out of scientific politeness I hold back a bit)

So you really can say AmE is rhotic and BrE not and be mostly correct

So that's a lot to say, I don't think it would be easy to find a regional or other accent that is non-rhotic for two lexical sets out of the 8 that are R colored.

jlliagre

Non-native pronunciations of English

Non-native pronunciations of English result from the common linguistic phenomenon in which non-native speakers of any language tend to transfer the intonation, phonological processes and pronunciation rules of their first language into their English speech. They may also create innovative pronunciations not found in the speaker's native language. == Overview == Non-native English speakers may pronounce words differently due to not having fully mastered English pronunciation. This can happen either because they apply the speech rules of their mother tongue to English ("interference") or through...

Mitch

@DannyuNDos But you should look at all those columns (the last eight rows) and see which one matches best

If you are looking for how to match which one you -should try to emulate, I'd go for GenAmE which is strongly rhotic, or contemporary RP.

I have no idea what EnE is... (Yes it's English English but that's not what anybody uses, they just say BrE)

Mitch

14:12

@jlliagre this is the case for all languages

Ie English doesn't have a monopoly on this process

English does have an overwhelming majority on Wikipedia though

alphabet

15:08

@Mitch What you really want is likely "Estuary English" (EE), the version most common in London nowadays. But I'm not totally sure.

@Mitch EnE is "English English," i.e. the dialects spoken in England; BrE also includes dialects spoken in Scotland and Wales, being parts of Britain but not England.

There are several differences between EE and RP; e.g. in EE the "PRICE" vowel starts further back and the "SQUARE" vowel is a monophthong.

Mitch

15:24

@alphabet no not at all. Estuary English is a very particular British dialect. Since @DannyuNDos is concerned about his personal difference between AmE and BrE then he is probably concerned with sounding 'like most people's or a 'favored' variety, and Estuary English is definitely not that. It is considered an east London/Essex lower class accent.

alphabet

@Mitch Ah, never mind. Contemporary RP it is.

Mitch

@alphabet the term English English sounds like it was made up by someone from Kent who really wanted to say 'real English' without knowing what linguists call it.

I don't know for sure but I doubt that English English is an accepted term. Just because it's in Wikipedia don't make it true.

@alphabet I have imagine the RP 'square' 'our' 'are' are all monophthings.

Cerberus

@Mitch It is called the King's English.

M.A.R.

16:36

@DannyuNDos do you converse with native speakers on a daily basis? If not, like the rest of us NNS, your idiolect consists of a mish-mash of whatever you've heard pronounced on various media, likely to be in at least half a dozen accents

CowperKettle

16:47

#Worldle #583 1/6 (100%)
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🎉
⭐⭐🪙
https://worldle.teuteuf.fr

alphabet

17:05

@M.A.R. This depends on whether your goal is to be comprehensible or to sound like a native speaker. The latter is, of course, much more difficult and I don't think most EFL students/teachers really aim for it.

(English, of course, almost certainly has some sounds that your native language doesn't and will be inordinately difficult to learn entirely correctly.)

I do get a sense that EFL teachers tend to teach something closer to British English, but that they also strongly prioritize writing over speech anyway.

CowperKettle

> Combining immunotherapy with KRAS inhibitor led to complete eradication of pancreatic cancer in mouse models. KRAS mutations occur in over 40% of pancreatic cancer cases. These findings are leading to the launch of a Phase I human trial.

Wow.

please give me coke

►

CowperKettle

17:32

Word of the evening: Schwinger effect (a predicted physical phenomenon whereby matter is created by a strong electric field)

alphabet

@CowperKettle The fact that her first example is "give me cigarette" (instead of "give me a cigarette") should have been a red flag

jlliagre

@Mitch It is indeed the case of all languages but unlike most other languages, English has an overwhelming amount of non native speakers, much more than native ones. Most of the people I speak English with are non native speakers and they usually have much stronger accents than native ones.

CowperKettle

Articles are very hard. I usually tell those who inquire that they should first read several books in English and only then bother about studying articles in-depth.

My friend, a successfull biology/chemistry teacher in New York, still mangles her articles.

So it's no big deal :)

alphabet

@CowperKettle I've heard that this is particularly hard for native Russian speakers; most languages don't have these, and even native speakers have trouble explaining the rules.

Cerberus

18:04

@CowperKettle Uhhh.

From what I have read, pancreatic cancer is perhaps the most deadliest kind.

If this really worked, it might be great progress.

M.A.R.

19:17

@CowperKettle when we're talking immunotherapy, we're either talking "are you taking me for a moron" expensive or "just kill me now" expensive.

And not guaranteed to be effective either, if it's cancer vaccines, for example.

@alphabet adopting various accents you mean? I'm fairly certain sounding like a native speaker is impossible without daily, even hourly conversation with a bunch of you guys.

Of course, I think I'm fluent enough to discuss complicated subjects verbally. It's just I probably will sound like a dozen Hollywood actors all at once for a few weeks.

@CowperKettle caveat emptor, animal cancer experiments tend to be unusually optimistic IMlimitedE

KRAS inhibition is not new for colorectal cancer, so I guess this immunotherapy is the novel method in these trials?

@CowperKettle but Russian has no article comrade.

They've always felt sort of natural for me, meaning I always get flustered when faced with article questions. Though I suppose that's partly because ESL practice problems generally suck.

Mitch

20:34

@Cerberus yes. The queen, on the other hand, PBUH...

@jlliagre true. I bet though that French (in former colonies) and Hindi (in non Hindi India, which could include nominally Hindu speakers but whose home language is an almost unintelligible variety) both are at the same scale of number of NNSs as English. (I'm sure there's a wiki page that gives (questionable) numbers.)

jlliagre

21:11

@Mitch Right, but not that much outside these languages historical areas while English is used globally. I work with people from Finland, Slovenia, Romania, Greece, Germany, the Netherlands, Korea, Egypt, Turkey and other countries and we all communicate in English, or at least we believe so ;-) Even when working with Spanish, Columbian or Italian colleagues, I have to insist for them to use their own language.

s.H.a.R.p.R.i.F.t

21:29

@alphabet Basically rattling everyone's cage to attract attention and cause awareness about something. Thanks!

Mitch

@jlliagre got it.

s.H.a.R.p.R.i.F.t

In my world many native French speakers speak English in the business, because of the coast to coast nature of some of these. Typical features include not pronouncing (enough or at all) the final of 3SG verbs, and many Gallicisms, plus completely off syllable emphasis.

Were we to ask English native speakers to speak French, the results would be unbearable lolll.

Lesser evils.

jlliagre

21:45

@s.H.a.R.p.R.i.F.t Yes, I vote to suppress this useless third person S!

s.H.a.R.p.R.i.F.t

@jlliagre Bon chance!

jlliagre

Heh, tu quoque!

s.H.a.R.p.R.i.F.t

...Son, this is the way. haha.

jlliagre