English Language & Usage: Multi-Layered Discourse Room

Cerberus

00:00

Women being extorted by means of a friend's naked pictures to provide the extortionist with naked pictures of themselves.

CC Inc

'Ello guys

I know you missed me

I have a question:

"(Before we could travel abroad), we had to get our passports"?
What verb does it describe? (the clause)

Cerberus

Hi.

I don't understand.

What is "describe"?

CC Inc

What verb does the adverbial subordinate clause modify?

Cerberus

Depends on your model. Traditionally, it modifies the main verbal phrase of the main clause.

So had to get.

But it is perhaps better to say that it modifies the main clause as a whole.

It describes the time at which we had to get our passports took place.

CC Inc

Yes, which is what I am confused about

I am sure my teacher wants something specific but I can't tell what

Cerberus

00:08

If he/she asks for a verb, I would give the verbal phrase had to get.

CC Inc

OK, thank you.

Cerberus

Good luck!

tchrist

01:12

@RegDwighт That one is easy:

macbook# perl -le 'print chr(8203)' | uniquote -v
\N{ZERO WIDTH SPACE}

tchrist

01:24

@RegDwighт The thing that nobody remembers is that it is a non-whitespace control character, not a whitespace character.

macbook# uniprops --perl --negated 'ZERO WIDTH SPACE'
U+200B ‹U+200B› \N{ZERO WIDTH SPACE}
    \pC \p{Cf}
    \W \S \D \H \V

I’d’ve said it was being used as a ZWNJ-type thing, but that occurs earlier in the string.

`macbook# uniprops 'ZERO WIDTH SPACE'  'ZWNJ'
U+200B ‹U+200B› \N{ZERO WIDTH SPACE}
    \pC \p{Cf}
    All Any Assigned InGeneralPunctuation C Other Case_Ignorable CI Cf Format Changes_When_NFKC_Casefolded
       CWKCF Common Zyyy Default_Ignorable_Code_Point DI General_Punctuation Graph Print X_POSIX_Graph
       X_POSIX_Print
U+200C ‹U+200C› \N{ZERO WIDTH NON-JOINER}
    \pC \p{Cf}
    All Any Assigned InGeneralPunctuation C Other Case_Ignorable CI Cf Format Changes_When_NFKC_Casefolded
       CWKCF Default_Ignorable_Code_Point DI General_Punctuation Gr_Ext Grapheme_Extend Graph GrExt Inhe…

So it seems that C♯ has gone the dumb Java route of allowing unrecognized characters by default instead of rejecting them. That is really a stupid idea.

I’m exaggerating, but it has something to do with the \p{Default_Ignorable_Code_Point} issue. They take it to extremes.

But why the hell those change when NFKD-casefolded I have NFclue.

Robusto

01:40

@Cerberus No wonder he's messed up. His parents named him Karen.

@BlessedGeek: We're all about "tough love" here. — Robusto 10 secs ago

@Cerberus: hAROLD REX INTERFECTVS EST

tchrist

03:19

Tee hee, too hoo:

24

A: Why no honeypot suggested edits?

We've rolled out audit tasks for suggested edits in our more recent builds. What we're doing here is actually kind of fun. They're also sometimes hilarious. Since we know suggested edits have really noisy history, the approach we use for other queues (selecting "known good" or "known bad" con...

> Instead we're building a super simple model (basically a Porter Stemmer + Markov Chains**) of a few thousand posts per-site, and using that to create "looks OK at a glance, but deeply flawed" audit edits. Thus "involve boy code machines".

“Boy code”?

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

03:41

@Cerberus Not upgrading office is nothing at all like not installing security updates for Windows XP.

Oh and @Cerberus I have placed an order for the Nexus 4.

Mahnax

05:04

theverge.com/2013/1/29/3929110/surface-pro-disk-space-windows-8

> Microsoft's 64GB Surface Pro will only have 23GB usable storage

That's embarrassing.

tchrist

05:32

It is inconceivable that an operating system could take 41 GIGA-bytes.

aedia λ

It sounds like half of it might be a recovery partition, but who puts a recovery partition on a tablet?

tchrist

You mean a duplicate copy of the entire Microsoft software distribution?

aedia λ

Yes.

tchrist

How . . . unpleasant.

aedia λ

I am on my phone and should be sleeping, but can't, due to a head cold; apologies for terseness.

Yeah. I don't know why they would do that to the poor tablet.

tchrist

05:52

They have no sense of propriety, proportion, or taste.

aedia λ

It makes sense in some way, but it will probably help like three people ever.

Mahnax

@tchrist I do not think it means what you think it means.

@aediaλ Aww, I hope you feel better soon.

Mme Pomfrey could probably fix you right up.

aedia λ

@Mahnax Thanks.

Mahnax

Hmm, funny. I think that is the same tablet that froze during its unveiling.

aedia λ

I should try the attempting-to-sleep thing again rather than the looking at the phone bit. That's probably not working. But at least it has stopped me ripping my sinuses out of my face, so yeah.

Mahnax

06:05

OK. Well, good luck with sleeping.

aedia λ

I wish you all pleasant dreams free of congestion and oppressively large operating systems.

Thanks!

Mahnax

I wish you the same thing!

Mohit

08:44

@Mahnax Microsoft has officially said that the backup partition is the reason behind that much space being used up. Once users back their system up to an external drive, they can remove the partition

@Mahnax Microsoft has officially said that the recovery partition is the reason behind that much space being used up. Once users back their system up to an external drive, they can remove the partition and free up lot of space.....And I also believe that this is the case with almost all of laptops but we don't notice it since the proportion of space being used up is too less than the one in this case is

Cerberus

08:58

@Mohit You're probably right.

PCs have huge hard drives, so 30 GB less is not an issue.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Congratulations!

ElendilTheTall

09:13

@Cerberus hello

Gigili

Hello.

What's a series of building called?

Jez

a block?

a complex?

a terrace?

ElendilTheTall

@Gigili any particular kind of buildings?

Gigili

A complex. That's it.

@ElendilTheTall Umm, I'm not sure. Perhaps tall buildings, is there any difference between a block and a complex?

ElendilTheTall

Block is an American term

Referring to a group of buildings bounded by a grid system of roads

Complex is a more loosely collected group of buildings

You might have a 'sports complex'

A university campus might be referred to as a 'complex'

Gigili

09:23

@ElendilTheTall There are three of them (X1, X2 and X3), and a number of blocks in each X.

OK, thanks.

Whatever it is.

ElendilTheTall

Complex sounds good

Cerberus

09:57

@ElendilTheTall Yo! Wow, I didn't realise how tall you were, until you stepped into this room.

TRiG

No fair! I want a boy code machine. — TRiG 2 mins ago

Cerberus

10:19

Hmm a boy machine.

RegDwighт

0

Q: What does it call when I see another person in the mirror when there is only me

Sometimes I look into the mirror, I find a vague vision of a woman standing behind me and when I turned my head she's gone: there is no one. How to descirbe this rare phenomena? Thanks to this I now have spectrophobia. I don't think it is haunted because I don't believe in ghosts. I am not super...

single-word-requests

Paranoia?

> I am not superstitious. I work on String theory.

Hahahahaha.

Sorry. But. Hahahahahaha.

Cerberus

Haha indeed.

That explains it, String Theory. Of course.

RegDwighт

english.stackexchange.com/posts/102264/revisions

I mean. Come on.

He rolls my edit back to add that he doesn't worship Satan?

Ah, he saw it and fixed it again.

Well, kudos to him.

I take back everything.

Cerberus

@RegDwighт WTF.

RegDwighт

Now I do have to wonder if the String theory doesn't take a the.

Cerberus

10:25

I would say "I work on String Theory".

Actually, I wouldn't.

But I would leave out the article if I had to.

RegDwighт

Well if I had to I leave second word.

Matt Эллен

10:40

with theories, if theory comes first it needs the e.g. "the theory of relativity" if theory comes after the thing, then there is no need for the, e.g. "Relativity Theory".

Cerberus

Yeah exactly.

RegDwighт

Well "no need" or "no room"?

Wiki is schizophrenic. Leaves the article out for the most part, but not always.

Matt Эллен

if someone writes "the Relativity Theory", I would suspect their nativity

you can also leave out the if you're determining the theory some other way, e.g. "Einstein's Theory of Relativity"

Cerberus

I always suspect the Nativity.

Matt Эллен

You're not The Jesus

RegDwighт

10:44

> The splitting of the two-dimensional continuum into two one-dimensional ones seems, from the point of view of the relativity theory, to be an arbitrary procedure without objective meaning.

-- THE HOLY SPIRIT AND THE PHYSICAL UNIVERSE: THE IMPACT OF SCIENTIFIC PARADIGM SHIFTS ON CONTEMPORARY PNEUMATOLOGY.

Cerberus

@MattЭллен I AM

Contemporary pneumatology.

Matt Эллен

@RegDwighт that reads weirdly to me. I don't like it.

RegDwighт

> In this context it is rewarding to note that the author supplements these novels, which are based on the relativity theory, with various "consequential data" and "workpoints," materials and paralipomena which, as he explains in a preface to the fourth volume, Clea, constitute "a number of possible ways of continuing to deploy these characters and situations in further instalments" (Author's Note).

-- The "Complementary Story": Outline of a Reader-Oriented Theory of the Novel.

Cerberus

@MattЭллен That's because we never say "relativity theory", neither with nor without the.

It would be an ugly modernism.

Matt Эллен

@Cerberus I read it, though, frequently, in New Scientist

Cerberus

10:46

Ugh.

RegDwighт

BNC: 5 relativity theories, 84 theories of relativity.

Matt Эллен

they're always talking about Relativeity Theory and String Theory and Evolutionary Theory

RegDwighт

COCA: 58 relativity theories, 5 the relativity theories, 293 theories of relativity.

Cerberus

"Relativity theory" I would read as "the complex of theories about relativity", as in "in anthropological theory, humans are considered...".

Matt Эллен

it's those blasted The American's again. Always messing up The English

hmmm

RegDwighт

10:48

@MattЭллен I feel you, bro. Life is hard in the booby hatch.

Cerberus

Just as string theory is one one, well-defined theory, I believe.

Matt Эллен

I seem to have lost spell checking in FireFox

Cerberus

It is the field of string theory, not the Theory of Strings.

RegDwighт

@Cerberus except according to wiki there are five, and then some more, and some are super.

Matt Эллен

@Cerberus if strings weren't a concrete thing, you wouldn't have a problem with that

Cerberus

10:49

@MattЭллен See, evolutionary theory is very different from the Theory of Evolution.

Or at least different.

Matt Эллен

@Cerberus not really, no

RegDwighт

No, it's even worse!

> Subsequent to this, five superstring theories were developed

Matt Эллен

:O

RegDwighт

That's five supers. Nobody has ever counted the nonsupers.

Cerberus

@RegDwighт Yeah OK, so you are referring to the whole complex of theories related to strings, not to one String Theory.

RegDwighт

10:50

off to develop a string theory. with an article. in your face

Cerberus

@MattЭллен Do you believe in Evolution Theory?

Don't tell me that sounds acceptable to you.

Matt Эллен

Evolutionary Theory I believe in

RegDwighт

@Cerberus I am not referring to anything at all!

Cerberus

@MattЭллен It is. The Theory of Evolution is a specific theory. Evolutionary theory is the field of theories concerning evolution.

Matt Эллен

which is the same as The Theory of Evolution

Robusto

10:51

►

RegDwighт

Robusto

This Jesus?

RegDwighт

This is the only string I could ever refer to.

Matt Эллен

@Robusto yes

Robusto

I think he's cracking.

Cerberus

10:51

@RegDwighт You were! By quoting.

Matt Эллен

@RegDwighт that's just thong

Robusto

I prefer Thong Theory to String Theory.

Cerberus

You're so funny.

RegDwighт

@Cerberus oh that. Sorry. Won't happen again. But still, the point is I had no idea what I was quoting.

Cerberus

@Robusto That was directed at Reg, but I might as well address it to you.

@RegDwighт Great.

RegDwighт

10:53

Cerberus

Maybe it's time to fire up your boy code.

RegDwighт

@MattЭллен no, this is a thong.

Cerberus

Or post some other non-sequitur.

Robusto

I said Thong Theory, not Banana Hammock Theory.

RegDwighт

@Robusto you needed further proof nobody cares what you say?

Cerberus

10:53

You're just jealous.

Matt Эллен

@RegDwighт you're so thong

and firebug's gone too

RegDwighт

@MattЭллен the joke hasn't worked the first time, it won't work on the twenty-first.

Robusto

@RegDwighт Then why dost thou protest so much?

Matt Эллен

@RegDwighт how about now?

RegDwighт

@Robusto because I'm a lady!

@MattЭллен more microwave oven.

And of course cowbell.

Robusto

10:56

@RegDwighт "Dios mio, man. Liam and me, we gonna fuck you up."

RegDwighт

Liam Neeson? I don't want that.

Johan Larsson

'There will be no lost of an reps' (looks like something i would write)

Robusto

Nobody does.

Matt Эллен

@JohanLarsson you just did! yay!

RegDwighт

Wow that was easy.

Is that how English works? You just say shit?

Matt Эллен

10:57

I thought you knew that

Robusto

Sometimes.

RegDwighт

No Britney Spears in this chat.

Robusto

Sometimes it works better by you not saying shit.

RegDwighт

I'd need the precise date and time.

Johan Larsson

Are we fighting or having fun? ^

RegDwighт

10:58

How is that an or?

Matt Эллен

it's a bit of a fun fight

Johan Larsson

unable to parse my own text

Robusto

Rule #1, don't be boring. Rule #2, see Rule #1.

RegDwighт

@JohanLarsson no idea what you're talking about. I can only suppose Xor is Xena's hubby according to the Swedish mythology.

Robusto

> Sometimes you eat the bore. Sometimes . . . why, the bore eats you!

Matt Эллен

11:00

Xena was born though Hercules

RegDwighт

@Robusto I was already bored by Rule #1.

Robusto

I knew you were going to say that.

RegDwighт

@MattЭллен no, Xena was boren through Hercules.

Robusto

Kevin Sorbo is Lucy Loveless's dad?

RegDwighт

No, he's a Van Boren Boy.

Matt Эллен

11:01

Essentially, yes

Robusto

TIL.

RegDwighт

The Greek mythology is so complex and unexpected when seen through the eyes of a capable TV producer.

Matt Эллен

Or, well, Hercules is Xena's mother

Robusto

But that brings up Liam Neeson again, from Wrath of the Titans.

I call foul.

Matt Эллен

Chicken?

RegDwighт

11:03

@MattЭллен Hercules is a song by Elton John. From the Honky Chateau. In other words, yes.

Cue Rob pointing out that you don't use articles like that in English.

Robusto

Get back, honky cat.

Matt Эллен

And honky tonk girl something something

RegDwighт

@Robusto that's the opening song.

Hercules is like number six. Or eight.

Robusto

@RegDwighт Thank you for explaining my reference.

RegDwighт

@Robusto I will check the male for the Czech.

Cerberus

11:05

@RegDwighт Seven.

RegDwighт

Ten, actually.

Fifth song on Side B.

Cerberus

But...

Robusto

Apparently we are still trying to deport a Czech who doesn't have a country to go back to because when he came here it was Czechoslovakia, which no longer exists.

Matt Эллен

Send him to Alaska. It's a fair trade.

Robusto

0

Q: What does it call when I see another person in the mirror when there is only me

Sometimes when I look into a mirror, I find a vague vision of a woman standing behind me and when I turn my head she's gone: there is no one. How to descirbe this rare phenomenon? Thanks to this I now have spectrophobia. I don't think it is haunted because I don't believe in ghosts. I am not sup...

single-word-requests

RegDwighт

11:07

@Robusto Well. At least it's not for the lack of trying that we'll fail.

Try or die trying.

There is no do.

Matt Эллен

yeah. screw you, Yoda!

Robusto

@RegDwighт But there is do support.

RegDwighт

@MattЭллен Nonono, "try screwing you, Yoda!"

Matt Эллен

:D

Robusto

Everybody shut up or I will hit you with my hyperbaton.

RegDwighт

11:08

Your baton is hypo at best.

Robusto

OK, asked for it, you did.

Matt Эллен

batten the baton

Robusto

Batter the bacon.

RegDwighт

Kevin the Kelvin.

Robusto

Kevin the Sorbo.

RegDwighт

11:12

Tutto questo senza Sorbini.

Robusto

Questo cazzo.

RegDwighт

Sorry, lost my backwards P.

Matt Эллен

Quiero queso

RegDwighт

@Robusto that's a quest I'd rather not take.

Robusto

~~Bilbo~~ Dildo would be all over it.

RegDwighт

11:13

Die hard with a morning wood.

Robusto

Now's the time to point out the supererogatory article.

RegDwighт

At last.

It always takes you so long.

Robusto

I'm such a tease.

RegDwighт

The article is there in the movie title, though.

So you should take your pointing-out business to L.A.

Robusto

There are many articles about morning wood.

RegDwighт

11:15

I even saw a movie once.

It was not about morning wood, though.

It was about Ed Wood.

Matt Эллен

Las Anus. Similar laws to Las Vegas, but fewer people want to go there.

Robusto

►

RegDwighт

Psychedelic video.

Robusto

Hardly.

Get it? Hardly?

Matt Эллен

I hardly get it

RegDwighт

11:17

No video can do thong with ZZ Top in it.

Matt Эллен

How about now?

RegDwighт

Where?

You just want to trade a thong for a thwack.

Matt Эллен

probably more comfortable and less irritating

Robusto

@MattЭллен *Las Vaginas

Matt Эллен

:D

Robusto

11:21

Looks like mohit is ragging on raj.

Morning wood subsiding. Time for breakfast.

Matt Эллен

11:40

@MετάEd has not got far to go before he's the steward of close vote shire

RegDwighт

11:52

I barely ever visit that queue.

Would be unfair to everyone else.

When I close something, it's removed from the queue.

Matt Эллен

Why is this here before it's in public beta?

community ad

RegDwighт

First things first. Why is it so hideous?

Matt Эллен

well, that also crossed my mind

I'm guessing it was made by a programmer

Cerberus

RegDwighт

In MS Paint?

Cerberus

11:59

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English Language & Usage: Multi-Layer…