What exactly are you claiming was false about my claims? I'm certain that you are wrong about that. What makes a language one language instead of two separate languages is the common rules of the language. English students in India, Britain and America all learn the same grammar rules, with a very few exceptions, such as the one we are discussing, and those exceptions are typically because a certain group of people decided to start breaking the rules...

...which is exactly how a single language spoken by two different groups of people diverges into two seperate languages. These are provable, demonstrable facts, rooted in well-established history.

While I admit that there are some people who know more than me about language, I would very seriously doubt that you know more than me about the history of England, Germany and Rome, and how their languages changed, were formed and diverged from each other. There is also only a 1 in 5,000 chance that any of you have a higher IQ than me, for what it's worth, if we're going to compare credentials and abilities. Perhaps I just might be right about some of the things I say.

Correction: between 1 in 31,560 or 1 in 11,307, depending on which set of data you use. It would be highly irregular to encounter internet strangers who know more than me in a general sense, and even more rare to meet one who's more intelligent. So, let's put our brain surface area measuring sticks away and continue with the inquiry at hand. Perhaps we could simply allow a British grammarian to tell us the official UK rule, which is the one and only thing I sought to discover with this question.

Why does this foum not allow editing for more than 3 minutes, and only allow 1 edit? I prefer the comments section we were using earlier. At least I had 5 minutes and multiple edits there. :) I decided a long time ago that it was better to post the comment early and edit it than to potentially lose it altogether due to some technical glitch before posting. Is anyone else able to edit comments that are more than 3 minutes old here?

I don't play speed chess. I don't have to. The games I play unfold over centuries. I can edit at my leisure, until my work meets the highest standards (or at least I should be able to in a forum with better rules).

OK. You're right. You're smarter and better educated than me. I was wrong about everything and you, being smarter and better educated, must be totally right. I'm so sorry I imagined I knew anything about language, because clearly I was wrong.

"internet strangers who know more than you". You brought it up. If you want to claim you know more than me as part of your argument, don't complain when I inform you of my IQ, which is an objective fact, not an opinion.

I've read every classic Roman and Greek history there is, and I've studied all of English history, from the founding of Londinum to the establishment of the first English classes in England by royal decree, to Beowulf, Shakespeare and T.S. Eliot. I've studied the Holy Roman Empire, from its rise to its fall. In the process, I discovered how Latin merged with German, and then how the blend transformed into English. I'm not ill-suited for this discussion.

Since comments cannot be edited or deleted, and since I was forced out of the forum where they can be, here's the corrected version: