Whacky Signs.

[melmerby]

25 minutes ago, billbedford said:

 

Nar, we'll get gangs of delinquent grocers adding apostrophes where no one else would think of putting them.  

Actually they are just keeping the Queen's* English alive.

*Queen Elizabeth 1st when apostrophes were used in plurals.

 

There never has been a golden age of the English language as it is constantly changing.

Chaucer's English is very different to Shakespeare's English, is very different to Victorian English and even today is constantly changing.

It's part of what makes it so successful as a global language, it adapts as it goes.

 

Edited May 13 by melmerby

[KeithMacdonald]

24 minutes ago, billbedford said:

Nar, we'll get gangs of delinquent grocers adding apostrophes where no one else would think of putting them.  

 

It'll cause mayhem!

• Sainsbury's
• Boot's
• Woolworth's
• Starbuck's ...

What do you want for tea?

Can i have baked bean's on toast?

[Hroth]

Surely the bean's would be on toa'st? 🤔

 

[DavidB-AU]

4 hours ago, pH said:

 

Kinlet Hall! (Wait, do we have the right song?)

[J. S. Bach]

2 hours ago, melmerby said:

Actually they are just keeping the Queen's* English alive.

*Queen Elizabeth 1st when apostrophes were used in plurals.

 

There never has been a golden age of the English language as it is constantly changing.

Chaucer's English is very different to Shakespeare's English, is very different to Victorian English and even today is constantly changing.

It's part of what makes it so successful as a global language, it adapts as it goes.

 

There even are places where English completely disappears.

 

[J. S. Bach]

In America, they haven't used it for years.

[martin_wynne]

2 hours ago, melmerby said:

Chaucer's English is very different to Shakespeare's English, is very different to Victorian English

 

Chaucer's English is very different from Shakespeare's English, is very different from Victorian English

 

similar to, different from.

 

But different to is almost universal now. It's a shame when the evolving language loses contact with logic.

 

Across the pond it's different than.

 

Martin.

[Ozexpatriate]

46 minutes ago, martin_wynne said:

similar to, different from.

You left off 'comparable with'. 😉

 

Edited May 14 by Ozexpatriate

[Ozexpatriate]

42 minutes ago, martin_wynne said:

Across the pond it's different than.

Not as a 'rule'.

 

"Different from" would properly be used.

 

Blog post on the topic here. Strunk & White do not comment on "different than" - saves me looking it up.

Quote

First, says Mr. Bernstein, you’ll never be wrong if you stick to “different from.” There’s generally no argument about the okayness of “different from.”

Theodore Bernstein - The Careful Writer - A Modern Guide to English Usage.

 

Edited May 14 by Ozexpatriate

[Hroth]

6 hours ago, J. S. Bach said:

In America, they haven't used it for years.

 

I'm glad YOU said that...

 

[martin_wynne]

My current objection is to the toothcomb, fine or otherwise, which is apparently being used in searches nowadays. The BBC political editor was using one only yesterday.

 

There is no such thing as a toothcomb. What he meant was a fine-toothed comb.

 

Martin.

[Hroth]

40 minutes ago, martin_wynne said:

My current objection is to the toothcomb, fine or otherwise, which is apparently being used in searches nowadays. The BBC political editor was using one only yesterday.

 

There is no such thing as a toothcomb. What he meant was a fine-toothed comb.

 

Martin.

 

But you can get a tooth brush...  🤪

 

[Grovenor]

47 minutes ago, martin_wynne said:

My current objection is to the toothcomb, fine or otherwise, which is apparently being used in searches nowadays. The BBC political editor was using one only yesterday.

 

There is no such thing as a toothcomb. What he meant was a fine-toothed comb.

 

Martin.

That fine toothed comb will really help in nit picking.

Edited May 14 by Grovenor

[The Johnster]

My soapbox is 'organic'.  Can I have 5lbs of non-organic potatoes, please; but potatoes are by definition organic, they are organisms or at least the roots of organisms. What is meant is 'organically grown/produced', which I'm fine with, but if that's what's meant then why isn't that what's said...

 

Oh, and 'they', referring to an individual person.  I think it comes from the use of he/she, which feels awkward in spoken form, but there is only one person, he, she, or he/she.  I would prefer a new word, 'heesh', but the misleading obscurfaction of 'they' had become accepted.  Not with my approval, I wasn't asked, and it rankles.  Rankles are what join the letter R's feet to it's legs, of course.

[J. S. Bach]

8 hours ago, Hroth said:

But you can get a tooth brush...  🤪

And tooth picks.

[Vistisen]

19 hours ago, Ozexpatriate said:

You left off 'comparable with'. 😉

 

and " not the same as"

[Guest]

8 hours ago, The Johnster said:

Oh, and 'they', referring to an individual person.  I think it comes from the use of he/she, which feels awkward in spoken form, but there is only one person, he, she, or he/she.  

 

Singular 'they' is perfectly natural and you've been using it for years.

e.g.

Who's that hanging round the bins? What are they doing?

There is only one person by your bins.

[The Johnster]

 Been around for years it may have been, but it's still nonsense. 

e.g.

Who are those people hanging round the bins?  What are they doing? 

There is more than one person by the bins, so 'they' is correct and describes the situation accurately.

Who's that hanging round the bins? What is he or she doing?

There is only one person by the bins, so he or she is correct and describes the situation accurately. 

 

Language is, or should be, a commonly understood and evolving means by which information is conveyed between people by the spoken or written word, and in this instance 'they' does not indicate that there is only one person by the bins, whereas 'he or she' stipulates that there is in fact only one person by the bins which is the reason 'they' is not as comprehensive or foolproof a method of conveying the information that there is only one person by the bins; there could be one, or two, or any number. 

 

Imagine the possibility of confusion in an emergency, say building on fire; he or she is still in the photocopier room, and you tell the fireman that they are in the photocopier room.  Fireman rescues Bob, then goes back for the other person...  Getting it right is important sometimes, so best practice is to get it right all the time so you don't get it wrong, or even questionable, under pressure when the building is burning down.  He or she, not they.  Sinking ships, mine collapses, classroom gunman, terrorist bomb in an airport; similar situations as far as this goes...

[melmerby]

10 hours ago, The Johnster said:

My soapbox is 'organic'.

Same here.

Organic is anything based on carbon molecules, so crude oil is by definition organic, so are artificial fertilisers such as organo-phosphates (it's in the name)

So is animal flesh, however it is reared.

 

However I disagree with your epistle on "they"

From the Oxford dictionary

Definition 2

Used to refer to a person of unspecified gender.

"ask a friend if they could help"

Edited May 14 by melmerby

[The Johnster]

Well, I don't like it and can't use it, it just feels wrong.  I am not in the game of decreeing what other people do, though, and accept that this has become accepted usage over the last 30 years or so, and nobody's going to listen to me.  I have never had any problem making myself understood using he or she for individual people, and will continue to do so.

[Ozexpatriate]

7 hours ago, Vistisen said:

and " not the same as"

"dissimilar to"
 

[Dunsignalling]

6 hours ago, melmerby said:

Same here.

Organic is anything based on carbon molecules, so crude oil is by definition organic, so are artificial fertilisers such as organo-phosphates (it's in the name)

So is animal flesh, however it is reared.

 

However I disagree with your epistle on "they"

From the Oxford dictionary

Definition 2

Used to refer to a person of unspecified gender.

"ask a friend if they could help"

 

"Ask a friend to help" or "Ask friends if they could help."

 

The current (and relatively recent) usage of "they" in the singular has arisen out of necessity as it is becoming increasingly unfashionable to define oneself in terms of birth-gender.

 

It's clunky in the extreme but, until someone invents an acceptable non-gender-specific singular pronoun for humans, what else could one use without creating offence? 

 

Where it really grates is in news items where singularity and gender are reported at the outset, only for a gratuitous "they" to be thrown in later in the story. 

 

Edited May 15 by Dunsignalling

[Compound2632]

3 minutes ago, Dunsignalling said:

The current (and relatively recent) usage of "they" in the singular has arisen out of necessity as it is becoming increasingly unfashionable to define oneself in terms of birth-gender.

 

It's clunky in the extreme but, until someone invents an acceptable non-gender-specific singular pronoun for humans, what else could one use without creating offence? 

 

I am told that it is actually a more ancient usage, general up to the 18th century - i.e. in use in a period when misrepresenting one's gender was unfashionable to the point of being downright dangerous. 

[Hibelroad]

I guess British English has gotten all American. 

[billbedford]

7 hours ago, The Johnster said:

Well, I don't like it and can't use it, it just feels wrong.  I am not in the game of decreeing what other people do, though, and accept that this has become accepted usage over the last 30 years or so, and nobody's going to listen to me.  I have never had any problem making myself understood using he or she for individual people, and will continue to do so.

 

Careful now, else we'll have to have an examination of the intrusive "do" as in:

 

"He do go" etc.