• Paul D. Anderson <paul.d.removethis.anderson comcast.andthis.net> May 12 2009
• "Nick Sabalausky" <a a.a> May 12 2009
• "Simen Kjaeraas" <simen.kjaras gmail.com> May 12 2009
• BCS <none anon.com> May 12 2009
• Georg Wrede <georg.wrede iki.fi> May 12 2009
• BCS <none anon.com> May 12 2009
• Derek Parnell <derek psych.ward> May 12 2009
• BCS <none anon.com> May 12 2009
• Christopher Wright <dhasenan gmail.com> May 13 2009
• Georg Wrede <georg.wrede iki.fi> May 13 2009
• Robert Fraser <fraserofthenight gmail.com> May 13 2009
• Georg Wrede <georg.wrede iki.fi> May 13 2009
• Robert Fraser <fraserofthenight gmail.com> May 12 2009
• BCS <none anon.com> May 12 2009
• "Nick Sabalausky" <a a.a> May 13 2009
• BCS <ao pathlink.com> May 13 2009
• Derek Parnell <derek psych.ward> May 13 2009
• "Nick Sabalausky" <a a.a> May 13 2009
• Walter Bright <newshound1 digitalmars.com> May 13 2009

Paul D. Anderson <paul.d.removethis.anderson comcast.andthis.net> writes:

Trass3r Wrote:

 Georg Wrede schrieb:
 :D good old cliches.
 but well you're right. we simply got the best beer in the world ;)
 Though it's "das WC".


 That's a toilet for pets. Der WC is men's room, die WC is the powder room.
 


 Nope. There's no differentiation.
 But "die Toilette" or "das Klo" is more common anyway.


Aren't languages wonderful? Here's a language that goes to all the trouble to
have gender-specific articles and doesn't use them for restrooms!!

(Yes, I know "gender" in a language doesn't necessarily corellate with "gender"
anatomically. And I'm not suggesting Engllish is any more logical than the
rest. A good read on the subject is George Lakoff's "Women, Fire and Dangerous
Things".)

And, BTW, if we're discussing changes to the newsgroup structure, it might make
sense to have an "off-topic" newsgroup for these kinds of discussions.

Paul

"Nick Sabalausky" <a a.a> writes:

"Paul D. Anderson" <paul.d.removethis.anderson comcast.andthis.net> wrote in 
message news:guc8a1$2mgc$1 digitalmars.com...
 Aren't languages wonderful? Here's a language that goes to all the trouble 
 to have gender-specific articles and doesn't use them for restrooms!!

 (Yes, I know "gender" in a language doesn't necessarily corellate with 
 "gender" anatomically. And I'm not suggesting Engllish is any more logical 
 than the rest. A good read on the subject is George Lakoff's "Women, Fire 
 and Dangerous Things".)


In my high school spanish class, they said that the spanish word for 
mustache (whatever that was, I don't remember) was a feminine noun. I always 
found that strange. I mean, why not just replace the last letter with an 'o' 
and consider it a masculine noun? 

"Simen Kjaeraas" <simen.kjaras gmail.com> writes:

Paul D. Anderson wrote:

 And, BTW, if we're discussing changes to the newsgroup structure, it  
 might make sense to have an "off-topic" newsgroup for these kinds of  
 discussions.


Has it ever happened that one of us has started a topic with the
/intention/ of it being OT? Well, I guess it has happened, but
mostly, it's just things derailing, and telling OTing people to sod
off to a different newsgroup is not really what we want, now is it?

--
  Simen

BCS <none anon.com> writes:

Hello Simen,

 Has it ever happened that one of us has started a topic with the
 /intention/ of it being OT?


There was an epic religion thread a while back that started on the psychology 
of why programing is addictive.

Georg Wrede <georg.wrede iki.fi> writes:

Paul D. Anderson wrote:
 Trass3r Wrote:
 Georg Wrede schrieb:




 :D good old cliches.
 but well you're right. we simply got the best beer in the world ;)
 Though it's "das WC".




 But "die Toilette" or "das Klo" is more common anyway.




You're joking, right? Everybody "knows" {der|die|das} WC and their 
meanings. (Outside of Germany, that is.) :-)

 Aren't languages wonderful? Here's a language that goes to all the
 trouble to have gender-specific articles and doesn't use them for
 restrooms!!


Actually few languages do. And the gotchas and their history and origins 
are intractable to the casual observer.

 (Yes, I know "gender" in a language doesn't necessarily corellate
 with "gender" anatomically. And I'm not suggesting Engllish is any
 more logical than the rest. A good read on the subject is George
 Lakoff's "Women, Fire and Dangerous Things".)


Well, at least the Spanish got the genders of Key and Lock (la clave, el 
candado) the wrong way. It's like calling 0 male and 1 female. (You do 
the math. I mean, the assosiations.)

A serious point, however, is that (in my first language) Finnish, the 
spoken language doesn't only *not* differentiate between gender, it also 
/doesn't/ differentiate between humans and other instances (be they 
living or inanimate!!!). You'd say

"se meni ulos" -- {he | she | the dog} went out
"se putos" -- {he | she | the dog | a flowerpot | a brick} dropped

Contrast this to "modern, politically correct American English", where 
one says "she" of the programmer, and "they" of any third person. The 
latter of which is not only semantically + grammatically incorrect, it 
also makes sentences cumbersome, but foremost, diffuses and murks up the 
original intent of the author.

 And, BTW, if we're discussing changes to the newsgroup structure, it
 might make sense to have an "off-topic" newsgroup for these kinds of
 discussions.


Errr, the mid-thread derailing of a topic is what makes the most 
entertaining, often even unexpectedly informative (and therefore 
idirectly, very valuable) contributions to our newsgroups.

The fact that (even NG discussions) tend to derail intermittently, does 
seem at first look, as simply an annoyance that only introduces static 
and clutter to an otherwise worthwhile use of bandwidth. Fact is, the 
cost of that is actually less than the benefit, because only by allowing 
it, many treasures otherwise forever undiscovered, are found.

It also allows the posters to feel less tense about their choice of 
words, about their threshold of including associated or whimsical 
thoughts -- thus not reducing brain capacity that would better be used 
to freely advance the issue at hand.

(There's an as-yet unpublished web site (www.bubblefield.com) that 
purports to graphically examine such issues. Also, some of Lakoff's 
writings tangent the issue. But the best proof is: why do a bunch of 
intellectually challenged housewives more than stand their ground in an 
island community, simply by never letting there be a second of silence 
when at least two of them are present. To an outsider the "discussions" 
are a hopeless meandering of one-sentence thoughts directly associated 
up by any one of the previous 4 sentences (by either party), and no 
analytic, rational, or disciplined approach or choice is ever excercised.)

-----

Whatevvva!!

Threads explicitly meant to be off-topic might as well be posted on 
another server, in a newsgroup geared towards entertaining, or in-office 
unwinding. Their Expected Value (as in statistics) to our cause is way 
below that of the in-thread derailments.

And last, discussions in such "officially OT threads", tend to 
spontaneously "re-enrail" way less than those of the "simply derailed" 
threads. What that loses us is a "proper" thread, only it is now located 
  in an unexptected position, which in practical terms is comparable to 
mining for gold outside the beaten path.

BCS <none anon.com> writes:

Hello Georg,

 
 A serious point, however, is that (in my first language) Finnish, the
 spoken language doesn't only *not* differentiate between gender, it
 also /doesn't/ differentiate between humans and other instances (be
 they living or inanimate!!!). You'd say
 
 "se meni ulos" -- {he | she | the dog} went out
 "se putos" -- {he | she | the dog | a flowerpot | a brick} dropped
 Contrast this to "modern, politically correct American English", where
 one says "she" of the programmer, and "they" of any third person. The
 latter of which is not only semantically + grammatically incorrect, it
 also makes sentences cumbersome, but foremost, diffuses and murks up
 the original intent of the author.
 


Ah! One of my favorite qwerks of the English language, how to refer to a 
specific single someone of unknown gender without insulting them: "it"?

 And, BTW, if we're discussing changes to the newsgroup structure, it
 might make sense to have an "off-topic" newsgroup for these kinds of
 discussions.
 


 entertaining, often even unexpectedly informative (and therefore
 idirectly, very valuable) contributions to our newsgroups.
 


I really ought to have a filter set up to flag for extra attention any thread 
with OT in the title :)

 The fact that (even NG discussions) tend to derail intermittently,
 does seem at first look, as simply an annoyance that only introduces
 static and clutter to an otherwise worthwhile use of bandwidth. Fact
 is, the cost of that is actually less than the benefit, because only
 by allowing it, many treasures otherwise forever undiscovered, are
 found.
 


I love "mark thread as read" it makes reading even the most boring thread 
easy.

Derek Parnell <derek psych.ward> writes:

On Wed, 13 May 2009 01:04:19 +0000 (UTC), BCS wrote:


 Ah! One of my favorite qwerks of the English language, how to refer to a 
 specific single someone of unknown gender without insulting them: "it"?


I hate it but what can I do?

Use "they". Sure, its wrong but everyone knows what you mean.
As in ... "A good coder will write useful comments because *they* care." 

-- 
Derek Parnell
Melbourne, Australia
skype: derek.j.parnell

BCS <none anon.com> writes:

Hello Derek,

 On Wed, 13 May 2009 01:04:19 +0000 (UTC), BCS wrote:
 
 Ah! One of my favorite qwerks of the English language, how to refer
 to a specific single someone of unknown gender without insulting
 them: "it"?
 


 
 Use "they". Sure, its wrong but everyone knows what you mean. As in
 ... "A good coder will write useful comments because *they* care."
 


Yeah, much as I dislike it, you end up having to. And as someone else pointed 
out, "they" is actually correct (why, I don't know). Also, in your case, 
it's the generic "they" and in one way of thinking, it *is* plural (as in 
there are many people that it can refer to) so it kind of sounds reasonable.

Christopher Wright <dhasenan gmail.com> writes:

BCS wrote:
 Hello Derek,
 
 On Wed, 13 May 2009 01:04:19 +0000 (UTC), BCS wrote:

 Ah! One of my favorite qwerks of the English language, how to refer
 to a specific single someone of unknown gender without insulting
 them: "it"?



 Use "they". Sure, its wrong but everyone knows what you mean. As in
 ... "A good coder will write useful comments because *they* care."


 Yeah, much as I dislike it, you end up having to. And as someone else 
 pointed out, "they" is actually correct (why, I don't know).


There is no "why" in linguistics, just "whence".

Georg Wrede <georg.wrede iki.fi> writes:

Christopher Wright wrote:
 BCS wrote:
 Hello Derek,

 On Wed, 13 May 2009 01:04:19 +0000 (UTC), BCS wrote:

 Ah! One of my favorite qwerks of the English language, how to refer
 to a specific single someone of unknown gender without insulting
 them: "it"?



 Use "they". Sure, its wrong but everyone knows what you mean. As in
 ... "A good coder will write useful comments because *they* care."


 Yeah, much as I dislike it, you end up having to. And as someone else 
 pointed out, "they" is actually correct (why, I don't know).


 There is no "why" in linguistics, just "whence".


Damn! Now that you mention it, it's actually true! Funny I never thought 
about it like that.

Robert Fraser <fraserofthenight gmail.com> writes:

BCS wrote:
 Hello Derek,
 
 On Wed, 13 May 2009 01:04:19 +0000 (UTC), BCS wrote:

 Ah! One of my favorite qwerks of the English language, how to refer
 to a specific single someone of unknown gender without insulting
 them: "it"?



 Use "they". Sure, its wrong but everyone knows what you mean. As in
 ... "A good coder will write useful comments because *they* care."


 Yeah, much as I dislike it, you end up having to. And as someone else 
 pointed out, "they" is actually correct (why, I don't know). Also, in 
 your case, it's the generic "they" and in one way of thinking, it *is* 
 plural (as in there are many people that it can refer to) so it kind of 
 sounds reasonable.


"why" in descriptive linguistics means "what most native speakers judge 
to be correct" (which is often different from "what textbooks like to 
assert is correct"). Basically, native speakers have an understanding of 
a language that may be different from any official "specification" of 
the language (just like DMD ;-P). This is why native Esperanto speakers 
tend to speak a slightly different version of Esperanto than the 
official one.

Some native speakers may judge "he" to be more correct than "they" 
(especially those in academia or snobby middle-class white socialites), 
so one or the other might be correct in different varieties of English.

I read a study (of Americans, probably college students at whatever 
university it was done at) that showed that the processing time for a 
sentence containing "they" for a singular unknown referent tended to be 
faster than the processing time for a sentence containing "he" in the 
same position for 90+% of speakers, even for speakers who believed that 
"he" was the correct choice. I'm too lazy to dredge up the study, but 
basically:

third-person "they" is easier to understand for native speakers!

Georg Wrede <georg.wrede iki.fi> writes:

BCS wrote:
 Hello Georg,
 
 A serious point, however, is that (in my first language) Finnish, the
 spoken language doesn't only *not* differentiate between gender, it
 also /doesn't/ differentiate between humans and other instances (be
 they living or inanimate!!!). You'd say

 "se meni ulos" -- {he | she | the dog} went out
 "se putos" -- {he | she | the dog | a flowerpot | a brick} dropped
 Contrast this to "modern, politically correct American English", where
 one says "she" of the programmer, and "they" of any third person. The
 latter of which is not only semantically + grammatically incorrect, it
 also makes sentences cumbersome, but foremost, diffuses and murks up
 the original intent of the author.


 Ah! One of my favorite qwerks of the English language, how to refer to a 
 specific single someone of unknown gender without insulting them: "it"?



Yeah, you can't use "it", because that's really derogatory. I remember a 
movie (probably something with Meryl Streep), where this person referred 
to the spouse as "it".

Robert Fraser <fraserofthenight gmail.com> writes:

Georg Wrede wrote:
 Contrast this to "modern, politically correct American English", where 
 one says "she" of the programmer, and "they" of any third person. The 
 latter of which is not only semantically + grammatically incorrect, it 
 also makes sentences cumbersome, but foremost, diffuses and murks up the 
 original intent of the author.


ARRRGHHHH!!! Sorry, you triggered a "pet peeve".

"They" is correct when referring to an unknown (single) person (even if 
the gender is known, e.x. "someone left their jockstrap in the locker 
room" is more natural to most native speakers than "someone left his 
jockstrap in the locker room", although in this case I'd say either is 
acceptable).

http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?cat=27
It's even in the bible: 
http://158.130.17.5/~myl/languagelog/archives/003572.html

It's been suggested that singular they has been in use since 1400 
(around the beginning of "modern English"), and likely in old/middle 
English as well. It's only been in the last few hundred years when 
people started analyzing how people talk and tried to figure out why 
people were using "they" in singular contexts. Someone decided to make 
it a "rule", and millions of people have been trying to force that 
"rule", despite using singular they themselves.

BCS <none anon.com> writes:

Hello Robert,

 It's been suggested that singular they has been in use since 1400
 (around the beginning of "modern English"), and likely in old/middle
 English as well. It's only been in the last few hundred years when
 people started analyzing how people talk and tried to figure out why
 people were using "they" in singular contexts. Someone decided to make
 it a "rule", and millions of people have been trying to force that
 "rule", despite using singular they themselves.


I have more problems with singular they making it hard to exclude the plural 
than anything else. It's right up there with (but not as common as) some 
neutral statements being promoted to negative ones: "I don't like cheese" 
vs. "I dislike cheese", making it hard to state some things.

"Nick Sabalausky" <a a.a> writes:

"BCS" <none anon.com> wrote in message 
news:a6268ff5b338cba14afe6aca70 news.digitalmars.com...
 I have more problems with singular they making it hard to exclude the 
 plural than anything else. It's right up there with (but not as common as) 
 some neutral statements being promoted to negative ones: "I don't like 
 cheese" vs. "I dislike cheese", making it hard to state some things.


That's a *HUGE* pet peeve of mine. I get sooo frustrated when attempting 
make a neutral statement around people who just simply will not accept that 
neutral statements exist. Drives me absolutely crazy. "Suzie is not 
tall/happy/beautiful" does NOT mean "Suzie is short/unhappy/ugly" (or even 
mid-height/calm/average-looking for that matter), but most people absolutely 
insist in believing that everything is either one extreme or the other and 
just can't comprehend neutrality unless you very, very blatantly spell it 
out for them and prop everything up with boatloads of disclaimers.

A similar thing that also drives me absolutely crazy is when people take a 
*comparison* and automatically assume that absolute statements are being 
made about one or both of the things being compared. For instance, saying 
"Babylon 5 is worse than Stargate SG-1", does *NOT* imply "I dislike Babylon 
5" nor does it imply "I dislike Stargate SG-1". But I have frequently come 
across people that have made both those assumptions when presented with a 
sentence in that form. Similarly, saying "Murder is better than genocide" 
does *NOT* imply "I think murder is perfectly acceptable." But a lot of 
people seem to be completely incapable of comprehending these distinctions.

Another note: Just because I used "Murder is better than genocide" as an 
example, does *not* mean that I'm actually saying that I consider murder to 
be better than genocide. And that previous sentence that I just wrote does 
*NOT* imply that I consider genocide to be better than murder, or that I 
consider them equal in severity. In fact, nowhere in this entire message 
have I (or will I) made *any* indication of my opinions on murder, genocide, 
or how they compare, or that I even have or don't have opinions on the 
matter, and it pisses me off that I frequently find myself needing to make 
qualifications like these just to prevent people from putting words in my 
mouth.

Regarding that last sentence in the previous paragraph, note that a lot of 
people would take that as me saying "I need to make this particular 
qualification because I think the people on this NG would be unable to 
correctly understand it without the qualification." And as per the whole 
point of my entire above rant, I'm not saying anything of the sort, or the 
opposite, or etc...

I hope all of the above serves as a good example of why people need to be 
able to make neutral statements and comparisons without the listener 
automatically assuming a bunch of extra garbage. Because when that happens, 
speakers are forced to turn perfectly simple ideas into an absolute mess of 
disclaimers and qualifications such as above. (Not that I'm saying I was 
forced to make such disclaimers in this particular case...etc...etc...)

BCS <ao pathlink.com> writes:

Reply to Nick,

[...]

LOL

 I hope all of the above serves as a good example of why people need to
 be able to make neutral statements and comparisons without the
 listener automatically assuming a bunch of extra garbage. Because when
 that happens, speakers are forced to turn perfectly simple ideas into
 an absolute mess of disclaimers and qualifications such as above. (Not
 that I'm saying I was forced to make such disclaimers in this
 particular case...etc...etc...)
 

Derek Parnell <derek psych.ward> writes:

On Wed, 13 May 2009 16:04:49 -0400, Nick Sabalausky wrote:

 "BCS" <none anon.com> wrote in message 
 news:a6268ff5b338cba14afe6aca70 news.digitalmars.com...
 I have more problems with singular they making it hard to exclude the 
 plural than anything else. It's right up there with (but not as common as) 
 some neutral statements being promoted to negative ones: "I don't like 
 cheese" vs. "I dislike cheese", making it hard to state some things.


 That's a *HUGE* pet peeve of mine. I get sooo frustrated when attempting 
 make a neutral statement around people who just simply will not accept that 
 neutral statements exist. 



 A similar thing that also drives me absolutely crazy is when people take a 
 *comparison* and automatically assume that absolute statements are being 
 made about one or both of the things being compared. 


I have the same personality disorder ;-)

But if people behaved as you suggested, then what would lawyers,
politicians and union bosses be doing for a lot of their time?


-- 
Derek Parnell
Melbourne, Australia
skype: derek.j.parnell

"Nick Sabalausky" <a a.a> writes:

"Derek Parnell" <derek psych.ward> wrote in message 
news:163i1iantpbgs.1i0ruyoi9ogmo.dlg 40tude.net...
 On Wed, 13 May 2009 16:04:49 -0400, Nick Sabalausky wrote:

 A similar thing that also drives me absolutely crazy is when people take 
 a
 *comparison* and automatically assume that absolute statements are being
 made about one or both of the things being compared.


 I have the same personality disorder ;-)

 But if people behaved as you suggested, then what would lawyers,
 politicians and union bosses be doing for a lot of their time?


I have a few things I could suggest to them ;)

Walter Bright <newshound1 digitalmars.com> writes:

Nick Sabalausky wrote:
 I hope all of the above serves as a good example of why people need to be 
 able to make neutral statements and comparisons without the listener 
 automatically assuming a bunch of extra garbage.


That's because some people actively look for offense.