Is there a web site that will diagram a sentence?

@dadpad,

I can just have him move the adjective and problem solved!

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@boomerang,

boomerang wrote:

Well dang! The "a" does make a big difference.

That makes it all so easy. Thanks.

It's very easy to check, you're right. But calculating the answer by conventional computational methods would take longer than the lifetime of our universe. That's why all the sentence-parsing and -diagramming programs linked by other posters here don't work in this case. You've hit upon the great P vs NP problem; to avoid it in the future, avoid "fancy" and stick with unambiguous terms like "complicated". Anyone who doesn't want to avoid the P vs NP problem, btw, can try his luck - the Clay Mathematical Institute is offering a $1m prize for the solution:

Quote:

...Suppose that you are organizing housing accommodations for a group of four hundred university students. Space is limited and only one hundred of the students will receive places in the dormitory. To complicate matters, the Dean has provided you with a list of pairs of incompatible students, and requested that no pair from this list appear in your final choice. ..... it is easy to check if a given choice of one hundred students proposed by a coworker is satisfactory (i.e., no pair taken from your coworker's list also appears on the list from the Dean's office), however ... the total number of ways of choosing one hundred students from the four hundred applicants is greater than the number of atoms in the known universe! Thus no future civilization could ever hope to build a supercomputer capable of solving the problem by brute force; that is, by checking every possible combination of 100 students. However, this apparent difficulty may only reflect the lack of ingenuity of your programmer.

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@Francis,

At the highest level of mathematical abstraction (see post to Boomerang) there is no contradiction: countless algorithmic shortcuts exist, but a general solution to the P = or =/ NP problem would obviously have tremendous applications in fields far beyond computational linguistics. However - it took 3 centuries to prove Fermat's last theorem, so holding breath here isn't advisable Smile

1 Reply

@High Seas,

I'd like to know an algorithmic shortcut to tongue in cheek..(following your request, not adding emoticon..)

1 Reply

@High Seas,

Factually this has absolutely nothing to do with the "P vs NP" problem.

By definition, an NP problem is a problem whose solution can be verified quickly (i.e. in polynomial time). This means that once you have a potential solution, it is easy to tell if you got it right or not (the problem being coming up with the solution to verify in the first place). Examples of this are finding factors (getting them is difficult, but showing they are the right factors is easy), or finding a quicker route between cities.

Parsing sentences does not have this property. The problem here is that to understand the sentence, you need to have an understanding of the underlying meaning.

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@ebrown p,

You're wrong on that - but consistent with your error in the previous page, where you decided there's no computer programs doing automatic parsing. Try looking up the problems of innate grammars (in languages and meta-languages) and of recursion - for starters.

1 Reply

@Francis,

The answer should be obvious to you - it was provided by the late, lamented (and much derided) Prof. Derrida!

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@High Seas,

What am I wrong about? Are you arguing with the definition of NP problems including "quickly" verifiable (where "quickly" is a formal definition involving polynomial time) solutions?

Or, are you saying that grammar parsing solutions are quickly verifiable.

1 Reply

@High Seas,

Quote:

You've hit upon the great P vs NP problem; to avoid it in the future, avoid "fancy" and stick with unambiguous terms like "complicated".

What do you think it is that makes complicated any less problematic than fancy, HS?

Boomer, what was the actual original sentence?

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The sentence was "My family is sort of fancy."

I chose the word "fancy" because it has kind of a happy feeling and I want Mo to feel okay about his complicated family. I felt like saying "different" made it seem peculiar/odd/cruddy.

I blame Mr. Rogers. He always used "fancy" to describe things that were odd/peculiar/different. I never realized it was such a problematic word.

1 Reply

@boomerang,

Exactly - stick with "My family is sort of complicated". You're right about "different" - while it avoids the risk of being mistaken for a noun or a verb, like "fancy", it runs into the political correctness disambiguation substitution for "peculiar/odd/cruddy" or inferior, or weird.

Political correctness has done more to destroy the effectiveness of mathematical linguistics than any other single factor: think of "differently abled" for the previously understandable "retarded", "big boned" for "fat", "developing (country)" - the country may not be developing at all, it may just as well be remaining stationary or regressing - for "underdeveloped" or any other linguistically meaningless PC euphemism.

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@ebrown p,

ebrown p wrote:

What am I wrong about?

Read your own signature line to see the answer to your question; that line currently reads:

Quote:

Proud Member of the "Political Rectitude Gestapo".

<G>

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@High Seas,

Quote:

Political correctness has done more to destroy the effectiveness of mathematical linguistics than any other single factor:

Stop being so gay.

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@High Seas,

Quote:

Exactly - stick with "My family is sort of complicated". You're right about "different" - while it avoids the risk of being mistaken for a noun or a verb, like "fancy", it runs into the political correctness disambiguation substitution for "peculiar/odd/cruddy" or inferior, or weird.

Language is used for every purpose under the Sun. The best choice for the word would be the one that helps Mo feel good about his family.

Quote:

Political correctness has done more to destroy the effectiveness of mathematical linguistics than any other single factor: think of "differently abled" for the previously understandable "retarded", "big boned" for "fat", "developing (country)" - the country may not be developing at all, it may just as well be remaining stationary or regressing - for "underdeveloped" or any other linguistically meaningless PC euphemism.

An absolute crock of sour owl manure.

Is your name really High Seas? Why have you chosen that particular euphemism?

'differently abled' is perfectly understandable, as is 'big boned' and 'developing country'. As we can plainly see, even an idiot, sorry, intellectually challenged individual like you understands those words.

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@ebrown p,

That should be a semicolon, not a comma.

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Hey I really liked that one site clearly diagramming a full sentence. While
it might not work perfectly in all instances, I know I will keep it in mind
for the day when one of my grandsons has a question about that. My own
English skills are rusty to say the very least.

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In your sentence, "fancy" is a predicate noun.
It can follow a "linking verb" such as am, is, was, being and been.
It refers back to the subject noun of the sentence.

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@boomerang,

She strikes my fancy. (noun)
I fancy him. (verb)

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i need this sentence to be diagram--- there are fluffy puppies at your neighbor home however they dont listen very well

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@boomerang,

Please send us a list of ware houses that you have in the current system when you get a chance.

1 Reply

Is there a web site that will diagram a sentence?

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