Periods Meeting Quotes

@izzythepush,

aidan wrote:

I'm just curious as to whether you've changed your stance on that grammatical point of contention ( whether or not it's okay to begin a sentence with a conjunction).

izzythepush wrote:

Many people regard the King James Bible as a wonderful piece of writing, and it's chock full of them.

Izzy: WHAT is the function of a conjunction ?????

4 Replies

@OmSigDAVID,

Quote:

One might expect that if u r going to use a conjunction,
u 'll use it to CONJOIN things.

You don't even realize how idiotic that idea is, Om. Is this your sole reason for not starting a sentence with a conjunction?

That is simply terminology. This terminology was devised to help grammarians recognize each others descriptions.

If we were to follow your "logic",

one might expect that if you are going to use a preposition, that it would sit in the 'pre' position.

One might expect that if you are going to use past tense verbs, that they would be used for only past tense, yet we also use them to describe a future.

One might expect that if you are going to use the present continuous, that it would describe the present and the continuous, yet we also use if for future actions.

One might expect that if you are going to use the present tense, that it would describe the present, which it rarely does. It describes the future, the general condition, the always, the rarely, the habitual, the scheduled.

1 Reply

@OmSigDAVID,

Whatever the writer wishes. Nice rhyming couplet btw. For someone who claims to be a bit of an anarchist you're intensely prescriptive. Humpty Dumpty would not approve.

If you've got a problem with the King James Bible I suggest you take it up with God. Try the power of prayer. I've knocked one up just for you.

Almighty God.

Thank you for the smell of gunsmoke and gun oil, the sound of gunfire, the recoil, hitting targets, oh and did I mention guns! I like guns, I really do, if you were to guess how much I like guns you'd be wrong, and you're God. And even after listening to this prayer you still won't know how much I like guns. Freaky huh? Oh and Bambi, that's a pretty cool movie, thanks for that.

Anyway God, what the **** were you thinking starting all those sentences with 'And?' You won't catch me doing that, apart from just now earlier on in the prayer, but it written by a ******* idiot anyway. So, do you want a fight about it or something? If so can we do it Yukon style, so I can wear my Davy Crocket hat?

Oh, can I have a panda please?

Love Dave.

Amen.

1 Reply

@aidan,

Quote:

Frank Apisa wrote: Are you under the impression that I think anyone here is an idiot? And if you are, why are you?

Quote:

Aidan asked: In your expert opinion Frank, is YOUR second sentence here a fragment?
I mean I feel like something of a petty little idiot for pointing it out - but I'm just curious as to whether you've changed your stance on that grammatical point of contention ( whether or not it's okay to begin a sentence with a conjunction).

I wonder if Frank, Roberta and some of the other prescriptivists can now see what I meant when I said that people, operating in natural language situations don't follow these artificial rules. They can't help but follow their natural grammars.

Linguists/real grammarians see this behavior all the time. Some prescriptivist goes on a rant about some artificial rule not being followed and often, in the same bit of text, they break the very 'rule' they are demanding others keep.

I'm curious as to what Frank will say about this.

0 Replies

@OmSigDAVID,

Quote:

Izzy: WHAT is the function of a conjunction ?????

You probably wish that you had read my post following yours, Dave. That might have prevented you from sticking your foot in your mouth, yet again.

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@OmSigDAVID,

Quote:

Maybe some day I 'll take the time
to figure out a way to surprize u, J,
but not yet.

How, Dave, by actually addressing one of your cockamamie ideas on language?

That'd be a real first, wouldn't it?

0 Replies

@Frank Apisa,

Quote:

Forget the contraction for a moment...and have the sentence stand uncontracted.

To my ears, "There are a few steamers over in the beer tent, Joe" sounds infinitely better than, "There is a few steamers over in the beer tent, Joe."

Does the contraction make the difference?

Yes indeed, Frank, the contraction makes all the difference in the world.

See,

WHEN "THERE'S" ISN'T "THERE IS"

http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/002447.html

1 Reply

@ehBeth,

Quote:

He doesn't seem to understand that his variant of phonetic English is his, and his alone.

I often don't understand his phonetic writing because the way he speaks English is clearly different from anything I've heard.

As singularly ignorant as Dave often seems to be, Beth, he doesn't constitute his own dialect.

0 Replies

@spendius,

Quote:

JT--Is this correct--"there are a few Barbie types in taverns" or should it be "is"?

In all dialects of SWE/SFE, 'there are' would be used with a plural [delayed] subject --> 'types'.

As you may have noted in other posts, there's + plural [delayed] subject is exceedingly common in everyday speech. The problem with asking if it's "correct" without referring to the measure is highly misleading and impossible to answer with a yes/no.

In informal speech, the kind you are asking about there's + plural subject predominates. Not because "a few" is a collective, it isn't, but for other reasons that really haven't been determined.

As anyone with a brain knows, the rules for SWE/SFE and the rules for speech are substantially different. As I've said before, speech is primary. Changes to language almost always come from speech.

As you must have noted, the resistance to changes in language from those who describe SWE/SFE, and [just in this thread] from those who badly describe SWE/SFE, is fierce.

I think that existential 'there', which is really just a dummy subject that, in effect, says, "I'm pointing to the existence of the real subject" has been reanalysed by speakers as, for example,

"The situation is/This situation is now in existence, two policemen are at the door".

"The situation is/This situation is now in existence, three apples are in the fridge.

We all still usually respect that need to introduce that is found in existential 'there' even though it's redundant. "redundancy', another major whine of the prescriptivists but they leave existential 'there' alone.

Why? Because no idiot has yet raised it for others to unthinkingly copy. Of course it's not at all likely that such an idiot will arise.

0 Replies

@Frank Apisa,

Quote:

Aidan: And then there'd even be more nuance and differentiation depending upon if your speaker was white, black, hispanic, a debutante, etc., etc.

Quote:

I would like, however, to ask the "experts" here about your use of "was" in that sentence.

EXPERTS: Is "was" correct...is "were" the proper verb...or are both correct?

There is no subjunctive mood in Aidan's sentence, Frank.

The subjunctive mood is the 'if' of irrealis/the impossible/the highly unlikely/... .

If I were/was you

If she were/was to come

Note that all 'ifs' do not signal that end of the conditional scale where irrealis if/unlikely 'if' lies.

Lot's of 'ifs' are used to describe the reality end of the conditional scale;

I'll pay for your plane fare if you come to my party.

If Frank replies to this post, we shall have a fine discussion on conditionals.

Those reality 'ifs' can even morph into 'whens', if the situation slides further toward the reality end of the scale.

I'll pay you for your plane fare when you arrive at my party.

When Frank replies to this post, we will have a fine discussion on conditionals.

Aidan's 'if' is so distant from the irrealis/subjunctive end of the conditional scale that it is actually a 'whether/if'.

And then there'd even be more nuance and differentiation depending upon if/whether your speaker was white, black, hispanic, a debutante, etc., etc.

We can see just how far to the reality side of the conditional scale this is, not just because it can be changed to a 'whether' but also by adding, for example,

And then there'd even be more nuance and differentiation depending upon the times when/those situations where your speaker was white, black, hispanic, a debutante, etc., etc.

Perhaps, Frank, you thought that the 'would', in there'd was denoting a condition/conditional that was getting close to the irrealis end of the conditional scale.

But it is interesting that you have brought this up, Frank. The subjunctive/conditionals have been so poorly described to American students [yes, others too] that they immediately [when they are in a fevered pedantic mode] see a subjunctive/irrealis where none exists.

This leads them to hypercorrect. Had you advised Aidan, in the same manner that you advised H20man, you would have been hypercorrecting in addition to being prescriptive. But in this case you would have been incorrect even by prescriptive standards, which, I guess one could say, describes an out to lunch analysis that is out of this universe.

2 Replies

@JTT,

Quote:

That it is a solecism to begin a sentence with and is a faintly lingering SUPERSTITION. The OED gives examples ranging from the 10th to the 19thc. ; the Bible is full of them.

Under SUPERSTITION Fowler refers to how "misleading their sweet simplicity is" regarding proscribing sentences beginning with and or but or those ending in a preposition. He applies the same to banning split infinitives. He writes there of "the havoc that is wrought by unintelligent applications of an unintelligent dogma."

And Jespersen accused Fowler of being prescriptivist!

It is well known that obsessive personalities tend to obsess with simple ideas of any sort that they learned during an early stage of life but they might heed Fowler's warning--

Quote:

. . . , to let oneself be so far possessed by blindly accepted conventions as to take a hand in enforcing them on other people is to lose the independence of judgement that would enable one to solve the numerous problems for which there are no rules of thumb.

The possessing deamon I presume being the ego. And I assume that by "numerous problems" he means more than simple grammatical ones. The most pressing problem for men being the woman, and thus the man who has any prescriptivist notions about women must have difficulties in his relations with them.

I can't speak for women as I don't know anything about them.

2 Replies

@spendius,

Except, of course, that the rumply-plumpies feel very nice when they let you have a free range around their nooks and crannies and bulbous nodules.

1 Reply

@spendius,

Quote:

And Jespersen accused Fowler of being prescriptivist!

That would be because he was, Spendi. You can use your copy in a backyard weeny roast instead of wasting a small log.

1 Reply

@spendius,

"There are disappointingly few steamers in the beer tent Joe" seems okay to me. Colloquially "there'r".

"Few" is a noun in my original. Fowler has half a page on the word.

I've been browsing Fowler this afternoon on my sun lounger. We did get a few hours of reasonable weather today.

I read the section on "female, feminine, womanly, womanish" and female refers to the she aspect in all creatures be they women, cows, vixen or lady slugs. A feminine education is that which tends to cultivate the qualities characteristic of women.

To what extent does American sex education concentrate on the female nature and ignore the feminine? If it does it seems to me rather derogatory towards our young ladies in that it equates them with sows and female beasts in general in a somewhat coy manner slightly less offensive than that employed by Ted Hughes in a footnote on page 11 of Shakespeare and the Goddess of Complete Being which I will forbear printing here for fear of over-exciting our glowering down-thumbers. The NCSE promotes "sex education". And its lickspittles and lackeys.

Some cowardly moron down-thumbed the Tour de France by sneakily spreading tacks on the road. I hope they catch the bastard and fill his shoes with sharp stones.

2 Replies

@JTT,

Quote:

That would be because he was, Spendi. You can use your copy in a backyard weeny roast instead of wasting a small log.

Oh no! Not a chance! It is a lovely little book packed full of interesting insights into all sorts of things. I just provided one example.

A book burner eh? Fancy that!! It suggests using language as a stick to beat people with rather than of loving it for its own sake.

I can't bring myself to mark the pages of a book, or turn a corner of a page down to keep my place, so pious am I about them.

Sir Ernest Gowers provides the limit of criticism of Mr Fowler in his preface to the Revised Second Edition. Going any further, which I'll admit you have avoided doing in your advice, for reasons best known to yourself, constitutes a bad case of lese majesty imeho.

3 Replies

@spendius,

Sorry about getting the italics function all mixed up. I wish I could still edit the piece. I'll have to do it the awkward way.

"There are disappointingly few steamers in the beer tent Joe" seems okay to me. Colloquially "there'r".

"Few" is a noun in my original. Fowler has half a page on the word.

I've been browsing Fowler this afternoon on my sun lounger. We did get a few hours of reasonable weather today.

I read the section on "female, feminine, womanly, womanish" and female refers to the she aspect in all creatures be they women, cows, vixen or lady slugs. A feminine education is that which tends to cultivate the qualities characteristic of women.

To what extent does American sex education concentrate on the female nature and ignore the feminine? If it does it seems to me rather derogatory towards our young ladies in that it equates them with sows and female beasts in general in a somewhat coy manner slightly less offensive than that employed by Ted Hughes in a footnote on page 11 of Shakespeare and the Goddess of Complete Being which I will forbear printing here for fear of over-exciting our glowering down-thumbers. The NCSE promotes "sex education". And its lickspittles and lackeys.

Some cowardly moron down-thumbed the Tour de France by sneakily spreading tacks on the road. I hope they catch the bastard and fill his shoes with sharp stones.

0 Replies

@OmSigDAVID,

OmSig gets a 3 thumbs up from, one can only assume, other idiots who were schooled in that same silly manner that is so prevalent in US "grammar" classes.

I think they love Dave's brilliant analyses of Sentence Initial Conjunctions. I know I do.

1 Reply

@spendius,

Sorry about getting the italics all mixed up. I wish I could still edit the piece. I'll have to do it the awkward way.

"There are disappointingly few steamers in the beer tent Joe" seems okay to me. Colloquially "there'r".

"Few" is a noun in my original. Fowler has half a page on the word.

I've been browsing Fowler this afternoon on my sun lounger. We did get a few hours of reasonable weather today.

I read the section on "female, feminine, womanly, womanish" and female refers to the she aspect in all creatures be they women, cows, vixen or lady slugs. A feminine education is that which tends to cultivate the qualities characteristic of women.

To what extent does American sex education concentrate on the female nature and ignore the feminine? If it does it seems to me rather derogatory towards our young ladies in that it equates them with sows and female beasts in general in a somewhat coy manner slightly less offensive than that employed by Ted Hughes in a footnote on page 11 of Shakespeare and the Goddess of Complete Being which I will forbear printing here for fear of over-exciting our glowering down-thumbers. The NCSE promotes "sex education". And its lickspittles and lackeys.

Some cowardly moron down-thumbed the Tour de France by sneakily spreading tacks on the road. I hope they catch the bastard and fill his shoes with sharp stones.

1 Reply

@spendius,

As is to be expected, the promoters of biological sex education accuse me of misogyny in order to support their horrifying position.

0 Replies

@JTT,

I thumbed Dave up JT. I thought it might encourage his idiocy and provide you with more opportunities to ply your jests.

I bet they never thought of the potential for ironic ambiguity in the thumbs.

1 Reply

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