meta user
network profile
| bio | website | facebook.com/thenonsequitur |
|---|---|---|
| location | New York, NY | |
| age | 29 | |
| visits | member for | 1 year, 3 months |
| seen | 7 hours ago | |
| stats | profile views | 43 |
puts 10.downto(1).each{ |i| puts i }
puts 'Blast off!'
puts (10.downto(1).map{ |i| i.to_s } + ['Blast Off!']).join("\n")
(1..10).to_a.reverse.each{ |i| puts i }
puts 'Blast off!'
|
Feb 15 |
comment |
Is “Just a friendly advice” grammatical? @J.R., completely agree. Just pointing that who/whom was a bad example because there is real linguistic discussion about that (and a lot of linguists have come to the conclusion that using "who" instead of "whom" in places where "whom" is allowed is not ungrammatical, but rather just choosing a marker of register/formality, or just an alternate grammatical style). Any of the things you listed would have made much better examples -- they are all examples of actual errors that are very common. |
|
Feb 15 |
comment |
Is “Just a friendly advice” grammatical? (The exception to that general shift from "whom" to "who" is in fixed phrases, e.g. "To whom it may concern") |
|
Feb 15 |
comment |
Is “Just a friendly advice” grammatical? @AndyIsbell, I completely disagree with kris's stand here that "a friendly advice" is grammatical, and I also agree with this answer and gave it +1. But I think your "who"/"whom" example is not well-placed. Unlike with "advice", there is a lot of strong linguistic evidence pointing to the fact that "whom" has mostly disappeared from modern Enlgish (at least AmE, not sure about BrE), and that "who" is correct and grammatical in all places where "whom" can be used. Unlike "a friendly advice", using "who" where "whom" used to be required is not a mistake, it's a shift in English language usage. |
|
Feb 11 |
revised |
How should a person holding a foreign military rank be addressed? fixed false reference to Latin language |
|
Feb 11 |
comment |
How should a person holding a foreign military rank be addressed? @IlyaMelamed, I suggested an edit to your post, changing the dichotomy to "Indo-European" vs "non-Indo-European". This seems pretty much right, considering the answer to this question: linguistics.stackexchange.com/questions/89/… |
|
Feb 11 |
suggested | suggested edit on How should a person holding a foreign military rank be addressed? |
|
Feb 11 |
comment |
English equivalent of a Kannada proverb @Paola, I still don't get the proverb. The part you explained is perfectly clear, but what does this have to do with being poor? This seems applicable to everyone, not just the poor, right? |
|
Feb 1 |
awarded | Civic Duty |
|
Jan 25 |
comment |
What does “Ms.” stand for? Most of what you said I agree with, but Regarding "'Ms' can be useful as a catch all term to use if you don't wish to cause offence by guessing whether the lady is a 'Miss' or a 'Mrs'", I'd go one step further and say it is useful whether you know the marital status of the lady or not. Encoding that information in an honorific for one sex but not the other is sexist, so "Ms" should be used to help level that out, regardless of what you know. |
|
Jan 25 |
comment |
Does the word “newbie” have a negative connotation? I disagree with this answer pretty strongly. @Mithun, it's copy for your business, so you can do what you want. And if you came here to find the specific answer you were already looking for and accept it, that's fine, but I also think that's a mistake. Your brother is right that some people find the word "newbie" derogatory. Whether that comes from a basic confusion with the word "noob" or otherwise is completely irrelevant for your purposes. Want to avoid offending your users? Then don't use the word "newbie". |
|
Jan 25 |
comment |
Greeting: “Cold enough for you?” @kubanczyk, there are plenty of actual greetings, e.g.: "hi", "hello", "hey", "aloha". I think "you there" might even qualify as an actual greeting. |
|
Jan 23 |
comment |
From French “manœuvre” to English “manoeuvre”, does “œ” exist in English? @KonradRudolph, not only that, but "œ" maps to a different pronunciation. In "Mœbius" it maps to an "oh" sound and all the other forms to an "ee" sound. Did the OED make a mistake here? (Note the OED is not to be confused with the ŒD) |
|
Jan 12 |
comment |
Is it “Check and mate” or “Checkmate”? @Mitch, changed my downvote to an upvote. Completely agree with your post as edited. |
|
Jan 11 |
comment |
Is it “Check and mate” or “Checkmate”? @J.R., sure, but if you read Mitch's comment he makes several references to the actual game: "analysis of the technical meanings", "how people use them in the game", "no one would say 'mate' alone to signify that they've won the game". Thus, I agree with Rory. If Mitch wanted to only address the expressions as borrowed by debaters and political wonks, then he should not have made claims about usage in the domain of the actual game, as he did. |
|
Jan 11 |
comment |
Is there an idiom that corresponds to the Hungarian expression “fall off the other side of the horse”? Not an answer to your question, but related: "The pendulum swung the other way" or "The pendulum swung too far" -- means that some popular trend leaning in one direction reversed so quickly that the opposite trend is now popular. |
|
Dec 21 |
answered | What is the difference between partial and total synonyms? |
|
Dec 21 |
comment |
What exactly are the differences between “diligent”, “assiduous” and “sedulous”? I agree that to me "diligent" has connotations of following instructions exactly, carrying out assigned duties to the fullest, or meeting every specified requirement (see: "due diligence"). Whereas "assiduous" on the other hand doesn't have those connotations, even though it has the same meaning. And I've never even heard the word "sedulous" before. |
|
Dec 7 |
comment |
login and payoff are nouns. But can they be used as verbs? @NeilCoffey Even on the "this is for a reason" front it's not about pronunciation -- it's about syntax as per Barrie's answer. But his counter-example of *"I'll login him now" is only a counter-example based on current usage. If that phrase had traction because single-word verbal "login" increased in usage, it would no longer be a counter-example. Also, going back to the "English is not logical front" it's very possible for irregularity here -- "login" as a verb used in some syntactical contexts, and "log in" in others, and bothto be correct. |
|
Dec 7 |
comment |
login and payoff are nouns. But can they be used as verbs? @NeilCoffey, I agree with what Jon said but there is another problem with what you wrote -- English is not logical. Careful writers don't make that distinction because of possible pronunciation differences, but simply because the usage of these single words as verbs has not evolved enough yet to be considered single words in careful writing. It is more correct to use two words -- definitely not as stipulated by God, but also not as stipulated by logic or pronunciation, but rather as stipulated by usage (which contains components of both popular usage and traditional usage). |
|
Dec 7 |
comment |
What is the difference between “rooster” vs. “cock” and “hen” vs. “chicken”? @rob, It's not purely marketing. Generally speaking, "baby chicken" is the only good way to say it unambiguously in English. The term "chick", except in rare contexts, more often has the slang meaning; just see the urban dictionary entry. |
