GalacticCactus Forum
Forums => English & Linguistics => Topic started by: dkw on October 28, 2007, 03:58:06 PM
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A thread to post the delightful bloopers we hear. Especially if the person says them multiple times in a single meeting. Or conversation. Or whatever.
Today in a district church meeting we were asked to approve our Goals and Objections for the year.
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I could get behind that idea.
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I think the secretary where I work would be terrified if she found out an "ask murderer" was at large.
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I feel your pain.
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Unbeknownst to most people, the region south of Oklahoma was originally called "Teskas".
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"Unique" != really cool. We have had the same "this week we have a unique opportunity" at least twice a month for the last year.
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Of course not!
To mean "really cool" it requires a modifier. Like "truly unique" or "completely unique" or "going out of business sale!"
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Um yeah. He actually says "truly unique" a lot of the time. For stuff that we do fairly often. And other congregations do just as often.
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I think I've posted about this before, but I have a coworker who says "no pun intended" when she isn't making a pun. I always have to resist the temptation to say "none made".
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An employee was just talking about someone he knows having a "urinary track" infection.
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You know what can cause that? An enlarged prostrate.
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You know what can cause that? An enlarged prostrate.
Yeah, enlarged to three-lanes wide!
The Prostrate Super-Speedway!
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Muscovies are excellent foragers and can utilize large quantities of grass. If good quality forage is available pasteurized ducklings required only light feeds of grain once daily.
From Ridgway Hatchery's website on the product page.
--Mel
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I'm guessing the problem is "utilize"? Yeah, that's weird. The tense shift in the second sentence is also weird, though not quite as jarring.
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The use of the word "pasteurized" is the weirdest part of that for me.
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Right. I doubt that "pasteurized" means that the duckies were allowed to romp around the pasture.
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The word I've heard for that is "pastured".
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Exactly. "Pasteurized" /= "pastured"
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Yes, "pasteurized" was the reason I posted that snippet, although it's true that there are other problems as well.
The sad thing is that I found that site through Polyface farms. I might order some of those Muscovies from them, since my usual hatchery doesn't carry them. I'm still looking, though.
--Mel
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*slaps forehead*
I don't know how I missed that.
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The sad thing is that I found that site through Polyface farms.
Why is that the sad part? I don't have enough context to know.
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Oh, because they're probably one of the best-known pasture-based farms in the country. If you've read Michael Pollan's Omnivore's Dilemma, they're the farm featured there. So it's funny and sad that their preferred hatchery used the word pasteurized instead of pastured.
Sorry, I should have made that more clear. I knew that Porter would know what I was talking about, but I didn't think of other people. :blush:
--Mel
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What am I? chopped liver? (to use a Tante-ism). I have a link to Polyface too!
(great that you caught that, though, Mel. I probably would have read right over it and not even noticed the incorrect use)
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In many ways I think it might be better to read right over it instead of getting hung up on what the word should mean instead of what the writer obviously meant.
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I have seen many, many occurences of 'segway' in place of 'segue' in the last six months in various internet communities.
*groan*
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Unfortunately it is due to the marketing of the famous electric scooter of the same name.
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My impression is that very few people spell it right, and the scooter isn't solely to blame. It took me a long time to learn that it wasn't "segue way." Borrowings from French are very common, and in French a word spelled "segue" would be pronounced "seg." Borrowings from Italian are far rarer by comparison, so most English speakers don't have a good handle on how to pronounce or spell Italian words.
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The strange thing, though, is that I rarely saw that misspelling before the marketing of the scooter. In the last two years I've seen it spelled incorrectly more than correctly.
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What am I? chopped liver? (to use a Tante-ism). I have a link to Polyface too!
(great that you caught that, though, Mel. I probably would have read right over it and not even noticed the incorrect use)
I'll just keep on digging, over here. (The hole that I'm standing in, that is.)
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The mistake didn't particularly bother me, but it did make me laugh. I'm still chuckling over "pasteurized ducklings" every time I think of it. Then I start thinking about "homogenized ducklings," and maybe even "heavy whipping ducklings," and then I'm having way too much fun.
It reminds me of being a silly teenager on too much sugar and caffiene, where we thought the funniest thing was going through the pantry and replacing parts of food names with the word "chicken," such as "vegetarian refried chicken."
--Mel
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This could also go on the Quotes from Work thread:
Tis the season to be jolly and if the Salt Lake HQ Seasonal Soiree doesn’t jack up the falalalala’s then nothing will. Please join special guest(s) to include [our CEO] (Frosty, Rudolph and Burger Meister Meister Burger were already booked – it is their busiest time you know) in the HWS Auditorium on Tuesday, December 18th at 11:00 am.
A soiree at 11:00 am? I'm pretty sure that would make it a matinee.
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But that doesn't start with an S!
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What does starting with s have to do with anything?
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As always, alluding to alliteration.
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Alliteration.
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Gesundheit.
I didn't realize that alliteration was more important than using words correctly. :pirate:
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Live and learn.
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duel citizenship
*giggle*
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I'm on the fence about that.
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Training session the other day, where the trainer kept talking about "lists of criterion" and "single criteria."
>.<
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That requires a special kind of talent.
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I think I can see the rationale, though. Normally, the plural is just one extra sound (sometimes two) added on to the end of a word. Phonetically, criteria and criterion differ only by the n on the end of the latter. So I can see how in some people's minds, the one with the extra sound seems like it should be the plural.
Of course, this doesn't make it right. :pirate:
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I was thinking something similar. I wish I could have figured out a way to say something quietly to her afterwards -- I'm sure I'm not the only one who notices these things.
Oh, I should mention in her defense, that while her English is excellent and barely accented, she is not a native speaker.
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I was thinking something similar. I wish I could have figured out a way to say something quietly to her afterwards -- I'm sure I'm not the only one who notices these things.
Oh, I should mention in her defense, that while her English is excellent and barely accented, she is not a native speaker.
I don't think being a native speaker would make a difference. I don't think there is any other English word that follows the pattern of criterion/criteria (which is why criteria is usually used as a singular count noun, with the plural criteria or criterias). Using criterion as the plural seems completely understandable for a native or non-native speaker, especially if they're aware that the word has 2 forms and they're not sure which is which.
imo there's no reason why English speakers or learners should be expected to know the morphological rules for making plurals in other languages.
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I don't think being a native speaker would make a difference.
More years of experience, and having attended primary school in that language.
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Is a primary school going to teach you that the Greek plural of criterion is criteria? Many native speakers don't know that, since criteria is usually used as a singular noun.
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More years of experience in a language is certainly going to make it more likely that they'll pick up on the word criterion. I was never taught it either, but somehow I know it.
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It is not a Greek plural. It is a Latin one.
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I think being a native speaker probably makes you more likely to know it, but obviously a lot of people make it through secondary school and even through college without learning it. It's possible that you two, Rivka and Porter, are more the exception than the rule.
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More years of experience in a language is certainly going to make it more likely that they'll pick up on the word criterion. I was never taught it either, but somehow I know it.
This speaker obviously knew the word criterion. But most native speakers, who have had as much experience as you can get, don't use criterion as the singular. Hence my claim that being a native or non-native speaker has nothing to do with this.
It is not a Greek plural. It is a Latin one.
It's Greek (http://www.bartleby.com/61/19/C0751900.html)
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Is a primary school going to teach you that the Greek plural of criterion is criteria?
Mine did.
But I was less referring to formal instruction than to the kind of learning by immersion that Porter is talking about.
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This speaker obviously knew the word criterion. But most native speakers, who have had as much experience as you can get, don't use criterion as the singular. Hence my claim that being a native or non-native speaker has nothing to do with this.
There is a huge difference between using "criteria" as both single and plural (as most native speakers do), and the over-correction of using "criterion" as a plural. I still think the latter is far more likely from someone who did not grow up hearing the language spoken.
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This speaker obviously knew the word criterion.
The speaker knew of that word, but obviously didn't really know it, or they wouldn't have used it as the plural of criteria.
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It is not a Greek plural. It is a Latin one.
It may have been borrowed into Latin, but it kept its Greek declension.
link (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Latin_declension#Second_declension_Greek_nouns)
If it had been Latin, it would have been criterium/criteria, as far as I can tell.
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This speaker obviously knew the word criterion. But most native speakers, who have had as much experience as you can get, don't use criterion as the singular. Hence my claim that being a native or non-native speaker has nothing to do with this.
There is a huge difference between using "criteria" as both single and plural (as most native speakers do), and the over-correction of using "criterion" as a plural. I still think the latter is far more likely from someone who did not grow up hearing the language spoken.
But... it's the only word in English that can follow that pattern. Growing up hearing the language spoken isn't going to help, because there are no other words that form their plural like this. And anyway, most speakers don't use criterion at all. We learn about criterion/criteria by reading about it in a usage book or dictionary, which non-native speakers can do as easily as native speakers. I believe you that you learned it in primary school, but I'm claiming that that is the exception.
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I'm rather surprised that you learned that in primary school. To be clear, we're talking about K–6, right?
Goofy: Are you sure that's the only word in English following that pattern? I have a feeling that there have got to be others, but I can't come up with anything.
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No, I thought of another: phenomenon/phenomena. There might be others. But there is a significant difference: phenomenon/phenomena have secondary stress on the last syllable, and criterion/criteria don't, so the connection is not transparent.
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We learn about criterion/criteria by reading about it in a usage book or dictionary, which non-native speakers can do as easily as native speakers.
Not me. I learned learned about criterion/criteria by hearing it used. Essentially by growing up hearing the language spoken. Probably from a book, but I have no memory of it.
If I were not a native speaker, there is a lower chance that I'd know that word, as I would have had less experience in the language to pick it up in.
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Medium/media is almost the same.
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I'm rather surprised that you learned that in primary school. To be clear, we're talking about K–6, right?
Fairly certain the year we had a whole section on Greek/Latin roots and stuff was 6th grade. Wouldn't swear to it in a court of law. ;)
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Porter: Right. That's the Latin equivalent of that Greek declension. And though many people are probably familiar with those forms, that might not translate into an understanding of the Greek form.
Rivka: Now that you mention it, I think I might've had something similar.
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Medium/media is Latin and not Greek. But I'd be surprised if most people realized they are singular and plural of the same word.
Maybe I'll name the space station in my book cafeterion.
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If I were not a native speaker, there is a lower chance that I'd know that word, as I would have had less experience in the language to pick it up in.
I'm inclined to disagree, but it's an empirical question. Where's the research on this important issue!
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How can you disagree? I picked it up just by using and hearing the language. The less I had used and heard English in my life, the less chance I would have had to pick up on that word.
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Psh. That's just an anecdote and speculation. We need data, man!
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But it's the anecdote that he disagreed with!
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How can you disagree? I picked it up just by using and hearing the language. The less I had used and heard English in my life, the less chance I would have had to pick up on that word.
I was going to say: because most native speakers use criteria as a singular count noun. If native speakers do it, why not non-native speakers?
But actually I'm wrong about that: altho it's common in speech and print, it's still a minority use (http://books.google.com/books?id=2yJusP0vrdgC&printsec=frontcover&dq=merriam+webster&sig=LO2R9hNkaz23lW0AFjqU3uWYJe0#PRA3-PA310,M1)
I don't dispute the anecdote, I just disagreed with the interpretation.
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MWDEU is on Google Books? That made my day.
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Yes! But some of the pages are badly scanned.