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It's voilà. How hard is it to not look like a moron?

If your sole association with the word "empower" is superheroes, then I'm afraid that the problem isn't with retarded kids on Slashdot ... (elsewhere, perhaps?)

If it were superfluous, it wouldn't be standard practice.

Certainly, because certainly people don't ever EVER do anything that might even be REMOTELY or POSSIBLY superfluous in their speech.

Wiktionary says superfluous means: "in excess of what is required or sufficient" Which, considering as you have noted people can say "I have no book." or "I haven't any books." Or whatever, then it is certainly the case that "do" is in excess, and not required or sufficient.

It's not currently fashionable to speak that way, but it's perfectly valid and some people still do say that.

Do you even read what I write? My statement was that double negatives are not logically invalid, because people can and do speak that way, in particular in most languages around the world.

You are mistaken.

Ok, let me give you a clear example here: The word "boil" can be an noun or a verb. When I say "I made a crab boil." I am not using "boil" as a verb, even though "boil" can be a verb. No less, when I say "I boiled the water." I am not using an intransitive verb, even though "The water boils." is using an intransitive verb. Each of those sentence are not using "boil" as a noun.

Now, a pronoun is something that occurs in place of a noun, namely, for a noun, or "pro-noun" like "justice pro-tempore". In the statement "I don't have any books", "any" does not occur in place of a noun. It occurs as a descriptor for a noun, which has a term, and it is not "pronoun", it's called an "adjective". Wiktionary specifically states this use is a Determiner, but certainly not a pronoun .

Now, again, if you're having difficulty understanding the fact that the "any" used in "I don't have any books" is not a pronoun then please talk with a 9th grade English teacher, because I don't want to teach you remedial English.

I learned about 1000 Chinese characters when I was actively studying Japanese, which was just as software input methods were first becoming available.
The amount of mental energy and practice necessary to keep it up was untenable, and I eventually switched to correct recognition as input systems became nearly ubiquitous.
I've lost about 2/3 of the characters in the intervening years, but I can still pick up a book and read with my old dictionary handy for the confusing parts.

With writing there are some even more confusing issues, because there are a number of similar-looking characters. You wouldn't confuse them reading (because of context) or in typing (because the input method is based on pronunciation) but they would be a big bugaboo for hand writing. So not having to deal with that type of confusion leaves your brain with more cognitive space to deal with other issues.

Here's a link showing a bunch of the similar characters: http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Appendix:Easily_confused_Chinese_characters

That list doesn't include the first one I encountered: claw and melon. Melon has a claw, but claw doesn't.
http://www.manythings.org/kanji/d/722a.htm
http://www.manythings.org/kanji/d/74dc.htm

[...] and its chalked full of shops [...]

The expression is chock full.

Consider this generation, with the English script comes easier access to the English language, not that the English language is superior in any way other than being a hodge podge http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/hodgepodge of other languages.

What it opens for this upcoming generation is a global exchange in thoughts ideas and cultural identities. English will likely change more in this century than it has in the past few hundred years, as new words and ideas and cultural expressions for which no existing English exists or even just changed for local slangs sake.

So will a person from the 20th century be fluent in 22nd century english or will they need a translator, I'm betting they'd need an auto-translator.

it's pretty frustrating when there are two meanings for a phrase and the meanings are contradictory.

You mean like "cleave" and other contronyms?

a words meaning does not change with altered capitalization

Perhaps not, but leaving an apostrophe out of a contraction and turning it into a plural most certainly does. Fail!

capitalisation is not a word. neither is Capitalisation. idiot.

Right, because everyone in the world lives in the United States of America. Idiot.

you're suggesting that in a 24 hour period, numerous posts over many weeks were just suddenly and randomly found to be needing down moderation

Plenty of people get modpoints, and it's admissibly possible that they might find a particularly offensive person worthy of spending a few on. They come something like 5 at a time, though, so if "numerous posts over many weeks" are getting moderated all at once it isn't the work of one person.

Anyway, it's not what you say; it's how you say it. Even when you're right, you're an asshole.

you are obviously a member of the party contributing to the down-moderations, and further attempting to bait me with your hypocritical ignorance

I had 5 mod-points that expire today. I've only used 2 of them. I don't remember whether or not any of them were used on you, but I am forced to remind you that moderators can't moderate and post (even anonymously) in the same discussion without undoing their modpoints. Whoever modded my post +1 Informative wasn't me.

The "improper" way is so widespread it has become acceptable usage now, perhaps even the standard usage.

The funniest thing about it is "facebook" is a generic noun!

"A reference book or electronic directory made up of individuals' photographs and names." http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/facebook

A facebook is a just a pictured list of students that they hand out to freshmen so they can get acquainted. Zuckerberg jumps from that to registering "Facebook" to wanting to control xyzBook ?

Origins of Facebook

They're not hypocrites. It clearly says that the name was borrowed , not stolen. I'm sure they're honest people and they'll pay the school sooner or later. We must consider Facebook to be innocent until proven guilty and, until now, there is no proof that they won't pay... right?

Droog, http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Concordance:A_Clockwork_Orange#D, Nadsat http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nadsat slang for 'friend' from the Antony Burgess novel A Clockwork Orange http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Clockwork_Orange made into a film by Stanly Kubrick http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Clockwork_Orange_(film)

in the same boat

Not just Spanish, but also not "what" in Spanish.

Would that explain my not seeing the accent in "qué"? Because "que" doesn't mean that; it means "that".

Would that explain my not seeing the accent in "qué"? Because "que" doesn't mean that; it means "that".

"Here, let me Google that for you..."

Gugurasete is allow/cause [someone] to google and gugutteageru is [I] google for [someone]. However, I think gugutteagemasyou (Why don't I google that for you?) is closer in meaning. Here, let me Google that for you...

gugusaserareru

Technically, guguru is a godan verb in the ra row. Wiktionary has a good list of conjugations here.

"Yin" and "Yang" refer to opposite states. Hot and cold, hard and soft, strong and weak. That's all.

Cool story, bro, but you're wrong. The character called "Yin" refers to shady, negative, female, hidden or genitals. The corresponding character called "Yang" refers sunny, positive or male. (As a side note, consider the quandary of deciding which character to use in describing male ("Yang") genitals ("Yin"). Both Japanese and Chinese have words using "Yang" to describe the penis, but note this unhappy word containing "Yang", which means clitoris in both Chinese and Japanese, but can also be used to write a word meaning penis or testicles in Japanese.)

You can point to poorly designed studies in every field.

More to the point, can you provide references to several well-designed studies that indicate the superior effectiveness of acupuncture relative to placebo? Citing studies published in a journal about acupuncture is essentially begging the question.

Are you trolling or merely gullible?

So, which part of the UK are you from?

. Colonies do not magically become part of the continent of the mother country.

They are part of the territory of the mother country. And Europe is not a continent, but a political body.

Specifically: Europe consists of the members of the EU

Europe
1. A political entity; the European Union.
2. A continent north of Africa, west of Asia and east of the Atlantic Ocean.

Canada would be part of Europe under definition (1).

2. Canada is no longer a colony.

Maybe 'colony' is not the term you would be most familiar with today. However, they are not sovereign either, not until they can control and amend their own constitution without the UK's approval.

3. Being a part of any economical union does not mean you are a part of that continent...

Hopefully, you realized your error when I showed you that Europe is a political body, and when we say 'Europe', we are talking about a political entity that has member territories in certain places, and is not constrained to a particular content.

The expansive definition would include both, all countries on the same continent AND all countries and territories of countries that are members of Europe (the political body also called the EU).

sexual harassment is pretty serious. one would think we should be more sympathetic to jodie fisher, not hurd

I agree, sexual harassment is a very serious problem and should not be taken lightly. But could you present the evidence of sexual harassment? Larry Ellison said of it '"The H.P. board admits that it fully investigated the sexual harassment claims against Mark and found them to be utterly false." Furthermore the reason Hurd was fired appeared to be "numerous instances where [Hurd's love interest, Jodie Fisher] received compensation and/or expense reimbursement where there was not a legitimate business purpose, as well as numerous instances where inaccurate expense reports were submitted by Mark or on his behalf that intended to or had the effect of concealing Mark's personal relationship with the contractor." If that's true, misuse of company funds is also serious but not on the level of sexual harassment.

oh right, his browsing history was used against him. therefore, we should be sympathetic to him (rolls eyes)

My concern here -- and what I think the general readership thinks -- is that Hurd did some questionable things or possibly made some enemies and so they tried to dig up anything they could on them. When the sexual harassment charges didn't stick well enough, they used a company policy that everyone is guilty of: using company resources and time to google silly things or read tabloids or do things unrelated to work. "Racy" means "Mildly risque, exciting." So he visited some mildly risque sites?

Basically this looks to be a scenario where Hurd upset someone and they simply looked through his browsing history in order to find a reason to terminate him. Are they constantly searching through browsing histories of all 304,000 employees to find which employment they should terminate? No, they are not. You speak so highly of ethics regarding sexual harassment but what about the ethics of terminating the employment of just one person when he is no more guilty than thousands of other employees -- which you also have the means and option to investigate.

Unfortunately, I have yet to find a dictionary wherein "literally" is described to mean "metaphorically."

There are notes explaining the usage problem of using "literally" as an intensity modifier, but this is not considered correct usage.

Here even explicitly rejects using "literally" as "metaphorically."

Languages need not be regular to be useful, but a minimum degree of rigor is necessary for them to function (and hence exist). Languages exist to facilitate communication, which they can't do [well or maybe even at all] if words also properly mean opposite things. Definitions may be loose, but not that loose, otherwise no one could understand anyone else.

In the end, it's possible, but unlikely. Thus, citation please.

Hmm, if only someone could invent some kind of cover to prevent accidental use...

I think a compounding issue is that the facilities guy (or higher up) is a cheapass.

http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/octopi
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/octopi

http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/octopode

It's interesting to note that only Wiktionary has octopode where as M-W.com doesn't (at least not in their freely available dictionary).

http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/octopi
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/octopi

http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/octopode

It's interesting to note that only Wiktionary has octopode where as M-W.com doesn't (at least not in their freely available dictionary).

Wow, that's some really zen pot-kettle stuff right there. How about sharing your experiences instead of claiming you must be absolutely right and I must be absolutely wrong, then saying that I'm the one dismissing things?

If you're going to dismiss others posts as "some random guy on the internet", don't be surprised when you get dismissed right back. If you're going to find that rude and insulting, then perhaps next time you'll not go down that particular cul-de-sac.

And you're not even using the word "perspective" correctly. You're looking for a word like "position" or "behavior" or even "approach." If you're going to be rude and insulting, please at least bother to say something which makes sense.

Or "point of view" perhaps. One of the many meanings of the word perspective. I suggest you check a dictionary before you make a fool of yourself because you don't recognise a common English idiom.
http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/perspective
http://www.google.com/search?client=safari&rls=en&q=%22from+my+perspective%22&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8

Apple's current setup imposes a number of undesirable factors and bars to entry which can potentially make it less competitive if there are comparable platforms available.

So you keep claiming. Yet you seem unable to be specific about what they are.

Your data is old. There are figures from earlier this month that say otherwise.

OK, accepted. The last ones I saw were Q1.

Claiming the modern iPhone platform is anything like a smartphone from 10 years ago is just ridiculous.

I didn't make any such claim. I simply pointed out that there were very significant competitors in the smartphone market when Apple entered that market, and such competitors remain. Apple have never had a monopoly. They never even had the largest market share.

The market is smartphones, not iPhones_and_iPhone_copies.

Tyre makes me think of a tire in a pyre. Wiktionary agrees with me that this is, at best, archaic.

Wiktionary states that "tyre" is currently used in Australia, Ireland, New Zealand, and the UK. That's hardly "archaic".

Tyre makes me think of a tire in a pyre. Wiktionary agrees with me that this is, at best, archaic.

Pedant says: It's either sterile or it's not.

http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/quite#Adverb

Has usage 1. gone out of use in North America or something? It's quite normal here, if slightly old-fashioned.

It's the plural of virus.

1. humans are causing it

Read the report. I'm not going to keep posting the same damned thing over and over.

Ah, but clearly you are.

It's all over there with convincing evidence that man-made or "anthropogenic" changes are attributing to this in serious ways. No, it does not account for 100% of all the warming but certainly some of it.

I believe you mean contributing to. Unless the anthropogenic climate change itself is the one speaking about the issue and assigning blame. Though I'm inclined to side with you overall over the GP, who as you correctly point out uses the word drastic with nary a conception of what it means.

1. humans are causing it

Read the report. I'm not going to keep posting the same damned thing over and over.

Ah, but clearly you are.

It's all over there with convincing evidence that man-made or "anthropogenic" changes are attributing to this in serious ways. No, it does not account for 100% of all the warming but certainly some of it.

I believe you mean contributing to. Unless the anthropogenic climate change itself is the one speaking about the issue and assigning blame. Though I'm inclined to side with you overall over the GP, who as you correctly point out uses the word drastic with nary a conception of what it means.

1. humans are causing it

Read the report. I'm not going to keep posting the same damned thing over and over.

Ah, but clearly you are.

It's all over there with convincing evidence that man-made or "anthropogenic" changes are attributing to this in serious ways. No, it does not account for 100% of all the warming but certainly some of it.

I believe you mean contributing to. Unless the anthropogenic climate change itself is the one speaking about the issue and assigning blame. Though I'm inclined to side with you overall over the GP, who as you correctly point out uses the word drastic with nary a conception of what it means.

A fully metricated person would indeed have no scruples at all.

The truth is that academically most of college in just highschool part 2. For anyone who is getting a degree in a field that is already their passion & hobby (e.g. someone who has invested 10000+ hours of personal time into programming and then goes for a computer science degree), it's only in the final 1 or 2 years that the coursework is even worthwhile. The rest of the time is spent underachieving because the content is so rudimentary that you can't even stay focused.

I think this shows the difference between different types of colleges. My first go at college I went to a private tech school and it was exactly as you describe, so I dropped out. My second time I went to university and it was a completely different experience. On the other hand, at uni I chose my courses aggressively and proactively to broaden my learning as much as possible, majoring in History and Chinese but taking advanced maths and mid-level computer science (which I talked my way into despite not formally having the background) just for personal enrichment, as well as searching for maximally interesting courses for each of my gen ed requirements, so if you just want to coast and not think too much about your courses, then my experience does not apply. If you just show up to your advisor's office asking "what courses should I take?" the experience is liable to be as you describe, but I always showed up with a list of long-term goals and a list of courses I thought made sense, and asked "will this get me there?"

You think the colleges want you to just buy the quality courses at the end? Hell no, they want you for 2-4 years of tuition!...

Not if you go to state school. They lose money on every course you take so they want you to get as much out of each course as possible. If you just ask (or show up) you can get into almost any advanced class without taking prereqs first. If it turns out you're out of your depth, that's on you, but you can get a good feel for this by talking to the instructor beforehand and reading the syllabus. I've never had this problem and I've taken at least 5 courses whose prereqs I hadn't met.

Summary: tough it out and get a degree, then forget the experience and get a well-paying job. You can be bitter all you want afterwards, but at least you'll have a good salary :) OR conversely, tough it out and do well, then get into a decent master program, and use your performance there to get into a top-quality Ph.D program

Looks like someone could use a dictionary. Perhaps you meant alternatively?

How in the world do you punch someone's crotch when he's lying prone?

[...] persay.[...]

"per se"

Bricking means the device is hosed and cannot be recovered without breaking in and modifying the hardware.

No, you seem to misunderstand the meaning of the word "brick". As defined by Wiktionary:

Noun
brick (countable and uncountable; plural bricks)
1. (countable) A hardened rectangular block of mud, clay etc., used for building.
This wall is made of bricks .

A brick is something you build houses with. A device that is in a state of non-function is called a "brick" because that's about all you could do with it. A device that I don't know how to return to a functioning state to me is a brick. If you know how to fix it, then to you it is not a brick, and if you offer to help me fix it then it is no longer a brick to me either. That's what adolf is saying, and I agree. Take a second to let that sink in and maybe you will understand.

Insurance is a really fucking good idea if you drive and could face effectively unlimited liability if you kill or, worse, injure someone.

Actually, if you do something to be liable for killing or seriously injuring someone, it's pretty damn likely that insurance won't help you.

Get out your policy. Go ahead, I'll wait. Now read it carefully. Somewhere buried in there is the maximum amount of money the insurance company will pay for such a claim. Now go look up how much plaintiffs win when you're held liable for someone dying or getting maimed, and compare it to the first number. If you kill or main someone, you're pretty much going to declare bankruptcy unless you're Bill Gates, pure and simple, and there's not a damn thing having insurance will do for you.

What insurance is good for is one thing and one thing only: To handle things between minor fender benders up to totaling a car and/or covering relatively minor injuries to others or major ones to yourself. Anything past that and you're screwed. Anything less than that, and you're better off simply paying out of your own pocket because of how much higher your premiums will be.

In case you don't know this yet, insurance is a scam. It sounds nice in theory, but it's legalized gambling with a twist--you're betting money on something bad happening instead of something good. Just like in a casino, in which the house always comes out ahead, the insurance companies will always come out ahead, too. There's actually a special word for people who make sure this stays true, they're called actuaries. Add up all of the money you--and your employer, on your behalf--have paid over the years for insurance, and imagine how far that money would have gone had you paid it into, I dunno, a mutual fund or something instead of paying for actuaries and marble-halled buildings. You might actually be able to pay off a large liability claim if you had.

And now, a lot of states have mandatory automobile insurance laws on the books. Do you live in one? I do, and I remember when it went into effect. If you do, have your premiums gone down because so many more people are now paying into the system and because there are so fewer uninsured motorists on the roads now? Yeah, mine haven't either. Funny how that works, isn't it? Again, it sounds nice in theory, but in reality, these laws are just a blatant money grab by insurance companies to use police power to force you to pay them money. Like I said, the industry as a whole is a scam.

http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/saddo

English

[edit]Pronunciation
Rhymes: -æd
[edit]Noun
saddo (plural saddos)
A pathetic or socially inept person; a nerd.
[edit]Synonyms
See also Wikisaurus:dork

I had to replace allot of those

You sure misuse "allot" a lot.

"Cheating" is called cheating for a reason. Cheating is breaking the rules. In marriage, there are a number of rules, some traditional (the vows), some legal (pre-nups, adultery, alienation of affection), but most of the rules are agreed upon by the spouses (you take out the trash, and I do the laundry).

If the spouses agree to an open marriage, then sex with other partners is not cheating. By agreement, the rules allow for it. In this context cheating is when you do something that you said you wouldn't do.

In which case it is breaking your word that is causing all the trouble, and that could be on sex, but also on a lot of other things.

Agreed.

There are no simple answers.

I respectfully disagree. The simple answer is "Keep Your Word", or even more simply "Don't Be an Asshole".

The funny thing is 'kan' can mean in Japanese a can or tin as well, if it's written using the kanji U+7F36. Oddly enough it's not one of the many wasei-eigo terms Japanese imported from English, as it's really one of the on-yomi (Chinese) readings of that kanji. The technical term for such a thing is a false cognate. It's written '', just in case Slashdot ever stops being one of the last few sites to survive to the 21st century while remaining stubbornly ignorant of Unicode.

IOW: it's actually a lottery. I've read a book on how to get your paper published. On the cover of that book there is an illustration of two dies. Now what does that tell you?

[link added]

That publishable papers are standardized entities made by a cookie-cutter or a mold to be identical to the ones that precede and follow them?

Pro-tip: the examples in dictionary definitions aren't meant to be taken as exact use-case criteria.

Since you are semantically challenged and unable to learn what expose means -- something a 5th-grader already knows well -- I will proceed to list the missing definitions from the above source.

2. to lay open to something specified: to expose oneself to the influence of bad companions.
3. to uncover or bare to the air, cold, etc.: to expose one's head to the rain.
4. to present to view; exhibit; display: The storekeeper exposed his wares.
5. to make known, disclose, or reveal (intentions, secrets, etc.).
6. to reveal or unmask (a crime, fraud, impostor, etc.): to expose a swindler.
7. to hold up to public reprehension or ridicule (fault, folly, a foolish act or person, etc.).
8. to desert in an unsheltered or open place; abandon, as a child.
9. to subject, as to the action of something: to expose a photographic plate to light.
10. expose oneself, to exhibit one's body, esp. one's genitals, publicly in an immodest or exhibitionistic manner.

More references for Your Laziness. A poor Wiktionary link. A better Merriam-Webster link.

Now. I expose you as a simpleton, brain exposed for lack of wits; exposed to ridicule; a man that exposes himself in front of small children.

Gosh, if only there were some sort of knowledgeable repository for information, sorted into easily searched pieces to allow for quickly finding what you want...

[...] where a group of people have poured over the source code...

FYI:
http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/pore_over
http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/pore#Verb

[...] where a group of people have poured over the source code...

FYI:
http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/pore_over
http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/pore#Verb

It does have a vowel, it's just not written down. When you pronounce this sequence of consonants (prst), a special mid back unrounded vowel would appear between "pr" and "st". If you try pronouncing it "prst" and "prast" (where "a" signifies this vowel), you'll notice it sounds the same. Other languages have the same word, and they have a letter for the vowel. Czech doesn't seem to have the letter, but the vowel would still be there implicitly, since you can't technically pronounce it without it (though if you try hard it will be almost inaudible). If you hear the pronunciation in Wiktionary, you'll notice that the vowel is evident there.

Oh, if you knew my life experiences. I could write a whole series of rather sorted books...

Oh my! Are you seriously going to start writing Phonebooks? Or *gasp* Dictionaries? The horror! Did you perchance mean Sordid?