Has English changed (aside from a handful of grammar constructs, a few words, etc.) in the last 50?
Our understanding of it has, very drastically, with a shift from prescriptive grammar to descriptive grammars (the grammar of speech is now recognised as quite distinct from the grammar of writing, rather than being taken as written grammar gone wrong) and computer analysis of texts telling us what the language really is like (rather than what 19th century classicists wanted it to be like). Unfortunately, schools still teach the old version.
More like lies and FUD. The sample size is high enough to get very good statistics if it's a random sample.
The issue is that are all people who use file sharing software doing it illegally? Everyone who subscribes to World of Warcraft uses file sharing software.
That's a point that I flagged to the program's discussion page. The main points made by the program were that the data didn't come from where the government said it did (an independent research organisation) but rather came from an unpublished study by an organisation with a vested interest, and that all of the assumptions made pushed the data in the same direction -- the direction wanted by the organisation who funded the study.
I'm pretty sure you can find some folks in the states who don't agree with what the constitution is; maybe the occasional Texan who thinks that the State should still be independent. It doesn't need everybody to agree to it, it just needs the authorities to agree to it. And they do in the UK, just as they do in the USA.
I was once at a standardisation meeting in which the US delegation demanded that the claim that "a pure Poisson process is time stationary" be put to a vote. It's the American way, democracy in action. Truth is decided by majority vote.
as well as some oddly structured loops for which try/catch logic doesn't get you all the way
Such loops are almost certainly buggy, almost certainly maintenance nightmares and I'll stick my neck out and say certainly unnecessary. The logic needs redesigning. So they are examples of dirty tricks to get code out of the door, as the GOTO poster suggested.
All you are doing is showing that you don't actually know what a constitution is or does. A constitution doesn't necessarily ensure citizen rights -- it could even explicitly deny them.
Considering that the BBFC decided *by itself* in 2002 to legalise pr0n videos/dvds
Not really. Their guidelines address things like whether material is "unacceptable to broad public opinion", and as public opinion shifts then the interpretation of such clauses should shift with it. All that happened was that they recognised that the range of what was acceptable had widened, but not so wide as to include everything that had been rated R18 or banned completely.
They lack money because they have make poor lifestyle decisions that RESULT in a lack of money
Like being born to poor parents, and so not getting access to education and opportunities that their wealthier compatriots enjoy. Really stupid lifestyle choice, that.
As the article says "the study only attacked some of the less complex stylometry techniques". In fact, I'm surprised that they even considered lexical density because that varies greatly within a single author's writing. It's usually high at the beginning of a text, usually (not always) gradually falls off, jumps when they change subject, and so on. I'm not aware of it's being used in forensic linguistics (although it is used in analysing texts to identify, for example, objective divisions within a text).
The sort of thing that they used in the Derek Bentley (which contributed to the partial posthumous pardon) was analysis of his statement, which had
unusually high proportion of passive constructions
the use of police jargon
use of language that was not consistent with an educationally sub-normal 17-year-old
word frequencies that didn't correlate well with general spoken or written English but that did correlate very well with police reports
unusual precision in the expression of times
frequent post-positioning of "then" after the subject ("I then went..." instead of "then I went..."), again characteristic of police reports
That all pointed to the statement not being Bentley's own words, but rather being the police version of his answers to a series of police questions that had been removed from the statement. One aspect of his original trial was a statement "I did not know he was going to use the gun", which was taken as evidence that he knew his accomplice, Craig, had a gun (and the inconsistency with the denial that he knew this, later in the statement, was taken as evidence that he was lying). Since the linguistic analysis shows that this was probably a reply to a question, it seems more likely that it went something like:
Police
Did you know he was going to use the gun?
Bentley
No.
Which makes sense because he knew at the time of the interview that Craig had a gun.
Yes, of course this sort of thing can be gamed, but it wasn't credible that Bentley would have been capable of such sophisticated gaming. The important thing as far as this thread is concerned is that forensic linguistics doesn't plug in a single measure, turn a handle and come out with a yes/no answer; it uses a whole range of measures and builds up an overall picture of what probably happened.
I'm certainly not suspicious of "free" books...but have you ever actually looked at the texts which are available? at least for physics? I have, and while I am not a fan of the big, glossy 1st year physics text books they are far superior to the free offerings available.
"The law is made by the rich and powerful in order to make sure they stay that way". Piers Paul Reed, (but he may have been quoting somebody else, and from memory so may not be exact).
You're preaching to the choir here! Although there are some questions about the those studies (yes, Ada progarms have a lower bug rate than, say, C++ programs -- the very worst Ada programs have about the same bug rate as the very best C++ programs -- but Ada only tends to get used in cases where everything else is securely tied down too, so it goes into the competition with a head start) it's not just chance that the bondage-and-discipline languages dominate(!) the safety-critical scene.
Slashdot Mirror
Has English changed (aside from a handful of grammar constructs, a few words, etc.) in the last 50?
Our understanding of it has, very drastically, with a shift from prescriptive grammar to descriptive grammars (the grammar of speech is now recognised as quite distinct from the grammar of writing, rather than being taken as written grammar gone wrong) and computer analysis of texts telling us what the language really is like (rather than what 19th century classicists wanted it to be like). Unfortunately, schools still teach the old version.
Free publicity for Halo 3 -- are folks sure that this is a real story?
It started out with "star" status -- in classical terms it was specifically a wandering star (mods, please mod any Lee Marvin references down!)
More like lies and FUD. The sample size is high enough to get very good statistics if it's a random sample.
The issue is that are all people who use file sharing software doing it illegally? Everyone who subscribes to World of Warcraft uses file sharing software.
That's a point that I flagged to the program's discussion page. The main points made by the program were that the data didn't come from where the government said it did (an independent research organisation) but rather came from an unpublished study by an organisation with a vested interest, and that all of the assumptions made pushed the data in the same direction -- the direction wanted by the organisation who funded the study.
Are they going to blow up the sun next?
Nature is ahead of them on that. Fortunately for us, it takes quite a while for something that size to blow.
Oh, I do hope not -- I hate to think that they might reproduce :-(
Not to mention -- how on earth does the method of modulation make a difference?
A pretty good impersonation of JH's style, for what it's worth. Are you sure you're not him?
It accepted the claim.
I'm pretty sure you can find some folks in the states who don't agree with what the constitution is; maybe the occasional Texan who thinks that the State should still be independent. It doesn't need everybody to agree to it, it just needs the authorities to agree to it. And they do in the UK, just as they do in the USA.
I was once at a standardisation meeting in which the US delegation demanded that the claim that "a pure Poisson process is time stationary" be put to a vote. It's the American way, democracy in action. Truth is decided by majority vote.
as well as some oddly structured loops for which try/catch logic doesn't get you all the way
Such loops are almost certainly buggy, almost certainly maintenance nightmares and I'll stick my neck out and say certainly unnecessary. The logic needs redesigning. So they are examples of dirty tricks to get code out of the door, as the GOTO poster suggested.
All you are doing is showing that you don't actually know what a constitution is or does. A constitution doesn't necessarily ensure citizen rights -- it could even explicitly deny them.
Considering that the BBFC decided *by itself* in 2002 to legalise pr0n videos/dvds
Not really. Their guidelines address things like whether material is "unacceptable to broad public opinion", and as public opinion shifts then the interpretation of such clauses should shift with it. All that happened was that they recognised that the range of what was acceptable had widened, but not so wide as to include everything that had been rated R18 or banned completely.
I'll admit that I don't follow UK politics very closely. But I thought that draconian censorship was more of a Tory thing.
No, it's a government thing.
That's like a legislature getting together and deciding that pi = 3. Couldn't happen.
Indeed it couldn't. Such an attempt would never get past state senate.
What are you talking about? Britain doesn't even have a constitution.
[Sigh]. Slashdot myth #17. Britain (and the UK as a whole) does have a constitution. What it doesn't have is a single constitutional document.
They lack money because they have make poor lifestyle decisions that RESULT in a lack of money
Like being born to poor parents, and so not getting access to education and opportunities that their wealthier compatriots enjoy. Really stupid lifestyle choice, that.
As the article says "the study only attacked some of the less complex stylometry techniques". In fact, I'm surprised that they even considered lexical density because that varies greatly within a single author's writing. It's usually high at the beginning of a text, usually (not always) gradually falls off, jumps when they change subject, and so on. I'm not aware of it's being used in forensic linguistics (although it is used in analysing texts to identify, for example, objective divisions within a text).
The sort of thing that they used in the Derek Bentley (which contributed to the partial posthumous pardon) was analysis of his statement, which had
That all pointed to the statement not being Bentley's own words, but rather being the police version of his answers to a series of police questions that had been removed from the statement. One aspect of his original trial was a statement "I did not know he was going to use the gun", which was taken as evidence that he knew his accomplice, Craig, had a gun (and the inconsistency with the denial that he knew this, later in the statement, was taken as evidence that he was lying). Since the linguistic analysis shows that this was probably a reply to a question, it seems more likely that it went something like:
Police Did you know he was going to use the gun? BentleyNo.
Which makes sense because he knew at the time of the interview that Craig had a gun.
Yes, of course this sort of thing can be gamed, but it wasn't credible that Bentley would have been capable of such sophisticated gaming. The important thing as far as this thread is concerned is that forensic linguistics doesn't plug in a single measure, turn a handle and come out with a yes/no answer; it uses a whole range of measures and builds up an overall picture of what probably happened.
[Sigh] Somebody else who thinks this is about handwriting. It isn't.
I'm certainly not suspicious of "free" books...but have you ever actually looked at the texts which are available? at least for physics? I have, and while I am not a fan of the big, glossy 1st year physics text books they are far superior to the free offerings available.
That doesn't seem to be what California found.
"The law is made by the rich and powerful in order to make sure they stay that way". Piers Paul Reed, (but he may have been quoting somebody else, and from memory so may not be exact).
I happen to agree with Microsoft's argument with regard to patent trolls.
But they should address that argument to the legislature, not try to tell the court that the law is something other than it is.
To add to that, I've seen books about sex for sale, and sex is occasionally free.
Who was it said that the sex you pay for ends up costing less than the sex that is free?
You're preaching to the choir here! Although there are some questions about the those studies (yes, Ada progarms have a lower bug rate than, say, C++ programs -- the very worst Ada programs have about the same bug rate as the very best C++ programs -- but Ada only tends to get used in cases where everything else is securely tied down too, so it goes into the competition with a head start) it's not just chance that the bondage-and-discipline languages dominate(!) the safety-critical scene.