If you and I and let's say 48 other people were in a closed society, and we each spoke different dialects of English, we wouldn't understand each other. One individual is not going to change a language. If all 50 of us spoke a common language, we could understand each other, and would have our own actual language.
By society, I meant the many societies that use different dialects. People in my native Texas speak one way, people in England speak another way, people in Canada speak yet another way and people in Australia speak again another way. Even subcultures within regions speak different ways. These different dialects are for the most part mutually intelligable. I can listen to another English speaker on the other side of the world, and while I may not (and probably won't) understand a lot of local sayings and idioms, I will recognize that English is the language being spoken and will most likely understand at least the gist of what is said. But these are groups, not individuals. You could say, like I sarcastically did, that English is how you define it, but most likely noone else, and certainly not enough to affect the societies we live and communicate in, would be enough to affect worldwide or even nationwide language usage. In short *you* do not define the English language any more than *I* do. Can you tell me the one person that decided to stop using "thee" and "thou" and just use "you"? I doubt it, because it wasn't done by one person.
I'm all into individualism and noncomformity, but you do need to be able to speak the same language as others to be understood. Even if your speech or writing is only understood by a small group, it's still a common thing that no one person defines, unless you have some secret cult and dictate that all members will speak a secret language.
To rationalize any spelling or grammar mistake with "I can do what I want, because It's my language." is silly. I sarcastically redefined English spelling, but noone but me or some other bored individual who might play along for fun speaks English that way, nor recognizes it as such. I'm not saying you can't make up your own language, but if no significant number of other English speakers accept it, it's not English.
BTW, in the last sentance of your first paragraph, it should be "effect", not "affect". "Effect" is a noun, but "Affect" is a verb. You affect something. How you affect something has effects on that thing. I'm sure you'll say that you're using it perfectly correctly because you say so, but the vast majority of people who know better probably make a discinction and use them correctly.
Thanks and have a nice day...er...zknaht dna evah a ecin yad huzzah!
Uhm, "learnt" isn't some new thing, it's a British English thing that doesn't happen in American English (that I've ever heard). If anything, it's an older form, that Americans no longer use.
I'm assuming you speak British English?
And if you think the dictionary added "learnt" because you use it, you're pretty conceited. Individuals do not define language. Societies may, but you or I don't. You can speak whatever you want, but if it isn't recognizable as English to other English speakers, it won't be English and noone will be able to understand you. And noone is going to change dictionaries because you changed how you talk or spell.
Languages change, but societies all speak the same language at the same time or noone would understand each other. And the whole of English isn't going to adapt to how you talk, no matter what you think. *You* don't define English, the English speaking world as a whole does.
Hey, *I'm* a native speaker too! That must mean *I* can change the language as *I* see fit as well!
I hereby declare that, all English words shall be reversed in their spelling, and all "s"s and "z"s shall be reversed with each other. All questions shall be ended with the word "huzzah" and all exclamations with the word "wigglums". If you don't like it, too bad, *I* am a native speaker. You can't tell me how to speak *my* language.
As a native speaker, I demand that Slashdot and indeed the entire English speaking world to change their spellings. Linguists must now adapt and I expect the next editions of dictionaries to contain my changes. Now, the rest of this post will be in English, as I, a native speaker, define it.
kool ta em, I ma a evitan hzilgne rekaeps wigglums!
Yes, but it's only used (at least with any sort of regularity) in British English.
Besides, I think "learnt" sounds funny, like something a hick would say, ie: "I dun learnt me some math-e-maticks in skewl!" In fact, I can't help but say it to myself in just this manner and chuckle every time I read it. *shrug*
Thank you very much for your reasonable and non-hostile response. It was informative, unlike most of the ones I've been getting. All I know about Sweden is what I read, having not been there. It's good to get a actual first-hand account, and from that, it seems that what I've heard and read may be overblown.
I'm not a racist. I make no assumptions, negative or otherwise, about someone based solely on race. Being against an ideology that is held primarily be members of a certain race doesn't mean that I'm racist. I'm just as against that ideology if it's held by black, white, brown, whatever color of people. If I'm against hip-hop culture, that doesn't necessarily mean I'm racist against black people, does it? So stop throwing around the "racist" line; It's not true.
That source was the first I found in an admittedly short time searching. I'd be happy to look in local Swedish sources, but I don't know the language.
The example of Sweden was one example that sprung to mind of an overall trend, that was my point. I admit I should have looked up more sources to back up the claim, but I stand by the main part of my post, that radical Islamics want to and are in the process of taking over countries in an attempt to Islamicize them. Members of these groups have said it straight out. I have no problem with imigration or immigrants, unless they refuse to abide by the laws of the country to which they move and attempt to change said laws.
Oh come on, you think they wouldn't notice if the vast majority of criminals were of a certain race? I'm not saying this is necessarily the case, but I'll repost an address to translations of Swedish news articles (with links to the original Swedish sites).
And no, I'm not racist; it's already been implied once, and I'm sure it will again in this discussion. Nor am I Christian; I'm an atheist, so I'm not biased for or against any religion by default.
I thought this kind of talk was paranoid at first too, but I looked into it and keep seeing disturbing things.
Ok, I tried to find articles to that effect in response to your obviously sarcastic post.
Here's one with links to a Swedish news site I realize that the site may be biased, but it has links to the original Swedish articles, if you care to read them. I can't read Swedish, so I can't vouch for accuracy of translation.
Keep in mind that news (at least here in the US) doesn't mention this kind of thing because of political correctness.
Did I say that? No, I didn't. I'm an atheist, and I'm against any religion (or practicioners of an extreme subset of one) that has such beliefs. I've never heard that, since I don't listen/watch to Ann Coulter.
I'm glad someone sees the real threat instead of falling for the "terrorism is just a nuisance" and "they just want to be free like everybody else" crap.
Terrorism is just a tactic, but the *ideology* behind it, is a serious threat to all free people. You may think it's exaggerated, but they have stated straight up that they want to *convert or kill* all non-mohammedans. They want to take over and convert to Sharia law western countries including the US. This has come from supposedly mainstream Islamic groups like CAIR.
It's worse in some European countries, like in the Netherlands, with what happened to Theo Van Gogh, and in Sweden (IIRC), where in some cities, police have admitted that they no longer have control due to hordes of Islamic immigrants causing chaos. And the aformentioned apathy about the problem is what has allowed these things to happen.
Now, I'm certainly not advocating a police state or anything of the sort; I'm pretty libertarian. But some common sense things need to be done, like controlling the borders (which is a way in which I differ from hardline libertarianism) and keeping an eye on groups that could be connected with terrorism.
Well, I admittedly did have to have my parents type for me, as I couldn't yet read. But I moved the character around and told them what I wanted them to type. I remember that the monsters in KQI scared me to death when they popped out of nowhere and started chasing me.
I can see a purely text adventure being hard for a young'un, but then I sharpened my reading and typing skills at a pretty young age on text adventures and the like, around 8 or so probably and I began programming my own text games in BASIC at around 10.
We watched Charlie Chaplin's "Modern Life" (I believe that was the title) in my university America 1917-1944 class, and it was geniuinely funny and I enjoyed it quite a bit, despite its lack of spoken dialog and the fact that it's about 80 years old.
Quite a few other people were laughing a lot too. While I love Family Guy and load of other modern comedy, sometimes the old stuff is pretty funny too.
I have a few silent films that I really like and watch, like Nosferatu, Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, and Metropolis. I don't have a collection of radio drama, but I listen to "When Radio Was" whenever I hear it on the radio.
I'm 24, for the record, so this stuff was long before my time.
It's perfectly possible to enjoy and appreciate old and "obsolete" things like that, just like old games.
The first game I remember playing was the original King's Quest (in glorious CGA graphics) on an IBM PC jr, which was my first computer. I was about three at the time.
I've been addicted to games ever since.
Re:No offense to the VGmusic people, but...
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Play it Again, Samus
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· Score: 1
I know that you can convert them to MIDI, as I often do.
MIDI, however has up to 127 controllers that can simulate anything that can be done in an NSF assuming the synth or sampler is set up properly. I am, in fact, working on a Reaktor synth that emulates the NES synth pretty closely (but not the white noise percussion yet). It can even do the bass drum effects in many MegaMan games (the triangle wave that quickly pitch shifts down).
I'm not arguing that MIDI can practically take the place of direct rips played on emulators, as I have a large archive of NSF, etc, just that MIDI is more than a type of file that plays cheesy sounding music, which is what many people think it is. I use MIDI when composing my own music and doing covers of video game music. If I want to hear original tracks, I'll play them on an emulator.
I'm just sick of comments like the " MIDI is shit. It is the Wonder Bread of music formats." from people who obviously don't understand the concept of MIDI.
Re:No offense to the VGmusic people, but...
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Play it Again, Samus
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· Score: 3, Informative
You obviously don't know what MIDI is for. It's not for replicating video game music on generic sound cards, no. But with some work, time, and a sampler, I could make a MIDI sound like video game music or anything else.
For those that still dont' get it: MIDI has nothing to do with sound quality. It is *note data only*. It is like digital sheet music. You don't complain that a composition sucks when it is performed by a crappy band using the wrong instruments, do you? Sound quality is dependent entirely on what the MIDI is being played on. MIDI does not fill the same role as an MP3, a WAV, a MOD, an NSF, or anything of the sort. MIDI was invented as a standardized way to control synthesizers, samplers, etc, not to play video game music on cheesy consumer soundcards.
MIDI is probably used in most video game sound tracks nowdays, as well as many movie soundtracks and in most electronic music. It's just not played through SoundBlasters. And for your information, I have taken MIDI files from vgmusic.com and made them sound quite cool. I do video game covers for fun, you see.
So please try to understand what you're talking about before talking about it in the future.
I have no idea what you're talking about or how it pertains to my post, but no, I've never discussed anything over any sort of beverage with any sort of cheerleader that I'm aware of. I'm not that fond of Cherry Coke anyway. Now, Vanilla Coke isn't too bad, however. If I were to discuss something with a cheerleader or anyone else, I'd be happy to do it over a nice, ice-cold Vanilla Coke.
America is just a name for the Continent(s). They're aboriginal to this continent. I don't see what the problem is. They aren't called Native/Aboriginal Citizens of the United States, but Americans, meaning aboriginal/native to the continent. What would you prefer them to be called, "Aborigines of That Large Landmass in the Western Hemisphere Across the Atlantic from Europe that Was Inhabitied only by Said Aborigines Until 1492"? I don't think all the tribes that lived here had one name for the whole landmass, did they?
I don't go for the whole politically correct thing and don't have any sort of moral objection to calling them "injuns", but I think aborigines is just more accurate.
Slashdot Mirror
Dammit, you got me. Er, I mean, I changed it on the fly, I can do that, you know. I'm a native speaker. I'm always right.
If you and I and let's say 48 other people were in a closed society, and we each spoke different dialects of English, we wouldn't understand each other. One individual is not going to change a language. If all 50 of us spoke a common language, we could understand each other, and would have our own actual language.
By society, I meant the many societies that use different dialects. People in my native Texas speak one way, people in England speak another way, people in Canada speak yet another way and people in Australia speak again another way. Even subcultures within regions speak different ways. These different dialects are for the most part mutually intelligable. I can listen to another English speaker on the other side of the world, and while I may not (and probably won't) understand a lot of local sayings and idioms, I will recognize that English is the language being spoken and will most likely understand at least the gist of what is said. But these are groups, not individuals. You could say, like I sarcastically did, that English is how you define it, but most likely noone else, and certainly not enough to affect the societies we live and communicate in, would be enough to affect worldwide or even nationwide language usage. In short *you* do not define the English language any more than *I* do. Can you tell me the one person that decided to stop using "thee" and "thou" and just use "you"? I doubt it, because it wasn't done by one person.
I'm all into individualism and noncomformity, but you do need to be able to speak the same language as others to be understood. Even if your speech or writing is only understood by a small group, it's still a common thing that no one person defines, unless you have some secret cult and dictate that all members will speak a secret language.
To rationalize any spelling or grammar mistake with "I can do what I want, because It's my language." is silly. I sarcastically redefined English spelling, but noone but me or some other bored individual who might play along for fun speaks English that way, nor recognizes it as such. I'm not saying you can't make up your own language, but if no significant number of other English speakers accept it, it's not English.
BTW, in the last sentance of your first paragraph, it should be "effect", not "affect". "Effect" is a noun, but "Affect" is a verb. You affect something. How you affect something has effects on that thing. I'm sure you'll say that you're using it perfectly correctly because you say so, but the vast majority of people who know better probably make a discinction and use them correctly.
Thanks and have a nice day...er...zknaht dna evah a ecin yad huzzah!
Uhm, "learnt" isn't some new thing, it's a British English thing that doesn't happen in American English (that I've ever heard). If anything, it's an older form, that Americans no longer use.
I'm assuming you speak British English?
And if you think the dictionary added "learnt" because you use it, you're pretty conceited. Individuals do not define language. Societies may, but you or I don't. You can speak whatever you want, but if it isn't recognizable as English to other English speakers, it won't be English and noone will be able to understand you. And noone is going to change dictionaries because you changed how you talk or spell.
Languages change, but societies all speak the same language at the same time or noone would understand each other. And the whole of English isn't going to adapt to how you talk, no matter what you think. *You* don't define English, the English speaking world as a whole does.
Hey, *I'm* a native speaker too! That must mean *I* can change the language as *I* see fit as well!
I hereby declare that, all English words shall be reversed in their spelling, and all "s"s and "z"s shall be reversed with each other. All questions shall be ended with the word "huzzah" and all exclamations with the word "wigglums". If you don't like it, too bad, *I* am a native speaker. You can't tell me how to speak *my* language.
As a native speaker, I demand that Slashdot and indeed the entire English speaking world to change their spellings. Linguists must now adapt and I expect the next editions of dictionaries to contain my changes. Now, the rest of this post will be in English, as I, a native speaker, define it.
kool ta em, I ma a evitan hzilgne rekaeps wigglums!
retteb, zey huzzah?
Yes, but it's only used (at least with any sort of regularity) in British English.
Besides, I think "learnt" sounds funny, like something a hick would say, ie: "I dun learnt me some math-e-maticks in skewl!" In fact, I can't help but say it to myself in just this manner and chuckle every time I read it. *shrug*
Thank you very much for your reasonable and non-hostile response. It was informative, unlike most of the ones I've been getting. All I know about Sweden is what I read, having not been there. It's good to get a actual first-hand account, and from that, it seems that what I've heard and read may be overblown.
I'm not a racist. I make no assumptions, negative or otherwise, about someone based solely on race. Being against an ideology that is held primarily be members of a certain race doesn't mean that I'm racist. I'm just as against that ideology if it's held by black, white, brown, whatever color of people. If I'm against hip-hop culture, that doesn't necessarily mean I'm racist against black people, does it? So stop throwing around the "racist" line; It's not true.
That source was the first I found in an admittedly short time searching. I'd be happy to look in local Swedish sources, but I don't know the language.
The example of Sweden was one example that sprung to mind of an overall trend, that was my point. I admit I should have looked up more sources to back up the claim, but I stand by the main part of my post, that radical Islamics want to and are in the process of taking over countries in an attempt to Islamicize them. Members of these groups have said it straight out. I have no problem with imigration or immigrants, unless they refuse to abide by the laws of the country to which they move and attempt to change said laws.
Apparently one is called Malmø. If ordinary street crime is like that in Europe, then I'm glad I live here.
I'll post this link here too in response:
Here
As I've said, I can't vouch for the accuracy of translation, and I know the site has a bias, but it has links to the original Swedish articles.
Oh come on, you think they wouldn't notice if the vast majority of criminals were of a certain race? I'm not saying this is necessarily the case, but I'll repost an address to translations of Swedish news articles (with links to the original Swedish sites).
Here
And no, I'm not racist; it's already been implied once, and I'm sure it will again in this discussion. Nor am I Christian; I'm an atheist, so I'm not biased for or against any religion by default.
I thought this kind of talk was paranoid at first too, but I looked into it and keep seeing disturbing things.
Ok, I tried to find articles to that effect in response to your obviously sarcastic post.
Here's one with links to a Swedish news site
I realize that the site may be biased, but it has links to the original Swedish articles, if you care to read them. I can't read Swedish, so I can't vouch for accuracy of translation.
Keep in mind that news (at least here in the US) doesn't mention this kind of thing because of political correctness.
Did I say that? No, I didn't. I'm an atheist, and I'm against any religion (or practicioners of an extreme subset of one) that has such beliefs. I've never heard that, since I don't listen/watch to Ann Coulter.
I said IIRC, which means I wasn't sure that it was in Sweden, but I read an article to that effect about some northern European country.
And no, it has nothing to do with race, it has to do with ideology. Thanks for making your kneejerk reactions completely clear.
Please, I'm curious...why should cannibalism be legalized?
If only I had mod points...excellent post.
I'm glad someone sees the real threat instead of falling for the "terrorism is just a nuisance" and "they just want to be free like everybody else" crap.
Terrorism is just a tactic, but the *ideology* behind it, is a serious threat to all free people. You may think it's exaggerated, but they have stated straight up that they want to *convert or kill* all non-mohammedans. They want to take over and convert to Sharia law western countries including the US. This has come from supposedly mainstream Islamic groups like CAIR.
It's worse in some European countries, like in the Netherlands, with what happened to Theo Van Gogh, and in Sweden (IIRC), where in some cities, police have admitted that they no longer have control due to hordes of Islamic immigrants causing chaos. And the aformentioned apathy about the problem is what has allowed these things to happen.
Now, I'm certainly not advocating a police state or anything of the sort; I'm pretty libertarian. But some common sense things need to be done, like controlling the borders (which is a way in which I differ from hardline libertarianism) and keeping an eye on groups that could be connected with terrorism.
The threat is real; open your eyes.
Yeah, it's US-centric, which is why it's done by a Canadian on a Canadian site.
If you don't like it, right your own version. The source is freely available.
Well, I admittedly did have to have my parents type for me, as I couldn't yet read. But I moved the character around and told them what I wanted them to type. I remember that the monsters in KQI scared me to death when they popped out of nowhere and started chasing me.
I can see a purely text adventure being hard for a young'un, but then I sharpened my reading and typing skills at a pretty young age on text adventures and the like, around 8 or so probably and I began programming my own text games in BASIC at around 10.
We watched Charlie Chaplin's "Modern Life" (I believe that was the title) in my university America 1917-1944 class, and it was geniuinely funny and I enjoyed it quite a bit, despite its lack of spoken dialog and the fact that it's about 80 years old.
Quite a few other people were laughing a lot too. While I love Family Guy and load of other modern comedy, sometimes the old stuff is pretty funny too.
I have a few silent films that I really like and watch, like Nosferatu, Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, and Metropolis. I don't have a collection of radio drama, but I listen to "When Radio Was" whenever I hear it on the radio.
I'm 24, for the record, so this stuff was long before my time.
It's perfectly possible to enjoy and appreciate old and "obsolete" things like that, just like old games.
The first game I remember playing was the original King's Quest (in glorious CGA graphics) on an IBM PC jr, which was my first computer. I was about three at the time.
I've been addicted to games ever since.
I know that you can convert them to MIDI, as I often do.
MIDI, however has up to 127 controllers that can simulate anything that can be done in an NSF assuming the synth or sampler is set up properly. I am, in fact, working on a Reaktor synth that emulates the NES synth pretty closely (but not the white noise percussion yet). It can even do the bass drum effects in many MegaMan games (the triangle wave that quickly pitch shifts down).
I'm not arguing that MIDI can practically take the place of direct rips played on emulators, as I have a large archive of NSF, etc, just that MIDI is more than a type of file that plays cheesy sounding music, which is what many people think it is. I use MIDI when composing my own music and doing covers of video game music. If I want to hear original tracks, I'll play them on an emulator.
I'm just sick of comments like the " MIDI is shit. It is the Wonder Bread of music formats." from people who obviously don't understand the concept of MIDI.
For those that still dont' get it: MIDI has nothing to do with sound quality. It is *note data only*. It is like digital sheet music. You don't complain that a composition sucks when it is performed by a crappy band using the wrong instruments, do you? Sound quality is dependent entirely on what the MIDI is being played on. MIDI does not fill the same role as an MP3, a WAV, a MOD, an NSF, or anything of the sort. MIDI was invented as a standardized way to control synthesizers, samplers, etc, not to play video game music on cheesy consumer soundcards.
MIDI is probably used in most video game sound tracks nowdays, as well as many movie soundtracks and in most electronic music. It's just not played through SoundBlasters. And for your information, I have taken MIDI files from vgmusic.com and made them sound quite cool. I do video game covers for fun, you see.
So please try to understand what you're talking about before talking about it in the future.
I have no idea what you're talking about or how it pertains to my post, but no, I've never discussed anything over any sort of beverage with any sort of cheerleader that I'm aware of. I'm not that fond of Cherry Coke anyway. Now, Vanilla Coke isn't too bad, however. If I were to discuss something with a cheerleader or anyone else, I'd be happy to do it over a nice, ice-cold Vanilla Coke.
America is just a name for the Continent(s). They're aboriginal to this continent. I don't see what the problem is. They aren't called Native/Aboriginal Citizens of the United States, but Americans, meaning aboriginal/native to the continent. What would you prefer them to be called, "Aborigines of That Large Landmass in the Western Hemisphere Across the Atlantic from Europe that Was Inhabitied only by Said Aborigines Until 1492"? I don't think all the tribes that lived here had one name for the whole landmass, did they?
I don't go for the whole politically correct thing and don't have any sort of moral objection to calling them "injuns", but I think aborigines is just more accurate.
Madden 2005 was dropped in price to about $30 from $50 because of ESPN's price drop (at least at Electronic Boutique).