BS: Language Pet Peeves

Subject: RE: BS: Language Pet Peeves
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 07 Jun 23 - 10:40 AM

2 nations divided by a common language again? :-D

I'm still recovering from going out to roll a fag in Chicago...

Subject: RE: BS: Language Pet Peeves
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 07 Jun 23 - 12:09 PM

…and I’ve been suffering gender-confusion ever since a colleague in Houston, TX told me I had a big fanny.

Subject: RE: BS: Language Pet Peeves
From: MaJoC the Filk
Date: 07 Jun 23 - 12:32 PM

> What's with "moist"?

Try asking Adora Belle Dearheart.

Subject: RE: BS: Language Pet Peeves
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 07 Jun 23 - 01:22 PM

Aaaaahh, those old times… Moist muffins and Fanny…

Subject: RE: BS: Language Pet Peeves
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 07 Jun 23 - 01:35 PM

Ah, Sheldon's Lancashire oven bottom muffins...

"When you were little, did you like Muffin the Mule?"

"Dunno, never tried it..."

Subject: RE: BS: Language Pet Peeves
From: Lighter
Date: 07 Jun 23 - 05:03 PM

The alleged explanation:


https://www.mentalfloss.com/article/64984/science-behind-why-people-hate-word-moist

Subject: RE: BS: Language Pet Peeves
From: Stanron
Date: 11 Jun 23 - 05:01 AM

I can't remember if this has been done but is it two teaspoons full or two teaspoon fulls?

Subject: RE: BS: Language Pet Peeves
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 11 Jun 23 - 06:39 AM

Why make life difficult? Two teaspoons full, or teaspoonsful (or whatever - who knows?) of sugar is exactly the same as two teaspoons of sugar. If your teaspoon isn't "full", you can say level teaspoon, or rounded teaspoon, or heaped teaspoon. Far more elegant, with the added bonus of avoiding ambiguity.

Subject: RE: BS: Language Pet Peeves
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 11 Jun 23 - 06:47 AM

From your link, Lighter: People who found themselves particularly grossed out by thinking of things as moist may just be more likely to associate the word with sex, the researchers postulate. As one participant explained, “It reminds people of sex and vaginas.” No disrespect to either, of course, but we're pretty sure no one wants to think about those things when they're browsing the baked goods aisle.

I think about sex and vaginas (and other bits) all the time, no matter which aisle I'm browsing, and indeed when I'm doing anything else that allows my mind to be drifting along at about 50% capacity. And I find the association of the word moist with those thoughts to be particularly pleasurable. I can't begin to believe I'm alone in this.

Subject: RE: BS: Language Pet Peeves
From: Stanron
Date: 11 Jun 23 - 06:44 PM

There as a song wasn't there?

A spoonful a spoonful, a spoooooonful.

That'd be three spoonfuls.

Subject: RE: BS: Language Pet Peeves
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 11 Jun 23 - 06:55 PM

Spoonsful is correct but it makes you sound like a twat. Spoonfuls is great. Just like bucketfuls and lots of others. English is always wot people speak. It's a good guide.

Subject: RE: BS: Language Pet Peeves
From: Mrrzy
Date: 11 Jun 23 - 10:10 PM

In recipes, it's teaspoons. Not full. Full would be redundant.

A spoonfull, sure.
A teaspoon or a tablespoon is a precise amount.

Subject: RE: BS: Language Pet Peeves
From: Doug Chadwick
Date: 12 Jun 23 - 04:56 AM

Spoonsful is correct but it makes you sound like a twat. Spoonfuls is great. Just like bucketfuls and lots of others. English is always wot people speak. It's a good guide.

I am English and I would say 'spoonsful' and 'bucketsful'. 'Spoonfuls' sounds really ugly .... and I dare you to make your comments to my face. ;-)

I agree that '-ful' is not needed and 'spoons' and 'buckets' would do but it's nice to have the option. English is a rich and varied language.

DC

Subject: RE: BS: Language Pet Peeves
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 12 Jun 23 - 05:31 AM

Spoonsful / Spoonfuls

A quick browse has Merriam Webster, and Cambridge org both giving both plurals.
Collins & Oxford both give 'spoonfuls' with no alternative.

My own preference would be spoonfuls. 'Spoonsful' always sounds to me as if more than one spoon is being used.

Strangely whatever spellchecker my computer is using picks up 'spoonfuls' as being the wrong spelling, although it is given in all four dictionaries that I checked.

Subject: RE: BS: Language Pet Peeves
From: Doug Chadwick
Date: 12 Jun 23 - 10:38 AM

On reflection, I don't find 'spoonfuls' that ugly. In fact, I think I probably use both constructions without thinking, though I would more likey drop the '-ful' and go for teaspoons/buckets. I like to pick and choose as the fancy takes me and am happy that they all exist.

DC

Subject: RE: BS: Language Pet Peeves
From: meself
Date: 12 Jun 23 - 11:16 AM

Moving right along .... I'm finding that reporters increasingly are hedging their pronouncements and speculations, to the point that much of the time, they're uttering inanities. So this morning I hear, "There is a 60% chance we may see showers" - no! there is a 60% chance we WILL see showers!

Subject: RE: BS: Language Pet Peeves
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 12 Jun 23 - 11:22 AM

there is a 60% chance we WILL see showers!

Even that may be untrue. I'm planning on staying indoors. That makes it virtually Zero%

Subject: RE: BS: Language Pet Peeves
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 12 Jun 23 - 11:27 AM

Then there are the radio travel presenters:
The M1 is heavy! Well, duh. it's made of rubble and concrete or asphalt. Of course it's heavy!

Traffic on the M1 is heavy!
Again, yes, and getting heavier with the switch to electric vehicles.

There are hold-ups on the M25
Well, apart from this not being news to anyone, are the hold-ups the Dick Turpin style, or belt & braces?

Subject: RE: BS: Language Pet Peeves
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 12 Jun 23 - 02:03 PM

Are you sure they're not holds-up, Nigel? Have you consulted Doug? :-)

Subject: RE: BS: Language Pet Peeves
From: Doug Chadwick
Date: 13 Jun 23 - 06:22 PM

Why is raising the thumb of one hand, to express approval, referred to as a 'thumbs-up' instead of a 'thumb-up'?

DC

Subject: RE: BS: Language Pet Peeves
From: leeneia
Date: 13 Jun 23 - 11:28 PM

Good question, Doug. Maybe it started as a contraction of "thumb is up."
=======
On then, to another peeve of mine, and that's the use of the word "existential" merely to mean "actual." For example, referring to a living, breathing zebra as an existential zebra. I suppose in contrast to a metaphorical zebra, whatever that may be.

When I was in college, existentialism was a sort of philosophy, a philosophy I never actually understood. No wonder. The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy says:

... it is difficult to explain what the term “existentialism” refers to. The word, first introduced by Marcel in 1943, is certainly not a reference to a coherent system or philosophical school.[1] Indeed, the major contributors are anything but systematic and have widely divergent views, and of these, only Sartre and Beauvoir explicitly self-identified as “existentialists.”

Reading about it now, I realize that it was a the attempt of people bewildered and horrified by the atrocities of World War II to make sense out of human life.

Subject: RE: BS: Language Pet Peeves
From: Senoufou
Date: 14 Jun 23 - 02:58 AM

Hee hee Nigel, 'hold-ups' on a road! There have been many hold-ups here in Norfolk on our country pot-hole-ridden roads. I now imagine a gang of Norfolk peasants waving pistols and holding up beleaguered motorists! "Gimme yer bank card yew fewl, or oi'll shoot yew dead bor!"
Regarding 'thumbs up', I've always put up both thumbs when signalling approval, not just one. (I don't do things by halves!)

Subject: RE: BS: Language Pet Peeves
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 14 Jun 23 - 04:14 AM

Absolutely with you on existential, leeneia. It's a pointless, useless word which even dictionaries struggle to elucidate. As with albeit, on a daily basis and prior to, there is always a far more elegant and far less pretentious alternative. Let's start a campaign in which we automatically start a fifteen-second, hundred-decibel belly-laugh every time we hear "existential threat." Away with the damn thing!

Subject: RE: BS: Language Pet Peeves
From: Doug Chadwick
Date: 14 Jun 23 - 04:25 AM

For someone who hates the word albeit, you don't half say it a lot, Steve. I've lost count of how many times you have mentioned it in this thread. We get the message - let it go!

DC

Subject: RE: BS: Language Pet Peeves
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 14 Jun 23 - 04:33 AM

Yes, Doug, mainly because I know how you hate it when I do. Anyway, I never use it in a sentence in which better alternatives are available, at least not prior to today, and certainly never on a daily basis, albeit that could change (note its ungrammatical use there, a mistake commonly made by the more pretentious among us!)

Subject: RE: BS: Language Pet Peeves
From: weerover
Date: 14 Jun 23 - 07:32 AM

...there is a 60% chance we SHALL see showers (convention being "will" in 1st person denotes intention or determination).

Subject: RE: BS: Language Pet Peeves
From: meself
Date: 14 Jun 23 - 10:59 AM

Convention in North America, if we are to understand 'convention' as the customarily-accepted practice, is that 'shall' is not used at all, other than by the rare schoolteacher.

Subject: RE: BS: Language Pet Peeves
From: Mrrzy
Date: 14 Jun 23 - 11:17 AM

Technically ... Shall can really only be used with I. One can't speak for others.

Will means intend to.
Shall means actually going to do it, no hedging about intentions.

A parent can say You shall to a child, but the kid still might not. So, twchnically, not proper usage.

It shall rain? Hmmm. Presumptuous, kinda.

Not that this is common current usage, I do know.

Subject: RE: BS: Language Pet Peeves
From: Rain Dog
Date: 14 Jun 23 - 11:23 AM

"Shall we?"
"Let's shall."

Subject: RE: BS: Language Pet Peeves
From: leeneia
Date: 14 Jun 23 - 01:32 PM

I think I read that the rules for "will" and "shall" were invented by some pedant in the 1600's. He felt that since Latin used different forms of a verb for different persons, then English should too. It didn't work.

I believe the only time I use "shall" is in singing "He Shall Feed his Flock."

Subject: RE: BS: Language Pet Peeves
From: meself
Date: 14 Jun 23 - 03:23 PM

Another one that's been bugging me is news commentators' uncritical use of 'believe', as in, 'Donald trump believes the election was stolen' - no! it is highly unlikely that he 'believes' any such thing; he does, however, claim to believe the election was stolen.

Subject: RE: BS: Language Pet Peeves
From: weerover
Date: 14 Jun 23 - 03:29 PM

Fowler's "Dictionary of Modern English Usage" and Harrap's "English Usage" both declare that "will" with the first person (singular or plural) denotes intention or determination. I am not usually pedantic but when someone else is being pedantic and gets it wrong I can't help it.

Subject: RE: BS: Language Pet Peeves
From: Helen
Date: 21 Jun 23 - 03:48 AM

This is relevant to the topic:

A creepy, dirty old man thinking about sex in a normal, everyday environment near other people, including girls and women, just going about their daily business, oblivious to his creepy, dirty thoughts.

Maybe this is not unusual for some (or even most?) men, to think about sex in normal, everyday situations, but to crow about it and make it into a big joke on a public music-related forum, open to all people of all ages. Is that normal and healthy or is it creepy and dirty?

And then to act self righteous about the comments posted by other Mudcat members?

Subject: RE: BS: Language Pet Peeves
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 21 Jun 23 - 04:32 AM

Aside from the fact that the link is dead, that doesn't seem to fit in this thread very well. Still, the poster has hedged their bets by sticking the post in two separate threads! :-)

My pet peeve of the day, very topical, is the misuse of "solstice." Even the weather forecaster on radio 4 this morning, a professional meteorologist, told us that today is the summer solstice. Well that's not right at all. The solstice occurs today, but it's an instant in time, not the whole day. For us Brits it occurs at 3.58 this afternoon. I'll stop digging my garden for a moment, look heavenwards and pretend I'm a Druid, just for a minute...

Subject: RE: BS: Language Pet Peeves
From: Doug Chadwick
Date: 21 Jun 23 - 04:57 AM

The solstice occurs today, but it's an instant in time, not the whole day.

That would also apply to 'anniversary'. If you were married at 3pm, then your wedding anniversary would occur at 3pm in each of the following years. Try getting away with not taking your wife a cup of tea in bed that morning, then come and remake your argument.

If a newsreader says "Today is the King's coronation", everyone would understand that what was meant was "Today is the King's coronation day". It would not need an explanation that the coronation is a moment in time, when the crown is placed on the King's head.

DC

Subject: RE: BS: Language Pet Peeves
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 21 Jun 23 - 05:19 AM

"Today is the King's Coronation"? Not a great example, maybe...

"Solstice" has a specific scientific meaning (sol=sun, stice=stasis or standing still). It's a momentary event, but I suppose we use it informally to mean the day on which the event occurs, and that's hard to fight. But it can still be a peeve!

Subject: RE: BS: Language Pet Peeves
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 21 Jun 23 - 06:27 AM

Generally, Doug, dictionaries regard anniversaries as being a date on the calendar, not a moment in time. Same with birthDAY. A minute before the solstice (God, nearly said "prior to" there...), the northern hemisphere is still a fraction away from having the sun at maximum angle in the sky, and a minute after the sun is declining from that angle. The "-stice" part of the word only applies momentarily.

After today's moment in time, the sun's angle declines on a daily basis, albeit almost imperceptibly so unless observed over a week or two. Sorry, couldn't resist...

Subject: RE: BS: Language Pet Peeves
From: MaJoC the Filk
Date: 21 Jun 23 - 06:35 AM

Hm: Knowing the *instant* when it's Solstice is a side-effect of modern astrophysical knowledge and instrumentation; but it's a stationary point on a gentle curve. Knowing the *day* would have been high-precision knowledge Way Back When. I'll settle for "longest day", and skip further astropedantry (unless severely provoked).

Subject: RE: BS: Language Pet Peeves
From: MaJoC the Filk
Date: 21 Jun 23 - 06:55 AM

Fresh peeve: "key" used to describe some event which enables others to happen ("unlocking" them, if you will), and that's a vaguely tolerable metaphor; but "key" has been diluted by repetition into a synonym for "important".

Subject: RE: BS: Language Pet Peeves
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 21 Jun 23 - 07:05 AM

I heard a newsreader say that today had more hours of sunlight than any other day. She should have said seconds, maybe.

It's a funny thing that, after the solstice, sunrise and sunset don't start to close in on each other equally. In Bude, sunrise today was at 05.04 BST and sunset is 21.35. By June 30 sunrise is four minutes later at 05.08 - but sunset is still at 21.35 (we won't quibble about seconds). Something to do with the Earth being a bit wobbly in its orbit. Maybe it needs its wheels balanced.

Subject: RE: BS: Language Pet Peeves
From: MaJoC the Filk
Date: 21 Jun 23 - 09:43 AM

OK, I consider myself provoked:

The Wikipedia article on the Equation of Time is most enlightening. It's not the wobbliness of the Earth's rotation on its axis: it's that the Earth's axis isn't at right angles to the plane of its orbit (which gives us summer and winter), and that the orbit's slightly elliptical (we're closest to the Sun around Christmas, which helps make Northern hemisphere winters milder). This may help explain my personal observation that the earliest dawn, longest day, and latest sunset happen in that order, over about a week; were we on solar time instead of mean time, these may or may not coincide.

.... that's Quite Enough for now.

Subject: RE: BS: Language Pet Peeves
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 21 Jun 23 - 10:08 AM

Aha, not wobbly then. Must've been the Ardbeg 10 making me THINK I was wobbling...

Subject: RE: BS: Language Pet Peeves
From: Lighter
Date: 21 Jun 23 - 10:20 AM

"Is" commonly designates "the day of" - as should be pretty obvious.
("Is today the exam?")

Those who assume, extralinguisticly, that the whole day is the solstice are just misinformed.

Their command of everyday English, however, is fine.

Subject: RE: BS: Language Pet Peeves
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 21 Jun 23 - 11:00 AM

Well the solstice has just passed (and the sun was beaming out). Can't help noticing that the nights are already drawing in... :-)

Subject: RE: BS: Language Pet Peeves
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 21 Jun 23 - 07:35 PM

Your point, Lighter, may well be the one I've consistently made here over the years, that English is wot people say and not wot the grammar (etc.) police like to dictate. One might feel that it's a shame when nuance is lost, as with unique, literally, disinterested, alternative and the like. Even worse when pretentiousness is allowed to creep in, things like prior to, on a daily basis and the dreaded albeit. It can feel like we're kowtowing to ignorance by accepting the "misuses," but language belongs to the people, not to professors in ivory towers. It's about evolution, not dumbing down, and the bottom line is that language is all about communicating.

But none of that means that we can't have peeves. And I'm peeved when allegedly educated scientific types such as meteorologists don't know that the solstice is a moment in time, not a day.

Subject: RE: BS: Language Pet Peeves
From: Doug Chadwick
Date: 22 Jun 23 - 02:45 AM

The meteorologists don't even know when the seasons start and finish. They refer to the calendar months of March, April and May as 'meteorological' Spring and June, July and August as 'meteorological' Summer. If they can't get the seasons right, no wonder they're so bad at predicting the weather.

DC

Subject: RE: BS: Language Pet Peeves
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 22 Jun 23 - 04:56 AM

It's a matter of having statistics that can be compared year-on-year. From the Met Office website:
"The meteorological seasons consist of splitting the seasons into four periods made up of three months each. These seasons are split to coincide with our Gregorian calendar, making it easier for meteorological observing and forecasting to compare seasonal and monthly statistics. By the meteorological calendar, spring will always start on 1 March; ending on 31 May.

The seasons are defined as spring (March, April, May), summer (June, July, August), autumn (September, October, November) and winter (December, January, February)."

It might seem arbitrary, but so is defining the seasons as beginning and ending on solstices and equinoxes. Doing it that way, summer started yesterday. As we've had six amazing weeks of "summery" weather already, that seems slightly absurd, at least this year. Another issue is the actual dates on which solstices and equinoxes fall vary from year to year. It's arbitrary, but doing it in convenient three-month chunks is more consistent.

Subject: RE: BS: Language Pet Peeves
From: Doug Chadwick
Date: 22 Jun 23 - 05:47 AM

People who pretend to be Druids, and the like, don't celebrate the solstice. They are out there at sunrise on the day of the solstice. If they can pick and choose when they celebrate and the the meteorologists can mis-name the seasons for their own convenience, there doesn't seem to be a lot of point in getting peeved about a moment in time.

DC

Subject: RE: BS: Language Pet Peeves
From: MaJoC the Filk
Date: 22 Jun 23 - 07:02 AM

> we've had six amazing weeks of "summery" weather already

Shortly to be followed by another false autumn, like last year: trees can't move away from the Equator fast enough to avoid the heat stress. But that's a peeve for a different Thread.

Subject: RE: BS: Language Pet Peeves
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 22 Jun 23 - 07:18 AM

You seem to be peeved that I'm peeved, Doug...