HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: frankm@microsoft.com (Frank R.A.J. Maloney)
Subject: Re: "Same as above" marks
Date: 07 Apr 92 16:18:23 GMT
Organization: Microsoft Windows/DOS Users Ed Group

In article <69434@ut-emx.uucp> verbum@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu (Neal Whitman) writes (quoting frankm@microsoft.com):
>>The word ditto derives from the Latin dictum, a saying, which in turns
>>derives from dico, dicere, to say.
>>
>I beg to disagree.  "Ditto" comes from a Greek prefix meaning "twice," as
>opposed to the prefix "haplo" meaning either "once" or "half" (I'm not
>sure which."  Take the pure Greek derivative "dittography," which describes
>a scribal error of the type, "Paris in the the spring."
>

No need to beg, just cite the dictionary or dictionaries
that support your etymology.

Webster's Ninth New Collegiate and Webster's New World
Dictionary of the American Language support the etymology I
described above. The former adds that ditto comes most
immediately from an Italian dialect word.

As for haplo-, if you had bothered to look in a dictionary
you would have found an entry similar to this one:

"hapl- or haplo- comb form [NL, from Gr., from haploos, from
ha- one (akin to homos same) + ploos, multiplied by; akin to
L -plex -fold -- more at SAME, FOLD]  1 : single : simple .
. . ."

-- 
Frank Richard Aloysius Jude Maloney
	"Only the mediocre can always be at their best." -- Mencken
For an average time write uunet!microsoft!frankm
For an even more mediocre time try frankm@microsoft.com
From: slagle@lmsc.lockheed.com (Mark Slagle)
Newsgroups: alt.usage.english
Subject: Re: "Get used to it."
Date: 11 Apr 92 02:39:14 GMT
	<1992Apr9.150403.8109@kakwa.ucs.ualberta.ca> <204657@unix.cis.pitt.edu>
Reply-To: slagle@lmsc.lockheed.com
Organization: Lockheed Missiles and Space Co., Sunnyvale, Ca.
In-reply-to: dtate@unix.cis.pitt.edu's message of 9 Apr 92 18:26:33 GMT

In article <204657@unix.cis.pitt.edu> dtate@unix.cis.pitt.edu (David M Tate) writes:
   Are certain words *incorrect* usage, regardless of context and form of the
   utterance in which they occur?  I don't think so; if it's a word that people
   use, then the way they use it is (by definition) correct usage.  Not proper
   style, perhaps; not desirable speech, perhaps; correct usage nevertheless.

----
But according to your statement, the modifier "correct" has
been stripped of all meaning.  If someone uses a word then
we can say, tautologically, "it is usage", but it is nonsense
to say it is automatically "correct" usage.  Or is correctness
just a matter of enlisting enough adherents?

Mr. Tate continues:
   If I choose not to use "hopefully" in a sentence because it will distract or
   offend the person I'm speaking to, that is not a choice of a correct usage
   over an incorrect one.  It's the selection of one correct usage that best
   suits the occasion over another which I have decided may not best suit that
   occasion.  You might as well claim that a poet who chooses a weak rhyme when
   there was a strong one available has made an error of usage.

----
You continue to argue about the meaning of the word "correct"
even after asserting its meaninglessness.  It is incorrect to
use "hopefully" in the way discussed because it is nonsensical,
or at least ambiguous, it is messy, and because it distracts from
the message in the remainder of the sentence.  I grant that
there will be times, in front of some audiences, where it will
be appropriate for you to use the construction.  This does not
make it correct.  The rules of grammar are not an assertion 
that you may not break them, simply that it is not a good idea
to do so without reason.  Most of the time doing so will just
make you seem stupid.  If that's OK with you then go with it.

--
----
Mark E. Slagle                                 PO Box 61059
slagle@lmsc.lockheed.com                       Sunnyvale, CA   94088
408-756-0895                                   USA
From: rarosenb@gandalf.rutgers.edu (Robert Rosenberg)
Newsgroups: alt.usage.english
Subject: Re: A whole nother story
Date: 8 Apr 92 15:10:49 GMT
Organization: Rutgers Univ., New Brunswick, N.J.

The expression "a whole nother" is the Great American Tmesis; the word
"another" has been split by "whole."  It's just easier on the tongue
than saying "a whole other."  And it's everywhere, from the radio news
to the classroom lectern, from Texas to Maine, from Ripken to Murray
(sigh--the good old days).
Xref: sparky alt.usage.english:2962 soc.culture.british:6120
From: smithj@jacobs.CS.ORST.EDU (Jeremy Smith)
Newsgroups: alt.usage.english,soc.culture.british
Subject: Re: Dictionary of American and English Usage (part 01/02)
Date: 11 Apr 92 19:20:00 GMT
Article-I.D.: CS.1992Apr11.192000.3890
Organization: CS Dept. Oregon State University, Corvallis, Oregon.

In article <1992Apr10.153036.17567@sun.pcl.ac.uk> marcus@sun.pcl.ac.uk (Marcus Harvey) writes:
>In article <1992Apr08.014809.25580@robobar.co.uk> gtoal@robobar.co.uk (Graham Toal) writes:
>>
>>I think the best British idiom is 'pulling', as in "We're pulling for Major".
>>[I'm not, but a public-school rowing idiom seemed out of place on any of
>>the others...]
>>
>
>"Pulling"!?!?! Uhh? The only meaning I know of "pulling" other than the the
>literal has to do with "birds".

You're pulling my leg!

>Marcus Harvey, Polytechnic of Central London IRS

You're pulling my leg!




-- 
Jeremy |-) Smith	The Tao of Wayne and Garth: "Way!"
From: gtoal@castle.ed.ac.uk (Graham Toal)
Newsgroups: alt.usage.english
Subject: Re: origin of word "okay"?
Date: 16 Apr 92 20:20:28 GMT
Organization: Edinburgh University

In article <1992Apr16.073640.11355@athena.mit.edu> jmnjeru@athena.mit.edu (James M Njeru) writes:
>Hi all,
>
>What is the origin of the word "okay" or "O.K."?

(I've always wanted to do this....)

Read the FAQ file for the group consensus on this one...

(chortle chortle chortle chortle chortle! - Thanks Mark - you're a hero!)

>Thanks alot.

What is the origin of the word "alot"?

G
Newsgroups: alt.usage.english
From: dbrooks@osf.org (David Brooks)
Subject: Re: Liberal/Conservative/Libertarian (was Loaded language)
Organization: Open Software Foundation
Date: Tue, 14 Apr 1992 16:14:23 GMT

ethanb@ptolemy.astro.washington.edu (Ethan Bradford) writes:
|> In article <ku6e80INNj9l@utkcs2.cs.utk.edu> eijkhout@cupid.cs.utk.edu (Victor Eijkhout) writes:
|>    How about 'liberal'? The believe that people are free to define their own
|>    lives? (The American use of 'liberal' puzzles me, by the way. In the Netherlands
|>    where I'm from the liberals are right-wing -- free enterprise and that
|>    sort of thing -- as opposed to the socialists who think that everyone
|>    is equal.)
|> 
|> In the U.S. we use the term "libertarian" to refer to the view that
|> the role of the government should be limited in all things.  With a
|> large "L" it refers to a party which promotes that view.

In "Why Americans hate Politics", the author reports on previous work
(sorry about this tenuous chain) which contructs a more useful taxonomy.

Dividing people who are for more, or less, government intervention on
economic matters, and those who are more more, or less, government
intervention on social matters (and to the extent to which the issues can
be separated), we have:

		Social intervention		Social nonintervention

Economic	    Populists			    Liberals
intervention

Economic	    Conservatives		    Libertarians
nonintervention


It turns out that, in recent elections, Populists and Libertarians have
tended to vote horizontally: given no mass party which matches their views,
they stay with economic principles rather than social.

I guess most of this belongs in another group, but I do find the taxonomy
illuminating.
-- 
David Brooks				dbrooks@osf.org
Systems Engineering, OSF		uunet!osf.org!dbrooks
From: perseant@milton.u.washington.edu (Dis Pater)
Newsgroups: alt.usage.english
Subject: Re: Missing syllables in place names
Date: 15 Apr 92 03:22:14 GMT
Organization: University of Washington

foster@mtechca.uucp (self.attribute:=major_arcana[0].name) writes:
>     Leicester     pronounced Lester
>     Gloucester    pronounced Gloster
>     Worcester     pronounced Wooster (oo as in book)
>     Chicester     pronounced Chester

>elision only happens to vowels, doesn't it?)? And why does it not
>happen in names like Winchester and Dorchester? Or did these latter
>names used to be spelled Winchecester and Dorchecester?

Well...
Try to pronounce /le" se stur'/
		 /glau" se stur'/
		 /woa" se stur'/
		 /chi" se stur'/
Where " is major accent, ' minor accent, oa = or, the English
pronunciation.  If you say them 10 times in a row I bet you are saying
/le" stur/ /glou" stur/ when you're done.

Elision is close but is not usually mentioned in a prose context, and
also usually is applied to vowels, or weak nasals.  (I could be
wrong--only this is the only context in which I have seen "elision"
mentioned.) 

Konrad Schroder
perseant@u.washington.edu
From: userisra@mts.ucs.ualberta.ca (Mark Israel)
Newsgroups: alt.usage.english
Subject: Re: Ass (U.S.)
Date: 13 Apr 92 05:37:55 GMT
Organization: University of Alberta, Edmonton, Canada
Originator: lnds@zeus.biochem.ualberta.ca

In article <3399@daily-planet.concordia.ca>, mac@abacus.concordia.ca (John McKay) writes:

> Did Americans ever distinguish between "ass" and "arse" ?

   I suspect not.  They were pronounced alike in Shakespeare's day 
("Then came each actor on his ass" was a deliberate double entendre),
and the Latin word "anus" has both meanings.

userisra@mts.ucs.ualberta.ca		Mark Israel
Instinctive grammatical moralizer.
From: steinmet@Oswego.EDU (Roy Steinmetz)
Newsgroups: alt.usage.english
Subject: Re: Golden
Date: 4 Apr 92 02:20:31 GMT
Reply-To: steinmet@oswego.Oswego.EDU (Roy Steinmetz)
Organization: Instructional Computing Center, SUNY at Oswego, Oswego, NY

In article <702135869.26760@minster.york.ac.uk> malcolm@minster.york.ac.uk (Malcolm Wallace) writes:
>>>>> Instead of saying "five gold rings", you say "five golden rings."
>
>>> My immediate reaction to "five golden rings" is that it sounds wrong.  
>
>>   George was referring to the Christmas carol "The Twelve Days of 
>>Christmas".  Most people think that the "five golden rings" in that 
>>carol are finger rings made of gold, but they're not.  They're ringed
>>pheasants.  The gifts of the first seven days are ALL birds!
>
>I have always heard the song to include "five gold rings", rather than
>"golden rings".  [My origin: Northern Ireland]
>
>    -malc.

Yes, the carol goes "five gold rings," and my origin is northeastern U.S. and
my ancestry is both German and Scotish.  I always assumed that the reference
in the carol was to the "ringed-neck" pheasant, quite the game bird in the
region.

 
Xref: sparky alt.usage.english:2916 soc.culture.british:6065
From: sandee@ds9.scri.fsu.edu (Daan Sandee)
Newsgroups: alt.usage.english,soc.culture.british
Subject: Re: Dictionary of American and British Usage
Date: 10 Apr 92 15:24:33 GMT
Followup-To: alt.usage.english
Organization: SCRI, Florida State University

In article <1992Apr07.231413.22903@robobar.co.uk>, gtoal@robobar.co.uk (Graham Toal) writes:
> In article <1992Apr5.174521.25924@osf.org> dbrooks@osf.org (David Brooks) writes:
> >This double assertion -- that Britons understand most Americanisms
> >(presumably through TV), and that they will soon be in common use --
> >doesn't really stand scrutiny.  Even excluding strongly culture-specific
 [lots of examples including ..]
>  ukase,
> Thought this was an enzyme like luciferin? :-)
> Something political I think.  Need context.

The Czar of All the Russias ruled by decrees, which were calles ukases. It's
a perfectly normal Russian word, and used in many other countries for
decrees imposed by authority (with a connotation of insufficient democracy).
I don't see any reason to view it as a particularly *American* introduction
into the language, and I'm surprised if it's not known in Britain.

(P.S. Is the word "czar" pronounced wrongly, i.e. "zar", in Britain, as it
is in America ?)

Daan Sandee                                           sandee@sun16.scri.fsu.edu
Thinking Machines Corporation
Supercomputer Computations Research Institute, B-186
Florida State University, Tallahassee, FL 32306-4052  (904) 644-4490
Newsgroups: alt.usage.english,soc.culture.british
From: goddard+@cs.cmu.edu (Nigel Goddard)
Subject: Re: Dictionary of American and English Usage (part 01/02)
Date: Mon, 06 Apr 92 14:59:00 GMT
Organization: School of Computer Science, Carnegie Mellon

In article <1992Apr6.121553.11608@osf.org> sp@mirabeau.osf.fr (Simon Patience) writes:
>In article <jwb.702255223@capek.rdt.monash.edu.au>,
>jwb@capek.rdt.monash.edu.au (Jim Breen) writes:
>> smithj@jacobs.CS.ORST.EDU (Jeremy Smith) writes:
>> >catsup n : tomatoe ketchup
>> 
>> More often tomato sauce. Ketchup sounds US to me.
>
>Ketchup sounds fine to me.

After 7 years in the US, I recently found out that catsup is in
fact ketchup and is even pronounced the same way!!!  It never
occurred to me it would be prounounced anything other than cat-sup.

More pronounciation trivia:

"solder".  In the UK, the "l" is pronounced, in the US it is
	    silent ("sodder").

"epoch".  In the UK, the "e" is long (I think!) and the "o" is an "o".
	  In the US, the "e" is short and the "o" is an "i" (i.e., "epic").

Nigel

-- 
Nigel Goddard
goddard@b.gp.cs.cmu.edu

Xref: sparky alt.usage.english:2915 soc.culture.british:6060
From: marcus@sun.pcl.ac.uk (Marcus Harvey)
Newsgroups: alt.usage.english,soc.culture.british
Subject: Re: Dictionary of American and English Usage (part 01/02)
Date: 10 Apr 92 15:30:36 GMT
Organization: Polytechnic of Central London

In article <1992Apr08.014809.25580@robobar.co.uk> gtoal@robobar.co.uk (Graham Toal) writes:
>In article <1992Apr7.133652.3157@sun.pcl.ac.uk> marcus@sun.pcl.ac.uk (Marcus Harvey) writes:
>>Barrack? In Oxbridge maybe. I thought it was a place where soldiers hung
>>out.
>>I don't think "cheer" is the same at all. Americans talk about "rooting for
>>someone" to describe their support for them. I think "backing" as in "I'm
>>backing Kennedy" would be the closest, but I don't think there's a direct
>>translation.
>
>I think the best British idiom is 'pulling', as in "We're pulling for Major".
>[I'm not, but a public-school rowing idiom seemed out of place on any of
>the others...]
>

"Pulling"!?!?! Uhh? The only meaning I know of "pulling" other than the the
literal has to do with "birds".

And I still don't think "rooting" and "cheering" are the same. An english
person would never say "I'm cheering for MUFC" because you can't speak and
cheer at the same time ;-). Of course I don't really know what "rooting"
means, I've just heard Americans in movies saying "I'm rooting for the
Monarchs" etc. Since they aren't actualy shouting or cheering as they say
this (or even immediately after) I presumed it indicated an intention to
shout "Yo, yo Monarchs Go!" or something in the future... errrr, help me
somebody please!

Marcus Harvey, Polytechnic of Central London IRS
marcus@uk.ac.pcl.sun - JANET  marcus%sun.pcl.ac.uk@ukacrl - BITNET/EARN

                                                          ...Bubble Up!
Newsgroups: alt.usage.english
From: 105126@adpdp2.lanl.gov (105126)
Subject: Re: Shape Changer
News-Software: VAX/VMS VNEWS 1.41    
Organization: Los Alamos National Laboratory, EMVAX
Date: Mon, 6 Apr 1992 20:24:00 GMT

In article <BRECHER.92Mar20120523@husc8.harvard.edu>, brecher@husc8.harvard.edu (Jonathan Brecher) writes...
>In article <57560003@hpscit.sc.hp.com> fish@hpscit.sc.hp.com (John Fisher) writes:
>>I, too, have been unable to find a particular word. I've been looking
>>for several months in every source I can think of, including the reverse
>>dictionary. I can no longer recall even what letter it begins with. It's
>>used in King's "It" but I am reluctant to wade through the 1100+ pages 
>>to find it. Any help will be appreciated.
>>
>>It is the name for a creature that can change its appearance. In science
>>fiction, it is most often called a "shape changer." The best example I 
>>can think of in sf is Campbell's "Who Goes There?", brought to the screen
>>by John Carpenter as "The Thing," about ten or eleven years ago.
> 
>The two terms I've seen most often are "polymorph" and "metamorph".  "Morph"
>is Latin for "shape", so these would be "many-shapes" and "greater-shape", or
>something similar.  "Metamorph" is often used to mean "shape changer" on 
>analogy with butterflies.
> 
>Another related term is "doppleganger", which is a creature that removes 
>someone, then takes their appearance and assimilates into society.
> 
>Disclaimer: linguistics is not my field, but I read a lot of SF :-)
> 
>					jonathan brecher
>					brecher@husc.harvard.edu
Another possibility is "xeno-morph." This has been used in sci-fi to talk about
aliens that have the shape-changing ability.

John
Xref: sparky alt.usage.english:2895 soc.culture.british:5992
From: gtoal@robobar.co.uk (Graham Toal)
Newsgroups: alt.usage.english,soc.culture.british
Subject: Re: Dictionary of American and English Usage (part 01/02)
Date: 7 Apr 92 22:13:51 GMT
Followup-To: alt.usage.english
Organization: Robobar Ltd., Perivale, Middx., ENGLAND.

In article <3239@inca.comlab.ox.ac.uk> rabson@oxford.ac.uk (David Rabson) writes:
:Some comments from a very cursory scan of a useful article and one
:of the follow-ups --
:
:The use of "alternate" for "alternative" is not American.  It is just wrong.

Yes, but it's a common *American* error, seldom seen in the UK.

:Some Oxford guide to English variants asserts with the original poster that
:Americans pronounce "Mary," "merry," and "marry" all the same, but it isn't
:true.  The first two are fairly close, but the third is completely different,
:at least as I and all the other Americans I know pronounce it.

I suspect you must be following up from soc.culture.british rather
than alt.usage.english, or you'd never make such a sweeping statement
after some of the pronunciation-wars we've had.  Pick any spelling
and any pronunciation and you'll find *somebody* in the US who matches
them.


By the way, I think the dictionary is pretty good.  Thought I'd better say
that since a lot of the posts have been negative about your chances of
getting it published.  I'd buy it.  But to be honest, I doubt it will
make you rich.  Why not format it in TeX and make it a usenet resource?
[And giving it to Project Gutenberg will see that it is widely
distributed...]

Regards
   Graham
-- 
Newsgroups: alt.usage.english
From: dhubin@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu (Donald C Hubin)
Subject: Re: More importantly, ...
Organization: The Ohio State University
Date: Thu, 9 Apr 1992 13:14:55 GMT

In article <22622@goofy.Apple.COM> casseres@apple.com (David Casseres) writes:

>[discussion of 'hopefully' used as a sentence adverb deleted]
>
>And so we have a controversial usage.  I submit that a usage that remains
>controversial after so many years and such wide acceptance is not a good one. 
>I'm not a particularly strict follower of traditional grammatical forms, and I
>embrace many useful or colorful neologisms.  I guess the same could be said by
>many who object to this usage.
>

We can hardly subscribe to the principle that what is controversial
usage is not good usage.  There are still those who stringently object
to any use of "split infinitives" or any sentences ending with
prepositions.  I don't think there are any compelling reasons for
these objections.  (I sometimes ask my students to imagine rephrasing
David Hume's beautiful [and I paraphrase here]:  In the golden age of
mankind, every other virtue would flourish tenfold, but the cautious,
jealous virtue of justice would never have been dreamt of.  How about
this lovely substitution:  ". . . is a virtue of which we would never
have dreamt"?  Great, huh.]  Sometimes you have to ignore controversy
and do what is right.

I'm not saying, by the way, that 'hopefully' is in this class.  I
agree that we *can* do without it and it is certainly not a beautiful
construction.  Indeed, I'm bothered by just the things that the
objectors cite.  I just find it convenient enough to put up with it
despite these problems.

Don


-- 
Donald C. Hubin  |  Depart. of Philosophy, The Ohio State University 
                 |  Columbus, OH  43210  USA   (614)292-7914 
-----------------+---------------------------------------------------------
hubin+@osu.edu   |  or hubin+@ohstmail.bitnet
Xref: sparky alt.usage.english:2849 soc.culture.british:5904
From: albion@bnr.ca (Alan Buchanan)
Newsgroups: alt.usage.english,soc.culture.british
Subject: Re: Dictionary of American and English Usage (part 01/02)
Date: 8 Apr 92 16:07:41 GMT
Reply-To: alanbu@bnr.ca
Organization: Bell-Northern Research Ltd, Ottawa
Originator: albion@bcrks63


In article <1992Apr7.131411.6994@morrow.stanford.edu>, francis@oas.stanford.edu (Francis Muir) writes:
> D. Gerdemann writes:
> 
> 	...it is therefore rather intolerant of you to blatantly declare 
> 	it wrong.
> 
> Should that not be "blatantly to declare"? Oh hell, I'm feeling pretty
> tolerant this morning...
> 

I suggest that it is one of them irregular newSpeak verbs.

 I suggest, 
 you blatantly-declare,                             + that
 he makes-the-totally-indefensible-statement


      vi  to be in a righteous state.


              

                                        Alan

--
Alan Buchanan       Bell-Northern Research, Ltd       Ph.: (613) 763-2750
Silicon Design      P.O. Box 3511, Station C          Fax: (613) 763-3970
  Methods           Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, K1Y 4H7  

alanbu@bnr.ca        

        Education is not the filling of a pail, but the lighting of a fire.
                         - William Butler Yeats
From: gtoal@robobar.co.uk (Graham Toal)
Newsgroups: alt.usage.english,soc.culture.british
Subject: Re: Dictionary of American and English Usage (part 01/02)
Date: 7 Apr 92 23:23:39 GMT
Organization: Robobar Ltd., Perivale, Middx., ENGLAND.

In article <jwb.702255223@capek.rdt.monash.edu.au> jwb@capek.rdt.monash.edu.au (Jim Breen) writes:
>>       surprize (a US alternate), realise (a GB alternate) and realize.
>                       ^^^^^^^^^                 ^^^^^^^^^
>
>In English the word is alternative. (US) alternate = (Eng) alternative.

Also in the US.  Alternate is a very common solecism there.  Will probably
be mainstream soon :-(

>>buck for v : root for
>
>Tsk, tsk. "Root" in English means either rummage around, or have sexual
>intercourse. The correct translation is "cheer" or "barrack"

There speaks either an ozzie or a kiwi.  Root has no sexual connotation
in *English*.

G
--