Wordle - daily game
- geoff_morphini - Aug 19, 2022 - 9:21am
Questions.
- oldviolin - Aug 19, 2022 - 9:16am
Make Scott laugh
- GeneP59 - Aug 19, 2022 - 8:37am
Radio Paradise Comments
- GeneP59 - Aug 19, 2022 - 8:24am
Derplahoma!
- Red_Dragon - Aug 19, 2022 - 8:18am
Upcoming concerts or shows you can't wait to see
- ColdMiser - Aug 19, 2022 - 7:49am
I have no idea what this thread was about, but let's talk...
- miamizsun - Aug 19, 2022 - 6:14am
Today in History
- Red_Dragon - Aug 19, 2022 - 5:39am
New Zealand
- Red_Dragon - Aug 19, 2022 - 4:52am
What are you listening to now?
- miamizsun - Aug 19, 2022 - 4:38am
Republican Party
- kcar - Aug 18, 2022 - 6:33pm
Little known information...maybe even facts
- Bill_J - Aug 18, 2022 - 6:30pm
Trump
- Red_Dragon - Aug 18, 2022 - 6:29pm
Gotta Get Your Drink On
- Bill_J - Aug 18, 2022 - 5:25pm
Climate Change
- R_P - Aug 18, 2022 - 3:30pm
Happy friendship Day
- Coaxial - Aug 18, 2022 - 3:13pm
Live FLAC support in Sonos API
- jarro - Aug 18, 2022 - 2:54pm
Minor quibble - why no Tedeschi Trucks Band?
- trachshack - Aug 18, 2022 - 1:43pm
Things You Thought Today
- Proclivities - Aug 18, 2022 - 1:23pm
Rare Beatles Art
- ScottFromWyoming - Aug 18, 2022 - 12:53pm
260,000 Posts in one thread?
- oldviolin - Aug 18, 2022 - 10:24am
Poetry Forum
- oldviolin - Aug 18, 2022 - 9:28am
Maarjamaa
- oldviolin - Aug 18, 2022 - 7:56am
Fix My Car
- KurtfromLaQuinta - Aug 17, 2022 - 8:44pm
Cheney, Dick
- Manbird - Aug 17, 2022 - 7:43pm
Guns
- Red_Dragon - Aug 17, 2022 - 3:55pm
Environment
- Red_Dragon - Aug 17, 2022 - 3:06pm
Counting with Pictures
- ScottN - Aug 17, 2022 - 2:17pm
What Did You Do Today?
- GeneP59 - Aug 17, 2022 - 1:43pm
Mixtape Culture Club
- ColdMiser - Aug 17, 2022 - 12:06pm
RadioParadise FAQ List Submission
- ScottFromWyoming - Aug 17, 2022 - 10:51am
Live Music
- oldviolin - Aug 17, 2022 - 9:52am
XPRIZE & Singularity University
- miamizsun - Aug 17, 2022 - 8:41am
Annoying stuff. not things that piss you off, just annoyi...
- ptooey - Aug 17, 2022 - 7:03am
Russia
- miamizsun - Aug 17, 2022 - 5:44am
Nuclear power - saviour or scourge?
- miamizsun - Aug 17, 2022 - 5:14am
Joe Biden
- NoEnzLefttoSplit - Aug 16, 2022 - 10:50pm
YouTube: Music-Videos
- R_P - Aug 16, 2022 - 7:19pm
The Obituary Page
- Antigone - Aug 16, 2022 - 5:33pm
Amazon Products (May Contain Spam)
- haresfur - Aug 16, 2022 - 4:02pm
Democratic Party
- Red_Dragon - Aug 16, 2022 - 2:29pm
The Hat Project
- kcar - Aug 16, 2022 - 2:20pm
Ukraine
- Red_Dragon - Aug 16, 2022 - 4:37am
Breaking News
- Red_Dragon - Aug 15, 2022 - 6:42pm
Words that should be put on the substitutes bench for a year
- oldviolin - Aug 15, 2022 - 9:31am
Interesting Words
- Steely_D - Aug 15, 2022 - 8:19am
• • • What's For Dinner ? • • •
- Manbird - Aug 14, 2022 - 8:40pm
RightWingNutZ
- Red_Dragon - Aug 14, 2022 - 3:36pm
Photography Forum - Your Own Photos
- Manbird - Aug 14, 2022 - 2:14pm
COVID-19
- R_P - Aug 14, 2022 - 1:31pm
RPeep News You Should Know
- islander - Aug 14, 2022 - 1:17pm
Automotive Lust
- R_P - Aug 14, 2022 - 11:34am
BRING OUT YOUR DEAD
- acaciascapes - Aug 14, 2022 - 9:20am
DARWIN AWARDS! - POST YOUR NOMINATION!
- Coaxial - Aug 13, 2022 - 5:03pm
China
- R_P - Aug 13, 2022 - 3:29pm
Brian Eno
- R_P - Aug 13, 2022 - 1:23pm
Name My Band
- oldviolin - Aug 13, 2022 - 11:15am
Radio Paradise NFL Pick'em Group
- Coaxial - Aug 13, 2022 - 7:03am
Health Care
- miamizsun - Aug 13, 2022 - 6:37am
Sweet horrible irony.
- miamizsun - Aug 13, 2022 - 6:32am
What is the meaning of this?
- oldviolin - Aug 12, 2022 - 3:33pm
Baseball, anyone?
- GeneP59 - Aug 12, 2022 - 12:59pm
Abiogenesis!
- R_P - Aug 12, 2022 - 12:02pm
PASS THE BEER
- kcar - Aug 12, 2022 - 11:33am
It's the economy stupid.
- rgio - Aug 12, 2022 - 9:06am
What's Precious and Sacred to Islam?
- Red_Dragon - Aug 12, 2022 - 8:38am
Floyd forum
- Proclivities - Aug 12, 2022 - 8:12am
So... what's been happening here lately?
- sunybuny - Aug 12, 2022 - 5:44am
Time to lawyer up!
- NoEnzLefttoSplit - Aug 11, 2022 - 10:52pm
• • • The Once-a-Day • • •
- oldviolin - Aug 11, 2022 - 10:04am
How to Use RP?
- kcar - Aug 11, 2022 - 9:53am
Got Road Rage?
- Red_Dragon - Aug 11, 2022 - 8:12am
>>>>>>Knitted
- Antigone - Aug 11, 2022 - 2:37am
India
- Red_Dragon - Aug 10, 2022 - 4:36pm
godnarb: the Lunchurch
- ScottFromWyoming - Aug 10, 2022 - 11:24am
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Index »
Radio Paradise/General »
General Discussion »
Little known information...maybe even facts
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Page: Previous 1, 2, 3 ... , 62, 63, 64 Next |
justin_thyme

Location: Windward O`ahu, Hawai`i Gender:  
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Posted:
Dec 2, 2008 - 12:16pm |
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Lazy8 wrote: Languages tend to get simpler as they get older . . . .
Speaking of languages: I recently finished re-reading Bastard Tongues by linguist Derek Bickerton. It's a fascinating and very entertaining exploration of the evolution of creole languages around the world — as much an adventure story as anything else. I heartily recommend it! Here's the Amazon link in case anyone's interested.
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Talalala

Location: Ã
rhus, Denmark Gender:  
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Posted:
Dec 2, 2008 - 12:04pm |
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JustineFromWyoming wrote:Eating all this English toffee won't make me any less sleepy.
Sooooo wish I could help you!
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JustineFromWyomi...

Location: Teetering on the edge of Avenue D Gender:  
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Posted:
Dec 2, 2008 - 12:01pm |
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Eating all this English toffee won't make me any less sleepy.
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dionysius

Location: The People's Republic of Austin Gender:  
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Posted:
Dec 2, 2008 - 4:43am |
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Lazy8 wrote: Languages tend to get simpler as they get older, and the bits that fall off are the ones that carry no information. Like gender.
Not true with the lexicon for any given modern language, for example, which tends to get bigger and more complex as time goes by. English itself is a famous example. Why, we have a word for everything.  And some modern languages are quite conservative grammatically, like Lithuanian, which proudly boasts all seven of the original Indo-European noun cases (wow, an instrumental case?!). Lithuanian also has the richest participle system of all I-E languages, with participles derived from all tenses with distinct active and passive forms, and several gerund forms. Sounds exhausting. Linguistic evolution isn't simply a progress from complexity to simplicity or vice versa; change can work in many different ways, some of them producing greater complexity, or leaving past complexity in place.
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winter

Location: in exile, as always Gender:  
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Posted:
Dec 1, 2008 - 2:57pm |
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Lazy8 wrote: Languages tend to get simpler as they get older, and the bits that fall off are the ones that carry no information. Like gender.
Numbering systems tend to get simpler too—counting in Mandarin is much simpler than in English, which is simpler than French.
French has a further disadvantage: l'Académie Française. The French language actually has a sort of governing body that decides what is French and what isn't, a sure-fire way to freeze the evolution of the language and doom it to the dustbin of history in a few centuries. Assuming anyone pays it any attention.
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Lazy8

Location: The Gallatin Valley of Montana Gender:  
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Posted:
Dec 1, 2008 - 2:52pm |
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dionysius wrote:Latin? Three genders but no articles. Closely related to Greek, three genders with articles. Lithuanian has strongly inflected noun system, like those ancient languages, but with no article. Icelandic uses only postfixed definite articles. English, with a developed system of definite and indefinite article, is more sophisticated than most languages. Try to have a Russian speaker make a quick and easy distinction between "a (any) banana lassi" and "the (one under discussion) banana lassi" and you'll get my point. That Frenchman was un homme complètement fou!
And I am aware that articles are weakened demonstratives, but demonstratives (like the Latin ille which yields Spanish el) are not used like articles in these languages!
Languages tend to get simpler as they get older, and the bits that fall off are the ones that carry no information. Like gender. Numbering systems tend to get simpler too—counting in Mandarin is much simpler than in English, which is simpler than French. French has a further disadvantage: l'Académie Française. The French language actually has a sort of governing body that decides what is French and what isn't, a sure-fire way to freeze the evolution of the language and doom it to the dustbin of history in a few centuries. Assuming anyone pays it any attention.
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musik_knut

Location: Third Stone From The Sun Gender:  
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Posted:
Dec 1, 2008 - 2:41pm |
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Most people can not chew gum while simutaneously slapping their ass with both hands. 
If someone offers to slap your ass while you chew gum, call the authorities.
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BlueHeronDruid

Location: planting flowers 
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Posted:
Dec 1, 2008 - 1:46pm |
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The current temperature at Newark Liberty Airport gate A18 is in the low 120's F.
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phineas


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Posted:
Dec 1, 2008 - 1:25pm |
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Isabeau wrote:I consider it boorish to look under a chair to see what gender it is.   Chairs the world over appreciate this!
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phineas


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Posted:
Dec 1, 2008 - 1:23pm |
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dionysius wrote:
Latin? Three genders but no articles. Closely related to Greek, three genders with articles. Lithuanian has strongly inflected noun system, like those ancient languages, but with no article. Icelandic uses only postfixed definite articles. English, with a developed system of definite and indefinite article, is more sophisticated than most languages. Try to have a Russian speaker make a quick and easy distinction between "a (any) banana lassi" and "the (one under discussion) banana lassi" and you'll get my point. That Frenchman was un homme complètement fou!
And I am aware that articles are weakened demonstratives, but demonstratives (like the Latin ille which yields Spanish el) are not used like articles in these languages!
And crazy, too!
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dionysius

Location: The People's Republic of Austin Gender:  
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Posted:
Dec 1, 2008 - 1:09pm |
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Welly wrote:Billy G has a soft spot for Librarians  And who wouldn't?
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Welly

Location: Lotusland Gender:  
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Posted:
Dec 1, 2008 - 1:08pm |
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Billy G has a soft spot for Librarians
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dionysius

Location: The People's Republic of Austin Gender:  
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Posted:
Dec 1, 2008 - 1:05pm |
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phineas wrote: Years ago, in Nepal, I sat next at a table next to a group of travellers, among them a Frenchman who was declaiming loudly that, because there is no 'gender' in English, "It is a baby language... THE butter, THE chair..." I wish I had been quick enough to ask if he thought, then, that French must be an adolescent language (2 genders), compared to, say, German with three. And would that in turn make Mandarin, which doesn't even use definite articles, an embryonic language.
But no, I just ordered a banana lassi and some toast...
Latin? Three genders but no articles. Closely related to Greek, three genders with articles. Lithuanian has strongly inflected noun system, like those ancient languages, but with no article. Icelandic uses only postfixed definite articles. English, with a developed system of definite and indefinite article, is more sophisticated than most languages. Try to have a Russian speaker make a quick and easy distinction between "a (any) banana lassi" and "the (one under discussion) banana lassi" and you'll get my point. That Frenchman was un homme complètement fou! And I am aware that articles are weakened demonstratives, but demonstratives (like the Latin ille which yields Spanish el) are not used like articles in these languages!
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AliGator


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Posted:
Dec 1, 2008 - 12:59pm |
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phineas wrote: Years ago, in Nepal, I sat next at a table next to a group of travellers, among them a Frenchman who was declaiming loudly that, because there is no 'gender' in English, "It is a baby language... THE butter, THE chair..." I wish I had been quick enough to ask if he thought, then, that French must be an adolescent language (2 genders), compared to, say, German with three. And would that in turn make Mandarin, which doesn't even use definite articles, an embryonic language.
But no, I just ordered a banana lassi and some toast...
My ex, who's French as you may know, used to say English was a primitive language for the exact same reason.
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Isabeau

Location: sou' tex Gender:  
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Posted:
Dec 1, 2008 - 12:56pm |
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phineas wrote: Years ago, in Nepal, I sat next at a table next to a group of travellers, among them a Frenchman who was declaiming loudly that, because there is no 'gender' in English, "It is a baby language... THE butter, THE chair..." I wish I had been quick enough to ask if he thought, then, that French must be an adolescent language (2 genders), compared to, say, German with three. And would that in turn make Mandarin, which doesn't even use definite articles, an embryonic language.
But no, I just ordered a banana lassi and some toast...
I consider it boorish to look under a chair to see what gender it is.
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phineas


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Posted:
Dec 1, 2008 - 12:29pm |
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dionysius wrote:
Well, not that strange. Many languages have stronger grammatical gender than English does. Even inanimate objects can have "gender" which will determine if it gets a masculine, feminine or (in some languages) neuter adjective or article, for instance. Der DJ and die DJ might grate on German-speaking ears without further gender distinction. The Romance languages are even stronger with the gendered nouns, often with distinctive endings and declension. Anyone out there with specific examples from their own languages?
Years ago, in Nepal, I sat next at a table next to a group of travellers, among them a Frenchman who was declaiming loudly that, because there is no 'gender' in English, "It is a baby language... THE butter, THE chair..." I wish I had been quick enough to ask if he thought, then, that French must be an adolescent language (2 genders), compared to, say, German with three. And would that in turn make Mandarin, which doesn't even use definite articles, an embryonic language. But no, I just ordered a banana lassi and some toast...
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Talalala

Location: Ã
rhus, Denmark Gender:  
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Posted:
Dec 1, 2008 - 12:22pm |
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dionysius wrote:
Well, not that strange. Many languages have stronger grammatical gender than English does. Even inanimate objects can have "gender" which will determine if it gets a masculine, feminine or (in some languages) neuter adjective or article, for instance. Der DJ and die DJ might grate on German-speaking ears without further gender distinction. The Romance languages are even stronger with the gendered nouns, often with distinctive endings and declension. Anyone out there with specific examples from their own languages?
Yes...I actually minored in German in college.  That makes sense.. and B said that 'die DJin' wouldn't really sound good, so I guess that's why they came up with DJane. They kinda thought 'DJay' even though they know that 'DJ' actually is an abbreviation of 'disc jockey'. Danish used to have more of a separation too, but they kinda got rid of it.
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OmegaConcern

Location: Sunrise, FL Gender:  
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Posted:
Dec 1, 2008 - 12:22pm |
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Speaking of gender specificities and rrrrromance languages (have to rrrroll the rrrrr), it's interesting to note that in spanish the vulgar terms for genitals are gender inverse. That is, "vulgar penis" has a female ending and "vulgar vagina" has a male ending. As such, you'd use "La" with the male and "el" with the female term. Reminds me of a movie I saw once actually...
Hmmm... "vulgar penis"...where's that Name My Band thread...
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dionysius

Location: The People's Republic of Austin Gender:  
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Posted:
Dec 1, 2008 - 12:17pm |
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Talalala wrote:My husband just told me that in Germany, female DJ's are called "DJanes" ... HUH. Strange compulsion to make things masculine or feminine. Semantic reasons?
Well, not that strange. Many languages have stronger grammatical gender than English does. Even inanimate objects can have "gender" which will determine if it gets a masculine, feminine or (in some languages) neuter adjective or article, for instance. Der DJ and die DJ might grate on German-speaking ears without further gender distinction. The Romance languages are even stronger with the gendered nouns, often with distinctive endings and declension. Anyone out there with specific examples from their own languages?
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lily34

Location: GTFO Gender:  
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Posted:
Dec 1, 2008 - 12:13pm |
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Talalala wrote:My husband just told me that in Germany, female DJ's are called "DJanes" ... HUH. Strange compulsion to make things masculine or feminine. Semantic reasons?
i like it!
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