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Carpal Tunnel
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last night, on jay leno's tonight show, the guest Rob Lowe talked about a vacation trip, taken the previous week, and he said "We scubadived with sharks"
Jay questioned "scubadived?" and asked if there was an english teacher in the audience.
so what's the answer? dived? dove?
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Pooh-Bah
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Pooh-Bah
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I reckon 'dived' is correct. Dove is for the birds. 
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Carpal Tunnel
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Gurunet went straight to Google (which means the word isn't in its dictionary), where there were 106 sites where the word scubadived was used. I reckon it must be like when we say a baseball batter flied out.
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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As usual, dxb is right. As this Usage Note from AHD4 shows ( http://www.bartleby.com/61/11/D0301100.html) both forms are presently accepted but the weak form, dived is the original, at least working from the OE verb, dyfan. The other verb mentioned, dufan was strong; the first preterite would have been deafan, however *that would have transmorgrified in MnE.
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old hand
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old hand
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If you do the search with the separated or hyphenated words (scuba-dived) you even get 1860 hits. I think the unusual thing is to fuse the two.
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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>>so what's the answer? dived? dove?
We went scubadiving
Bingley
Bingley
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Carpal Tunnel
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Often separate words in a bound phrase pass through a hyphenated stage on the way to becoming a single word. Cf. Base ball, base-ball, baseball.
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Pooh-Bah
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Pooh-Bah
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This is, as Faldo the catowner pointed out, one of those situations where the past tense of a weak verb looks wrong but isn't. Personally, I would take the trouble to break it out into a form which didn't put me in the position of having to make a choice by adjectivising the verb - "I went scuba diving". A kind of imperfect perfect tense, if you will. Well, better than the alternative tenses anyway. "I scuba dived" or "I scuba dove" just sounds (and feels) awkward.
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Can one chop liver underwater?
Bingley
Bingley
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member
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so what's the answer? dived? dove?
Strictly speaking, the answer is neither.
SCUBA stands for "Self-Contained Underwater Breathing Apparatus".
You can use it in shallow water, or simply by floating face-down as with a snorkle.
When using a snorkle, one does not snorkle-dive. You go snorkling.
Lowe should have said "We SCUBAed with sharks".
In the present tense, one says "Let's SCUBA", just as one would say "Let's Bomba".
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Carpal Tunnel
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>In the present tense, one says "Let's SCUBA", just as one would say "Let's Bomba".
Or, if one is using the common NZ usage, one simply says "diving". The "scuba" is understood, and the only time a qualifier is used is if the diving in question is free diving, i.e., not using scuba equipment.
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The scubadiving depth record seems to be around 2300'
Useful link, Faldage. Thank you.
But somewhat self-defeating if you are defending the use of "scubadiving", is it not?
The title at the top of the page you linked us to reads "SCUBA Depth Record".
The "diving", in "Scuba-diving", probably dates to a time when the sport was young. Rather like "horseless carriage" which eventually became "car".
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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self-defeating if you are defending the use of "scubadiving"
Or either you could have read the posts and noticed that, in the first four posts, by four different posters, the word dive in one form or another is used at least five times.
As a newly certified diver…
…the navy using scuba divers…
***
So far the deepest dives (2300')…
***
…the divers in the link you posted…
***
from GUE's "Getting Clear on the Basics: The Fundamentals of Technical Diving" book
But that would probably have been too much trouble.
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member
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But that would probably have been too much trouble
Never too much trouble to remind ourselves that language evolves, and some who use it do not.
No offence, of course.
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Carpal Tunnel
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remind ourselves that language evolves, and some who use it do not.
Yeah, you're probably right. Still, it's a shame that all those folks who actually do it haven't figured out that you have decided that the use of the term dive is no longer necessary.
On the bright side, it's good to see that you have come around to the majority opinion concerning the difference between snorkels and scuba gear.
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Carpal Tunnel
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I'm still working on what BOMBA stands for...
Battle over musical...?... Burning old mopeds...?... Bringing out more bloody ale?
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Carpal Tunnel
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Bite Old Moss's Big A... oops...  
formerly known as etaoin...
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addict
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addict
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Here you go, Musick
www.bomba.com.au
[My youngest son, Phil, was with them for a few years]
To see what he's doing now:
philneet.customer.netspace.net.au/index.html
[Information supplied by proud father!]
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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cool, Paul! 
formerly known as etaoin...
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