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#173058 02/01/08 02:17 PM
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Can any one explain to me why the sight of 'Express Lane - 10 Items or Less' might elicit feelings of wincing despair and superiority in a linguaphile?

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This is a situation that arises when a die-hard prescriptivist, suffering from chronic arthropod infestation of the distal GI tract, contemplates the distinction between "fewer" and "less" while shopping for Rolaids.

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Originally Posted By: Porcupine
Can any one explain to me why the sight of 'Express Lane - 10 Items or Less' might elicit feelings of wincing despair and superiority in a linguaphile?


As for the wincing despair I, too, am baffled. The misplaced feeling of superiority might be easier to explain, but why they would accept "more" with both counted units and measured units is beyond me. What this has to do with national motel chains also baffles me.

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regarding word rage resulting from changing usage, David Crystal reminds us, "The only languages that do not change are dead ones."

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"The only languages that do not change are dead ones."

That's it! We need to kill English to preserve (or embalm) it. Now to start a society and a website.

Latin changed quite a bit between 9th century BCE and the 15th century CE, when humanists like JC Scaliger and D Erasmus killed Latin off by prescribing that only the Classical grammar and style were to be used.


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never mind... but it's still not a question about suppurate. ;-P

Last edited by Myridon; 02/01/08 04:40 PM.
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Myridon, check AWAD for 02/01/08 -- it's all related.

-ron o.

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I'm baffled: what corporation is called "Suppurate"? Googling the word leads to many entries that use the word in its literal, medical sense. The only possible "corporate" definition is an obscure Japanese art collective...but that doesn't seem to be a "corporation" as usually defined. Otherwise we could say that "Sex Pistols" is a "corporation" - band names, art collectives, etc., hardly seem to fit the definition of corporation. Not to mention that using such an obscure corp. is a bit...odd.

So seriously: some corporation actually named itself "Suppuration"? Nearly as bad as the medical entity some years back around here that named itself "Emphesys"...good job, using the first several letters of "emphysema" in your name - such an apt connotation!

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Don't click here, there be spoilers ahead! (As Faldo noted within and withal.)


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Back when I was a prescriptivist I would have agreed wholeheartedly, but I was having too much heartburn. So turned in my pre-credentials for those of a de- and now much more content with the State of the World


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