#206272 - 06/28/12 10:53 AM
grammatical sentences and nonsense
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Carpal Tunnel
Registered: 08/13/05
Posts: 3269
Loc: R'lyeh
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In that other thread, I said what I thought grammar is and how it does not include orthography. In this thread I'd like to look at some perfectly grammatical sentences and how they mean or don't mean.
It was Chomsky, roughly five decades ago, who wrote the following:
1. Colorless green ideas sleep furiously.
It was an example of a nonsensical, but grammatical, sentence. It has a subject and a predicate. It has adjectives, a noun, a verb, and an adverb. These parts of speech are assembled in the normal manner. The problem with the sentence is one of meaning. Human beings being what they are have tried to create contexts within which the sentence might be said to have meaning, but I think you get the idea. This is why grammar (at least for generativists) does not include semantics, although parts of it are related to that field of study.
Chomsky was not the first to notice this disconnect between grammaticality and sense. Lewis Carroll and Edward Leary both carved out a small niche in literature in the 19th century exploiting this disconnect. Think of some of those poems, like Jabberwocky or Leary's limericks.
The next example comes from Bertrand Russell:
2. The current king of France is bald.
He came up with this to show how a perfectly grammatical sentence can be (logically) untrue. This sentence skirts dangerously close to literature. Entire books have been written where almost none of the sentences are true. We can still understand them, and their truth has nothing to do with grammar, orthography, style, or the author's intentions. Truth has to do with logic, and logic is not a part of grammar.
Now comes a novelist, E.M. Forster:
3a. The king died and then the queen died.
3b. The king died and then the queen died of a broken heart
Forster famously said that (3a) is merely a story, (3b) is a plot, because the latter not only has a causal connection, but also an emotional element. Although (3b) is the world's shortest novel, I have no way of even determining its veracity.
As for spelling and punctuation, I suppose it seems like a no-brainer to me that these two things have nothing to do with grammar that it is hard for me to conjure up a context in which they do. I think it may be because I have been exposed to texts that are older than two centuries. I am currently reading through Henslowe's Diary which was written in the late 16th and early 17th centuries in Early Modern English. It's main claim to fame is that it records some financial dealings with the companies that put on some of Shakespeare's plays. It is not a facsimile of the MS in the sense that the text has been printed in a modern typeface, but the spelling, punctuation, and abbreviations have been left as they are in the MS. There are hardly any sentences in this diary, but if you look at one of Shakespeare's quartos or the First Folio you will see some beautiful poetry, but the spelling and punctuation are nothing like we do them today. The orthography used in the First Folio probably isn't even Shakespeare's, but one or two of the typesetters who worked for the printer who published the book.
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#206278 - 06/28/12 04:35 PM
Re: grammatical sentences and nonsense
[Re: zmjezhd]
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Carpal Tunnel
Registered: 06/23/06
Posts: 5249
Loc: Netherlands, the Hague
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As for spelling and punctuation, I suppose it seems like a no-brainer to me that these two things have nothing to do with grammar that it is hard for me to conjure up a context in which they do. I like and understand your examples and explanations but I'll be darned if I understand what you mean here. As for spelling and punctuation, I suppose it seems like a no-brainer (evident, simple) to me that these two things have nothing to do with grammar that it is hard for me to conjure up a context in which they do. ( I try, I try but.........it's literature to me)I really would be happy with maybe one more tiny comma somwhere. The king died and then the queen died. Happens all the time. 
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#206284 - 06/29/12 12:01 PM
Re:stuff and nonsense
[Re: BranShea]
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Carpal Tunnel
Registered: 08/13/05
Posts: 3269
Loc: R'lyeh
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I like and understand your examples and explanations but I'll be darned if I understand what you mean here.
Do you mean in the entire opening post of the thread or just the part that you quoted? I can see that I am not getting through to you. I don't think I can. Probably my fault. Ah, well.
I really would be happy with maybe one more tiny comma somwhere.
Go ahead. Make your day. Add as many commas as you think are needed. Of course, if you can figure out where the commas should go, you probably don't need them in the first place.
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#206288 - 06/29/12 08:41 PM
Re: grammatical sentences and nonsense
[Re: BranShea]
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newbie
Registered: 01/19/12
Posts: 37
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It may be that you and people who think like you do not need punctuation. Or hardly any.
Certainly not. Punctuation is important. I don't think it's important as some other people think it is, but I certainly don't think we don't need it.
Edited by gooofy (06/29/12 08:44 PM)
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#206294 - 06/30/12 12:01 PM
Re: grammatical sentences and nonsense
[Re: BranShea]
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Carpal Tunnel
Registered: 08/13/05
Posts: 3269
Loc: R'lyeh
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I understand it till where you get to the spelling itch. It may be that you and people who think like you do not need punctuation. Or hardly any.
I shall repeat myself. Punctuation is important. So is spelling. Their importance does not make them a part of grammar. That's all I am saying.
I like you examples although I do not see why
"2. The current King of France is bold" isn't logic, but that just a detail.
LOL. That's cuz there's a typo.
2. The current King of France is bald.
Although, it does not change the fact that the sentence is logically false.
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#206296 - 07/01/12 06:16 AM
Re: grammatical sentences and nonsense
[Re: zmjezhd]
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Carpal Tunnel
Registered: 06/23/06
Posts: 5249
Loc: Netherlands, the Hague
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 _ I like you examples although I do not see why
"2. The current King of France is bold" isn't logic, but that just a detail. I see I did two typo's here. Hurray! I hope your patience will hold, but why can't the current King of France be bald or bold? It is not true but what is unlogic about it?
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#206302 - 07/01/12 02:24 PM
Re: grammatical sentences and nonsense
[Re: BranShea]
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Carpal Tunnel
Registered: 08/13/05
Posts: 3269
Loc: R'lyeh
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why can't the current King of France be bald or bold? It is not true but what is unlogic about it?Well, in logic the sentence is neither true nor false, because there is no referent for "the current King of France". You can read up on it in this Wikipedia article. I also see that I misremembered Russell's example sentence; it is "the present King of France is bald". (Also, I think that Russell was making a teasing reference to an actual, but deceased, King of France, i.e., Charles II le Chauve (in English "Charles II the Bald"). He is not to be confused with Charles le Hardi or le Téméraire, duc de Bourgogne (Karel le Stoute in Dutch, Charles the Bold in English).
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