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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Aug 2000
Posts: 3,409 |
and/or
This lazy construction is one which I am frequently guilty of using. Can anybody think of a situation in which it would be acceptable?
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Pooh-Bah
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Pooh-Bah
Joined: Aug 2000
Posts: 2,204 |
I had enough trouble understanding public transport signs written in my native English.
A late nineteenth century British railway company had great trouble from a literary figure of the day (and I totally forget who it was) who wrote to the company inquiring into the meaning of the signs that read, "No Smoking Permitted in This Carriage."
The general tenor of his lengthy correspondence was to discover just what was this "No Smoking" that was permitted in certain carriages, and whether it might be injurious to his health. (At no time did he suggest that their use of English might be faulty.)
The company, aparently, went to great lengths to convince him that there was nothing for him to fear, but as they refused to acknowledge - if, indeed, they realised - that the notice was badly phrased, they merely dug themselves into an ever deeper morass of mutual misunderstanding.
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Pooh-Bah
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Pooh-Bah
Joined: Aug 2000
Posts: 2,204 |
Can anybody think of a situation in which it would be acceptable?
When writing on a postage stamp?
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Joined: Mar 2000
Posts: 1,027
old hand
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old hand
Joined: Mar 2000
Posts: 1,027 |
I have a suspicion that this is again one of the treasures we owe to the lawyers. If a law reads "those who own a car or a bike are supposed to know traffic rules", some freak could object (interpreting the "or" as an "exclusive or"): I have both, so I am exempt.
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Posts: 2,204
Pooh-Bah
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Pooh-Bah
Joined: Aug 2000
Posts: 2,204 |
I have a suspicion that this is again one of the treasures we owe to the lawyers.
I'm not so sure. In the good old days (i.e, C19, of course) lawyer's draughtsmen were paid so much per word for legal documents, so they would have been more likely to write, "those who own a car or a bike or both a car and a bike are supposed to know traffic rules," thus increasing their emolument by seven units times the rate.
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Joined: Sep 2000
Posts: 347
enthusiast
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enthusiast
Joined: Sep 2000
Posts: 347 |
Marty, if it makes you feel any better, I had a lot of trouble with the sign "MIND YOUR HEAD" over London tram doors.
Anna,
We appear to have achieved confluence (or perhaps entanglement to avoid the mixed metaphor) with the thread "Directions" in Wordplay and Fun. Think I'll relocate over there.
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Joined: Jul 2000
Posts: 167
member
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member
Joined: Jul 2000
Posts: 167 |
I think lawyers these days would tend to say "those who own a car or a bike(or both)" or "those who own a car and bike (or either)". No less a person than Fowler labelled the two types of OR as being either disjunctive (A or B but not both) or copulative (Aor B or both). Never could understand why it isn't just "conjunctive"!
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Sep 2000
Posts: 4,757 |
copulative ... conjunctive
Guess it would add whole new layers of meaning to conjuctivitus?
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Joined: Mar 2000
Posts: 11,613
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Mar 2000
Posts: 11,613 |
whole new layers of meaning to conjuctivitus?
I hope not--conjunctivitis is a nasty eye inflammation.
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Joined: Sep 2000
Posts: 4,757
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Sep 2000
Posts: 4,757 |
conjuctivitus--conjunctivitis Hey, Jackie, u no i carnt spill 
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