"One day, a scientist will build a computer more intelligent than himself."
And one day man-and-womansounkind will learn the nature of the words they speak.
And pertinent to this discussion...
Language transfers information between those who agree upon the symbols that are used to effect the transfer.So it follows that the rules of language are determined by the useage that most accurately reflects reality in an efficient manner. And a language that lies, doesn't.
Note...
(1) Ninety-one percent of computer scientists are men.
[and for you ladies who find math confusing] That means that only nine percent of computer scientists are women.
(2) And some computer scientists are bi-sexual and some are transexuals who once were men but now are women and so forth.
(3) The great god that is Google reports...
433,000,000 ghits "himself"
230,000,000 ghits "herself"
3,000,000 ghits "male computer scientist"
1,600,000 ghits "female computer scientists"
So as to the sentence quoted by Hydra: "herself" is possesive and misleading. "theirselves" is possesive and numerically inconsistent. "themselves" is numerically inconsistent.
And "hisself" is a possessive term that is accurately understood only by rednecked folk in the American South.
It was in 1957 at 11:45 AM Central Standard Time - before the advent of the prissy
Word Inquisition by academicians who decreed that it was foul words and not foul deeds that kept life from being jolly - that the word "HIMSELF" was appointed to stand for each member of mankind when speaking abstractly rather than particularly, as was "HISSELF" which only could be spoken without reprimand in the deep American South.
Or...
If you happen to be in a hurry you can just read what zmjezhd wrote.
