Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2008 March 12

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[edit] March 12

[edit] Japanese honorifics

When addressing a colleague of equal status, what Japanese honorific would I use to be as insulting as possible? --12.169.167.154 (talk) 03:39, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

Depends on how well you know the person and whether you are speaking in Japanese or English. If in English, then you generally wouldn't use honorifics anyway (outside of maybe "Mr. Tanaka"). If you're conversing in Japanese, you should already know how to be rude. ···日本穣? · Talk to Nihonjoe 04:24, 12 March 2008 (UTC)
Also, "honorific" implies being polite, so being rude is as easy as using no honorific. Seems like a stupid thing to do, though. If it's someone you work with, why in the world would you want to make it harder to work with the person. Why don't you just ask the colleague? You're trying to get on his bad side as it is, so you may as well be a total jerk. ···日本穣? · Talk to Nihonjoe 04:28, 12 March 2008 (UTC)
Call them "anta". That means "you", which is even ruder than leaving off the honorific, and it's short for "anata", which would have been slightly more polite. It's like saying "whoever you are, I don't care to remember your name, and I don't have time for that extra syllable." --Masamage ♫ 01:52, 13 March 2008 (UTC)
PS. I don't actually recommend doing this; I assumed you were writing a story or something. X) --Masamage ♫ 01:56, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Whoever or whomever?

I know it means slightly different things, but which do you think is closer to what the author means: "I can sleep with whoever I want." —Preceding unsigned comment added by Imagine Reason (talk • contribs) 04:36, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

Whether one takes the pronoun as the object of want or as the object of a preposition—the second with—in an elliptical construction ("I can sleep with Xever I want [to sleep with]"), it should be whomever according to the traditional "rules" of grammar. Of course, whoever is frequently seen (and more frequently heard) in such constructions nowadays. I'm not sure what you mean by "it means slightly different things" and "what the author means." Deor (talk) 04:50, 12 March 2008 (UTC)
That example is not the most clear-cut, unfortunately. In strict traditional grammar, whomever would be preferable, yes. This whole question is treated well at the article Who (pronoun).
–⊥¡ɐɔıʇǝoNoetica!T– 05:15, 12 March 2008 (UTC)
Have you considered "whomsoever" which sounds a little more natural than "whomever"? SaundersW (talk) 09:52, 12 March 2008 (UTC)
Not to me it doesn't. —Angr If you've written a quality article... 10:16, 12 March 2008 (UTC)
Don't you like the unstressed "so" which turns the word into a pretty pair of trochees, and restores the metre of the sentence? SaundersW (talk) 12:43, 12 March 2008 (UTC)
Just cuz it's rhythmically pleasing doesn't mean it sounds natural! —Angr If you've written a quality article... 13:28, 12 March 2008 (UTC)
I suppose that in this case naturalness, like beauty, must rest in the ear of the hearer. It's hardly a question of earth-shattering importance, anyway. SaundersW (talk) 17:19, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] bouquet, or bouguet?

Its 'bouquet', or 'bouguet'? i think it is bouquet, but in my OXFORD dictionary, the word 'bouquet' does not exist, instead i can only found the word 'bouguet'. 'bouguet - bunch of flowers for carrying in the hand' this is how my dictionary explain. Which actually is the proper one? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Aforapple (talk • contribs) 04:47, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

It's bouquet. Your dictionary must have a misprint. —Angr If you've written a quality article... 04:49, 12 March 2008 (UTC)
I have never heard of a "bouguet", but Googeling indicates that it is an occasional misspelling.
There is, however, a bouget, a word for pouches filled with water (or wine or whatever). These were used in the Middle Ages and are still used when travelling through arid stretches of land on horse back or by jeep .
I think there are a few depictions by Bosch or Brueghel, but I could not find one in a quick browse. --Cookatoo.ergo.ZooM (talk) 11:53, 12 March 2008 (UTC)
The Google hits for "bouguet" probably include a large number of scannos. —Angr If you've written a quality article... 12:00, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Success/downfall: one word meaning both?

Is there a word for a thing which is both a great strength and a great weakness? (eg. Being able to see into the future, being hyper-sensitive to grammar, being extremely tall...) I feel like I heard such a word recently, but I can't remember any particulars. (It's not hamartia, which is sort of related, not the same thing, and awesome.) --Masamage ♫ 05:16, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

All I can come up with is "a blessing and a curse", but that's not one word. Deuteronomy 11,26 has the most famous example, but it's a recurring topos in the bible. Perhaps there is a theological term for God attaching both blessings and curses to people or even objects? ---Sluzzelin talk 10:22, 12 March 2008 (UTC)
Just chiming in one idea: Pyrrhic victory - a victory at too great a cost. Rfwoolf (talk) 10:44, 12 March 2008 (UTC)
One use of the phrase "two-edged (or double-edged) sword" is for something that can be either a blessing or a curse. Another related idea is a "mixed blessing". SaundersW (talk) 12:40, 12 March 2008 (UTC)
These are all on the right track; they mean exactly what I'm looking for. But its just one word (possibly a figment of my imagination? But I hope not). --Masamage ♫ 16:14, 12 March 2008 (UTC)
It's related to the classic sense of tragedy, surely? The idea that one's strength is one's weakness, in the Greek or Shakespearian sense. Macbeth had great ambition and that made him king and drove him mad. Hamlet was thoughtful and that didn't help either. Still not just one word, sorry. BrainyBabe (talk) 09:59, 13 March 2008 (UTC)
Yes, exactly. It's such a common dramatic concept that it seems like it's got to have a name, at least in Greek or Latin. --Masamage ♫ 16:31, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

It may be something in another language..? --Masamage ♫ 01:26, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

Maybe it's time to coin a new word. Ahem...George W. Bush's greatest strengthiness was his steadfastness / inflexibility. Clarityfiend (talk) 04:36, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

How about Hubris? In its pride before a fall sense? - X201 (talk) 16:44, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

Not quite; hubris is kind of the transition from a strength to a weakness. This needs to be both at the same time. --Masamage ♫ 18:36, 13 March 2008 (UTC)
Re Sluzzelin's idea, the mark of Cain seems to be a combination like that. And stubborness can be janusian appearing as strength while being a handicap. But yeah, on with the search... Julia Rossi (talk) 23:03, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

Does anyone have any ideas about how to discover a Greek or Latin word for this? Anyone fluent? It's hard to look stuff up by definition, so I don't know how to start. --Masamage ♫ 22:01, 15 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Latin term for a specific legal concept

I cannot remember the name of a legal concept that I believe might be summed up in a Latin phrase and none of my Google searches have been productive. The concept I'm thinking of is that a person cannot be prosecuted for performing an action that is required by law. In other words, if a law requires you to take a particular action, then you cannot be prosecuted for taking that action. Can anyone identify that phrase or concept name? Thank you. 152.16.59.190 (talk) 09:05, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

The example that came to mind was the Schießbefehl, the order and execution of shooting "border penetrators", which the European Court of Human Rights came to see as imcompatible with higher-ranking law. The border guards' defense did quote nullum crimen, nulla poena sine praevia lege poenali and nulla poena sine lege which come close to what you're asking for, but no cigars, I'm afraid. ---Sluzzelin talk 12:09, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Google as a verb: ever intransitive?

Can Google (verb) be used as an intransitive verb? For example, is it appropriate to say "Kushal googles." without any particular object? Can it be used in the same way as "Kushal smiles." or "Kushal sleeps." ? Thanks Kushal 11:41, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

Technically, whenever you say "Kushal is googling for recipes" you're using "google" as an intransitive verb, because its complement is not a direct object (a noun phrase) but rather a prepositional phrase ("for recipes"). The article you linked to even says, "The first recorded usage of google used as a verb was on 8 July 1998, by Larry Page himself, who wrote on a mailing list: 'Have fun and keep googling!'", where Larry Page used the verb without even the preposition phrase complement. If you can say "Kushal is googling recipes", you're using it transitively. I can't quite decide if that sounds grammatical to me or not. I probably wouldn't say it myself, but I wouldn't be surprised to hear it used. —Angr If you've written a quality article... 12:05, 12 March 2008 (UTC)
Any verb that can be used transitively can also be used intransitively: some more naturally and readily than others, though. Hard cases are use and say (where speak is a normal choice for the intransitive equivalent). Here are examples with them as intransitive:

Lady Jane is so posh: she doesn't use, she utilises.

Are you still using, Dino? I thought you were clean these days!

I do, but she only says!

Why? Because I said so!

So is not an object of said, is it?
But the theory of transitivity is complex, I am told. I have my own thoughts on the matter, connected with my theory of voice in English... but we don't want original research here!
–⊥¡ɐɔıʇǝoNoetica!T– 13:25, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

Why? Because I said so!

Ups... that's a brain-teaser, isn't it? Technically, so is an adverb there. But it stands in replacement of a clause which would act as a direct object to say. I fancy that so could perfectly be substituted by it in that example. But in terms of purely syntactical terms, I guess I agree with Noetica in that it's an example of say lacking a direct object. Pallida  Mors 15:28, 12 March 2008 (UTC)
Angr: I wouldn't say 'Kushal is googling recipes', but I would say 'I googled myself'. The OED has 'I've googled some keywords', 'I came right home and googled her' and 'Googling his name every few hours'. Algebraist 16:50, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

The dictionary that comes preinstalled with my computer says it can be used as both transitive and intransitive. I would like to learn about the statement that "Any verb that can be used transitively can also be used intransitively".

One more point of interest is capitalizing Google in Google (verb). my dictionary that came preinstalled with my computer used Google with a capital G when using it as a transitive verb. is it better (or even acceptable) in any situation? Please let me know.

Thank you very much for the insightful help so far. I really appreciate it. I would love to read more about it, especially since I am not a native speaker. Kushal 17:21, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Please assist: pay rates for transcribing audio?

okay i just got recruited to start transcribing financial conference and earnings call for companies which are mainly overseas.First,my avergae is like 30-35 words per minute.Okay am from kenya and guys arent that fast in typing,anyways am still practicing on how to up my speed.In general someone tyipng 35 wpm fast or just a lamer?and would better be suited doing something else?

2.what is the average pay for a 3 minute audio.How much do companies pay for something like a 3 minute audio to be transcribed?because am being paid around 160 dollars monthly.i do an average of nine calls a day,each being one and a half minute becasue we split them into two.If anyody can please inform me so i know if am better off,if i went back to college rather than being ripped off(which i feel i am).I just want a basic or general sum that comapnies pay for transcriptions.

If you are in Kenya, then you have probably been hired because the company expects to pay a lot less than it would pay in its home country. For this kind of work in the United States, you would be expected to type at least 55 words per minute, and you could expect to earn maybe $14–16 an hour. With 40-hour weeks, that would be $2,700 a month before taxes (maybe $2,000 a month after taxes). Given your slower typing speed, your work would still be worth something like $1,500 a month in the United States, though it would be difficult to live on that income in most cities, because expenses are so high here. Marco polo (talk) 18:58, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

so being paid 160 dollars is a rip off?thanks marco polo,this is my last month at the office. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 41.220.113.117 (talk) 20:22, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

As Marco Polo implied, pay rates reflect the local cost of living, as well as local demand for educated labor. Your wages would be much higher in New York City than in Eureka, California. In Nairobi, the costs of living are lower than either, and I believe the unemployment rate is higher, so your wages are going to be correspondingly lower. However, $160 a month does seem to maybe be a bit on the low side. — kwami (talk) 01:08, 13 March 2008 (UTC)
The other thing to consider is how many hours a month you are working. A lot of this work is farmed out in piecework. That affects the hourly rate, and thus the rate per minute. BrainyBabe (talk) 07:11, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Lebanese (Arabic) translation

How does one say "I want to kidnap you and cover you in chocolate" in Lebanese (Arabic)? Acceptable (talk) 19:53, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Punctuation in headings: a full stop at the end?

Say you were presented with something like this:

"When I sneeze, the world listens."

- Chuck Norris, world karate champion

Let's say this was on a poster or something, in a magazine or on a billboard. My thinking is that the normal guidelines for full stops do not apply when sentences are left on their own as headings or straplines, and are dictated more by the individual needs of the layout. However my boss is adamant that they should, not for reasons of style as such, but because there is already punctuation in the sentence. If there is a comma, she reasons, there must be a full stop. Presumably if there were no other punctuation marks in the attribution she wouldn't feel a full stop was necessary. What do you think? FreeMorpheme (talk) 21:54, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

You are right, and your boss is wrong. (A good feeling, yes?) It is widely accepted in standard style guides that you do not put a full stop at the end of a heading, even if other punctuation is present. You do put a question mark, if the heading is a question, and you may put an exclamation mark. This all applies whether or not the heading makes a full grammatical sentence. In exceptional cases, a heading might consist of a full grammatical sentence with more following it. In such a case, end the full grammatical sentence with a semicolon (;), and do not capitalise what follows it (unless you are applying capitals to all major words, etc.). Some cases call for other handling; but you get the basic idea. See Wikipedia's Manual of Style WP:MOS for guidance on this, and for links to other pages where these things are discussed. Wikipedia does some things in unusual ways, but is quite standard with its headings.
–⊥¡ɐɔıʇǝoNoetica!T– 22:09, 12 March 2008 (UTC)
Thanks Noetica. So whereabouts on the Defcon scale of prescriptivism would someone have to be to consider it actually incorrect to put a full stop after 'champion' in my example?
(It is indeed a good feeling, a warm tingly sensation, I'd say.) FreeMorpheme (talk) 22:58, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Asking the impossible

I recently found myself writing the following words:

The gay rumour mill is usually the very worst place to find factual information about such matters. The Canberra rumour mill is, paradoxical as it might seem, even worse. Put them together and there's no telling what you could hear from "reliable sources" that sound quite plausible.

Thinking about contradictions like this, I was also reminded of the first movement of Robert Schumann’s Piano Sonata No. 1 in G minor, Op. 22, which contains the infamous tempo indications: “So rasch wie mōglich”, followed by “Schneller” and later by “Noch schneller”, which I understand to mean “As fast as possible”, “Faster”, and “Faster still”. Apart from the apparent impossibility of obeying the composer’s apparently impossible second and third instructions without disobeying his first, is “paradox” the right word to describe this sort of thing? -- JackofOz (talk) 23:11, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

That's Schumann for you. But it is almost de rigueur for composers to ask for the uninterpretable or the downright impossible, isn't it? Sometimes not in words (chords for the piano that can't be played without six fingers to the hand, for example: though arpeggiation is very often assumed). Beyond that, there is an enormous amount of music theory that is illogical, yielding flat contradictions and (sharp?) uncertainties in even the best reference works (yes, New Grove certainly among them), wherefore we make articles like Diatonic and chromatic to bring what order we can. So much more to fix in our music theory articles, though!
Shifting genres and worlds, which rock group was it that asked the sound techs for everything to be louder than everything else? My schooling was deficient in that area.
–⊥¡ɐɔıʇǝoNoetica!T– 00:22, 13 March 2008 (UTC)
"These go to 11...it's one louder." Adam Bishop 02:02, 13 March 2008 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 205.210.170.49 (talk)
The Canberran gay rumour mill? I'd best warn some people... I'd use impossible rather than paradoxical. 'Theoretically impossible' implies further that reality shows it truly is possible. Steewi (talk) 03:41, 13 March 2008 (UTC)
Love that scene, Adam, and Noetica cannot be forgiven for pretending not to remember Motörhead. How do native English speakers feel about phrases such as "more optimal" or "We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union"? One of my teachers went nuts when we combined comparatives and superlatives like that, but it has never bothered me. I think Schumann is playing with the poor pianist, as often, and he might also be referring to the Italian usage of musical terms such as prestissimo. The suffix -issimo can mean either an absolute superlative (the fastest, as fast as possible) or also merely a very high and exceptional, but still increasable, degree of quality (very fast, extraordinarily fast). ---Sluzzelin talk 05:31, 13 March 2008 (UTC)
Arrgh, someone else who doesn't understand what "a more perfect Union" means. Comparatives like "more X" don't always mean "it was X before, and now it's even more X"; they can also mean "it wasn't X before, and it still isn't, but it's closer". If a students gets an F in math in one grading period, and the next grading period he pulls his grade up to a D, it is reasonable to say his performance is better, though still not good. Likewise, the framers of the Constitution were not saying the Union was perfect before and they wanted to make it more perfect; rather, they were saying the Union was imperfect before, and would still be imperfect after, but they wanted to bring it closer to perfection. —Angr If you've written a quality article... 07:02, 13 March 2008 (UTC)
Hmm. I do understand what it means. Nevertheless, applying a comparative to an absolute term with definitions or synonyms such as "flawless", "accomplished", or "indefectible" seemed like something that might bother prescriptivist pedantics (like my teacher). Perhaps not, then. ---Sluzzelin talk 08:06, 13 March 2008 (UTC)
Sluzz, I know what you mean about the different languages used in musical instructions and the variance in meanings they import. If I saw prestissimo on a piece, I would not assume it is to be played as fast as humanly possible, because that would introduce a wide range of speeds depending on the capabilities of the pianist. When we say a car was travelling "extremely fast", we don't refer to the utter extreme of the possibility of speed, the speed of light; and not even to the fastest speed that particular car can possibly do under any circumstances; but more as a way of distinguishing that speed from a lower speed, such as "very fast". And that's how prestissimo would be read: faster than "very fast", but still not as fast as humanly possible. However, apparently Schumann wrote his instructions in his native German, and "So rasch wie mōglich" can't be interpreted any other way than "as fast as possible". My edition of the score has the German words, followed by the Italian prestissimo in brackets, presumably put there by the editor, Harold Bauer. Maybe the composer didn't want it to be interpreted quite that literally, but if so, what was he on about? However, let's not turn this into a discussion about Schumann and his artistic milieu. I'm more interested in a compact way of referring to these sorts of circumstances where words stop you in their tracks because they contradict something that went before. Maybe "contradiction" is the best word. -- JackofOz (talk) 20:47, 13 March 2008 (UTC)
Will refrain from trying to answer that one, and sorry for feeling compelled to return to the musical milieu, but I thought you might appreciate the fact that Ligeti 's Continuum has the following tempo marking: Madly (fast), even faster than possible, and even faster than Schumann's "noch schneller"." ---Sluzzelin talk 21:17, 13 March 2008 (UTC)
Perhaps, on the principle of the piling on of multilingual prefixes that has given us hemidemisemiquaver, we could say that the first such expression (e.g., Schumann's "So rasch wie mōglich") is hyperbolic, the second ("Schneller") is superhyperbolic, the third ("Noch schneller") is oversuperhyperbolic, und so weiter. Deor (talk) 01:10, 14 March 2008 (UTC)
Which would make Ligeti's marking ultraoversuperhyperbolic, perhaps? (Sluzzelin, I've never been much of a Ligetist, but I just love that one. I must listen to Continuum next time I have a chance. Thank you. (jocular thought enters brain) Those players of Continuum who don't know their Schumann would be wondering what Ligeti was on, and when they track down the reference, they'd then be wondering what Schumann was on. How awfully confusing for them. I feel their pain. But I still won't go their concerts.) -- JackofOz (talk) 03:40, 14 March 2008 (UTC)
Late thought, Sluzzelin. Mention of that tempo marking of Ligeti's should go into the Continuum article, with an explanation of what "Schumann's noch schneller" refers to. I'll do it if you're not up for it. -- JackofOz (talk) 22:38, 14 March 2008 (UTC)