Exactly like nothing we've ever seen

Undiscovered animal, alien, or a hoax? How about none of the above?



Again with the suspension of ignorance. We don't know what any aliens look like. So to say that this looks like an alien requires that alien be shorthand for what we have imagined or previously suggested that some aliens look like. And undiscovered of course means previously undiscovered. Both of those abbreviations are reasonable and common in conversation.

But it's quite a stretch to say that a hairless sloth is the most bizarre discovery.

Chupacabra = not very coyote-like coyote

We have another chupacabra candidate.



Jerry Ayer pretty much admits that not knowing what to call it is good enough for him. So he might as well call it a chupacabra. And why not? It'll help bring some attention to his taxidermy business.

But the issue of what we expect a chupacabra to be is harder to resolve. From an investigative position I have to say that longer front legs doesn't convince me this isn't a coyote. Some will argue that just looking at it should be enough evidence that it's not a coyote. It doesn't look like one and that's how we decide most animal classifications. This is an OK argument as far as we trust that seeing something provides us with enough information about it to include or exclude it in a class. If we take the time to identify what exactly doesn't look like a coyote, we come up with the same argument. Just more detailed. No fur = we trust it's not a coyote. But long legs? This is why just lookin' can be so easily countered. Because impressions need to survive investigation.

The old saying about looking sounding and... tasting like a duck is really based on an interplay of feature analysis and prototypes. Prototype theory suggests that we have an idea of an ideal duck in mind when we call something a duck. And we know when we see a good example of what we were thinking.¹ Feature analysis works by proposing a checklist of those features common to a set. Proper features might be something like physical characteristics. Size. Shape. Skin/coat type. When distinguishing species, it's safe to say that something [+scales] is not the same species as something [-scales][+fur]. So for any category, feature analysis will suggest that there is a set of features that are necessary and sufficient for classification. So every member of a group is and must be [+F1] [+F2] [+F3]...

But features are tough to lock down. Features like quadriped or biped can be used when categorizing members of some classes. So among other things, a human is [+biped] and a dog is [+quadriped]. But a husky with two legs is still a dog. Even if it was born with two legs. So we can add a set of transitive features. A little mammal born of a dog is also a dog.² Even if it doesn't have some of the features we use to identify dogs. But this is just passing the buck. Such transitive features rely on the premise that the class of one dog is already known. In some cases this is valid. Like the difference between a Ford and a Chrysler.³ But we haven't moved too far with the analysis. We find ourselves stuck with the ultimate feature being tautological. A dog is [+dog].

This question of the chupacabra works by subtraction. The argument is almost explicit that since it's "unlike anything native to Texas" it must be that mysterious chupacabra that we have never before seen. That's not a very strong argument. But we use some of the assumed features of the chupacabra in our analysis. I wrote about this exact topic a couple of years ago.

So now we see that Texas has produced two of what look like the same weird little sucker. And only 130 miles apart. I'll go out on a limb and say that if we find a few more of these creatures that look like bald coyotes with long front legs, a new category will be created. Some name will be suggested. But no one will accept that this is the little monster. The chupacabra will still be an elusive little wingless bat that must remain [+mysterious].

---

1. That's too simple to be very helpful. But we'll move on for the sake of space.
2. One big question here: are we sure it's a dog because when born of a dog it must be a dog, or because we trust that it simply will be a dog?
3. Let's avoid the arguments about quality usually heard in the vicinity of a set of truck nuts and bumper sticker of Calvin taking a leak.

Palin and Letterman and cooperation and coordination

A lot of linguistic fodder packed into one segment on Keith Olbermann's little show:

Intentions Inferred through Available Extensions

Sarah and Todd Palin have lashed out at David Letterman for making sexual jokes about their fourteen-year-old daughter. Letterman didn't name a daughter but he claimed the joke was intended as a dig at the older daughter, Bristol. How would we know? Daughter has the intention (think of a dictionary definition) of a 'female offspring.' But when using a term that then has several possible extensions (the actual person or object being referenced) we look for clues as to where the speaker in 'pointing.'

The joke used the phrase 'knocked up.' Bristol was 'knocked up.' She's reasonably likely intention.

But Bristol didn't go to New York with the family, so by their understanding, the only daughter 'available' for the jokes was Bristol's younger sister. It's a fair assumption for them to make if they thought that Letterman knew which kids went on the trip, and they assume that he's referring to the family members on that trip. That's assuming a Common Ground understanding about the trip. And the implications then rely on Grice's maxim of quality: assuming that a statement is truthful.

Letterman then defended himself by offering more facts for the Common Ground: specifically, that he would never make such a joke, so they should trust that his intention was not the younger daughter.

More on Grice's Maxim of Quality in Jokes

There's a fuzzy line where Gricean maxims stop being relevant to humor (we're allowed to make up some facts and say more than we have to etc.) and it starts to flout them deliberately. One of Letterman's jokes on the Top 10 list straddled the line:

2. Bought makeup at Bloomingdale's to update her "slutty flight attendant" look

Among Palin's complaints: she never went to Bloomingdales.

OK. It seems pretty clear to us that she's missing the point of the joke. But let's imagine that the joke was worded differently:

2. Reason she went to Bloomingdale's: to buy makeup to update her "slutty flight attendant" look

Excusing the clunky rhythm, another reason that wording doesn't work as well is the implication that the trip to Bloomingdale's is a premise on which the joke is built, not a factual introduction of the joke itself. As the joke is actually written, her complaint sounds silly. But it does call attention to that fuzzy line where jokes have to be careful about what facts they introduce.

Scope of Adjective

The phrase "slutty flight attendant" gets some attention from Olbermann who wonders if it's fair to use a word like "slutty" to make fun of a public figure. His on-air comrade, Craig Crawford agrees that it's probably too crude. Then Crawford adds

And of course—uh—it's also an insult to flight attendants

That reading is possible. Some would say any comparison to Palin is unfair to respectable women. HEY-OHHHH.

But grammatically this is debatable. If "slutty" is a specifier of "flight attendant" then this isn't really an insult to flight attendants generally. It's a claim that some flight attendants are slutty. And so are some engineers and some librarians and some pilots. So to argue that this is not an insult could offer a structure something like

[[slutty [flight attendant]] look

to be contrasted with

[[prudish [flight attendant]] look

and the joke is then merely saying that Palin is trying to look like the first type of flight attendant.

However, there are also readings available that do conflate "slutty" and all flight attendants. Imagine that both "slutty" and "flight attendant" are specifiers of a type of look, we have a structure something like

[slutty]/[flight attendant] look

where "flight attendant" is almost a restatement of "slutty". The important distinction in coordinations here is that it's not slutty AND flight attendant but slutty IE flight attendant. If it were the first, it could still be contrasted with that "look" that is specified as slutty BUT NOT flight attendant.^† Using them in identical coordination the specifications are conflated and cannot be distinguished.

Which one did Letterman intend? I don't really care.

Watch the video, another post will address the bit that really caught my attention.

---

†Note that a specifying NP, "flight attendant" is awkward or ungrammatical in a predicative role.

I completed my flight attendant training.
*My training was flight attendant.

On terms and clarity

The Facebookers are after me. This post arises from the same comment thread that spawned the last post.

I wrote

in my opinion the best way to observe grammar is by noting how fluent speakers purposefully form their sentences, not by how some people wish sentences were formed. and if i want to be a good writer -- i'll learn from the example good writers (tho not always from their advice).

Friend the Second responded:

Who defines "fluent" and "good writers"? To me, they are the ones who use the language in a consistent manner to convey information in the most clear and concise manner. So the people I consider "fluent", you would probably consider stagnant. For me, the language is a communication tool, not an art medium, as it hampers my work when … communication is not consistent. Perhaps the best "quick example" I can give is with the common names of organisms. Common names are regional, applied haphazardly, and often misused. Just because everyone calls members of the Coccinellidae "ladybugs" does not suddenly place that group of organisms in the Order Hemiptera, which is the group of "bugs", rather it remains a beetle (order Coleoptera), despite misuse by many people considered "good writers", or even "good scientists".

Fluency is not a measure of aesthetic quality or fluidity. Linguists often use "fluent" to describe speakers who learn a language with native ability and no syntactic, phonological, or semantic/pragmatic limitation beyond that which would be expected of their dialect. It's not about being smooth or melodious. Many stagnant writers are completely fluent. As I use the word. Other terms for this would be first-language or L1 speaker, or speakers with native competence and proficiency.

Defining good writing is not that important to me in discussing the issue. The argument is of limited interest to me generally. When linguists use examples from writers' works, it's usually in the interest of countering the argument that "masters of the language" won't use singular "their" or split an infinitive or put a preposition at the end of a sentence. It's a simple argument: If you think Shakespeare was a master of the English language, then shouldn't his example be worth considering? If you don't think he's that great, give me your favourite writers. You'll find that they break many of your favourite rules in their work. So who can be trusted to define the language if not the speakers?

Linguists know better than anyone that language is not a free-form art medium. It's a system. It's bound and constrained by real grammar. Not by an arbitrarily manufactured and promoted set of expectations. The premise of descriptivism is that languages are best studied when they are considered as they are, not as some would argue they should be. It's the difference between observation and imposition. Even if I have favored forms and aesthetic sensibilities, I must admit that language isn't defined by desire, no matter how well I can argue that it would benefit from this or that feature.

The issue of conventional labeling is a real concern in many situations. It's true that many of the labels used by laypeople don't correspond exactly to the labels used by specialists in various fields. That's a jargon and terminology issue, not really a grammatical one. When I say that use informs grammar, I'm not also saying that the use of one label necessarily controls the category to which that thing belongs. Categories can have fixed definitions, conventionalized by one group, regardless of the labels that are conventionalized by another group for items that might or might not fit in that category.

People who point and say "Look! A ladybug!" are in no way saying "Look! A member of the Order Hemiptera!" They're using a common word for the insect even tho an entomologist might not use that same word... anymore. But are they pointing at a ladybug? On this one I'm going with the majority rule. Yes. They are. Why is it a ladybug? Because that's what people call it. The common label doesn't need to find the approval of the scientific label. It doesn't even need to take it into account. In some circles a label might be discouraged. But being discouraged in one group does not make it wrong in all others. Come now. Is ladybug really bad grammar? Isn't it the clearest and most concise label the vast majority of the time? That's what establishing a standard of consistency gets us. Speak so they can understand you.

Appropriately this relates to the question of fluency and grammar and even English and language. As we saw, I was using fluent differently from the way my friend thought I was using it. And that definition was key to a part of my point. The purposefully fluent_native usage of fluent_1.native speakers defines langauge, not the purposefully fluent_pleasing usage of fluent_2.pleasing speakers. I find much of E.E. Cummings' poetry to be wonderfully fluid and ungrammatical at the same time. Grammar has to be defined as well. Many peevologists like to use grammar to mean a style of writing that conforms to a list of chosen and imposed standards regardless of the actual use of native (fluent₁) speakers. A standard is chosen and its merit is argued and the reality of actual usage is ignored.

When they speak of Language they are not thinking of the same system that linguists consider. For peevologists, The English language is a Platonic ideal that exists even if nobody is careful enough to speak it. For linguists the English language is the system, varied and mutable, that must be observed honestly, even when a more efficient and unambiguous system can be imagined. Such a system is much more interesting to me when seen as a field with barely visible borders—at times distant; at times nearby—rather than a vault with sturdy cement walls. We know those vaults exist. And we understand that they are safe. We know that they are fixed. We call them dead and frozen languages.

Seeing labels

The Child by Alex Gopher



There are a few interesting examples of how language is conventional and words can separate from meanings. The <lift> is moving down. The <subway> is elevated.

I'm not quite sure what to make of each individual person on the street being represented by the plural noun people, or the signs in other alphabets.

And hey– if this is in New York, why is it called a lift?

The worst perfect word

Someone out there is spreading the idea that diarrhea is a perfect word. At least that's what one of my students told me. 'Is that true?' she asked. Perfect for what? I asked.

The claim apparently has something to do with the sound and spelling of the word. About the spelling I assured her that the word is actually a pretty bad example of spelling/sound correspondence. The <d> is fine, corresponding to [d]. Then we have <i> corresponding to [aɪ] and <a> corresponding to [ə]. The doubled symbols <rr> are clear, but only one is necessary. Then we have the <h> that corresponds to nothing; there is no [h] in the pronunciation. And finally we have a digraph <ea> that often corresponds to [i] but in this case represents two syllables, [i.ə].

It's not a particularly confusing spelling -- but it's far from a perfect correspondence.

More interesting then is the onomatopoetic quality. Is diarrhea the perfect word for what it means? Because of the blood oath I took to believe in the arbitrariness of language, I have to start off by saying that this is often a pointless argument to make. Words capture and express their meaning because of a conventionalized denotation and connotation, not because of an inherent quality.

But this shouldn't stop us from appreciating that the sound of diarrhea does in some ways capture the flowing nature of its disgusting extension. After the voiced stop onset we have a diphthong gliding into a schwa leading into an approximant giving way to a tense vowel that falls into another unstressed mid vowel schwa. The word flows.

But an important point to make here is that it's really just a coincidence that we can make these observations about the word as a mimetic expression. There's no reason to think that diarrhea would not work equally well for another meaning. If a word sounds horrible to us it's almost always because we find something about the meaning horrible. If a word sounds beautiful to us it's usually because we appreciate what it means. If we switched the meanings, and diarrheal traded places with mellifluous we would probably think diarrheal was the perfect word for a rich and lyrical sound.

SNL sends viewers to Google: (we might have an answer)

Flurge? Flurj? Flerge? Flirge? Flirj? Anyone? (I'm going with <FLIRJ> though <flirge> looks like the most common search term. And a crass answer will be found at the end of the post.)

On the season premier of Saturday Night Live Tina Fey played the role she was born to play. And it was very funny in that 'oooh did that go too far? No absolutely not,' way that she does so well. (video below)

So what did everyone come away with? A question: What the hell is a [flɹ̩ʤ]?

I have to spell it phonetically because I didn't have the captions on and I only know what it sounds like. Amy Poehler (playing Hillary Clinton opposite Fey's Sarah Palin) uttered it in the following exchange (lines labeled with the initials of the character rather than the player).

HC: One thing that we can agree on is that sexism can never be allowed to permeate an American election.

SP: So please stop photoshopping my head on sexy bikini pictures.

HC: And stop saying I have cankles.

SP: Don't refer to me as a MILF

HC: And don't refer to me as a [flɹ̩ʤ]. I Googled what it stands for and I do not like it.

So what is it? And what do we look up? The line "I Googled what it stands for" is a clue that it's an acronym. On analogy with MILF it makes sense that FLI___ would be First Lady I'd___. So extending the analogy I'll spell it either FLIRJ or FLIRGE. Maybe not FLIRG unless the initial <g> of the last word is the voiced affricate or 'soft' <g> and the pronunciation of the acronym reflects that.

Most of what comes up in a search for any of these is other people online asking the same question and guessing at the answer. One site (www.youbemom.com) suggests that FLIRG stands for first lady I'd rather get elected. (If so then maybe it's spelled <FLIRGE>).

But that wouldn't make much sense given that the Clinton character in the sketch says that she doesn't like it. And it should be sexist to fit with the joke.

Did SNL knowingly create a definition gap here? Put the acronym out there and see what rushes in to fill it? If so then this could be an organic competition. What's the best meaning and how do you promote it? If the word is too specific and only means something about Clinton then I don't see the word taking root.

Or is there already a meaning out there that I just couldn't find? A spelling I didn't think of?

[Update: For now I'm going to accept this as the answer because it works perfectly. FLIRJ: First Lady I'd Rim Job.

Thanks anonymous
]

What do you call it?

The old brain-bender about 'how do we know that blue looks the same to everyone' is pointless. There's no way and really no reason to find out. We have our conventional labels and when we say 'point to the red square' everyone can point to the same square each time. Well almost.

Rarely is there disagreement in identification of primary or secondary colors. And we can identify shades pretty accurately too. Once I was doing a color match with the additive RGB scale of 0-255 for each value and I matched the two areas within 3 total points difference. 3 points among 16,000,000. Our eyes can be pretty impressive.

But the linguistic task gets fuzzy quickly. What's navy blue? What's dark blue? Sky blue? Baby blue? Powder blue?

If you want to know what other people said in a study described on the Dolores Labs Blog just check the map below. Don't get mad when you disagree. Maybe you're the one that's wrong.

(click image to enlarge)

Now play with the labels. This page allows you to type in a color or a specifier and see which shades were called what. If you type orange only those shades that were called orange or have <orange> somewhere in the name will show up in the wheel.

---

Several years ago a friend of mine was looking at some shirts in a nice store. The salesperson walked up and asked if he needed help.

'Yes. What is this colour?' he asked. 'It's not on the tag.'

She looked at the shirt then checked the tag. 'Sorry' she responded. 'I'm not sure exactly what it's called.' She shrugged figuring it wasn't a big deal that she didn't have such specific information. 'Is there anything else?' she asked.

'Well can you just tell me?' he asked again.

She looked confused. 'Sorry' she repeated. 'I don't have that information anywhere. It's not listed and I don't know where to find it.'

'Can't you tell just from looking?' he asked.

'Look, the names change from brand to brand. So your guess is as good as mine.'

'No it's not' he said. 'I'm colour-blind.'

She looked horrified. 'Ohh I'm so sorry. It's green.'

He laughed and told her not to worry about it. Knowing him I think he was hoping she'd misunderstand.

Wouldn't a little be enough?

More and more I think the BBC knows that it's doing this sort of thing.The reporting starts of with nods to a reasonably skeptical tone. But the story about the allegedly existent hirsute megalopodous quasihomonid ends on a cheeky note.

Stories of a giant ape roaming the forests of North America date back to before European settlement. But despite occasional footprints and photographs, there has never been much proof of Bigfoot's existence.

But there may be some charitable reading of this use of proof. It may be related to the term from Scottish law for a civil case. Or it may be some sort of cancelable predicate. If it's worth specifying proof beyond a reasonable doubt then it can also be proved within an enormous amount of reasonable doubt. Right?

Of course

The image of Eight Belles slumped over her grotesquely bent ankles makes me shiver. I can't imagine what pain means to an animal. But I imagine pain is a sensation that levels any hierarchy putting humans above beasts. I suspect a human soul isn't what caused a grimace when I heard a soft snap on twisting my ankle. As I curled over and grasped my foot I was only knowing that I felt pain.

If anything I think Eight Belles had to have been more focused on the pain than I was.

This distinction was leading me to write a post about the claims of semantic weakening when words like tragedy and catastrophe are used to describe the events following Saturday's race. But that's a slick path to tread. One ADS-L comment picks on the word choice as a 'degradation of meaning' -- which is probably less judgmental than it sounds. Calling a process semantic weakening or degradation can be a description and not an accusation. Well it can be both.

But while browsing through the online stories (looking for other words to discuss) I came across this:

Alex Waldrop, president of the National Thoroughbred Racing Association, said there will be an autopsy to find the cause of Eight Belles’ death. (here)

They really don't know what was in the syringe?

Thematic roles help sort out this semantic clump. And they allow us to move away from subject as a semantic category.

My teacher always told me that the subject of the sentence is the person or thing doing the action. They'd give me an easy sentence like 'Michael broke the window' then ask who did the action. But a smartass could argue that a rock probably broke the window. 'But that's not in the sentence' Mrs Cook counters. Well what if it was? In the sentence: Michael broke the window with a rock the old trick doesn't work.

Effectors can be divided into four types:
An agent exists outside the event and acts willfully.
A force doesn't act willfully but can act independently of the event and can use an instrument (e.g. gravity, wind, a locomotive...)
An instrument is neither independent nor willful and must be put to the work in question.
The means is not a person object or physical force (e.g. a plan, policy, public opinion...)

In the death of Eight Belles the agent is clear. The agent of Eight Belles' death was Dr Larry Bramlage the on-call veterinarian. (This is not an incrimination. It's a semantic distinction.) The instrument was the drug in the syringe.

The autopsy will not reveal any more information about the instrument or the agent. There are some forces and means that might be illuminated but a final judgement regarding the means is bound to be more philosophical than scientific. The indifference of the training to physical harm; or the wanton breeding in the pursuit of speed without strength; or the disregard for the danger to an physically immature horse -- these will not be revealed by an autopsy. But they are factors to consider.

Some people have blamed jockey Gabriel Saez' technique. It may seem like splitting hairs to separate him from his technique but in this case it's appropriate. An agent has to be a willing instigator of the event but a force can be accidental. It's not reasonable to accuse Gaez of trying to kill Eight Belles. Even if you want to argue that he didn't care (and that's a ridiculous accusation) he was not hoping for the horses demise. That intention is necessary. Saez no more directed his technique to his horse's death than any other jockey on the course. And beyond intention his technique wasn't unique in any other way. His technique could be a means impelling a sequence of events that ended in the horse's death but that becomes a campaign of blaming every action and every decision that didn't reverse the course of events away from death. We approach blaming every cheer. Every bet. Everyone who knew a race was taking place and didn't stop it. Some people are making that argument. Whether it's silly or not the autopsy won't reveal.

The autopsy might reveal evidence of certain forces contributing to a means. Evidence of already-weak ankles more likely to give under the intense force of gravity on a heavy body. Evidence of a genetic defect. Evidence of prior injury. Evidence of malnutrition. Evidence of physical immaturity. This could reveal how some decision-making was a means (a not the) by which a system of discovered forces was responsible for the event that put Dr Bramlage in the unfortunate position of making the appropriate choice using the instrument he did to be the agent he was.

Maybe a pre-interview would have helped

Violations of Gricean maxims of cooperation are easy enough to create in a classroom setting for illustration. In the wild they often occur because of a misunderstanding. It's a little tougher to find good examples of willing violations -- or knowingly uncooperative discourse.

A quick recap of the four principles as set up by Grice (1975):

Quantity - Be as informative as necessary and no more.
Quality - Be as accurate as you can be.
Relation - Be relevant.
Manner - Be clear unambiguous direct and well-ordered.

Today's example: a violation of the maxim of relation.



The clip has been around long enough to have inspired parodies. But I found it just recently.

Bozell the clown

Keith Olbermann has named Brent Bozell "Worst Person in the World" several times. And he just might be. He might not be. I haven't seen all the data.

But Bozell didn't help his cause during his recent talk at the National Press Club in Washington DC where he was promoting his book Whitewash: What the Media Won't Tell You About Hillary Clinton, But Conservatives Will (broadcast by C-SPAN2). The corpse of the following topic was introduced by an audience member but Bozell was all too happy to help disinter it for blatantly obvious political interests.

Making me lean towards a vote in favor of the title: his comment regarding Juanita Broaddrick's allegations (made almost a decade ago) against Bill Clinton.

"It went beyond rape. It went to a level of violent rape that is ghastly."

I hope he would revise this if given a chance. As it stands the statement implies that the word rape does not always entail a violent and ghastly crime.

Horrific.

Lies damn lies and sports

When I started following hockey and college football back in the Eighties I learned of the necessity for a difference between a winning streak and an unbeaten streak. (The same distinction is necessary in the NFL but ties are not common enough to make the difference salient.) For a while I thought it was just an optimistic and pessimistic way of saying the same thing. Then I learned that the semantics went beyond attitude.

So a winning streak does entail an unbeaten streak; and when a team ties a game the unbeaten streak continues but the winning streak is over. So an unbeaten streak is less impressive than a win streak. But it's not too shabby.

Because of the point system in hockey it was a relevant statistic. The team got two points for a win one point for a tie and no points for a loss. Well that changed several years ago. Ever since the 1999-2000 season a team earns one point if the regulation period ends in a tie even if the team loses the game during the overtime period. Of course the other team gets two points for the win. And now there are no more ties. The game will always be decided; if necessary by a shootout.

This has introduced a new phrase for another somewhat relevant streak: the point streak. Even if a team loses a game the streak is still intact as long as the regulation period ends in a tie. A winning streak entails an unbeaten streak which then entails a point streak. And of course a point streak is less impressive.

And as far as headlines and sports commentary go there are several other streaks entailed by all these so far mentioned.

One AP headline today announces the end of one team's streak that isn't very significant and really not too impressive:

Canucks' 14-game home point streak ends

Over the course of those 14 home games (which stretch back to Nov 9) the Canucks have also played 14 away games. Their record in those away games is 5 wins 7 losses and 2 overtime losses. Combined with their home record over that period (before today's loss) the Canucks have won 17 games and lost 11. Four of those losses were tied at the end of 60 minutes so they get moved over into the points column.

There are several ways to make their performance sound impressive. One line late in the story extends the span of the accomplishment by mentioning that their previous home loss was back on November 1. That statistic give the illusion of adding more than a week to their streak even though their next home game (the game that started the streak) was 8 days later.

Another trick to make their performance sound more impressive: They're second in their division: the Northwest division of the Campbell Conference. But they're technically the 5th place team in the conference. And they're 18 points behind the conference leading Detroit Red Wings.

Sort the league into 2 conferences and it's possible for the best team in one conference to fall below the 50th percentile overall. Divide each of those categories into three divisions and it's possible for the best team in a division to be around the bottom 15th percentile.

In sports such a case is unlikely. And this isn't such a case. The Canucks are not a bad team. And they haven't been playing badly over this span of time. They're comfortably over .500 in their record. But it's been no more than a mediocre run.

17-11: and they get a headline calling it a streak.
_

I have some ideas for what I should write in my head

Three's the charm. One more syntactical ambiguity example then no more posts like this until after the new year.

A recent post at languagehat.com provides...well a sentence fragment. A noun phrase really:

"A perfect encapsulation of the asininity of the usual simplistic 'if you come here, you should speak English' attitude at xkcd."

That's fine. I like fragments. I like using them. Sometimes they're necessary. For instance now. But the fragmentation...fragmentalism...fragmentality... well none of those is the theme of this post.

My first time thru the line I read it this way (roughly): [here is] a perfect encapsulation of the asininity of the usual simplistic 'if you come here, you should speak English' attitude that we often find at xkcd.

So I thought Really? xkcd is usually not too bad. I followed the link. I read the cartoon. And I thought hmmm...I must have misread languagehat's post.

It makes sense now read (roughly): [here is] a perfect encapsulation of the asininity of the usual simplistic 'if you come here, you should speak English' attitude presented satirically by the fine folks at xkcd.

It's a tough one to restructure. Even in the short comment I left at languagehat the distinction is tricky. There's a semantic waviness on this one because even if xkcd provided the encapsulation and did it knowingly it would still be possible to read the sentence with the implication xkcd believes this argument and it's clearly a dumb one. Syntactically there's a clear difference between these two structures:

1. encapsulation of [the stupidity of [the attitude at xkcd]]


2. encapsulation of [the stupidity of [the attitude]] at xkcd

But semantically both can be criticizing xkcd's ideas. While only the second syntactic structure allows xkcd the possibility of being a fellow derider of the attitude.

Is Yahoo Serious?

I can't call it a snowclone. I'm not sure what name I would give for the pattern--other than 'tired joke.' A story on NPR about James Burrow's new sitcom starring Kelsey Grammer and Patricia Heaton has been given the title "'Back to You' Crew: Sitcoms Are Serious Business." No one expects this headline to elicit a laugh of course but it is playing with the connotations of serious. Jokes are serious? How can that be? I thought jokes were only funny!

A Google™ search tells us that the following are "(a) serious business" in a search for "[X] are (a) serious business":

• Games (5X)


• Cybernet games


• Legos


• Toys (3X)


• funnies


• Funny Ads


• comedies


• comics (4X)


• jokes (2X)


• hoots and hollers (ie laughter)

Those were all found within 200 results (100 each for [X] is serious business and [X] is a serious business). These reversals were not the most common subjects--they make up about 10% of all results.

I would create 4 tiers of the types of results. The first is use devoid of irony. The writers who claim that hurricanes, missles, eating disorders, drugs or allergies are serious are speaking with cheek clear of all tongue. The only slight reversal in the list might be something like "allergies": an affliction some people might consider a mere nuisance but which the writer is saying is a source of real suffering for some people.

I'll put the first list above into an opposing tier: opposing the 2nd list and directly opposing expectation. It's a list of topics that would often be considered contradictory to seriousness. In fact the definition of several of these could easily include the necessary quality that they are not serious. Likewise, serious activity might easily be defined as an activity/event that does not allow games or anything funny or comical.

The third tier would be a list of topics/objects that would not normally be considered serious and which might more likely be considered contrary to seriousness. Cupcakes, birthday parties, and noodles would rarely be defined as serious, but neither would I expect anyone to sp define a cupcake as a non-serious item. But if prompted to rate the seriousness my guess is that these types of objects would fall on the non-serious side. Only an impression--but I'm pretty certain... Non-seriousness may not be a necessary connotation, but seriousness might be an incompatible connotation.

One last tier is the completely neutral. Mowers, acquisitions, reunions and minivans have no typical connotation to either seriousness or non-seriousness. Claiming that these are serious business has no strong implication of bet ya didn't think so...like humor or burritos. Yes it does blend on the edge with the 3rd tier. Especially since inference is a slippery determiner of connotation.

There is of course no clear line between any of these tiers. And any arguement based solely on my inferrences is easily boring even to me. But there is an interesting pattern at each end--of either typical intention or reversal of intention--that favours repetition of items that are in the first two tiers. Illness and disaster are represented heavily as are humor and play.

Out of 200 results 26 said humor or play was serious business. Another 26 said disaster or disease was serious business. These 52 results were distinct results: repetitions were not counted. That left 148 results. The remaining 148 comprised a variety of results: food, legal procedures, machines (technology in general), cultural/mass-media references, hobbies, botany, biology, travel...and all the repetitions thereof.

I decided to leave out any search using "is" because I figured "are" made the point already. But the first 10 results for "* is serious business" turn up 2 results for "comedy"--so maybe using "is" would have made the point better.

Well clearly this is not quite the most scientific survey. So far from it in fact that I should just drop the litotes and say it flat out: this is not a scientific survey. But it does show a pattern with general antonymy that I mentioned in a post a while ago when I wrote

Somewhere in that encyclopedic matrix of 'what this word means' is an awareness of what the word does not mean and a sense of the word's opposites and even complements.

Sometimes that awareness is subconscious and sometimes its foremost in our intention. And that awareness leads us to rely too often on those opposed meanings--thinking too often that we are the first to come up with a clever use of a word.

5th grade bullies

I have enjoyed watching a few episodes of Are You Smarter than a 5^th Grader. I like the implication that a typical fifth grader can answer all the questions asked. I know I couldn't have answered them all at that age. And I can't answer all of them at this age. Sure I know that there are 13 stripes on the flag. And I can name all 5 Great Lakes. But I don't know the national dog of France. I would guess it's a Poodle. But I'm not sure.

And should I know for sure? Should I be embarrassed that I don't? Am I not smarter than a 5^th grader? There's a split claim being made by the show. Everyone is familiar with the concern that Americans are stupid. We hear that 20% of the country can't find the country on a map and we think hmmm...Our schools are a mess so 1/5 sounds about right. Even though the actual number is probably closer to 1/15. Then we turn on the claim that Americans are stupid and we look to the 5^th graders as a group that puts us to shame. American 5^th graders. So maybe schools are getting better?

Well of course this show has made no overt claims that Americans are dumb. It might in fact be more intent on simply calling attention to a lot of kids that are representing us very well. But there's no entertainment without a patsy and what's better than an adult being made to look foolish by a kid. It's a great reversal. Have they had a 5^th grade teacher compete on the show yet?

So the kids have the ɵ-role of THEME: the producers hired them. Or they are a GOAL if they receive the praise. They might be in the role of EXPERIENCER if they are personally encouraged by the praise. The kids can also be AGENT if they answer the questions or deliberately tease the contestants. They might be a SOURCE if the contestant gets an answer from the kids. The LOCATIVE role isn't as obvious. But there are opportunities for the contestant to sit next to a student.

That leaves INSTRUMENT as an unfilled role. If we consider the role of the contestant we find that the students are often used to make the EXPERIENCER grown-ups feel ashamed. If we make the producers the AGENTS we then make the kids the INSTRUMENTS.

But this can get out of hand. I read a sentence the other day that unwittingly put a brutish sense out there.

• "I feel like seriously I could be beaten with a fifth grader!"

That puts the producers or some other AGENT in a pretty violent role. And it puts the kids into a very non-human INSTRUMENT role. It also called to my attention the way that prepositions can propel some very textured readings when they occur in an unexpected phrase. If the sentence simply changed "with" to "by" we wouldn't just assume that the kid is clobbering the writer. We would assume the pummeling was in some sort of a non-violent skills competition.

And of course a kind reading using with allows us to see the producers as nefarious agents of destruction and ridicule. And isn't that the safest bet when it comes to the suits at FOX?

The chupacabra in all possible worlds....

Phylis Canion of Cuero Texas found this ugly little beast dead on the side of the road. She's been calling it the legendary chupacabra and she's waiting for DNA testing to prove that it's...uh...not a dog?

Is this the mythical chupacabra? It depends on what your definition of is is. Or maybe just your definition of chupacabra. If you mean an odd looking creature with protruding teeth about the size of a small dog--then sure. This is a chupacabra. If you mean a small animal that hunts chickens and is rarely seen--then maybe this is a chupacabra. If you mean the very species of animal that has actually committed rampant goaticide and chickicide and has inspired many tales of demonic blood-sucking creatures from Puerto Rico, Mexico, the U.S. and several other countries--then...well...this and coyotes and wild dogs and foxes and jaguars and panthers and some snakes and birds of prey and mischievous humans are all 'el chupacabra'. Maybe even rats.


Legends are fascinating semantically because they are defined by their Prototypical Properties and yet they are extremely flexible because they often have no well-examined extension by which to create a Typical Denotatum. Necessary Conditions are almost impossible to impose because each speaker has merely chosen which of the Necessary Conditions make up the intention. And extensions are almost always ephemeral and partial. Sightings are merely instances of faith that investigation will not reduce a collection of properties to those belonging only to the extension of another already attested intention.

So Canion really can't expect that the DNA tests will prove that her creature is a chupacabra. There is no extension of that animal or its DNA that can serve as a standard for Necessary Conditions. So far she can only hope that the DNA is not limited to the same properties that are necessary and sufficient to denote the DNA of a dog or some other animal--probably canine. But even if the DNA does limit this to a canine of some sort all is not lost. It might turn out that the chupacabra was a nasty little mutt all along. That would require that some of the previously argued conditions of the chupacabra be discarded.

Because if by chupacabra you mean this



Then no. This is not the chupacabra.

(photos by Eric Gay/AP)
(drawing from here.)

Semantic tectonics

The commentary from a recent post alights on some very basic (but always interesting) historical linguistics topics.

Textbooks are always sure to provide a list of traditional semantic changes including amelioration and pejoration, and common examples such as knave churl hussy nice...etc. The following list gives some loose examples of amelioration but it's not exactly the type of elevating shift that is intended by the term.

bad sick fierce mad wicked ridiculous crazy insane terrific awesome

Rather than having shifted meaning by undergoing simple amelioration the first eight of these are a type of contranym (or autoantonym, or "janus word" or several other rarely necessary words that few dictionaries list). But those labels usually indicate a word like cleave or peruse that is equally likely to have contradictory meanings without consideration of style or register while the first eight words above typically have clear meanings based on the context. Consider the following pairs of uses:

She is a bad mother.
She's one bad mother!

Trying that stunt was ridiculous.
Dude that 360 nac-nac was ridiculous!

In formal speech the 2nd meaning would be very odd for each word. Like ridiculous in slang usage crazy and insane don't simply mean extremely good. They have a connotation of impressiveness and "hard-to-believability" (that was awkward).

Terrific and awesome are good examples of a complete semantic shift, having abandoned an earlier meaning. Awesome has the interesting tie to awful which has kept its negative meaning. We can trace awe back to OE ege and its cognate in ON agi: fear and terror.

Amelioration and elevation don't quite capture the force on these words. There is an inversion that isn't explained by simple lenition of the semantic force. In fact there is no lenition at all, but an equally forced reversal; there is no significant loss or gain of neutrality in these words.

The common theory that a word must go through polysemy in order to acquire new meanings is probably quite relevant here. For a word like terrific there was clearly a time when the more specific meaning "causing fear" generalized to include other emotions before moving over and settling on "worthy of praise." But what generalization and polysemy was there with bad? In some of these words like insane and mad there is that space where they are used to concurrently indicate positive attributes like bravery and daring while also indicating a lack of good judgment.

How about "that's sick"? Maybe something like "It's sick that anyone should be so talented. I'm jealous of your skill." Wicked? Perhaps an intention like "You must have connections to darker powers to be so successful." Both of these jocular in use. But there always a little truth in any good jest no?

And bad might follow right along with that but with a more basic sense of the fascination we have for those people who break rules and show no fear or remorse. In fact the OED suggests in its very recent draft addition the meaning of "dangerous, menacing, or imposing to a degree which inspires awe or admiration; impressively tough, uncompromising, or combative."

Considering all this we go back to a word like comprise, which when considered alongside a word like apprise is evidence that the mental representation of a word's semantics is much more broad than just to include the intention. Somewhere in that encyclopedic matrix of 'what this word means' is an awareness of what the word does not mean and a sense of the word's opposites and even complements. So when called up, a word like start brings with it a role of opposite of stop. That's pretty clear. What I find fascinating is that the understanding and use of a word like gather comprises not only disperse but also be gathered. And a word like learn travels with be taught and forget and teach in its pocket. These words must have such pockets. Otherwise it'd be hard to understand why we are always finding new meanings in there.

That'll learn ya

Buffy just finished reading a book that her former professor and now friend Chris Blake wrote. Along with the occasional bursts of laughter (because he's quite funny) and the frequent pauses to discuss and investigate his claims (because he's quite provocative) she also pointed out a few mistakes (because he's quite human). There were very few -- such editing oversights as giving a character two different names and giving a quote two different speakers.

Buffy is a close reader. I flinch every time she looks at my writing. She follows arguments well and she catches all inconsistencies. And she remembers from several years ago Blake enlightening his students by informing them that nauseous (causing nausea) is commonly misused when the speaker means nauseated (feeling nausea); and that comprised of is misused when the speaker means composed of.

So there on page 82 of his book Buffy found that her mentor wrote

and the human sanctuaries that comprise the church are free to wonder and probe without fear

A stumble she figured. Surely he remembers his old rule. Then on page 92:

It was a test comprised of one hundred problems

Blake is a fine writer and editor. He uses words knowingly and he expresses himself clearly. And I'm not going to say anything critical about his use of the word comprise in these sentences. When Buffy shook her head on reading them I asked her to temper her distaste. There were certainly other instances of Blake's writing that deserved a some teasing.¹

I will however take issue with his lesson to the students. Perhaps he will temper the very advice he has shown he doesn't always heed.

Here's the usual argument regarding this word: To comprise means to bring together or collect. So a house comprises thousands of bricks. A mall comprises many smaller stores. And a university comprises several schools/colleges. Ergo! (those pedants like to say as much as they can in Latin) it is incorrect to say that a burrito is comprised of lettuce tomatoes beans cheese etc. It is incorrect to say that 88 keys comprise a full piano keyboard. And it is doubly incorrect to say that this nation is comprised of 48 states.

Before I address the fluidity of language I should note that the etymology of the word does go back to a meaning of collecting and gathering. And if we look carefully we find that the word merges with comprehend. According to the OED the -prise ending was probably formed by analogy with several other English words such as enterprise -- the verb derived from the formally identical noun.

To put it simply: nouns that ended in -prendre showed a pattern of becoming verbs ending in -prise. Some verbs ending in -prendre followed suit.

Now some will wail and moan and argue still that comprised of meaning made up of is a recent misunderstanding and misappropriation of the word. That it's a flat mistake: the wrong meaning. This argument will often go to such horrific worst case scenarios as "what if up starts to mean down?" They argue that words so arbitrarily linked to meanings will eventually become meaningless.

Point 1) The very fact that they know a word is being used incorrectly means that the intended meaning is clear. If I say "Two cups comprise a pint" or "I listened to a choir comprised of 32 singers" the meaning of the word is clear. Not arbitrary. We are allowed to use context.

Second point) It's not a recent trend. The OED entry includes the meaning "To constitute, make up, compose" and provides citations as early as 1794. Nine citations are included for this meaning: more quotations than are given for any other use. The passive use meaning "To be composed of, to consist of" gets four citations of its own. The earliest included is from 1874.

Meanings change. And it's mere convention that determines which meanings connect to which forms. This is not to say that those conventions don't serve a purpose. My point is simply that when the currents of language create the occasional polysemy and the occasional complete shift it is not a deterioration. It is merely evidence that language is of the people for the people and yes by the people.

And scoff as you might I'll bet you are okay with this (I now address the skeptics). Let's take a look at the history of apprise. The -prise ending is also derived (by analogy) from a form ending in -prendre. That early form of the word (from the French) had the meaning to grasp or understand. We still have that meaning preserved in the familiar form apprehend. And apprise once had the same meaning. But it went through a very reasonable shift and came to mean inform teach or enlighten.

Where's all the complaining about that shift in meaning?

-----------------------

Take a look at his Union College profile page (link above) and note his use of aerobie as a mass noun. It's like he thinks it's a real sport or something. (This may be related to the aggrandizing effect of mass nouns that I've mentioned before.) Now I agree that "throwing aerobies" sounds like a juggling act. Couldn't he just say "throwing around the ol' aerobie"? Yeah. That sounds more like fun and less like a sanctioned and organized activity.

You say "potato" I say "loathsome starchy glob thing."

An AP story reports that Keanu Reeves allegedly conducted his Porsche into contact with a man on Monday evening. The story opens thus:

Keanu Reeves was behind the wheel of a Porsche that allegedly grazed a celebrity photographer standing in the path of the sports car, investigators said Tuesday. The photographer fell to the ground and paramedics were called after Reeves' car allegedly struck the man at 7:30 p.m. Monday, said Deputy Ed Hernandez of the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department.

I had a hard time starting this post because my point was to highlight the writer's chosen wording especially in reference to the pedestrian. I know my first sentence sounds tethered and evasive. I was trying to be so.

The headline reads Reeves' car allegedly hits photographer and the story twice refers to the pedestrian as a "photographer" and once as a "celebrity photographer" before a quote from LA Sheriff's Deputy Ed Hernandez refers to him as a "paparazzi."

Before we roll our eyes too dismissively regarding the writer's obvious agenda of impartiality (can an agenda be impartial?) by using the neutral term in place of the loaded paparrazzi or paparrazzo we should note that Mr Reeves' lawyer Jay Lavely is given ample attention with an uninterrupted and conspicuously long quote. In the generous spotlight Lavely uses "paparazzo" 4 times. He also says the hit was "brought on more by the actions of the [cameraman] than by the actions of Mr Reeves." Laver attempts not only to deflect culpability, but tries to lessen the incident by saying that Reeves "slowly inch[ed] the car away from the curb." Notice that he has drawn attention away from the claim that Reeves was driving, calling attention to the curb: where cars tend to be stationary.

Regarding the hit (a noun which the headline implies by using the related verb) or graze (which the Deputy Sheriff implies by his use of the related verb (thus prompting the writer to report the allegation with the same verb)) Lavely starts with "If" and refers to "contact with the paparazzo."

He then says "It appeared as if the paparazzo was trying to
cause this type of encounter."

Did the filthy paparazzo take a dive? Was the celebrity profile artist assaulted? Is this a case of a visual promotions specialist being crushed under a wheel or was an exploitative private-life profiteer lightly brushed by a door handle?

Only the box office gross of Keanus Reeves' next movie will tell.