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Pastimes : SI Grammar and Spelling Lab -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: HairyWho? who wrote (2)	11/29/1997 10:14:00 AM
From: jbe	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 4711

Rahn, heaven forfend I should look over your shoulder! I could not have put the case for Grammar more effectively than you have. Actually, I should probably have named this thread "SI Writing Lab" rather than "SI Grammar and Spelling Lab." Most people will acknowledge the need for writing at least well enough to get their ideas across effectively, whereas the words "grammar" and "spelling" reek of pedantic elementary school drill. Some people write well, without necessarily knowing the "rules" of grammar, because they have a good ear, an instinctive sense of language. But others, ostensibly well-educated people, make such egregious errors that one really wonders....Perhaps the only cure is to READ good writing (by which I do not mean Investors' Business Daily). Speaking of good writing, there is a magnificent and truly entertaining book about grammar (I kid you not!), called "The King's English," written by H.W. Fowler & F.G. Fowler. First published in 1906, it is now out in a (probably revised & updated) paperback edition. I recommend it to all for both edification & amusement. jbe

To: HairyWho? who wrote (2)	11/29/1997 10:45:00 AM
From: jbe	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 4711

Watch That Pedantry -- or, Do Not Engage in a War of Words If You Lack the Proper Weapons. Here is an object case, taken directly from an SI thread (which shall be nameless). Poster X and Poster Y undertake to do battle, in the customary SI manner. Poster X decides he can win some points by jeering at Poster Y's misspellings. First, he quotes Poster Y, adding "sics" after the misspellings, as in the following: <I have only expressed a desire for all of these thread commentarys [sic] to stay on course with the facts...> Poster X then follows that up with a riposte: "Your two sentences and views on [censored, jbe], in general, appear to be mutually exclusive pursuant to basic precepts of deductive logic, hence, irreconciliable with someone focused on the facts." What? Come again? A total mishmash -- and with a misspelling (irreconciliable instead of irreconcilable) to boot! The next sentence is even better: "Simple due diligence of our respective posts provides superior and immediate verification and validation as to whom is providing objective prima facie information and issues of facts." Moral: do not try to use abstract words and Latin phrases as weapons -- at least unless you are quite certain as to what they mean. And incidentally, if you must use "whom," use it right. It is true that, normally, "whom" (the objective case) rather than "who" (the nominative case) should follow a preposition or prepositional phrase ("as to whom"). However, you can't use "whom" as the subject of a verb ("is providing"). In this case, therefore, "who" takes precedence over "whom." Thus the proper usage is: "as to who is providing the objective etc." Frankly, I would suggest scrapping the entire sentence altogether. Poster X really lost that round, in my opinion. jbe