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Posted by Hammerer on 03/22/06 00:09
Don M. wrote:
>
> "anthonyberet" <nospam@me.invalid> wrote in message
news:486c5tFidvnsU1@individual.net...
>
>> Hammerer wrote:
>> <snip>
>
>>>> nope, 1.8 legs is still legs and 1.8 thousands is still thousands :)
>>>>
>>> And £1.8 in good old sterling is "pounds"? No! It's £1 and 80 shiny, new
>>> pence! Twenty shiny, new pence short of *2* pounds sterling! Really,
>>> anthonyberet . . . . hold together a cogent argument, whu don't you?!
>>>
>> You thought you had gotten away with this didn't you?
>> Well lookee here:
>> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plural
>> Extract:"For example, in English, German, Italian, Spanish and
>> Portuguese, the plural form is used for zero or more than one, and the
>> singular for one thing only."
>> Therefore, 1,800 which is clearly not 'one thousand only', must be
>> thousand_s_
>> Goodness, I am fantastic sometimes. ;)
>>
> ==========
>
> You can be a fantastic pest sometimes, yes.
>
Yes. Note the way he viciously usurped the entire thread to prove his
insane, numerological theories merely in order to try and hide the fact
that he frequents karaoke bars. I've always said he's a troublemaker.
>
> 1800 is more than 1, surely. "More than one"
> is at least two unless you have a word to quantify 1.8. Clearly 1.8 doesn't qualify for
> plural; 1.8 of the unit of measure we call 'thousand' is still 1.8 thousand, more
> correctly 1800 is '1 thousand 8 hundred', not '1 thousand 8 hundreds'. Some people say
> 'eighteen hundred', not 'eighteen hundreds'.
>
The anthonyberet is confused over the whole notion of units, tens,
hundreds, and thousands. But you've got to laugh.
>
> Moreover, that extract you quoted oversimplifies complex linguistic rules and was probably
> submitted by a unqualified contributor.
>
Yeah! I was going to bring up stuff about linguistics, too . . . . even
try to work in the words "semantics" and "vernacularism", somewhere -
but I couldn't be arsed.
>
> Just look at the use of singular and plural in
> each of those languages for '4' and '8' in 4800, for example. In plain English even you
> should understand: that would be 4 'thousand', not 4 'thousands' and 8 'hundred', not 8
> 'hundreds'. German follows the same pattern, but not the other 3 languages. In English
> you'd use 'thousands' to denote undefined quantity in four figures as in "thousands of
> bloody pests infest Usenet", and no, nobody would assume it's just 1 thousand and change..
> Case closed. Hammerer wins.
>
If it makes you feel any better, anthonyberet, try to think of it not as
an arse-kicking, but a 2x0.5 buttocks-kicking. Depending how you do
the maths, you could very well end up with an answer totalling less than
1, especially if you make a mistake with the decimal points, somewhere,
and thus regain some self-respect (and, logically, an un-kicked arse).
Go for it!
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