Elements of Style in English
in [Lisp]
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From: Jerry Friedman on 13 May 2010 12:16 On May 13, 2:45 am, Stan Brown <the_stan_br...(a)fastmail.fm> wrote: > Thu, 13 May 2010 08:56:59 +1000 from Peter Moylan > <gro.nalyomp(a)retep>: > > > > > Aleksej Saushev wrote: > > > Stan Brown <the_stan_br...(a)fastmail.fm> writes: > > > >> the need for a verb to have a subject, are first-semester > > >> stuff in any European language. > > > > Obviously, you don't know European languages. > > > In fact, Stan's claim is easily refuted [*] by translating the English > > "It's raining" into a few other languages. > > > *In the traditional meaning of "refuted". I haven't yet caught up with > > our news reporters, who believe that "refute" means "deny". > > :-) > > Granted, I oversimplified. Out of curiosity, though, which languages > are you thinking of? .... "It's raining" in Spanish is "Llueve" (literally "Rains") or "Esta lloviendo" (literally "Is raining"). Personal-pronoun subjects are optional in Spanish, and more often than not are suppressed, but in expressions for weather, there's no optional subject you can put in. Unless you hear differently from one of the many people around who know Spanish better than I do. -- Jerry Friedman
From: Pascal J. Bourguignon on 13 May 2010 14:28 Jerry Friedman <jerry_friedman(a)yahoo.com> writes: > On May 13, 2:45�am, Stan Brown <the_stan_br...(a)fastmail.fm> wrote: >> Thu, 13 May 2010 08:56:59 +1000 from Peter Moylan >> <gro.nalyomp(a)retep>: >> >> >> >> > Aleksej Saushev wrote: >> > > Stan Brown <the_stan_br...(a)fastmail.fm> writes: >> >> > >> the need for a verb to have a subject, are first-semester >> > >> stuff in any European language. >> >> > > Obviously, you don't know European languages. >> >> > In fact, Stan's claim is easily refuted [*] by translating the English >> > "It's raining" into a few other languages. >> >> > *In the traditional meaning of "refuted". I haven't yet caught up with >> > our news reporters, who believe that "refute" means "deny". >> >> :-) >> >> Granted, I oversimplified. �Out of curiosity, though, which languages >> are you thinking of? � > ... > > "It's raining" in Spanish is "Llueve" (literally "Rains") or "Esta > lloviendo" (literally "Is raining"). > > Personal-pronoun subjects are optional in Spanish, and more often than > not are suppressed, but in expressions for weather, there's no > optional subject you can put in. Unless you hear differently from one > of the many people around who know Spanish better than I do. The fact that you don't write the subject doesn't mean it doesn't exist. It's the water droplets who are raining. -- __Pascal Bourguignon__
From: Jerry Friedman on 13 May 2010 17:31 On May 13, 12:28 pm, p...(a)informatimago.com (Pascal J. Bourguignon) wrote: > Jerry Friedman <jerry_fried...(a)yahoo.com> writes: > > On May 13, 2:45 am, Stan Brown <the_stan_br...(a)fastmail.fm> wrote: > >> Thu, 13 May 2010 08:56:59 +1000 from Peter Moylan > >> <gro.nalyomp(a)retep>: > > >> > Aleksej Saushev wrote: > >> > > Stan Brown <the_stan_br...(a)fastmail.fm> writes: > > >> > >> the need for a verb to have a subject, are first-semester > >> > >> stuff in any European language. > > >> > > Obviously, you don't know European languages. > > >> > In fact, Stan's claim is easily refuted [*] by translating the English > >> > "It's raining" into a few other languages. > > >> > *In the traditional meaning of "refuted". I haven't yet caught up with > >> > our news reporters, who believe that "refute" means "deny". > > >> :-) > > >> Granted, I oversimplified. Out of curiosity, though, which languages > >> are you thinking of? > > ... > > > "It's raining" in Spanish is "Llueve" (literally "Rains") or "Esta > > lloviendo" (literally "Is raining"). > > > Personal-pronoun subjects are optional in Spanish, and more often than > > not are suppressed, but in expressions for weather, there's no > > optional subject you can put in. Unless you hear differently from one > > of the many people around who know Spanish better than I do. > > The fact that you don't write the subject doesn't mean it doesn't exist. > > It's the water droplets who are raining. The verb is singular. For another example, when the Spanish verb "haber" corresponds to English "there is", it has no subject, at least in standard Spanish. The thing whose existence is exerted is the direct object. However, it's common but non-standard to conjugate the verb to agree in number with the thing, as if were the subject. I'm hoping to meet a bilingual person here in New Mexico who uses the opposite non-standard forms--"There was five frogs" and "Hubieron cinco ranas." (Plural "hubieron" would be singular "hubo" in standard Spanish.) -- Jerry Friedman
From: Tim Bradshaw on 13 May 2010 18:04 On 2010-05-13 22:31:00 +0100, Jerry Friedman said: > The verb is singular. As in English: "it rains", "it is raining". Clearly not the droplets.
From: Christian Weisgerber on 13 May 2010 16:38
Jerry Friedman <jerry_friedman(a)yahoo.com> wrote: > > > >> the need for a verb to have a subject, are first-semester > > > >> stuff in any European language. > > > > > > Obviously, you don't know European languages. > > > > > In fact, Stan's claim is easily refuted [*] by translating the English > > > "It's raining" into a few other languages. > > "It's raining" in Spanish is "Llueve" (literally "Rains") or "Esta > lloviendo" (literally "Is raining"). In French, where personal-pronoun subjects are NOT optional, this is "il pleut", with a dummy subject, just like English "it rains" or German "es regnet". However, German offers at least two non-elliptical sentence types where there really is no subject. The first kind is encountered early by beginning language learners in expressions such as "mir ist kalt" (I'm cold). You have a dative noun phrase, the copula, and a predicative adjective. The seconds kind are advanced passives. In German, as in English, when you put a sentence in the passive voice, the old (accusative) object is promoted to subject. In German, Dative and genitive objects remain as objects and keep their case. (No equivalent in English.) Contrary to English, German can also put sentences into the passive voice that do not have an (accusative) object. In that case, there simply is no subject. Heute arbeiten wir. (Today we work.) => Heute wird gearbeitet. (*Today, is worked. ~ Today work is done.) There is no hidden subject that could be recovered. If you have such a sentence without subject, turning it into active voice requires a bit of imagination since you need to invent a subject that fits the context. -- Christian "naddy" Weisgerber naddy(a)mips.inka.de |