Can’t. Stop. Parsing.
huh? “best” adverbially modifies the verb “like”.
Yes, and that is the point! As an adverb with like it implies you are the best at liking $thing. Not that it is your favorite. I understand and accept the colloquial use of the phrase, but it always seemed passive aggressive. (Shouldn’t it be cunningly aggressive?)
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I am not convinced about this example representing a grammatical problem. Doesn’t it depend upon whether or not “liking” is fundamentally qualitative or quantitative? “So many/few fucks to give” states something similar in quantitative terms. Personally, I consider “like” as it being purely qualitative.
There are some instances which I know are more grammatically correct, but I disregard them anyway. I could be mistaken, but I think I recall that action verbs should relate to a being verb. For example, “I walk in the rain” could be considered less appropriate than “I am walking in the rain”. This use of being verbs does strike me as if it were completely redundant. As if to explicitly mention: “This action is being undertaken by something/someone that exists!”, because actions which occur (do occur?) without the formality of the actor existing first present such a frequent dilemma.
Also, those instances irk me when people ask questions without using question marks. This especially happens with so-called “rhetorical questions”, that is to say, ones they don’t expect to be answered. Periods I interpret as signifying that a complete statement has been articulated, so I tend to find myself annoyed when people use. several. per. sentence. This seems to transform what may have been a coherent idea into a free-association session with a phrase or two, followed up by several one-word sentences.
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I get irked when people use do use question marks, but like, at the end of sentences? When they’re not like, actually asking a question? Which I guess isn’t, you know, strictly a grammatical issue?
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What do you mean.
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Such examples seem to be more often encountered in spoken than written communication, at least in my experience. I think people learn a lot more by asking questions than they do by making statements, but that they need to be distinct. Making questions into pauses or disfluencies rather than engaging people with them outright seems to suggest that the questions might not be worth asking. I disagree with Mali about the value of “speaking with authority”, and think it is rather a matter of making concepts distinct. Knowing facts from opinions, sentences from questions, etc.
Partly, I also worry that the practice is symptomatic of a decrease in debate, of an increasing prevalence of one-way communication. It can be considered a lazy reliance upon rote, token, ritualistic forms of mostly unconscious communication. Where actually offering a thoughtful answer to: “How are you, today?”, or: “Do you know what I’m saying?” can often be construed as rudely going off-script. It’s easy to orate declarations off into the void, but communication seems to falter when one needs to ask questions which then aren’t answered. Hopefully they are, at least, considered!
You, Sir, continue to outrage us! You are sooo lucky right now that cheesemakers are blessed. XD
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But that auxiliary verb changes the meaning. “I walk” is a simple present that indicates the action is one that happens regularly. “I am walking” indicates a present progressive, that it is happening in this particular moment of existence.
“I walk dogs” could be someone telling you about their job or hobby. “I am walking dogs” means they’re busy and you’ll likely have to continue the conversation some other time.
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I agree that distinguishing between these meanings is worth doing, but I think this is an awkward way to go about it. If the auxiliary is modifying time, then a word which directly references this can be used with even less change. Or, if you prefer, fewer changes. (tee hee). So, “I walk in the rain” could become “I now walk in the rain”. For contrast, this could indicate that I walk dogs now, versus at another time, or in general terms. Instead of a being verb, which suggests that the time of the action changes because I suddenly exist to perform it.
I’m betting a random search of all you fuckers’ comment history would show that you’ve just Muphry’d yourselves right good.
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Except it doesn’t seem to work to me; “I now walk dogs” only tells me that it’s your present job. The suggestion that your current existence is as a walking being at least matches well with “I was walking” and “I will be walking”. I just took it as the price for not conjugating.
I’ll grant “I do walk” is a little more complex, if only because that form has picked up some odd connotations.
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This. For me this is less a pet hate and more a monstrous, slathering beast of hate. A beast that should be slain, quartered and buried.
I used to feel a lot of Australian guilt at this, buying into the British argument that, at least in the UK, it was a product of Australian soap operas. But apparently US use predates it, although I don’t know whether that means its origin is West Coast or it’s some awful form of convergent evolution.
(Edited to add link)
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Even though I think that the partial hybridization with Latin was one of the best things to ever happen to the English language, I dislike gendered language, and find it’s use in Latin languages incomprehensible. English seems to be mostly free of this, except with regards to pronouns, which I am of the opinion tend to be used far too often. I’ve got a relative who chronically spins forth entire conversations which are utterly devoid of proper names. People and places change constantly without being explained. After five minutes or so, when they pause, I might ask them to clarify the fifty or so references they left completely ambiguous, and they look upon me with disgust - as if I had just asked them to bob for apples in sewerage.
Even though I do think that people rely on the use of pronouns too much, there is a usage which contributes to my perplexity more than others. Should I use the proper name or the pronoun? I know… I shall use both! For instance:
My uncle Raymond, he is a great chef.
Why do people split sentences in this redundant way? It seems that they could have obviously said that:
My uncle Raymond is a great chef.
Is there any grammatical, conceptual, or expressive purpose served in people doing this?
Well, to my ear, “DUN dah-duh DUN, DUN dah-duh DUN” is more pleasurable to hear than, ’ da da da da da da da".
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Yes. I hear the first one with an exclamation point at the end, sometimes for comical effect, sometimes to emphasize the point of the sentence. The latter effect might involve (in speech) emphasizing the appositive, instead of ending with the oral equivalent of an exclamation point. Also, I consider this construction quite rare in U.S. English, with the second construction almost always used instead.
Here’s something that has long bugged me, not because it’s wrong, but instead because I don’t know what it’s called. Surely there’s a name for that common "The . . . the . . . " construction. Anyone here know if there’s a term for it? And is it even technically a “sentence”?
As in:
The bigger they are, the harder they fall.
The richer the man, the younger the wife.
The more you know, the more you realize you don’t know.
The more comments you write, the more BB Points! you will one day redeem in Heaven.
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Parallel construction?
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This happens to me quite often! I am rather wordy, but with no formal education. Whatever understanding of grammar I have has been a result of reading, writing, and speech.
I had not even heard of apposition until you mentioned it in your previous post! So thanks for that.
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The pleasure, it is all mine.
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Parallel construction?
Makes sense, but I’m thinking not, since that’s a more um, general term? Maybe it’s one kind of parallel construction? Still seems like such an odd construction grammatically that it would have its own term, but I’ve yet to come across one.
