deanb Posted March 18, 2011 Author Report Share Posted March 18, 2011 lore = lore law = law Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hot Heart Posted March 18, 2011 Report Share Posted March 18, 2011 (edited) I don't think Ethan was serious. Â I mean we all know 'law' in British is called 'dos and do nots'. Edited March 18, 2011 by Hot Heart Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheFlyingGerbil Posted March 18, 2011 Report Share Posted March 18, 2011 A bit late to the entree discussion, (been playing professor layton and the lost future. ACE!) but 'entrance' could be the arrival of the main meat: boar's head, cockentrice etc. which would be paraded in to the room at a feast(making an entrance) so could just as easily mean the main part of the meal as the beginning of it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deanb Posted March 18, 2011 Author Report Share Posted March 18, 2011 There are three states of legality in Irish law. There is all this stuff which comes under That's grand, then it moves into Ah now don't push it, and finally it comes under Right now you're takin the piss, and that's when the police come in. Â Dara O'brian Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Battra92 Posted March 18, 2011 Report Share Posted March 18, 2011 (edited) I don't think Ethan was serious.  I mean we all know 'law' in British is called 'dos and do nots'.  Everything I needed to know about British Law I learned from Thomas. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YPRTuRdQaOo  Specifically around 2:10-2:30. Edited March 18, 2011 by Battra92 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WTF Posted March 18, 2011 Report Share Posted March 18, 2011 A bit late to the entree discussion, (been playing professor layton and the lost future. ACE!) but 'entrance' could be the arrival of the main meat: boar's head, cockentrice etc. which would be paraded in to the room at a feast(making an entrance) so could just as easily mean the main part of the meal as the beginning of it. Â Yes it could have been that but it was misunderstood by someone who had very little knowledge of French trying to learn a dish from a French cookbook. It was just a total misunderstanding which could have arisen in a number of ways. It's nothing to do with what it really meant but rather someone just didn't know French and spread it around . Â There are plenty of similar issues with the versions of Moby Dick and that was written in English in the US in 1851 when the language didn't have as many differences as it does today on both sides of the Atlantic. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SomTervo Posted March 18, 2011 Report Share Posted March 18, 2011 When a word is used "wrong" by an entire continent for 100 years it's no longer wrong, that's just what the word means there. Â It's not that Americans use it incorrectly, it's that it means something different here, as do so many things in this thread. Â But there's no such thing as using a word wrong as long as it is understood in communication by a listener! Philolololology (kinda). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheMightyEthan Posted March 18, 2011 Report Share Posted March 18, 2011 That's why I put wrong in quotes. It was wrong at first, but then it became commonly understood and accepted and so was no longer wrong. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mr W Phallus Posted March 20, 2011 Report Share Posted March 20, 2011 the fact that most everyone I speak with seems flippant about them might explain why (From this article.)Â Another bizarre expression like 'could care less', although in this case it doesn't even make grammatical sense, since you can't have most of a singular noun. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hot Heart Posted March 20, 2011 Report Share Posted March 20, 2011 That looks more like a mistake where they meant to say 'almost everyone' or an odd switch of 'everyone' for 'people'? Â I'd have to defer to Stephen Fry on other stuff. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mr W Phallus Posted March 20, 2011 Report Share Posted March 20, 2011 I really enjoyed that video (well I'd enjoy listening to pretty much anything if Stephen Fry said it) and I have to say I agree, but at the same time a part of me leans towards the pedants as well (probably because it's so fun to correct people).  At the end of the day, my reaction will depend on the specific example at hand. For 'most everyone' it doesn't bother me at all, though I doubt I'd ever use it myself, whereas with 'could care less' I do think it's nonsensical and lazy and that people shouldn't use it. Then, falling in the middle ground, misuse of a word like 'entrée' doesn't bother me if a modern day American uses it, since it's meaning has already been altered and adapted, but if the misuse was only beginning now I'd probably tell everyone to stop being so culturally ignorant.  I'm just gonna put this one down to me being a hypocrite. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheMightyEthan Posted March 20, 2011 Report Share Posted March 20, 2011 Maybe "most everyone" is just an American thing, cause I've heard it enough that I'd never even considered that it didn't make sense. It's not a mistake, I'm sure the writer very much intended to write it that way. It probably evolved in speech with almost everyone becoming 'most everyone becoming most everyone. Â Also, that was a good video Hotty. I especially like the analogy of language to clothes. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hot Heart Posted March 20, 2011 Report Share Posted March 20, 2011 I'm just gonna put this one down to me being a hypocrite. Â Yeah, I think I'm the same. I blame a lot of it on a couple of my close friends who are really fussy about language, so it's rubbed off on me. Â Until they went on about it, I never knew about subjunctive stuff (I blame the teachers) which I'm actually not sure Americans are even taught. For example, that silly 'I wish a was a punk rocker' song should be 'I wish I were a punk rocker' and you would say 'if I were President' and not 'if I was President'. Â I 'clean up' some of the other Press X or Die writers' stuff just because if someone did want to use their articles in a professional capacity (say, applying for a games reviewer job) it would benefit them not to have little errors. Â I do try and restrain myself but I think I'm a little Asperger's. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheMightyEthan Posted March 20, 2011 Report Share Posted March 20, 2011 Oh my god, "if I was" annoys the shit out of me. It's "were" you illiterate twit! Â (This is not directed at hottie, but rather at a hypothetical person using "if I was".) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hot Heart Posted March 20, 2011 Report Share Posted March 20, 2011 Oh, so Americans are taught it? My apologies. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheMightyEthan Posted March 20, 2011 Report Share Posted March 20, 2011 lol, well I don't know what the hell "subjunctive" means (though I have heard it before), but I do know that "if I were" is the correct usage. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deanb Posted March 21, 2011 Author Report Share Posted March 21, 2011 Just from Staysicks "nitpick" on the homefront thread: Infant = a young child. birth to, can be up to like 10 I guess. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mr W Phallus Posted March 21, 2011 Report Share Posted March 21, 2011 Could you explain the context a bit more there Dean? Since when was infant an uncommon word? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SomTervo Posted March 21, 2011 Report Share Posted March 21, 2011 I consider an infant to be like a baby, almost newborn. In my head I've got some made-up schema where a new person is an infant, then a toddler (2-3), then a young child (4-8), then a child/kid (9-12) onto teenager etc. Â As Phallus said, this isn't really an issue of contention between American English vs British English is it? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hot Heart Posted March 21, 2011 Report Share Posted March 21, 2011 (edited) Well, if you compare the American and British dictionaries it's considered a difference in certain instances. Â In technical terms, English seems to consider it ages 4-8 and we do have 'Infant Schools' which I think cover those ages. The closest American equivalent would be a 'minor' (although I think that extends right up to adulthood). Â But in development terms, an infant would be how most of us perceive it. Edited March 21, 2011 by Hot Heart Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deanb Posted March 21, 2011 Author Report Share Posted March 21, 2011 Could you explain the context a bit more there Dean? Since when was infant an uncommon word? Â It's not that it was uncommon: Nitpicking, RPS, if that was an infant that witnessed his parents' death, that was the most developed infant I've ever witnessed. Toddler. That was a toddler. Doesn't make it any better... Â Which I assume is implying in the states infant = baby (or at least pre-toddler stages) only, whereas here as hotheart pointed out, we even have infant school. Infant is kinda cross compatible with child/minor/1-10ish. Â http://board.pressxordie.com/topic/143-homefront/page__pid__43388__st__80#entry43388 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheMightyEthan Posted March 21, 2011 Report Share Posted March 21, 2011 Yeah, apparently this is a US v. UK thing, cause over here people always use "infant" to mean "baby". Dictionary.com's first definition is "a child during the earliest period of its life, especially before he or she can walk". Once they can walk they're not an infant anymore, they're a toddler, just like StaySICK said. Â Unless you're talking about usage in law in which case "infant" is used to mean anyone under the age of majority, but that's pretty archaic and modern stuff would use the word "minor" instead. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Strangelove Posted March 21, 2011 Report Share Posted March 21, 2011 Sod off, you bloody chavs! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deanb Posted March 21, 2011 Author Report Share Posted March 21, 2011 What's archaic for US is more often than not based on something English . I only started hearing about "miners" when I started watching CSI. Here we go http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infant_school The 4-7 thing is probably why I made a pause every time I went to type 10. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheMightyEthan Posted March 21, 2011 Report Share Posted March 21, 2011 lol, I knew that the English used to use it that way, but I figured you had moved on in terms as well. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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