Now with Beer Garden for our smoking patrons.
Prince George wrote:...I recollect back in the 90's one philosophy prof musing that she had seen the students...
In any case, language isn't a fixed thing, it changes over time. The grammar-philes of old would be mortified to see how often we are splitting infinitives, leaving dangling prepositions, or ending setences with conjunctions.
Now I'm being picky. But, I make mistakes all the time. So glasshouses and stones.The other thing (one of the other things for I am well on my way to becoming a cranky old man) that has been annoying me of late is people putting "up" or a similar direction on the end of every verb. Sometimes it's simply redundant, other times it's an oxymoron.
Consider the differences between:
"The lift went up."
"The balloon rose up."
"The saucepan is warming up."
And my favourite office cliché:
"I've got that covered off."
The first one is okay. The second is redundant, for a balloon can't rise down. The third is the same as the second.
But the last! Arrgh. Okay, let me understand you. You have covered the situation... or the cover's come off of the situation?
George: the argument that language isn't a fixed thing does not excuse the situation. Sure language changes. Sometimes words flip in meaning. But in recent times when most people are literate and everything can be recorded on many media (written word as well as spoken word) not only is that change somewhat slower, but the codification of communication is more clear.
The bottom line is a lot of people's written word (and in some cases their spoken word) FAILS to communicate what they are trying to express. A lot of people argue that as long as their point is being communicated, it doesn't matter about their grammar. Well I've seen a lot of people's attempt to communicate through the filter of their poor grammar and often they fail. And that makes baby Jesus cry.
