I'm very glad, in fact ecstatic, that IBM's compilers were not designed or written by Mr. H. Dumpty.
On Tue, Jun 11, 2013 at 8:38 AM, Phil Smith <[email protected]> wrote: > Timothy Sipples wrote: > >I apologize up front for continuing a topic of dubious value in IBM-MAIN, > >but at least I didn't initiate it. :-) > > Neither did I, per se - I started the thread, but not the digression into > word use! And yeah, this equine is pretty deceased, but as the son of a > (himself deceased, seven years today) linguist, I must note that this is > the classic battle between the two schools of linguistics: descriptive and > prescriptive (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linguistic_descriptionand > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linguistic_prescription). > > Particularly in the era of texts and Twitter, I'd submit that the strict > prescriptivists are bailing against the tide, although of course Humpty > Dumpty wasn't correct, either: > > '...And only one for birthday presents, you know. There's glory for you!' > `I don't know what you mean by "glory",' Alice said. > Humpty Dumpty smiled contemptuously. `Of course you don't-till I tell you. > I meant "there's a nice knock-down argument for you!"' > `But "glory" doesn't mean "a nice knock-down argument",' Alice objected. > `When I use a word,' Humpty Dumpty said, in rather a scornful tone, `it > means just what I choose it to mean-neither more nor less.' > `The question is,' said Alice, `whether you can make words mean so many > different things.' > `The question is,' said Humpty Dumpty, `which is to be master-that's all.' > > Indeed, which is to be master? > > ...phsiii > > ---------------------------------------------------------------------- > For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, > send email to [email protected] with the message: INFO IBM-MAIN > -- This is a test of the Emergency Broadcast System. If this had been an actual emergency, do you really think we'd stick around to tell you? Maranatha! <>< John McKown ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to [email protected] with the message: INFO IBM-MAIN
