Hi Jacqueline That’s funny, I was assuming that it was a male / female language usage issue. It would be odd if coders saw ‘couple’ not being an arbitrary number but one with some flexibility and not coders not. (Although if your husband is also a coder that would blow that theory out of the water. ) I would think the opposite would be true. The coders I would think would think arbitrary values instead of fuzzy variables.
Our disagreement over “couple” is the same as yours over “facts”… friendly, amusing and kind of yet not totally false. eg. asked to chop up a couple of carrots I will ask how many exactly. "Two" is the reply….. and then the “argument” starts. Sad to hear that looking up the facts about “facts" ruined your ongoing argument about “facts”. But maybe there are alternative facts that state otherwise and you can revive the discussion as to the meaning of “facts”. Martin > On Sep 8, 2021, at 3:54 PM, J. Landman Gay via use-livecode > <use-livecode@lists.runrev.com> wrote: > > My husband said the same when I told him about this thread. "Couple" means > two. I said yes, but colloquially it can mean "two or three or somewhere in > that range." We almost started a longer discussion about it, but I reminded > him of our 30+ years of ongoing talk about a "fact" so we both stopped. > > Addendum: he claims there are "true facts." I say that is redundant, that a > fact is by definition true, and he's implying there are false facts (or as we > say in the US, "alternative facts.") This has been going on for years. It's a > friendly, amusing, kind of false disagreement. Then one day we just looked it > up in the dictionary and...a fact can either be a true bit of information, or > a generic datum. > > And that spoiled all the fun. > > On 9/8/21 6:14 AM, Keith Martin via use-livecode wrote: >>> On Sep 7, 2021, at 11:04 PM, Martin Koob via use-livecode >>> <use-livecode@lists.runrev.com> wrote: >>> >>> My wife and I have an ongoing disagreement about the term 'couple of’ in >>> terms of counting. I say it means around 2 or 3ish. She says it means 2. >>> Further she says if you wanted to say 3 or 4 you would say ‘a few’. >> I'm the kind of person that distinguishes between 'like' (exclusive: similar >> to but not) and 'such as' (inclusive: similar to and part of the comparison >> set), so this is coming from a position of pedantry, but that's because I am >> a writer... >> Strictly speaking, 'a couple' means two, no more and no less. In casual use >> (when counting, not when referring to relationship partnerships) it isn't >> unusual for it to be used in place of 'a few' and possibly mean three or >> even four, but it's not technically *correct.* >> I too hope your wife's logic is what holds true! >> :) >> k > _______________________________________________ use-livecode mailing list use-livecode@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-livecode
