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#154399 - 09/04/2003 08:31 Iraqi's celebrate
Anonymous
Unregistered




Iraqi's in Baghdad topple a huge statue of Saddam wednesday evening (baghdad time) with the help of a US armored vehicle.

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#154400 - 09/04/2003 08:36 Re: Iraqi's celebrate [Re: ]
tonyc
carpal tunnel

Registered: 27/06/1999
Posts: 7058
Loc: Pittsburgh, PA
And a few blocks away, other "Iraqi's" (sic) are still giving their lives to fight against U.S. forces. Guess they missed the memo about the whole "Saddam's regime is history" thing.
_________________________
- Tony C
my empeg stuff

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#154401 - 09/04/2003 09:37 Re: Iraqi's celebrate [Re: ]
Daria
carpal tunnel

Registered: 24/01/2002
Posts: 3937
Loc: Providence, RI
Did you mean "Iraqi is celebrate"?
Or did you perhaps mean "The celebrate belonging to Iraqi"?

Your apostrophe license is revoked. Please remove the keycap and send it to...


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#154402 - 09/04/2003 09:47 Re: Iraqi's celebrate [Re: Daria]
tonyc
carpal tunnel

Registered: 27/06/1999
Posts: 7058
Loc: Pittsburgh, PA
Did you mean "Iraqi is celebrate"?
Or did you perhaps mean "The celebrate belonging to Iraqi"?
Iraqis are celibate?
_________________________
- Tony C
my empeg stuff

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#154403 - 09/04/2003 09:53 Re: Iraqi's celebrate [Re: Daria]
Anonymous
Unregistered


I meant "Many citizens of Iraq celebrate in Baghdad."

The apostrophe and 's' were used to pluralify Iraqi, as it would be used in POW's, but obviously I made a mistake, and the apostrophe was not needed in this instance, and it was incorrect usage of it. I apologize to any punctuation marks that were harmed in this incident.


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#154404 - 09/04/2003 09:57 Re: Iraqi's celebrate [Re: Daria]
Anonymous
Unregistered


Your apostrophe license is revoked


I don't need a license. It's my God given right to use apostrophe's (apostrophes?). And I'm sure there are at least a dozen apostrophe's in the Bill of Rights. You'll have to pry my apostrophe from my cold dead keyboard.

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#154405 - 09/04/2003 10:12 Re: Iraqi's celebrate [Re: ]
Roger
carpal tunnel

Registered: 18/01/2000
Posts: 5680
Loc: London, UK
apostrophe's (apostrophes?).

"apostrophes" -- it's the plural, it's not a contraction, and it's not possessive.
_________________________
-- roger

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#154406 - 09/04/2003 10:15 Re: Iraqi's celebrate [Re: ]
Daria
carpal tunnel

Registered: 24/01/2002
Posts: 3937
Loc: Providence, RI
The apostrophe and 's' were used to pluralify Iraqi

Pluralize. Your "POW" example is a good one. Not all people documenting rules of English recognize it, and I was taught both ways. Notably, pluralizing an acronym or a referenced item (typically a letter or a symbol) allows use of an apostrophe. The POW example you cited is an example of the former, and not a required use of an apostrophe in all sources. An example of the latter would be:

We dotted the i's, but still need to cross the t's on the new contract.

I'm not familiar with any sources which do not require this use for an apostrophe, but I may be painfully unaware. Note also:
GOOD
1990s
'70s (contraction of 1970s)

BAD
1990's
70's (unless it's a business named 1990, or something with a "handle" of 70, or such)

So this can be generalized as:
-Do not use apostrophes when pluralizing.
-Do use apostrophes when indicating any singular possessive. (My parent's car, if I had only one parent)
-Do use an apostrophe when indicating a plural possessive, but do not add a trailing s if the word already has an s for pluralization. (My parents' house, if I have more than one parent; The children's room.)

Expect ridicule if you open a restaurant and call it "Food's Express", unless your name is John Food.


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#154407 - 09/04/2003 10:17 Re: Iraqi's celebrate [Re: ]
Roger
carpal tunnel

Registered: 18/01/2000
Posts: 5680
Loc: London, UK
as it would be used in POW's

Here (and I'm winging it a little), the apostrophe is used because it's an abbreviation (actually an acronym), so the apostrophe is used for the contraction.

However, I believe that apostrophes on plural acronyms are falling out of favour, much as the dots between the letters have.

In particular, POWs would expand to "Prisoners of War", so why is the "s" at the end, and why the apostrophe?
_________________________
-- roger

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#154408 - 09/04/2003 10:20 Re: Iraqi's celebrate [Re: Daria]
Roger
carpal tunnel

Registered: 18/01/2000
Posts: 5680
Loc: London, UK
Do use apostrophes when indicating any singular possessive

...except for "its". His doesn't have an apostrophe (hi's), so why should its (it's)?
_________________________
-- roger

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#154409 - 09/04/2003 10:20 Re: Iraqi's celebrate [Re: ]
Daria
carpal tunnel

Registered: 24/01/2002
Posts: 3937
Loc: Providence, RI
I don't need a license. It's my God given right to use apostrophe's (apostrophes?)


While I don't recall any biblical references specifically giving right to use this overutilized creature, I'll note that apostrophes are not owned by apostrophe, though you did spell the word right when you parenthesized it, presumably to indicate you were uncertain of the spelling.

And I'm sure there are at least a dozen apostrophe's in the Bill of Rights.


Did it give them rights of ownership?

You'll have to pry my apostrophe from my cold dead keyboard.


At least you got this one right. Of course, I suspect like the one in front of me, your keyboard is already dead.

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#154410 - 09/04/2003 10:23 Re: Iraqi's celebrate [Re: Roger]
Daria
carpal tunnel

Registered: 24/01/2002
Posts: 3937
Loc: Providence, RI
I'm oversimplifying. I probably shouldn't. I also shouldn't have neglected to mention contractions explicitly rather than implicitly. And it was bad of me to simplify in this manner, as I'd rather see too few apostrophes than too many.

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#154411 - 09/04/2003 10:29 Re: Iraqi's celebrate [Re: Daria]
Daria
carpal tunnel

Registered: 24/01/2002
Posts: 3937
Loc: Providence, RI
If you want to get complicated, I found Strunk's Elements of Style online:
http://www.bartleby.com/141/strunk.html#1

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#154412 - 09/04/2003 10:32 Re: Iraqi's celebrate [Re: Daria]
wfaulk
carpal tunnel

Registered: 25/12/2000
Posts: 16706
Loc: Raleigh, NC US
How did this get started (and ended) without me?

There's a lot of debate on whether apostrophes should be used when pluralizing non-standard words. My personal rule of thumb is not to use it unless it becomes difficult to understand what's being talked about. And I usually use quotes when talking about a word or a sequence of letters, so that obviates the need for an apostrophe there.
_________________________
Bitt Faulk

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#154413 - 09/04/2003 10:34 Re: Iraqi's celebrate [Re: wfaulk]
Daria
carpal tunnel

Registered: 24/01/2002
Posts: 3937
Loc: Providence, RI
How did this get started (and ended) without me?


I've been rabidly anti-apostrophe-abuse long before I owned an empeg, or knew who you were.

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#154414 - 09/04/2003 10:35 Re: Iraqi's celebrate [Re: Roger]
peter
carpal tunnel

Registered: 13/07/2000
Posts: 4172
Loc: Cambridge, England
However, I believe that apostrophes on plural acronyms are falling out of favour, much as the dots between the letters have.
Oh. I would have said that the apostrophe was once used only in specific circumstances (when its absence would cause ambiguity, i.e. when the s would otherwise cleave too closely to the abbreviation: we awarded five MScs this year) but nowadays is increasing in use. The old old way to do it was to repeat the last letter: pp for pages, mss for manuscripts.

In particular, POWs would expand to "Prisoners of War", so why is the "s" at the end, and why the apostrophe?
Would you rather write PsOW? As the its-vs-it's thing shows, clarity and lack of ambiguity beat consistency every time in this game.

Peter

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#154415 - 09/04/2003 10:38 Re: Iraqi's celebrate [Re: peter]
tonyc
carpal tunnel

Registered: 27/06/1999
Posts: 7058
Loc: Pittsburgh, PA
Obligatory "The Onion" article for this discussion...

NEW YORK--Stopping for lunch at a Manhattan Burger King, New York Times 'On Language' columnist William Safire ordered two "Whoppers Junior" Monday. "A majority of Burger King patrons operate under the fallacious assumption that the plural is 'Whopper Juniors,'" Safire told a woman standing in line behind him. "This, of course, is a grievous grammatical blunder, akin to saying 'passerbys' or, worse yet, the dreaded 'attorney generals.'" Last week, Safire patronized a midtown Taco Bell, ordering "two Big Beef Burritos Supreme."
_________________________
- Tony C
my empeg stuff

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#154416 - 09/04/2003 11:55 Re: Iraqi's celebrate [Re: tonyc]
tfabris
carpal tunnel

Registered: 20/12/1999
Posts: 31563
Loc: Seattle, WA
I love this BBS. What might have become a political discussion has turned into a grammar discussion.
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Tony Fabris

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#154417 - 09/04/2003 11:59 Re: Iraqi's celebrate [Re: peter]
JeffS
carpal tunnel

Registered: 14/01/2002
Posts: 2858
Loc: Atlanta, GA
So if I were going to pluralize SSN, would it be SSNs or SSN’s? I use this a lot in my work, so I’d really like to know which version is correct.
_________________________
-Jeff
Rome did not create a great empire by having meetings; they did it by killing all those who opposed them.

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#154418 - 09/04/2003 12:07 Re: Iraqi's celebrate [Re: JeffS]
wfaulk
carpal tunnel

Registered: 25/12/2000
Posts: 16706
Loc: Raleigh, NC US
Some people will argue for one, some for the other. I'd go with SSNs, as it's still perfectly clear what you're talking about. The basic rule about apostrophes is that they're used to indicate possession or to indicate contraction, not to pluralize.

But no one would crucify you if you went the other way, as it's also sometimes used to indicate pluralization of acronyms and abbreviations, and pretty much must be used when a simple trailing `s' is unclear.
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Bitt Faulk

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#154419 - 09/04/2003 13:26 Re: Iraqi's celebrate [Re: wfaulk]
mdavey
enthusiast

Registered: 06/03/2003
Posts: 269
Loc: Wellingborough, UK
The Americans seem to get knocked down a lot on this BBS, but one thing they are very good at, is fixing the English language.

What is needed is a character (or characters) that indicate(s) that the attached word is pluralized. Something like *person or person[].
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Michael
Ex-owner of stolen empeg #030102741

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#154420 - 09/04/2003 13:40 Re: Iraqi's celebrate [Re: mdavey]
wfaulk
carpal tunnel

Registered: 25/12/2000
Posts: 16706
Loc: Raleigh, NC US
What is needed is a character (or characters) that indicate(s) that the attached word is pluralized.
I coulda sworn that, with a few exceptions, that's what `s' did.
_________________________
Bitt Faulk

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#154421 - 09/04/2003 13:44 Re: Iraqi's celebrate [Re: wfaulk]
JeffS
carpal tunnel

Registered: 14/01/2002
Posts: 2858
Loc: Atlanta, GA
I coulda sworn that, with a few exceptions, that's what `s' did.
And it's the reason that there are only four "S"'s (???) in Scrabble, which is very frustrating. They should have just made plurals not count and put in a reasonable number of "S" pieces.
_________________________
-Jeff
Rome did not create a great empire by having meetings; they did it by killing all those who opposed them.

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#154422 - 09/04/2003 13:52 Re: Iraqi's celebrate [Re: JeffS]
wfaulk
carpal tunnel

Registered: 25/12/2000
Posts: 16706
Loc: Raleigh, NC US
But then you wouldn't get to use ``oxen'' or ``children'' or ``alumni'' or ``criteria'' or ``dice'' or ``algae'' or ``graffiti'' or the various other irregular and ``irregular'' plurals.

Maybe a rule against using simple `-s' plurals.
_________________________
Bitt Faulk

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#154423 - 09/04/2003 13:54 Re: Iraqi's celebrate [Re: JeffS]
tonyc
carpal tunnel

Registered: 27/06/1999
Posts: 7058
Loc: Pittsburgh, PA
Hmm, never new they did that. That certainly is lame. Do they also limit the number of Es and Rs so you can't make dumb -> dumber? Then you need to limit the number of Ts so you can't make dumb -> dumbest... You're right, they just shoulda made a rule against plurals.
_________________________
- Tony C
my empeg stuff

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#154424 - 09/04/2003 13:58 Re: Iraqi's celebrate [Re: tonyc]
JeffS
carpal tunnel

Registered: 14/01/2002
Posts: 2858
Loc: Atlanta, GA
To be fair, I dont know that's why there are only four; I just assume it because it would seem there should be a lot more.
_________________________
-Jeff
Rome did not create a great empire by having meetings; they did it by killing all those who opposed them.

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#154425 - 09/04/2003 14:11 Re: Iraqi's celebrate [Re: tonyc]
tfabris
carpal tunnel

Registered: 20/12/1999
Posts: 31563
Loc: Seattle, WA
Do they also limit the number of Es and Rs so you can't make dumb -> dumber?
Yeah, it's more than just that, though.

To win really seriously at Scrabble, you need bingos. (For those out of the loop, a Bingo is when you lay down all seven letters to form a word, earning you an additional 50 points above and beyond the normal score for the play.)

To do that, you need to hoard E's, R's and S's because they allow you to turn smaller words into bingos in multiple flexible ways. Thus allowing you to squeeze the bingo onto the board combined with the other words. E R and S are most flexible because the RE can be a prefix or a suffix to many words.

Example: "work" with ERS could become "reworks" or "workers" depending on the board layout.

Of course, if you hoard too much and make sucky plays the whole rest of the game, then a bingo isn't going to save you. It's all very strategic...
_________________________
Tony Fabris

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#154426 - 09/04/2003 14:12 Re: Iraqi's celebrate [Re: mdavey]
rob
carpal tunnel

Registered: 21/05/1999
Posts: 5335
Loc: Cambridge UK
Something like *person or person[].

Isn't it considered rude to *person?

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#154427 - 09/04/2003 14:15 Re: Iraqi's celebrate [Re: rob]
wfaulk
carpal tunnel

Registered: 25/12/2000
Posts: 16706
Loc: Raleigh, NC US
Not as rude as it is to !person. At least in public.
_________________________
Bitt Faulk

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#154428 - 09/04/2003 14:16 Re: Iraqi's celebrate [Re: tfabris]
JeffS
carpal tunnel

Registered: 14/01/2002
Posts: 2858
Loc: Atlanta, GA
I've only ever seen that (never knew it was called a "bingo") a few times. But my wife did it once (and I don't remember the word) where she managed to cover two triple word scores as well. My father and I both quit at that point.
_________________________
-Jeff
Rome did not create a great empire by having meetings; they did it by killing all those who opposed them.

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