Ahoy, me bloggies!

Did you miss me? I was out investigating nature yesterday -- and I'll have some photos to show you (at some point). But because you were so sad when you came here yesterday and found nothing, I shall regale you with random thoughts. Hooray!

The newest thing is left-handed conversion therapy. Why do so many people choose to be left-handed? It obviously goes against God's plan. Mind you, there's nothing wrong with left-handed people -- as long as they live right-handed lives. But it's best to nip the infection in the bud.

Next: I remember well my days of serving as an altar boy. As I recall, the Latin went something like this. (The first line is the priest, the second is the altar boy and so on.)

P:     Ad deum qui laetificat
AB:  Juventutem meam.
P:     Rectum sanctum
AB:  And to you too, father.

That last line was when English entered the mass.

Next: I'm amused by the common American phrase, "but still". As in, "But still, we shouldn't just toss him onto the street". It's kind of the argument beyond the argument's end. You've already decided to toss him onto the street. But still, shouldn't you do something for him? Maybe tuck a sandwich in one of his pockets?

Next: Ted Cruz has a face like pulled taffy. Has anyone mentioned this? Probably, but just in case, there you go.

And finally: I was thinking about the term "low-life". We say, "He's a low-life" to dismiss someone. But we never say, "They're a bunch of low-lives". That would be incorrect. It's always "low-life", even when pluralized. "They're definitely low-lifes". Now you're talkin'.

Which reminds me of something I noted in an old "Language of Baseball" post. I mocked the MLB announcers who said, "He's one of the best First Basemans in baseball". Now, I think that might actually be correct. After all, there is no such thing as a "first basemen". I've decided it's like saying "the Kennedys always summer in Stublonkportshire" rather than "the Kennedies always summer in Stublonkportshire". There are no Kennedies. I hereby condemn myself for mocking "first basemans".

Now you don't miss me so much, right? Aww, that's so cute.

This and that, or rather, "at" and "the"

Some changes are hard to accept. Twenty or thirty years ago, everyone used the words "at", "the", "in" and "on" in similar fashion. You didn't have to think about it. But times change.

In recent years, I've noted that people say "at" when I'd say "on" (or sometimes, "in"). For instance:

"At Mars, you can start a self-sustaining civilization and grow it into something really big," Musk told an audience at the Royal Aeronautical Society in London on Friday. (Interesting story, BTW)

"At" Mars? I'd feel much more comfortable saying "on Mars..." But "at" is used more often these days. People even say someone is "at Paris". C'mon, they're in Paris, no? This use of "at" rakes against my grain but I guess I can't call it improper anymore.

I've noticed something else. Many Americans drop the word "the" when referring to our country by name, at least when it's the subject of a sentence. When Hilary Clinton spoke recently alongside Egypt's president, Mohamed Mursi, she began her words with "United States". Not "the" United States. I can't find a video of her remarks, but the sentence was along the lines of "United States believes..." whatever. I guess it's official. We are United States.

I have many friends who were born in other countries, and I long ago noted that they don't say "the" when saying United States. For instance, they say "Everyone wants to be in United States." So I was primed for this. I guess we're aligning with the way the world refers to us.

Noted in passing. (Shrugs and walks off set.)

Chimps throwing stuff

Chimp. (Image/Wikipedia)

There's an interesting article on physorg today. It suggests that chimps throwing feces is a sign of intelligence. That's the headline they pulled from the story, anyway. But it's way more interesting than that.

It seems throwing and language are intertwined. It's a wild thought: that throwing something at someone in your group may have been one of the first forms of communication -- a comment of sorts. Looking at today's chimps, they found that those who threw the most stuff, and threw it more accurately than their pals, also showed increased activity in the left hemisphere of the brain, where speech is processed.

I love the idea that throwing and language are related. It's so unexpected. This is another sign that we know next to nothing about our own brains. That's because we are an infant race. Too bad we have nukes, huh?

PS: This is a fun story too: Hive mind to sort out whale sounds. 

From dolphins to aliens

They won't look like this.

The other day I posted about similarities between human and dolphin speech. It was in reference to an article at physorg called Dolphins, Aliens and the Search for Intelligent life. Ah, you didn't know about that last bit, did you? I figured I'd save it for another post -- this one.

In the article, Laurance Doyle, a scientist at the SETI Institute in California, speaks about what the language of aliens who are more intelligent than us might be like:

To explain, Doyle highlights the example of Koko, a captive gorilla that has learned sign language and can understand concepts like “tomorrow” or “yesterday”. But combine time tenses, and Koko doesn’t understand.

 “If you say to her, ‘by this time tomorrow I’ll have finished eating’, Koko doesn’t understand the two time jumps, that at some point in the future there will be a point in the past,” says Doyle. “Now imagine an alien comes with more complex abilities. They may say, ‘I will have to be have been there’. Now there’s nothing wrong with that per se, but humans can’t handle three time jumps or more. An alien could just think in a more complex way.” So instead of double entendres, they might have triple or quadruple entendres.

Isn't that cool? I'm 100% sure there are aliens out there who are vastly more intelligent than we are. It makes perfect sense given the size of the universe and life's propensity for existing in any possible niche. In fact, it's insane to think there aren't aliens who are more intelligent than us. Dog, I'd like to meet them (even if they think I'm a fly). Go read the entire article. It's major fun.

Dolphin language looks like human language

There's an article at (where else?) physorg today about dolphin intelligence and language. (It's also about alien communication but I'll leave that aside for now.) Although we don't understand the language used by dolphins, it seems to follow the same basic patterns of human speech. Here's an excerpt in case you don't want to read the whole article.

Think of all the different sounds human beings make as they speak to each other, the different letters and pronunciations. Some, such as the letters ‘e’ and ‘t’ or words such as ‘and’ or ‘the’ will occur far more frequently than ‘q’ or ‘z’ or longer words such as ‘astrobiology’. Plot these on a graph, in order of the most frequently occurring letters or sounds, and the points form a slope with a –1 gradient. A toddler learning to speak will have a steeper slope – as they experiment with words they use fewer sounds but say them more often. At the most extreme a baby’s babble is completely random, and so any slope will be nearly level with all sounds occurring fairly evenly. It doesn’t matter which human language is put through the information theory test – be it English, Russian, Arabic or Mandarin – the same result follows.

What is remarkable is that putting dolphin whistles through the information theory blender renders exactly the same result: a –1 slope, with a steeper slope for younger dolphins still being taught how to communicate by their mothers, and a horizontal slope for baby dolphins babbling. This tells us that dolphins have structure to how they communicate.

We're not set apart from the other animals. The differences between us and them are a matter of degree. This story lifted my spirits. There's still so damn much we don't know about ourselves, our planet and the relationships among all of Earth's residents. And yet we feel free to kill any creature and pollute the planet at will, as if we and we alone lived here. We are an infant race, just beginning to understand the complexities of the world around us, and yet our M.O. is so arrogant. This makes no sense. We're babies.

The rest of the article is fun, especially the part about looking for alien intelligence out there. G'wan, go read it. Here's the link one more time.

At, in and on: weird language

A story at physorg.com today begins like this:

"As Spring continues to unfold at Saturn . . ."

At Saturn? Not on Saturn? This sounds so strange and wrong to me. What's with the "at", guys? I even see this in reference to places on Earth (note I didn't say "at Earth"). People will say, "He was at England when he . . ." At? 

I don't get it. Storms occur on Saturn, not at Saturn. And one is in England, not at England. Language has gotten very odd in this area and I'm not sure why. Any suggestions?

Mrs. Malaprop and the word manglers

As you may know, Mrs. Malaprop is a character in a play written by Richard Brinsley Sheridan. The character's name is a play on the French phrase mal à propos (literally "ill-suited"). Mrs. Malaprop reaches out for words when she speaks but misses her target by substituting words that sound like the original word, but are so ill-chosen as to be funny.

To give an example, Wikipedia cites these quotes spoken by the character in The Rivals:
 
 "...promise to forget this fellow - to illiterate him, I say, quite from your memory."

"...she might reprehend the true meaning of what she is saying."

She's a great character but the disease isn't confined to fiction. Lots of people are Mrs. Malaprops and I love each of them. Deeply.

For instance, the other day I heard a woman on the news commenting on the death of a lovable, but loud, neighbor. She said "We're going to miss her around here. And we'll know she's gone -- because she was voicetrous, you know what I mean?"

There are a lot of people who have a constant word-salad going on in their brains -- and I find them fascinating. Famously, I had a friend who was the most haphazard speaker I've ever encountered. Anything could tumble out of his mouth; it was a complete jumble up there in his head. He was a lovable guy and a good friend but I always found myself laughing at the way he said things. He was gay too and at one point in our young lives, we would often go to gay cruising areas. But he could hardly relax when we did this. He was terrified of what he called "underclothes" policemen. That was my favorite word mish-mosh of his. He would do this all the time, combining two or three words as he did here with undercover and plainclothes. (He also mixed the pronouns "he" and "she" haphazardly, not because he was gay but because his brain had a hard time keeping track of any words.)

In general, how people say things fascinates me and of course this extends to print. I love word mix-ups of a particular kind. For instance, I once saw a sign in the front window of a deli that said, "No eating aloud in store!" I heartily approved. Those smacking sounds can be so distracting.

When I'm bored, I'll tune in to any natural language show on TV (except "reality" shows, of course) and settle down, not to watch the show but to hear the speakers speak. True crime shows are great for this because I get to hear the police officers, detectives and DAs speak. Since they don't use a script, their words are undisciplined and free. I love the regionalisms, the odd ways things are said in a particular area of the country. It's like visiting a foreign land. I love listening to people speak.

But then I love anything about language. Did you know that it's young people who create language? They make the changes and move language forward. Our language and everyone's languages are in their hands. (Their English teachers may have other ideas but they will lose the fight). Language is always changing and I like to sit in a rocking chair and listen as streams of language go by -- the old, the new, the confused and the delightful. It's a language smorgasbord out there. I'm tellin' ya.

Got any Mrs. Malaprop or word-mangler stories? Any word goofs that made you laugh? I know! Why not drop those stories into the comment thread? G'wan.

UPDATE: SP's "refudiate" is a perfect example of malapropism. I should have included this in the original post.