The English Language

Sort:
aggressivesociopath

The use of one sentence can dispense with the need for a pronoun altogether.

TheGrobe

We're being rated?

TheGrobe
zealandzen wrote:
Ziryab wrote:
aggressivesociopath wrote:
Ziryab wrote:

"Your opponent has disconnected, and has two minutes to reconnect."

This one strikes me as best. 

***NO COMMA should be in this sentence.

 

You mean like this?

"Your opponent has disconnected, and has ***NO COMMA two minutes to reconnect."

Or did I get the placement wrong?

Ziryab

Your opponent has two minutes to reconnect. Your opponent disconnected.

Two independent clauses joined by a coordinating conjunction employ a comma.

Mebbe they don't teach that rule in Chicago, what with the teachers they have. 

aggressivesociopath

You are correct; "...has two minutes to reconnect" is not an independant clause, and the comma is not needed to prevent a misreading. However, not all commas are mandantory; some are permissive, and I am not prepared to say Ziryab's punctuation is wrong. Perhaps it is old-fashion, like hypenating words when not needed for clarity, but either way the sentence is clear, and superior to the ones I have just pened.

Ziryab

It's probably a spill-over from high school German. In that sense, it's archaic in a postmodern sense. 

RomyGer

Ziryab, post 21 : I am a Dutch language freak and interested in context and relation between languages, so  please  explain  what  you ment to say with " the French corruption of English ", after the Norman conquest.   Can you give examples of words ?

I like two other comments, by Steve212000 and Loek Bergman,  the latter I would ask : do you know the poem by Dutch writer Gerard Nolst Trenité, called "The Chaos", about writing English words as they (!) were spoken in the middle ages, and about changes in pronunciation  --  without changing the spelling of the words. 

Playing with words can be international as long as the other person understands what is ment.

A Dutch joke as an example : how do you spell " fish " ?   The answer is  as follows  :  gh - o - ti ,   viz.  gh  from enough ,  o  from 2 woman   and the ti from nation.

Anyhow, this forum is about English Language, isn't it ? 

Ziryab

When I pay my bills with a check, I often remind my debtors that the French have their hands in the English king's (or today, the queen's) purse. The Chancellor of the Exchequer is not a German office.

Ziryab
RomyGer wrote:

A Dutch joke as an example : how do you spell " fish " ?   The answer is  as follows  :  gh - o - ti ,   viz.  gh  from enough ,  o  from 2 woman   and the ti from nation.

Anyhow, this forum is about English Language, isn't it ? 

A more common term for ghoughpteighbteau is spud.

NewArdweaden

I špeak Engelsk nicht, pertanto I zorg ei mitään.

bigpoison
TheGrobe wrote:
DeweyOxberger wrote:
TheGrobe wrote:

The whole issue could be avoided with some better choices in sentence construction. E.g.:

"Johnny has disconnected and has 5 minutes to reconnect."

Try reading the thread before you comment, they have already made this suggestion.

Thanks for the suggestion, but I think I'll decide how I spend my time.

That didn't read like a suggestion to me, Mr. TheGrobe.  It read like an order. 

You better get hot.

bigpoison

What are you on about now, Li'l Nappy?

TheGrobe
Ziryab wrote:

When I pay my bills with a check, I often remind my debtors that the French have their hands in the English king's (or today, the queen's) purse. The Chancellor of the Exchequer is not a German office.

That's cheque to me.

Ziryab

My games last less than five minutes. Two are permitted for reconnection, not five (5).

TheGrobe

Ahh, another interesting grammar question -- what is the threshold above which you stop spelling numbers out?  I say ten or less, above which (11 or more) you should use the numeric digits.

bigpoison

Depends on the position.

TheGrobe

And is it chess.com or Chess.com?

Was it acceptable that I started the preceding sentence with a conjunction?

Ziryab
zealandzen wrote:
Ziryab wrote:

Your opponent has two minutes to reconnect. Your opponent disconnected.

Two independent clauses joined by a coordinating conjunction employ a comma.

Mebbe they don't teach that rule in Chicago, what with the teachers they have. 

You make assumptions about me from very limited facts, and that looks bad under any circumstances, but especially when your main point is wrong.  

Since "and has 5 minutes to reconnect" is not an independent clause, no comma is allowed.

DeweyOxberger got it right:

"Johnny has disconnected and has 5 minutes to reconnect."

Heed your own advice. I've already acknowledged the comma as unnecessary. To disallow it, however, is another matter. Time to move on.

We seem to be in agreement that the OP's sentence can be recast without a pronoun. 

TheGrobe
shockinn wrote:
TheGrobe wrote:

And is it chess.com or Chess.com?

Was it acceptable that I started the preceding sentence with a conjunction?


lol my thoughts exactly. These grammar guys always try to sensationlize every little errors. Bitter people!

Ahem: sentence fragment.

bigpoison

The irony!