Tag: language
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We Are The Martians
Alec, Matt R, Penny, and Dan play The Outpost scenario in Dialect: A Game About Language and How It Dies.
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CSS Logical Properties
Andy Bell recommends use of CSS logical properties to help lay out and space content in a language-independent way.
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Understanding Them (Pronouns)
After many years, Dan has a change of heart and decides that the singular "them" isn't all that, and maybe we do need some other nonbinary pronouns.
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Word Ladder Solver
It's likely that the first word ladder puzzles were created by none other than Lewis Carroll (Charles Lutwidge Dodgson), the talented British mathematician, and author of the Alice's adventures. According to Carroll, he invented them on Christmas Day in 1877.
A word ladder puzzle consists of two end-cap words, and the goal is to derive a … -
The British-Irish Dialect Quiz
What is your name for the playground game in which one child chases the rest and anyone who is touched becomes the pursuer?
New York Times
Pretty accurate for me, although my answers to some of the questions - representing the diversity of places around Great Britain that I've lived and some of the … -
What If English Were Phonetically Consistent?
YouTube (youtube.com)
Aaron Alon (YouTube)
I'm reminded of an old joke (best read aloud), which I'll repeat for your amusement:
The European Union commissioners have announced that agreement has been reached to adopt English as the preferred language for European communications, rather than German, which was the other possibility. As part of the negotiations, … -
From the Collection: Blissymbolics
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Blissymbolics was conceived by Austro-Hungarian expatriate Charles K. Bliss (1897–1985), born Karl Kasiel Blitz to a Jewish family in the town of Czernowitz (now Chernivtsi in modern-day Ukraine). He was introduced to signs and symbols at an early age in the form of circuit diagrams – his father’s many occupations included mechanic and electrician – … -
Authority and Usage and Emoji
Authority and Usage and Emoji (Dan Cohen) Maybe it’s a subconscious effect of my return to the blog, but I’ve found myself reading more essays recently, and so I found myself returning to the nonfiction work of David Foster Wal…
Maybe it’s a subconscious effect of my return to the blog, but I’ve found myself … -
Neural nets respond to pranks like children do
There's a lot of fun to be had in "pranking" image-recognising neural nets with unusual photos. But the ways in which they fail might be a clue about how young humans learn language, too.
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My Sammelband has Frisket-Bite: A Short Glossary of Delightful Library Terms
Two weeks ago I asked Twitter if anyone had favourite obscure and/or delightful library or archival words. Here are some of the best replies:
Tête-bêche: From philately, meaning printed upside down or sideways relative to another. (Tara Robertson)
Respect des fonds: A principle in archival theory that proposes to group collections of … -
Odd One Out?
Which is the odd-one out: gypsies, turkeys, french fries, or the Kings of Leon? It's a simple riddle, but it's still better than whatever you've gotten out of your cracker.
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Orange
Which orange came first: the colour or the fruit? Dan answers this chicken-and-egg question, and then muses on the abstract nature of colours in linguistics.
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The Worst Joke I Ever Heard
After refusing to share it for over twenty years, Dan performs his first (and only) re-telling of the worst joke he ever heard.
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Spee Kin Dork Weans Anguish
Darn desk covers eh Anguish languish, you sing eat toucan fusion Hanoi owl office fronds.
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HDMI Virus, or How I Became An Old Person
HDMI cables are over-marketed at the best of times. But Dan's just discovered one that goes one step further, claiming to do the fundamentally impossible. And then, like an old person, he writes an irate letter.