Re: No pronoun, no article
From: | Stone Gordonssen <stonegordonssen@...> |
Date: | Sunday, October 19, 2003, 1:40 |
Drat my books being packed. There's a 70's sci-fi novel which uses this
idea.
> > I'm talking to you > David's talking to Erin (or whoever).
> > Do you want to come outside? > Does Erin want to come outside?
> > Give me that! > Give David that!
>
>Except, what about strangers? How would you ask someone "What's your
>name?", or how would you translate "you" in, for example, a contract? I
>suppose one could use a phrase like "listener" or "reader", but I
>suspect that eventually that would become a genuine 2nd person pronoun,
>even if this language still tends to avoid it when possible.
>
>And, again, using names for 1st person could be potentially ambiguous.
>What if there's another person named David? And another person named
>Erin? Then a phrase like "David's talking to Erin" could be ambiguous
>between "I'm speaking to you", "I'm speaking to Erin [the other Erin]",
>"David [the other David]'s speaking to you" or "David [the other
>David]'s speaking to Erin [the other Erin]"
>
>--
>"There's no such thing as 'cool'. Everyone's just a big dork or nerd,
>you just have to find people who are dorky the same way you are." -
>overheard
>ICQ: 18656696
>AIM Screen-Name: NikTaylor42
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