Re: Forget it

Kristian Jensen <kljensen@...> wrote:

> It'd be interesting if there were two question particles. One
> serious, the other rhetorical. Or perhaps, that's what you had in
> mind?
>=20
Not precisely -- in Drasel=E9q, you ask questions by
raising the entonation a bit only, except for yes-no
questions, where you also prefix ke- to the verb (or
use _ke_ as an independent sentence-final particle).
There's no real need for a particle analogous to
Japanese _ka_. The development of _nu`n_ was just a
matter of wearing out a phrase, probably _nutan a_
"oh, forget (it)", that kept appearing at the end
of non-serious questions. A parallel development of
"serious question" particle is very unlikely, tho
could happen, maybe with a contraction of an expression
that claims for the attention of the hearer. Not in
Drasel=E9q from where I'm looking at it. :)


>=20
> >Now, the smiley is a nice invention in e-mail, but
> >it still doesn't tell you to ignore a question, it
> >only makes it not serious. Shouldn't there be a
> >special emoticon for "forget it, just kidding"?
> ><not rhetorical>
>=20
> How about:
>=20
> 8~
>=20
> Unfortunately, not all computers recognize the thorne as a valid
> letter.
You mean the tilde '~'? The symbol 8~ is intriguing...
How do you interpret it? (I mean, I see big eyes and
a... curly nose?)


--Pablo Flores