Quote from flymike91 :

gotten

That is an ugly word and shouldn't be allowed, although it would look more at home in German. The other word I really dislike but Americans seem keen to perpetuate is 'Obligated'.

Quote from Shotglass :

luckily german only has 3 cases (nowerdays)

Shame on the rest of you German speakers for not mentioning this sooner. So which case can I safely ignore?

Also please send me a list of all the verbs that nobody really uses. Thanks!

Quote from thisnameistaken :

That is an ugly word and shouldn't be allowed, although it would look more at home in German.

Yet 'forgotten' is ok. Why? Because English yes.

Well, while I hate some of those irregularities and exceptions, they exist in in most languages and I guess they're inevitable to be there as every language evolves over time.

Soon we'll be using New Speak. Then it will be good. Double plus good actually.

w4t ab00t 1337 5p33k?

Quote from Flame CZE :

Yet 'forgotten' is ok. Why? Because English yes.

Well, while I hate some of those irregularities and exceptions, they exist in in most languages and I guess they're inevitable to be there as every language evolves over time.

'forgotten' has nothing to do with 'gotten'. 'Gotten' is an American **** up of the past participle of 'to get' (which should just be 'got').

Quote from Crashgate3 :

I was referring to the triple 'f'.

That triple "f" is something rather new. In order to simplify German (in Germany) it was introduced 7 years ago

seeerfahren (sea experienced)
Schritttempo (walking pace)

The German word for inland navigation is Binnenschifffahrt. The synonym for it is Flussschifffahrt.


They also removed several irregular spellings. Also all "ph" were replaced by "f" like in Delphin → Delfin, Telephon → Telefon or Photographie → Fotografie. Several other words were Germanized back than as well such as Strike → Streik, Bureau → Büro, Friseur → Frisör or Ketchup → Ketschup.



Austria however has got different rules about spelling then Germany does. Although the majority of words are identical there are some differences like Ski (Germany) → Schi (Austria).

Quote from TFalke55 :

That triple "f" is something rather new. In order to simplify German (in Germany) it was introduced 7 years ago

It's all a conspiracy by the German signwriting industry.

The world would be just so much better if everyone spoke esperanto. No need to learn zillion different languages when you could learn just one.

"Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo".

Isn't English so clear? In fact, any combination of any number of "Buffalo" is actually a grammatically legal sentence.

So excellent

Have you been smoking alot lately?

How could that be possible?

Actually no. Buffalo can refer to 3 separate things: Buffalo, New York; To Buffalo (bully); and a buffalo (bison).

Thus, Buffalo buffalo buffalo is a valid sentence. Along with any other (infinite) combination of it.

Isn't English retarded?

Quote from dawesdust_12 :

Thus, Buffalo buffalo buffalo is a valid sentence.

No it isn't. At least with that spelling it isn't.

"The problem with defending the purity of the English language is that English is about as pure as a cribhouse whore. We don’t just borrow words; on occasion, English has pursued other languages down alleyways to beat them unconscious and rifle their pockets for new vocabulary."
--James D. Nicoll

English isn't so much a language in the pure sense, as a collection of useful words other languages have that we english speakers felt were of some use.
It's constantly evolving naturally, without the need of language police saying what is or isn't permitted, looking at french here.....
Therefore, any foreign words that we haven't taken are generally considered pointless.
English is far more use than esperanto, why create a new language when english is already a universal international language.
It's already the language of computing, ever tried programming in German ?

To be fair English is only the world's common language because Britain built the world's biggest empire, and it happened relatively recently. When there are people on every continent speaking English it becomes quite a useful language for everybody to learn.

It could just as easily have been German, French, Dutch, Portuguese or Spanish, but they weren't greedy or ruthless enough.

For a long time German was the language of science. Lots of scientist came from Germany and while whatever you write won't read or sound nice, you can be very precise, especially when it comes to new discoveries (guess compound nouns help). Scientist all over the world published there new stuff in German.

But that changed after WW1, unsurprisingly.

Quote from thisnameistaken :

It could just as easily have been German [...] but they weren't greedy or ruthless enough.

excuse me?

also english only took off well after your silly little empire was dead
the real reason for english being this ubiquitous is that what passes for culture these days mostly comes out of the us

Quote from ACCAkut :

For a long time German was the language of science. Lots of scientist came from Germany and while whatever you write won't read or sound nice, you can be very precise, especially when it comes to new discoveries (guess compound nouns help). Scientist all over the world published there new stuff in German.

But that changed after WW1, unsurprisingly.

germans are actually terrible at writing papers
english or otherwise

Quote from Shotglass :

also english only took off well after your silly little empire was dead

But it wasn't a 'little' empire, that's the whole point. If it hadn't been so big then English wouldn't be used all over the world.

Quote from Shotglass :

the real reason for english being this ubiquitous is that what passes for culture these days mostly comes out of the us

The USA is a former British colony. But actually why do they speak English there? It was settled by the Dutch too, and the Spanish, and of course the natives had their own languages. And of course after the USA declared independence from Britain there was a huge rush of immigration from Europe. Why do they all speak English?

youre becomming the steretypical brit clinging on to long lost glory

I don't know where you've got that idea.

just pulling your leg a little

I think english is the universal language precisely because it is open to change, whilst most national languages get precious about control and limitation, english adapts and changes according to usage.
Something new happens, english adapts, most national languages spend years trying to come up with a local version that doesn't recognise the already accepted english version.

Each so called english speaking country has it's own version of english, in NZ we've incorporated a lot of Te Reo, also a national language here.

We won't even mention America and their idea's on spelling.

Even in Britain, there's Welsh and Gaelic, both of which are national languages.

As a way of communicating between peoples with their own national languages it tends to be practical and efficient. It's also living and transmutable which is more than most other languages.

Quote from Shotglass :

just pulling your leg a little

You're pulling Kev's little leg?

Get a room.

Did I mention it also deals well with memes ?

We'll just wait for other languages to catch up with the concept......

Quote from bmwe30m3 :

Damn, I remember learning German, it was a real pain, okay, can deal with words and the articles, but the verbs and the forms of the verbs....
I remember having a textbook, that had the verbs in it.
I learned german for like 5 years, now I remember nothing.

i did for 12 and i know nothing

Quote from e2mustang :

i did for 12 and i know nothing

I did for 2 months and have been able to order a beer and ask for directions, in a style of german that was _almost_ totally incomprehensible to the german. You get very far with few words (but understanding what they say is impossible)

During the 2 months I did an epic test with one die/der/das where I got less than I would if I have answered the same on every query. and one fill out the sentences where points started at 100 and 1 was removed for every error, most got 80, I got 0 at about 30% in.....

Also the german sentences are strange, one page of words with some logic at the end that negates all that I just read.... Bastards!