Moral debate

[jack]

Hmm, there seems to be too much debate today. gerald_duck, robert_jones, filecoreinuse. And even extended argument about grammar and ice-cream with feanelwa and ewx not-respectively[1].

I guess I'm putting something off :)

In other news: I expected everyone to criticise my phases of the moon, but they didn't. I can never predict what will set people off ;)

[1] Would you distinguish "non-respectively" meaning "not necessarily in the order listed" and "not-respectively" meaning "not in the order listed?" Why didn't I just change the order? Because then I couldn't have this amusing footnote :)

Comments

[feanelwa.livejournal.com]

I would interpret it as "not in the order listed" because if you typed it in a random order and it happened to be the right one, it would be less effort to write "respectively" and not to bother with "non-respectively" to denote that you hadn't cared; so clearly the only scenario in which "non-respectively" is worth using, is the one in which they're definitely not in the order listed. Unless the list is very long and you can't read through it with a quick glance to see whether you happened to do it in the same order or not.

[cartesiandaemon.livejournal.com]

OTOH, you might not know and need to specify that. Imagine a maths question "If A and B are 1.54 and 12 (non-respectively) what are the possible values of [expression with A and B]."

:)

[simont]

Of course, "not in the order listed" is rarely a genuinely useful concept; it's only helpful in this case because with only two items in a list ruling out one of the n! possible orders uniquely specifies the actual one.

I think we should find a use for the word "disrespectively".

[cartesiandaemon.livejournal.com]

True. I was mainly kidding about. And it would generally be more confusing even if it were usable.

Though otoh, two element lists probably are more common than most other sorts put together. And you *might* have a reason for the order (eg. to put "I" after someone else.)

[mair_in_grenderich]

one element lists?

[cartesiandaemon.livejournal.com]

What about them?

(Note I did say *most* other sorts.)

[mair_in_grenderich]

What about them?

I think we should round them all up and put them in a field.

[cartesiandaemon.livejournal.com]

Are one element lists synonymous with their element?

And mustn't there be one you can't put in the field, because of set theory?

[mair_in_grenderich]

Are one element lists synonymous with their element?

No! What kind of a typechecker do you have?
If it's a list of apples, it's not an apple, even if it's a list of only one apple. It's a list, not an apple. If it's a list of lists, um, well, shhhhh.

Mathmo: "You have a big field, and a little field, and the little field is in the big field - "

Farmer: "Weird".

[cartesiandaemon.livejournal.com]

T-J, yo bitch still wearing the pants?
Don't say that, don't say that. Me and my ho are like a man and his dog!
In that order?
Hey, you disrespectiving me, brother? [bites thumb at him]

[geekette8.livejournal.com]

*splortle*

[cartesiandaemon.livejournal.com]

Was that a good splortle or a bad splortle? :)

[geekette8.livejournal.com]

A messy one. :-)

[miss-next.livejournal.com]

Mmm, grammar and ice-cream. :-)

[cartesiandaemon.livejournal.com]

The insufficiently recognised pairing.

[filecoreinuse.livejournal.com]

I would have to invent new words I think. Probably, off the top of my head, 'arespectively' for 'they are not necessarily ordered' and 'disrespectively' for 'the are definately not ordered'. One might, if one were generous, use 'quasirespectively' or 'perirespectively' in place of 'arespectively' but I think we're straying far from the meaning there.

I certainly wouldn't've immediately noted the difference between 'non-...' and 'non-...' there although 'non-...' feels like it is synonymous with 'not-...'.

[vyvyan.livejournal.com]

Would you distinguish "non-respectively" meaning "not necessarily in the order listed" and "not-respectively" meaning "not in the order listed?"

No. If only two elements were involved, I would assume that either non- or not-respectively meant "not in the order listed". I would assume that a person wouldn't bother to insert the negative otherwise, following Grice's conversational maxims (and also, in this case, on the basis that it seems more likely to me that ewx would argue extensively about grammar than about ice cream!). If more than two elements were involved, I would assume that various possibilities (other than strict respectiveness) were implied by both wordings, but that the ordering was not especially important (since otherwise the person would have spelt it out explicitly).

[cartesiandaemon.livejournal.com]

It seemed likely to me richard would argue about anything :)

I went and looked up grice's maxims, and then saw the link from google had the already visited colour. Apparently I did that *before* and then forgot.

(And to you and filecoreinuse: yep, consensus seems to be formed that that would not be a useful or traditional distinction, however funny.)