On 03/22/2011 11:35 AM, Alan Cox wrote: >>> You can find someone on the internet who will believe anything is >>> incorrect. >> >> Sure, but that's rather beside the point. We're not talking about the >> opinion of J.Random Nutter here, but about something that Fowler's >> Modern English Usage, also published by Oxford, warns about. > > And.. there are a considerable number of people who consider that > Fowler's is J Random Nutter (notably everyone from Cambridge who don't > even agree with Oxford spelling rules) I think you're being unfair to Fowler: these days it mostly describes English as it is used, noting disagreements where they arise. It certainly doesn't take a strong pro-Oxford stance. >>> Oxford by the way take bug reports, so you can write them a >>> letter giving examples of the problematic usage and suggesting changes - >>> but IMHO you have to balance excessive detail against usefulness in >>> any learning process. >> >> Indeed so, but the problem arose here because someone, quite >> reasonably, tried to use the Oxford Advanced Learners Dictionary as an >> authority. It's clearly not fit too be used as one. I think that's > > It's not an authority, there is no authority except the person who wrote > the words, hence Humpty. > >> wrong: advanced learners deserve to be treated with a little more >> respect. Even if you believe that anything goes, it's unfair not to >> tell an advanced learner that there is a controversy. > > We could all go one better. As it was obvious what they meant so you could > simply have assumed that meaning. But I did simply assume that meaning; I am not the poster who complained. I am not taking any position WRT "beg the question". I am taking a position WRT bad dictionaries. > Who *cares* about the finer points of US v Indian v UK English > providing people are understood ? That's a perfectly reasonable position to take, but it's one that you've taken based on what you know. There is a difference between saying to a pupil "X doesn't really matter" and not telling them about X at all. I think advanced learners have a right to make up their own mind, rather than have someone else decide that they should remain ignorant. IMO all this is rather like Postel's robustness principle: "be conservative in what you do, be liberal in what you accept from others." > Should I go around correcting every time some American writes "If I > was" or other horrors ? No, certainly not. See Postel's principle. Andrew. -- users mailing list users@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx To unsubscribe or change subscription options: https://admin.fedoraproject.org/mailman/listinfo/users Guidelines: http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Mailing_list_guidelines
