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Language, Education, Religion and History
by John Seago 16 Jul '01

16 Jul '01

Interestingly the grammer/spelling discussion has now reached the point where it touches upon religion. It is (probably mistakenly) my understanding that European Christianity owes its current position to the decision taken by the Roman Empire to use it as an extension of its political influence. However if one looks at the other institution used to extend the political influence of the Roman Empire, the Roman Army, the latter is currently older than the Church. John Seago

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Re: [Alug] Going Alpha
by MJ Ray 16 Jul '01

16 Jul '01

David Freeman <david_freeman(a)rocketmail.com> writes: > EUROPEAN STANDARD ENGLISH Forwarded ancient mass-forwarded xenophobic "joke". > which as much as it hurts me to say it, because the lack of infleunce > of religion on people. The church had the role of teaching people on > moral issues and educating and supporting them through raising there > off spring. Irrelevant introduction of religion into the discussion of morals. Yep, this should start a small flame-war. Can people take this off-list, or at least trim quotes very heavily when replying, please? Thanks.

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Re: [Alug] Going Alpha
by Jenny_Hopkins＠toby-churchill.com 16 Jul '01

16 Jul '01

David Freeman wrote: >ZE DREM VIL FINALI KUM TRU! I like that. Have you read that Ray Bradbury story where a guy goes back in time and steps on a butterfly and when he returns to the present the language has changed just like this? >The problem >is parenting ansd socail responsiblity aren't impressed upon people, >which as much as it hurts me to say it, because the lack of infleunce >of religion on people. The church had the role of teaching people on >moral issues and educating and supporting them through raising there >off spring. Jen's soapbox of the day: Religion does not have a monopoly on morality. Religion is responsible for a lot of bad stuff. Religion was made to control, and the people in charge of it abuse their power. Morality through fear is not a solution. Intelligence and understanding should be the teachers of humanity. And how are people going to be intelligent or understanding without a fair chance in life? There's nowt as strange as folks. Jenny.

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Re: [Alug] Going Alpha
by David Freeman 16 Jul '01

16 Jul '01

--- Laurie Brown <laurie(a)brownowl.com> wrote: > David Freeman wrote: > > > > All, > > > > My web site has now gone alpha. So could I ask for people to take a > > look and let me know of any bugs, speiling misstakes etc... Also > > constructive criticism would be nice. > > > > http://freemadi.alug.org.uk/ > > Before I get flamed for daring to speak the unspeakable, to whit: > grammar and > spelling *are* important, and that the results of trendy education > methods and > piss-poor teaching are a serious disservice to our young people, > note: I agree completely and admit that my english is crap. As for the education system, just don't get me started. > IMO, written English is no more difficult to master than any > programming > langauge, except that one doesn't need to compile English... Clear > communication is no less important, however, and going public on a > web site > *requires* that it be at least close to correct. The sole reason so > many > youngsters can't spell or write, is down to the education system and > crappy > teachers, abetted by the acceptance of poor standards by the world at > large. I > wonder, for instance, how so many people get through tertiary > education when > they can't write to save their lives (we all know examples). Again, I agree to the point I would say that a programming lnaguages and human lnaguages are very much the same sort of things but on different levels. Each has the sma e general constructs but under different terms, compare syntax and Grammer. Then add in correct spelling and a wide vocabulary, we have language. The problem comes from so much redundency which we add into the interpretation and thus make poor compilers. Take for example. Chocolate me need. me need chocolate I require a cocoa based product with added milk and sucrose sumplement. as you can see english has a lot of syntatic sugar, which isn't required for understanding to be had, this si where natural language processing comes in. Each sentence has verbs, adjectives etc... and the processor just processes the sentence for such words and treats them as objects. foe example the sentence "chocolcate me need" has the objects of me and chololate with the relation ship of "need" thrown in as "me" needing it. The problem we have is in our compilers or lexical analysis. We will parse the sentence a number of times in attempts to make sense of it, if after an arbitary number of passes we decide it doesn't make sense we barf an error. Where Computer languages come into there own is that the language is very strict in the constructs which are allowed and the lexical analysis is somewhat poor (compared to a human). As such Programmers and hackers tend to command a better than average use of their native language through this need for above average levels of accuracy. So to summerise, language has too much syntatic sugar which allows for interpretation from mal formed sentences where a Parse error whould be through. but through years of use we have go lasy and our interpreters have "improved" to the point that we no longer require such sytatic sugar and can use the language in a much reduced way. To summerise, english is a robust language to sumerise the summery of the summary: people are a problem. > Anyway, David, my initial comments: the site is so full of > grammatical and > spelling errors that it shouldn't be considered anything near ready > for > release. I'd suggest that if you have a problem with spelling, > grammar and > syntax, you get someone who hasn't to proof-read and correct it for > you before > you publish. This is what I thought which is why it is alpha not beta. It may now be apparent why I use Bascule as a nick at times. Also the purpose of sending it to the list was for it to be proof read, and I am greatfull of your input on this. > I picked up the following on a quick read-through, certainly there > are some I > missed. Please don't ask me to do this again! Thank you, I will get it into a high beta stage with as many mistakes as possible removed. > First para could do with a sprinkling of commas and/or > colons/semi-colons as it > has too many fragmented sentences: actually, this applies throughout > the site. > Additionally, there is a lot of random capitalisation of words, and > many words > uncapitalised when they should be. I stopped picking this up after a > while. Does any one know of a good site which explains the correct use of colons, semi colons and comas? Also what exactly is meant by fragmentation, word sometimes brings it up by I never knew what that means. Thanks for the input, it is very helpful Thanks D <snip my appaling spelling> > > Cheers, Laurie. > -- > --------------------------------------------------------------------- > Laurie Brown > laurie(a)brownowl.com > PGP key at http://pgpkeys.mit.edu:11371 > --------------------------------------------------------------------- ===== -------------------- "We all know Linux is great... it does infinite loops in 5 seconds." Linus Torvalds __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Get personalized email addresses from Yahoo! Mail http://personal.mail.yahoo.com/

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Re: [Alug] Going Alpha
by Jenny_Hopkins＠toby-churchill.com 16 Jul '01

16 Jul '01

Andrew Savory wrote: >Sorry, but I don't agree. Written English is a heck of a lot harder to >master than programming. Most programming languages have a right and a >wrong way: ie, black and white, works or doesn't. They have a very limited >syntax and often there are many easily accessible books written on how to >program in a given language. >English, on the other hand, has too many shades of grey to make it easy to >master. Syntax, grammatical rules, spelling: all these things change based >not just on what country you're in but often depending on the region of a >country. In English, it's very difficult to pin down 'write' and wrong, >once you get beyond the basics of spelling and grammar. It becomes much >more subjective and more difficult to define. I agree. Teaching a small child to read and write brings it home just how erratic the english language can be. I think a few hundred years ago it may have made more sense, when "when" was spoken aloud with the "h" being audible, and the "k" in "knee" or "knight" also was heard. But look at bough, cough, through. As a small child, language is learnt first by ear then by reading. So any input at that age is more likely to result in proper spelling and grammer if the parents of a small child talk to them properly, and later if they are encouraged to read the written word. >Hmmm... again, I think it's easy to blame the education system and "trendy >methods" for falling standards, but I think a portion of the blame should >also be directed at the parents and society. TV doesn't encourage reading >and writing; the fast food disposable lifestyles we live also prohibit >attention to detail and focus on results over accuracy. Well, that one starts off a whole new debate on responsibility - who is responsible in this society and for what. Can you point a finger at a parent who sits their kid in front of the telly stuffing hamburgers when it is the way they were brought up themselves? At what point does someone have to face the fact that each person is ultimately responsible for themselves? (I don't know what I think the answer to this one is, it all makes me a bit confused). Laurie Brown wrote: >I've learnt that my views on grammar and written >English differ a little from most other people's... Oh yes, how is that? Jenny

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Re: [Alug] Going Alpha
by MJ Ray 16 Jul '01

16 Jul '01

Adam Bower <abower(a)thebowery.co.uk> writes: > I disagree :-) I have seen how perl scripts can be (and are) written, I > find english is far easier for me than programming. Of course I am crap at > both though.... Perl was designed to reflect the richness and idiom of natural languages in a programming language, hence the "there's more than one way to do it" banner. Whether or not that is a good thing is a long argument which has been had many times before and I believe certain people here can testify to the fact that perl scripts from speakers of different languages have different styles. What is also sure is that a number of languages now pride themselves on the fact that "there's one best way to do it" in their language. > Anyway I don't want to get drawn further into this debate, as I know that > you will hear me start to rant about education! I always think that I was lucky to get such a traditional education in the time when "trendy teaching" was at its peak. I feel really sorry for the people who, for example, never had their spelling corrected because it would demoralise them and have had to put in lots of work to turn it around. I don't have much sympathy for those who don't put in the work and just blame education for the bad spelling, though ;-)

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Re: [Alug] Going Alpha
by Jenny_Hopkins＠toby-churchill.com 16 Jul '01

16 Jul '01

Ha ha! Just realised that I spelt "grammar" wrong in the last thread! What a gaffe!

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RE: alug digest, Vol 1 #302 - 13 msgs
by Earl Brannigan 16 Jul '01

16 Jul '01

Hi Dave, David Freeman <david_freeman(a)rocketmail.com> wrote : > > > > > > Are there any Crypto specialists on the list? > > I should have thought crypting was something you were expert at! > > Is this a fancy way of saying my messages are a we bit cryptic? or that > you thought this was something I did? No, "crypting" was a favourite pasteime of Bascule.... > > > sorry... completely useless post. > > Not really too kind. Cheers Earl

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Re: [Alug] Weekly IRC reminder
by Neill Newman 16 Jul '01

16 Jul '01

Hi again all, Somebody has forwarded me the old IRC reminder, which I have included here. I'll sort out the cron job now ;) Reegards Neill > > This is the automated ALUG irc meeting reminder sent to remind you that > there is an irc meeting tonight (Monday) at 8.00pm. > > The meeting takes place on the irc server irc.openprojects.net in the > #alug channel, you can take a look at www.openprojects.net to get more > info on the openprojects network. > > Popular irc clients include tkirc, bitchx, xchat and ircII on Unix, and > Mirc under windows. Here are some links to help you get started with irc. > > Unix > > http://www.bitchx.com > http://www.xchat.org > http://freshmeat.net > http://www.epicsol.org/ (for Brett!) > > Windows > > http://www.mirc.com (loads of help with irc for newbies!) > -- Open Source Specialists http://www.entora.co.uk/ Tel: +44 (0)701 0723686 Fax: +44 (0)870 3214368

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Weekly IRC reminder
by Neill Newman 16 Jul '01

16 Jul '01

OK, as I'm sure most of you have read, Adam and Zeus have gone their seperate ways, and the weekly IRC reminder cron job has disapeared. I've been asked to set this up temporarly on one of our machines. The biggest problem is that I have always deleted the IRC reminders as soon as I get them, as I never forget to login ;) so, I don't have the words that used to be sent out! If somebody has an archived copy then let me have it. If not, I'll just make up some random words along the lines of "ALUG IRC meeting tonight, server: irc.openprojects.net, join #alug". there you have it, a slightly different weekly reminder for all those lurkers out there ;) Hope to see some new people this evening Regards Neill -- Open Source Specialists http://www.entora.co.uk/ Tel: +44 (0)701 0723686 Fax: +44 (0)870 3214368

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