Philosophical debates about languages

[Пушистая няшечка2]

Arrrgh! I hate teachers! They're too smart and ruin everything! I just learned that saying 'there were less than thirty people in the room' is incorrect and considered to be a serious mistake. Because I can't use 'less' with multiple countable.

And what is correct? Fewer?

[Дерзкий Серхио]

Yep. I bet I can't use 'yep' either.

[Пушистая няшечка2]

Hm... Fewer than 30 people... Sounds strange.

[Н.Ф.]

https://www.google.com/search?q=less+th ... =firefox-a

[Кая З]

Сергей, you’re a lucky student, because your teachers are smart, much smarter than one English scholar who had written a famous, but still valuable book. And there is a sentence from the book – “there is a growing tendency to put ‘less’ before a count noun plural”. Maybe the tendency has dried out totally, but nobody knows about it expect the teachers.

[Брэйв]

Did anybody hear the story where Russian teacher of English has scolded a kid because he used a wrong turn of speech? And it would be a usual story, but the child was a native speaker, who immigrated from the United States, and this fact didn't stop her. It was a really funny story.

[А.М.]

Night. Rain. Knock at the door.
- Who is it?
- It is I.
- Oh. Come on in poor old teacher of grammar...

[Дерзкий Серхио]

Did anybody hear the story?..

One Canadian guy corrected me twice when I was saying something in Russian. He was... well, not shocked, but really surprised. You should have seen his face when he asked me 'How come?..' I said 'Er... well... Russian is a very difficult language.'

[Иван Л]

Натолкнулся на интересные рассуждения по поводу языков: http://www.filosofia-itogi.ru/azik.html
И по резному письму: http://www.filosofia-itogi.ru/runi.html#top
Спешу поделиться

[Дерзкий Серхио]

I have a question. Could it be offensive if I wrote 'Hello Brain' instead of 'Hello Brian'? He's not one of my friends. I was writing to tech support. I really don't want to sound offensive and now I'm not sure if this is a big deal. Shall I apologize?

[А.М.]

If i received a such thing, I would count it as a compliment...

[А.М.]

Sometimes I meet someone who thinks he knows English. And almost every time when it happens and he hears that I'm learning English, he begins to examine me. And the silliest method of examining is the question, "How many percents of English knowledge do you have?"

At first I try to evade the question. Kind of: Who cares about this stuff? But if he is stubborn and repeats this question again and again, I say: Ok. Let’s do it. Can you count the percent of knowledge? Who the hell can do it?

Let’s make a scale of knowledge. It is a piece of cake to put a zero of the scale. It's a person who never saw an English letter or heard an English word. But the further working on the scale is more difficult.

How many percents do I have if I know only two phrases: My name is A.M. and London is the capital of Great Britain? And how many percents does a translator have? On the other hand, how many percents of knowledge does a native speaker have? Forrest Gump, for example. And is Forrest’s percent higher than translator’s one? And in this case, how many percents did Shakespeare have?

All of these percents do not make any sense. But again and again I hear this question. Why?...

[Дерзкий Серхио]

'I've read that book and understood 87,3%.' Sounds like a weather forcast to me. You know, 'the temperature today is 14,2 °C.' Really, point two? Oh, my god! I thought it's gonna be 'point three' today!

[А.М.]

“I just read the book and began to learn the language with the matrix from scratch.”

When I read such a thing, I think: “You are lucky, man. You have chosen the right way and if you are strong and find enough energy and patience, you will learn the language.”

Another thought I have is kind of jealous. You do not have to waste your energy on breaking the old “knowledge” of the language. How I would like to unmemorize all of my previous language learning... Maybe it helps you start reading or writing. Maybe it even helps you understand by ear (though I don’t think so). But it really disturbs to speak. I know it because every time I speak and feel a little difficulty or maybe make a mistake, that guy wakes up. That guy who thinks he knows the language. And he tries to speak. But his “My name is…” cannot help.

But, anyway, I want to say also - good luck and I wish you patience to go all the way.

[А.М.]

Have you ever seen how children are learning to swim? Or maybe you remember how you were learning yourself? Too many useless movements, too many splashes, mouth full of water, desire to invent a new style of swimming or improve an old one. … And then, day by day, your movements become clearer, splashes fade away, swimming speed increases.
What am I talking about? About the language learning. About questions, and mistakes, and desire to improve the method of learning.
When you just started to learn, of course, you have so many questions, make so many mistakes, and of course you "see" so many "weak" places in the method and you want to improve it…
But then, day by day, work gives you answers to your questions, and you begin to see your mistakes. And you understand that those "weaknesses" are just your misunderstanding…
The main thing is to believe in yourself, in your powers. And to work. And everything will be OK.