Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Nobody Pronounces the 'B' in 'Debt'

merriam-webster.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

51–60 of 338 posts

Re: Nobody Pronounces the 'B' in 'Debt'

#51

Post by Ekaros »

KronisLV wrote: post #26
timonoko wrote: post #3

Nobody in some nobodyland. Majority in the world would. It is safer to pronounce English as it written and just modify on well-known cases. Especially when two non-natives speak two each other. "Fancy" pronunciation can make things impossible, as only native speakers can understand where you are aiming at.

> It is safer to pronounce English as it written and just modify on well-known cases. Especially when two non-natives speak two each other. "Fancy" pronunciation can make things impossible, as only native speakers can understand where you are aiming at. Heh, this seems like the right thing to do when you think about it. Why should we keep track of some odd rules that only exist for historical reasons and aren't reall…

If they haven't cared enough to fix their mess of pulling half dozen or more sources, why should I care to follow the mess...

Re: Nobody Pronounces the 'B' in 'Debt'

#52

Post by szszrk »

toxik wrote: post #32
timonoko wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Me knows, but I wont. Some bulgarian innkeeper will not understands any detts . But insists on me paying my deBts with special emphasis on "B".

I wouldn’t even try to use that word. I find that I can only speak as well as I write when I talk to near native speakers… I’d just say I want to pay or something

Which in exchange makes you easier to understand in most of the world. I have this with "rare" - such a problematic word for a slavic person and even if you nail it, non-native speakers may not get you. So it's better to actually say it with your mother tongue accent.

"Rare" can often be substituted by "seldom", but that doesn't work very well in restaurants. I like my steak medium-well anyway.

Re: Nobody Pronounces the 'B' in 'Debt'

#54

Post by bloak »

dorianmariefr wrote: post #37

As a non-native english speaker (french), I was pronouncing those words wrong I guess: debt, doubt, plumber, subtle, indict, and island

Were you aware that the "t" in "often" is traditionally not pronounced?

(On the one hand it's a very common word, so someone learning English as a foreign language might have been taught the "correct" pronunciation. On the other hand, it's something that many native speakers of English, particularly younger and less well educated speakers, get "wrong" so teaching the "correct" pronunciation may be assigned a lower priority. Also, for all I know, perhaps the "t" should be pronounced in some dialects of English; I only know standard British English.)

Re: Nobody Pronounces the 'B' in 'Debt'

#55

Post by raverbashing »

dmurray wrote: post #23
1_player wrote: post #15

Oh this is the place where I can finally rant about _aesthetic_, the favourite word for most music/art/movie content creators I've watched in the 2020s, one everybody mispronounces and reads it as "asthetic" which annoys me to no end, because it is totally WRONG. And I keep hearing it daily, which is maddening. "Ae" is supposed to be one sound, like the vowel sound in "egg". The "a" is silent. I'm terribly afraid eve…

In American English, unlike British English, œ and æ have mostly been collapsed into e. Compare encyclopaedia, foetus, faeces, diarrhoea, oestrogen. (But exceptions spelt the same way in both dialects: phoenix, oeconomics). If you'd like to encourage what you consider the correct pronunciation, I'd suggest favouring the spelling esthetic , which I do see but less commonly.

Apple still uses an A for that sound (though true, it does not come from the latin æ)

Re: Nobody Pronounces the 'B' in 'Debt'

#56

Post by rjtavares »

tsimionescu wrote: post #44
rjtavares wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Minor correction: it's also "subtil" in Portuguese.

Google translate must have failed me here... It claims "sutil".

Turns out in Brazillian Portuguese the form "Sutil" is more common than "Subtil". In Portugal there's only "Subtil". So it didn't fail you exactly, and I was unaware of that difference.

Re: Nobody Pronounces the 'B' in 'Debt'

#57

Post by toxik »

szszrk wrote: post #52
toxik wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wouldn’t even try to use that word. I find that I can only speak as well as I write when I talk to near native speakers… I’d just say I want to pay or something

Which in exchange makes you easier to understand in most of the world. I have this with "rare" - such a problematic word for a slavic person and even if you nail it, non-native speakers may not get you. So it's better to actually say it with your mother tongue accent. "Rare" can often be substituted by "seldom", but that doesn't work very well in restaurants. I like my steak medium-well anyway.

"I would like my stake medium seldom, please."

I have a hard time with the word "ineligible" - easy to read and write, but I just cannot say it without stumbling. No particular part of the word is hard either, it just... comes out wrong. I think it may be unusual way you turn it into syllables: in-el-i-gi-ble.

Re: Nobody Pronounces the 'B' in 'Debt'

#58

Post by nieve »

dmurray wrote: post #23
1_player wrote: post #15

Oh this is the place where I can finally rant about _aesthetic_, the favourite word for most music/art/movie content creators I've watched in the 2020s, one everybody mispronounces and reads it as "asthetic" which annoys me to no end, because it is totally WRONG. And I keep hearing it daily, which is maddening. "Ae" is supposed to be one sound, like the vowel sound in "egg". The "a" is silent. I'm terribly afraid eve…

In American English, unlike British English, œ and æ have mostly been collapsed into e. Compare encyclopaedia, foetus, faeces, diarrhoea, oestrogen. (But exceptions spelt the same way in both dialects: phoenix, oeconomics). If you'd like to encourage what you consider the correct pronunciation, I'd suggest favouring the spelling esthetic , which I do see but less commonly.

In American English the word is spelled economics, not oeconomics. Not the same spelling at all.

Re: Nobody Pronounces the 'B' in 'Debt'

#60

Post by smitty1e »

kreeben wrote: post #39
brotherofsteel wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I'm terribly afraid everybody will learn the wrong way of saying it, and the correct way will go extinct. Is that really so bad?

The correct way is more aesthetic.

Particulary for the ascetic.
Post reply on HN