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Square Theory

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Re: Square Theory

#91

Post by geodel »

anyfoo wrote: post #59
yojo wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My favorite part about that quote is the broken symmetry between the double meaning of the second sentence and the single meaning of the first. It begs one to consider the possibility of little “time flies” snacking on arrows. Which I guess completes the square?

Gosh, after all those years I've only just realized the double meaning of "fruit flies". Thanks! Before that, I just thought it was more of a non sequitur, but still amusing. There was just something inherently funny about imagining a banana hurling through the air in an awkward tumbling motion, right after the sagely abstract concept of time and its elegant arrow metaphor.

This is hilarious. I never thought of a flying banana and now I can't un-see it.

Re: Square Theory

#92

Post by frogulis »

akoboldfrying wrote: post #82
simianparrot wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For some reason this old saying popped into my head reading that. I know it's not related but: Time flies like an arrow. Fruit flies like a banana.

"Fruit flies like a banana" is arguably the quintessential example of ambiguity in English grammar. It shows that the grammatical structure of a sentence (which words are nouns, which are verbs, etc.) cannot be reliably recovered even if we know the meaning and possible grammatical categories of every word. Both ways to parse it are grammatically sound: (Fruit) (flies) (like a banana) (Fruit flies) (like) (a banana)…

Even spoken aloud, there's a natural-sounding stress pattern that is ambiguous. Love it.

Re: Square Theory

#93

Post by deadbabe »

cooperaustinj wrote: post #19
kelseyfrog wrote: post #15

I'm a big fan of killing time on long drives with friendly word games. One of my favorites is a mix between rhyming and square theory. Here's how it works: one player picks two words that rhyme perfectly. Then, for each of those words, they choose a clue word, usually a synonym, but any kind of related word is fair game. They say those two clue words out loud, and the other players have to guess the original rhyming…

Do you know any unfriendly word games I can try?

Freestyle rap battles

Re: Square Theory

#94

Post by bdr »

kelseyfrog wrote: post #15

I'm a big fan of killing time on long drives with friendly word games. One of my favorites is a mix between rhyming and square theory. Here's how it works: one player picks two words that rhyme perfectly. Then, for each of those words, they choose a clue word, usually a synonym, but any kind of related word is fair game. They say those two clue words out loud, and the other players have to guess the original rhyming…

Stinky Pinky! https://www.nosupplies.com/play/stinky-pinky

Re: Square Theory

#95

Post by preciousoo »

joshhug wrote: post #16

The part about dad joke square theory got me thinking about this classic scarecrow joke, which feels like an example from some higher order version of square theory: "Why was the scarecrow given an award?" "He was out standing in his field." The fact that a scarecrow's job is to be "out standing in his field", and that excelling at one's job can be phrased as being "outstanding in his field" is an incredible linguist…

If you use TikTok, search up “to the untrained ear”. You’d love those. Maybe they’re on YouTube too

Re: Square Theory

#96

Post by mattclarkdotnet »

jonny_eh wrote: post #75
finnh wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My family calls that game "pink mink"!

We call it Awful Waffle, based on a Board Game called Brain Strain. They had "Awful Waffle" as an example. https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/8785/brain-strain I made a proof-of-concept daily game: https://awfulwaffle.jonabrams.com/

Is the example meant to rhyme, or is it an example of a subtle category of "words that only rhyme in some English accents"? "Offle Woffle" is somewhat standard American English, while "Orful Warful" would be British English.

Re: Square Theory

#97

Post by tclancy »

cshimmin wrote: post #28

My favorite example, which was an honest translation error from a non-native speaker friend: Hand job (he meant to say manual labor)

There’s a joke in The Jerk that uses this same intentional misunderstanding.

Re: Square Theory

#99

Post by andriamanitra »

The obvious question to ask is could you take it to the third dimension and make a cube out of double-doubles? What about other shapes, perhaps a pyramid or a tetrahedron? Squares are simple enough that it's still easy to come up with examples, but I think a graph with higher edges-to-vertices ratio would be even more satisfying.

Re: Square Theory

#100

Post by kragen »

cooperaustinj wrote: post #19
kelseyfrog wrote: post #15

I'm a big fan of killing time on long drives with friendly word games. One of my favorites is a mix between rhyming and square theory. Here's how it works: one player picks two words that rhyme perfectly. Then, for each of those words, they choose a clue word, usually a synonym, but any kind of related word is fair game. They say those two clue words out loud, and the other players have to guess the original rhyming…

Do you know any unfriendly word games I can try?

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