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Why the global elite gave up on spelling and grammar

wsj.com

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Re: Why the global elite gave up on spelling and grammar

#181

Post by mrguyorama »

vardalab wrote: post #59
stackghost wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>The people who rule us can't be this mid, otherwise the very concept of meritocracy is bunk. It is bunk. Nobody who has even a modicum of critical thinking ability thinks that Donald Trump or Elon Musk are geniuses. Luck and circumstance are an immense part of success.

Exactly. Look at just the most recent conflict in Middle East. You think they would have freaking gamed out potential scenarios using AI or whatnot? Looks like nobody gamed out anything. It's all just seat of the pants.

All the people who had the job title of "War game Iran scenarios" were actually fired a month or so ago.

Competence in a senior position is a threat to an incompetocracy. It's more important you be stupid and loyal than be good.

Re: Why the global elite gave up on spelling and grammar

#182

Post by trollierworm »

FpUser wrote: post #117
bluepeter wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's great. What's also amusing is how you felt it necessary to provide the diacritical pronunciation guide for "Vaughan"... because I think to most native English speakers we can't imagine any other pronunciation!

I think native English speaker who had never heard of Vaughan (sure we can find some of those) would likely to pronounce it like "Vog-un" - /ˈvɒɡən/ or "Vog-han" - /ˈvɑːɡən/

This sent me down a mental rabbit hole, I think it's one of those interesting nuances that are rules that native speakers follow without being able to name it, or know it. I'm a native speaker, and also thought `vawn` was the most obvious pronounciation. I'm guessing it's because `augh` is perceived as a recognizable vowel cluster where `gh` tends to be silent (daughter, caught, naught, taught). The interesting twist for me is that `laugh` is in obvious counter example, until I realized that gh in final position (laugh, rough, enough) is almost always \f\. And further, in words like laughter, roughness, we immediately distinguish a modified root word from the lexical position.

Maybe there's also an interesting thread to pull on in that the pattern may be more pronounced for names (e.g. Hughes). Just ruminating here though, I don't have a source for any of this.

Re: Why the global elite gave up on spelling and grammar

#183

Post by jrflowers »

bluepeter wrote: post #22

British aristocracy has been pronouncing their own surnames wrong for centuries on purpose. Cholmondeley is "Chumley" Featherstonehaugh is "Fanshaw." If you read it phonetically you mark yourself as an outsider. The misstake is the membership card. (Heck, even in Portland we locals hear about misprouncing Couch St probably every year in local press as some bar for membership to our own locals only vibe.)

Note that you only pronounce Couch that way in Portland when talking about the street. You wouldn’t maintain the pronunciation when saying eg “Sorry for spilling wine on your couch”

Re: Why the global elite gave up on spelling and grammar

#184

Post by pessimizer »

Most of these people are legitimately stupid. This article is also pretty stupid for focusing on grammar and spelling when the content of these emails is also quite moronic.

I don't think Larry Summers was fired for hanging out with Epstein and talking terribly about women with him; I'm sure plenty of people knew that he was an Epstein-type and hung in Epstein-type circles, and he publicly said horrible things about women's capacities, to people he barely knew.

I think he was fired for sounding like a subnormal reddit dweller. Simply seeming like a mediocre dumb guy. The idea that he was teaching their precious children was simply repellent to Harvard alums. It makes it even more of an obscenity that he was in charge of the government response to the housing bubble, and for running up the stock market in the late 90s. It's so much worse when you confirm the awful acts were done by an actually dumb guy.

You want to fool yourself into thinking that these monsters were trapped by some bad premise within some elaborately reasoned theory or at least unfortunately tripped up by a sign error or a transposed digit buried somewhere. Nope, just a guy whose job is to sit in a chair with a bunch of qualifying paper around his name, and do the things that his backers pay him to do. An elite robosigner. They're not even charming or handsome.

Re: Why the global elite gave up on spelling and grammar

#185

Post by therein »

bluepeter wrote: post #22

British aristocracy has been pronouncing their own surnames wrong for centuries on purpose. Cholmondeley is "Chumley" Featherstonehaugh is "Fanshaw." If you read it phonetically you mark yourself as an outsider. The misstake is the membership card. (Heck, even in Portland we locals hear about misprouncing Couch St probably every year in local press as some bar for membership to our own locals only vibe.)

> in Portland we locals hear about misprouncing Couch St

That explains why many years ago when I visited Portland, a homeless guy corrected my pronunciation of that while we were walking past him.

Re: Why the global elite gave up on spelling and grammar

#186

Post by AntiDyatlov »

RamblingCTO wrote: post #31
ryandrake wrote: post #15

I think a more likely reason, that for some reason, a lot of people don't want to talk about, is that these "Global Elite" aren't really that smart, creative, or articulate. That they've gotten to where they are despite, not because of their communication skills. They're not being "typical unconventional / quirky entrepreneurs." They're simply C students who knew the right people.

or efficiency is more important because you have a high load of people you need to interact with. I was a grammer nazi back in the day but stopped caring because the ROI is minimal and I've got shit to do that's more important. so maybe it's the same for them

If you have time to post on Hacker News, you definitely have time for proper grammar.

Re: Why the global elite gave up on spelling and grammar

#187

Post by sanswork »

teachrdan wrote: post #115
nobody9999 wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or Wilkes-Barre, PA

Or Montpelier, VT!

Delhi, Ca -> Del-High

Fontainebleau State Park -> Fountain Blue State Park

These were two off the ones that really stood out from my travels.

Re: Why the global elite gave up on spelling and grammar

#188

Post by sanswork »

rapnie wrote: post #179
FpUser wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here in Toronto area city of Vaughan pronounced as (/vɔːn/ or /vɑːn/) like in "dawn" or "gone" Imaging me fresh from USSR asking someone how do I get to ... and getting blank stare

As a non-native English speaker I wonder if Leicester is naturally pronounced right for the natives, or has to be explicitly taught.

It has to be taught. Most english native speakers will say Lie-chester by default.

Re: Why the global elite gave up on spelling and grammar

#189

Post by throwaway94275 »

stackghost wrote: post #54
bluepeter wrote: post #22

British aristocracy has been pronouncing their own surnames wrong for centuries on purpose. Cholmondeley is "Chumley" Featherstonehaugh is "Fanshaw." If you read it phonetically you mark yourself as an outsider. The misstake is the membership card. (Heck, even in Portland we locals hear about misprouncing Couch St probably every year in local press as some bar for membership to our own locals only vibe.)

>Cholmondeley is "Chumley" Featherstonehaugh is "Fanshaw." If you read it phonetically you mark yourself as an outsider. This is a monstrous crime against language.

well how do you say Newfoundland? Soon it will be said "Noovlan"
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