Wikipedia user edits over 90k uses of “comprised of”

Post by fireant » Sun, May 07, 2023, 4:57 AM UTC

ghaff wrote: post #477

JW_00000 wrote: post #450

Earlier quoted context omitted.

OK, but does that mean the phrase should be used as such in an encyclopedia? For instance, the word "biweekly" now means both "once every two weeks" and "twice per week". I don't mind usage of that word for those two meanings. Obviously, linguists can gather data and analyze how it's being used. They may conclude that one meaning was more favored 50 years ago and the other meaning is now. But when I'm reading an ency…

Biweekly (and probably semi-weekly) is one of those words that should be generally avoided. It's like depending on some less obvious operator precedence rule rather than parentheses. You may be technically correct, but you shouldn't do it that way because others will misunderstand you. ADDED: I'm genuinely confused why people would disagree with this (which is in multiple style guides). I assume it's some variant of…

Post by p-e-w » Sun, May 07, 2023, 5:18 AM UTC

defrost wrote: post #669

dragonwriter wrote: post #668

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Dictionaries Dictionaries generally explicitly do not define what is correct, they describe what is in use (often with notes about the contexts of common use). > style guides Style guides do not define what is correct for the language, they define what is correct for those adopting the style, they are intentionally by design more limited than what is acceptable in the language to serve, for adopting institutions, t…

Noah Webster, of the US Webster's Dictionary was a language reformer and created a prescriptive dictionary intended to "correctly instruct" people about what he believed the correct use and spelling of English to be. He introduced American spelling and American English. By constrast the Oxford English Dictionary was created by lexicographers intent on mapping the usage of English across space and time, they created m…

Post by totalZero » Sun, May 07, 2023, 5:30 AM UTC

relaxing wrote: post #607

Pazzaz wrote: post #169

As a non-native English speaker, I appreciate pedantic editors like this one a lot. When I read Wikipedia, I want the text to be easy to understand and consistent with the rest of Wikipedia and when I edit, I want people to improve what I wrote. I wish everything I wrote had a copy-editor as pedantic as Wikipedia power users. Some people are complaining about overly zealous editors who delete a lot of and as an Inclu…

As a native English speaker let me assure you this user has done nothing for the understandability or consistency of the text.

Post by junon » Sun, May 07, 2023, 6:45 AM UTC

OJFord wrote: post #536

epgui wrote: post #517

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's also a well-known thing about English in that it's culturally much less prescriptive about grammar than other languages. The American-English philosophy around grammar doesn't necessarily transpose to other grammars around the world.

American English is trying to do away with adverbs entirely! Sometimes I find myself shouting '-ly!' at the screen. (I just wanted to leave that comment here real quick .)

Post by ttiurani » Sun, May 07, 2023, 7:51 AM UTC

hhjinks wrote: post #192

ttiurani wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'm going to impose my preference on everyone else, even though the term has been part of standard contemporary English for a long time. At least I, as a non-native speaker, find the edited sentences always easier to read. They simply make the text better. As the entire point od Wikipedia is to make knowledge accessible with co-writing, I find it just wild that people would object to better language. So who exactly…

Simplifying the language, so that non-native speakers can understand it, doesn't automatically make the text better. That's a wild assertion. Worse yet, Simple English Wikipedia exists for that exact purpose.