80 thoughts on “Bad grammar!”

      1. It goes beyond that.

        When it comes right down to it, all there is is communication and computation. Claude Shannon gave us the physical limits to communication, and Alan Turing’s Machine tells us how computation works. Every intellectual endeavor boils down to a logical equivalent of one of Turing’s Machines implemented within Shannon’s physical constraints.

        Of course, that still gives us a good deal of wiggle room to play in….

        b&

      2. Not at all. In the discussion of written language, “usage” has a particular connotation. Usage and spelling, in fact, precede grammar. They are both concerned with words in isolation. Grammar is concerned with words in context, with the conventions that govern the structure of language–syntax and sentence formation. When you’re looking at words in isolation, as you are when you consider spelling and word choice, grammar seldom comes into play, because the spelling you use or the word you choose, whether wrong or right, generally has no effect on the word’s function in a sentence.

      3. Yep, and usage tends to overtake everything else. That’s how language develops and evolves.

        Gadzooks, sire, where hast thou rested thy body for past ages. Or something like that. Move or die.

        But I know what you mean. In the UK I’m often presented with the prospect of possible queues ahead but I live for the day when I might encounter an impossible one.

  5. Actually, what I see is a drab gramma dressed in mad ram garb as she stops innocent bystanders with her dram(m)a grab.

    There might be something else going on there, too….

    b&

  6. “When you come to a fork in the road, take it.” – Yogi Berra

          1. Yes true. As a kid I always thought arrows pointing up like that were for airplanes. But I also thought lookouts on maps were warnings.

          2. Oh, those’re warnings, all right, but not the type of warning you’re thinking of.

            You see, those are the locations where people have recently fallen to the clutches of the infamous Lookout Bird, a giant flying carnivore that swoops down upon its victims out of the clear blue. It is so named for the (presumed) last words of its victims.

            Of course, there have been no survivors of Lookout Bird attacks, and no reliable documentary evidence of its existence, either. This accounts for its alternate designation as the “Holy fucking shit! Get it off me! AAARRRGGHHH!!!! <glurgle /> Bird,” but decorum has led to the preference of the more informal name on children’s maps.

            Hope this helps.

            Cheers,

            b&

          3. Ha ha, that sounds like something my dad would’ve told me and then I would’ve believed it, passed it on & been laughed at by the other kids!

  8. Even if there is another way, the word is alternative. Alternate means to go from one to another.

    2. Alternate also means “constituting an alternative ” according to Merriaqm Webster so there is no problem here.

      1. Yeah, that’s what MW 11th Collegiate says: alternate 4: constituting an alternative

      1. Ha ha – nice. Even when I sudo into root I can’t get my computer to make me anything.

    2. Irony faileth them suffering form literalismo. Besides, Gov. Wallace of “doorway and p-seudo” infamy, half redeemed his self in old wheelchair-bound age.

  11. So … what the people at dictionary.com are saying is that there is an alternate definition of alternate in which alternate can be used alternatively as an adjective, verb, or noun. But maybe Jerry thinks that dictionary.com is an unacceptable alternative among grammatical authorities and he will cite a more authoritative alternate source.

    1. My Oxford Desk Dictionary (because I’m too lazy to find then heft my big Oxford Dictionary) says in a note under alternative that alternate (adj and noun) refers to every other one or first one, then the other (alterate recruits were chose for special training). Alternative (adj and noun) refers to choice (the alternative road leads to the lake)

      That’s the difference. Ta dah!

      2. Then, may I suggest that the copy of the dictionary is outdated? Here is whet the OED says about it these days.

        alternate
        ….
        ….
        adjective
        ….
        …..
        2 (chiefly North American) taking the place of; alternative:the rerouted traffic takes a variety of alternate routes

        So, as several commenters have pointed out above with references from other major dictionaries, there is nothing ungrammatical or unidiomatic about “alternate route” to mean “alternative route”. In fact, I would go so far as to say that calling it “bad grammar” is faactually incorrect.

        1. Also usage is old –
          1776 J. Burrow Rep. Cases King’s Bench I. 320 ‘An alternate Way of traversing a corrupt Agreement.’
          1837 G. Phillips Syriac Gram. 25 ‘Whenever the noun in its primitive form receives a syllabic augment, the alternate form is used.’
          1874 Cornhill Mag. July 39 ‘An alternate evening diversion to music, cards, or tea?’

        2. Yes you are probably right about my dictionary being out of date. Now I must know when all this happened. I’m trying to find out more 🙂

          1. I suspect any acceptance of ‘alternate’ to mean ‘alternative’, is just legitimisation of bad usage. i.e. people have been incorrectly saying ‘alternate’ for long enough that it’s come to be considered acceptable. This, I deplore.

          2. And how do you know, may I ask, that this is indeed “legitimization of bad usage”, especially, when as Dominic points out above that this usage dates back hundreds of years?

            What I suspect is that this “rule” about the usage of “alternate” to mean “alternative” being “ungrammatical” is another example of the evergreen phenomenon of evidence-free invention of presonal grammatical rules which somehow become entrenched in the popular imagination. The interesting historical question here is who was the original instigator of this “rule”.

          4. If you Google ‘alternate’ the first two entries are Merriam-Webster and The Free Dictionary. Look them up and they both give, as their first few definitions, ‘alternate’ meaning ‘occurring or succeeding by turns’ and similar e.g. day alternating with night. (This doesn’t mean day is an alternative to night – my comment). Similarly alternating current. Tennis players alternate in serving sets – but the rules do not give them any alternative (so far as I know. If there was an alternative which they adopted then they would be ceasing to alternate).

            So ‘alternative’ has a subtly different meaning from ‘alternate’. ‘Alternate’ has a clear implication of two things which must be used in turn. ‘Alternative’ implies two or more options with some freedom of choice.

          5. infiniteimprobabilit:

            Firstly, I don’t know why you call the difference between the two senses of “alternate” as “subtle”. To me, the differences between the two senses does not appear to be “subtle” at all: they are rather widely different.

            Secondly, as I and several other commenters have posted above, all major dictionaries—including Merriam-Webster and FreeDict—list the usage of “alternate” to mean “alternative” as valid. User Dominic also showed examples of this usage in texts written more than a hundred years ago. Your comment, on the other hand, provides no evidence for your stronger claim that this is just “legitimization of bad usage” (who decided it was bad usage, BTW?).

          6. And those dictionaries give ‘alternative’ as a permissible meaning way down in their list, which suggests that this is an unusual or rare usage.

            When I said ‘legitimisation of bad usage’ possibly I should have said ‘legitimisation of aberrant usage’. Insofar as words have commonly accepted meanings, I would suggest that introducing alternative meanings for those words is bad in that it reduces the precision of language. If any word can mean anything the user likes, it can only lead to ambiguity and loss of clarity in expression.

          7. This ship has sailed.

            Besides, the two meanings of the word are pronounced differently–presto, no confusion.

  12. I’m more puzzled by what Jerry called the sad part. What is the path next to the sign the only route to?

  13. “Evolution is smarter than we are”

    Think that was Crick

    But to be more encompassing, it should be added

    Evolution is stupider than we are

    It bothers me a little ( well I have a major depressive disorder, but please still attend to my depressive view). Particularly some of these physicists, astronomers, rant on about how they we are so glad to be alive now with all the technology blah blah.

    This same technology when turned on other venues reveals countless genetic mutations that will lead to a miserable protracted dying/death. The evolution of emerging new infectious disease that completely overwhelm our Immune system and limited mental abilities against these agents).

    Yup to me – an atheist long long before most on this group,

    Evolution is stupider than we are, Crick should have added that.

    2. That’s the argument from ‘I’ve seen it all, me – I remember when all this was fields’.

  14. Read the comments. I think this one is a draw. Considering the terms, one could arrive correctly at different points of grammar. “Alternate” is a shorter word than “alternative” so maybe they were a little short on paint.

  15. No one seems to have pointed out that the meaning of ‘alternate’ depends on how it is pronounced. It can indeed mean ‘alternative’ if pronounced without accentuating the last four letters.

    At least that I’d my excuse for taking a while to figure out what all the fuss was about.

  16. I suggest that Jerry sends this to Mark Liberman at Language Log for an in-depth discussion

    1. Now that would be an accurate sign. I’d want to write it as, “go or don’t, meh”.

  18. Not the grammar that bothers me – it is the pronunciation! Route rhymes with ‘root’, whereas rout rhymes with ‘out’!

    I’m just pulling your plonker! 😉

  20. So now obsessed, I bothered my friends who are professional writers and editors and they concur that “alternate” is often used to mean “alternative” and usage trumps all. I then asked Ben Zimmer (he is always so helpful when you tweet him) and he said the same and that this usage is especially seen in North America. He gave the example of “alternate route” as well.

    So, I guess I’m just old in my usage 🙂 Damn you, evolving language!

    1. Now what is the colour of a yield sign?

      This is a good question to gauge the age of someone. Most people beyond a certain age will answer the question incorrectly.

      1. I’ve seen both – yellow as well as white ones with red borders — did I pass? 🙂

        1. Talking of which, I noted with surprise on Streetview and now confirmed by actual observation, French Stop signs say ‘Stop’. Surely they should say ‘Arret’? Curious.

          (By the way, a prior study of Streetview proved invaluable in pre-plotting my route out of the centre of Lyon, and in finding several pre-booked small local hotels tucked up side alleys in France and Italy. Excuse my preoccupation with things Continental, I’m just back from there).

          2. This is a case of the French Canadians being more French than the French? 😉

            (Happens to all colonials, not just French ones of course).

          3. It’s a cultural identity thing being a minority French language in a majority English speaking country and in a larger predominantly English speaking continent, they have rules to preserve French. It gets silly and political (Bill 101) but meh what can you do? I get where they’re coming from.

          4. I quite understand their reasons, and most of us, I think, share them when we instinctively try to defend our culture or language against less desirable alternatives. 😉

  21. Maybe it’s an ad: “The University of Chicago is your alternate route”. Or maybe it’s pointing up, and it’s sponsored by the Divinity School.

    In my day that sign wouldn’t have been in English at all. They used to have “keep off the grass” signs everywhere, but in all different languages like Sanskrit or German written in Suetterlin.

    1. From a New Zealander’s point of view, hearing Americans argue about grammar is hilarious. To our ears the American use of English is a continuous series of bizarre grammatical constructs.

      Taking your example, Americans would tend to say “keep off OF the grass”. That the hell is that extraneous “of” doing in there? But it is common American grammar.

      I can’t get too worked up over it – just point and laugh.

      1. Yeah but Kiwi’s use that trailing off emphasis “as as….” example, “he’s as rich as” and then there is no comparison, leaving the uninitiated waiting for the rest of the sentence that never comes. 😉

        1. Umm, yep. And from (some) Kiwis’ inflection it sounds as if they mean it to be the end of the sentence rather than trailing off, e.g. “He’s as rich as.[Period]. He could easily afford to buy the house.” Niggles me too.

          In contrast to this is their habit of rising inflection at the end of a (normal) sentence, making it sound like a question (when none is intended). “That is the final decision of the committee [???]”. (My immediate reaction is “I don’t know, you tell me”).

          And, a final irritating quirk, their habit (much used by TV reporters) of laying stress on random conjunctions and prepositions – “This is *THE* third day *OF* hearings *INTO* the Blobowski affair”.

          (I do find ‘murican grammar equally quaint, by the way).

          1. A number of twenty-something American women have that same tic of turning every sentence into a question? Most annoying, especially since it makes them sound ignorant and unsure of themselves.

            The last thing we need is smart, capable women guaranteeing that nobody will take them seriously because their speech patterns make them sound like they don’t take themselves seriously.

            b&

          2. Agreed, and now you mention it, when I visualise a ‘typical kiwi’ doing that they do seem to be female. Maybe it’s more noticeable with a female voice. Whereas the annoying ‘conjunction’ quirk I mentioned and the ‘rich as’ quirk are shared equally by both sexes.

          3. It’s not exactly up-talking like we hear here but I know what you mean. The inflection isn’t on each sentence either. It may be more regional as well.

      2. And to Ami ears New Zealander voices sound too weirdly kind to comment negatively on the variety of the Monther Tongue spoken by the majority of native speakers.

  22. It reminds me of the signs one sees in French one-way systems that say ‘Toutes Directions’ or sometimes ‘Autres Directions’. Occasionally one sees both on the same post, which takes a little bit of getting ones head around.

    Possibly more relevant are the signs one sees at road works that say ‘Circulation Alternee’ which mean, quite unmistakeably, ‘alternatING traffic’, usually controlled by temporary traffic lights.

    1. That would totally confuse me! I’d think toutes directions would be 2 way not one way! I’d be in a lot of accidents in France!

      1. I was a little bit loose in my description. The ‘Toutes Directions’ signs are not related to one way traffic as such, they are typically found in such places as town centres in those picturesque old towns where the streets are only 12 feet wide between buildings so traffic is routed through side streets – this often involves a One Way circulation system – which is where a ‘Toutes Directions’ sign would typically be found.

        Incidentally, I found French traffic (driving there for the first time ever) to be remarkably tolerant. A complete absence of indignant tooting, everyone just sorts it out. When the streets are so narrow and crazy-angled that no traffic rule can be sensibly applied, this is the only approach that works. I also noted this in Paris (not that I drove in Paris!) – everybody just weaves around obstructions without getting irate.

        1. I should have said “routed through a maze of side streets” – the signage is usually very good, but you do have to watch for it.

  23. Somebody should have consulted a dictionary before he started pointing out somebody else’s alleged grammar problems. See item 4 below:

    From the Merriam-Webster on-line dictionary:

    Definition of ALTERNATE

    1: occurring or succeeding by turns

    2a : arranged first on one side and then on the other at different levels or points along an axial line — compare opposite

    b: arranged one above or alongside the other

    3: every other : every second

    4: constituting an alternative

    5: alternative

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