“That that” can and probably should be replaced with “that which” in almost every instance it is used.
Edit: or “when that”
I’m surprised that that is your opinion.
Put that in your thatwhich and eat it ;).
Many times you don’t need the first “that” at all.
Did you know that I play soccer?
Vs
Did you know I play soccer?
That is both true and less “demonstrative”.
Live footage of me reviewing a report that has a repeated word series like this:
Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo.
I showed my teacher a flork and now she loves them
Hahaha holy shit, some of them are way the fuck out there
What makes this a “flaw”? Also, show me a " flawless" language (a real one, not loglang or whatever)
“I would never! Not unless you were already having been going to do that!”
“wha-?”
“You heard me!”
I present the present as a present to all those present in the present tense.
Incoming James While John
Many of the at least 400 words that are technically both nouns and verbs depending on usage can form sentences of just repeating the word.
Buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo.
Echoes echoes echo Echoes’ echoes.
Mrs Miss misses misses’ Miss.
Fly flies fly.
Tests “test” test tests Tests’ test.
Reasons reason reasons.
In German the following is a completely valid sentence:
Wenn hinter Fliegen Fliegen fliegen, fliegen Fliegen Fliegen nach.
Which translates to when flies fly behind flies, then flies follow flies. The same works for seals:
Wenn hinter Robben Robben Robben, robben Robben Robben nach.
Some Hungarian prefixes can be piled on without limit, while still creating meaning.
The word “úszni” means “to swim”.
Úsztatni - to make someone or someone swim
Úsztattatni - to make someone make someone swim
Úsztattattattattattattattattattni - to make someone make someone make someone … make someone swimCan be done with any verb, and maybe some other suffixes as well.
Wow, that’s wild. Amazing language
It’s basically a mishmash of Ancient Ugric, Turkish, German, Slavic and Romani words with grammar that is an eldritch monstrosity, nobody really knows where it came from, and it is seriously weird.
There are only two real tenses, but nineteen cases and two different ways of doing imperative, which are kind of equivalent but carry cultural and tonal differences in certain contexts.
Strangely enough, this works in Finnish too:
Uida - to swim
Uittaa - to make someone or something swim
Uitattaa - to make someone make someone swim
Uitattattattattattattattattattaa - to make someone make someone make someone … make someone swim
It’s almost as if they are related languages or something.
Wenn hinter Robben Robben robben, robben Robben Robben nach.
FTFY
English has Buffalo Buffalo Buffalo Buffalo Buffalo Buffalo Buffalo
I don’t know what it means but I’ve been told it is indeed a full sentence.
Bison from Buffalo, New York bully bison from Buffalo, New York who bully other bisons.
The same works in Dutch:
Als vliegen achter vliegen vliegen, vliegen vliegen vliegen achterna.
Although my favourite form of that tongue twister is:
Als vliegende vliegen achter vliegende vliegen vliegen, vliegen de vliegende vliegen vliegensvlug.
When flying flies fly behind flying flies, the flying flies fly rapidly (“flying fast”).
The landlord of a pub called The Pig And Whistle asked a sign writer to make a new sign. When he saw it he thought that the words were too close together so he said to the sign writer “I want more space between Pig and And and And and Whistle”.
Inspired by the story, another landlord decides to name their pub “Pig and And and And and Whistle.” Lo and behold, the sign was cramped… Ther needed more space between Pig and and and and and And and And and and and and and And and And and and and and and Whistle.
You shut your whore mouth.
I think you or they added two extra ands, because the pub isn’t “Pig And And Whistle.”
Nah, it’s referring to the first space by grouping the first and second words, “Pig” and “And,” and then referring to the second space by grouping the second and third words, “And” and “Whistle.”
They said and “And” and “And” and “Whistle” tho, thats 2 extra.
“The Pig And Whistle” asked a sign writer to make a new sign.
“I want more space between “Pig” and “And”
and
[more space between] “And” and Whistle
Ovahea’s comment as I copy and paste is
Pig and And and And and Whistle”.
So if you remove the bonus ands, it becmes “Pig And And Whistle”.
But as someone else pointed out it’s the same “and”. The sign has three words on it. Between the words are spaces. How many spaces are there? What on either edge of each space?
Okay I concede that it works, albeit it requires a comma, but it also works without the redundant ands
Space between pig and and, and space between and and whistle
Yes but they have two too many, go count it.
No, more space between Pig & And + And & Whistle.
It is indeed a very convoluted way of making the requests. I would say more space between each word.
They refer to the same and twice.
then it should be separated by comma after the first and and
I don’t believe that’s accurate.
There are only two things in the list, pig & whistle.
They want more space between pig and &.
They also want more space between & and whistle.
If we were listing three areas where they want additional space we would need at least one comma, and I would argue for the Oxford comma as well, however we are only listing two areas where we want more space and so no comma is needed.
Sure it’s nearly unreadable, but I think the punctuation is correct.
If the same and is referred to twice then it should be a separate sentence clause requiring use of a comma. Since there is no comma there is no indication the and is the same both times.
Imagine saying “It was just me and dave and dave went driving” instead of “It was just me and dave, and dave went driving.” Yeah, maybe its the same dave, possibly readable, but its wrong.
(Pig and And) and (And and Whistle)
Ah see this one makes more sense but since it is a single sentence clause two of them are still redundant.
“Pig and Whistle” is what they’re asking for.
But they gave instructions for “Pig And And Whistle” in the comment I replied to.
Pig & And, And & whistle. It’s focusing on the conjunctive. ’And’ is repeated because it is pertinent in both phrases.
Pig
.
And
.
Whistle
More space between pig and and as well as between and and whistle.
Yeah thats a proper sentence but thats not what was written above.
Buffalo buffalo, Buffalo buffalo buffalo, buffalo Buffalo buffalo.
Have fun. Or an aneurysm, whichever:
Given the fact that that poem is 100 years old, I would have thought that English would have evolved to fix these issues by now. Oh well.
We need a new language I guess. Maybe it’s time to switch to the most popular language in the works (in terms of number of native speakers): Mandarin Chinese.
Maybe better use second most popular: Spanish, it at least uses same letters (differently though ¯\_(ツ)_/¯)
As someone who has studied it, have fun with that. While that poem is an outlier, there’s still a ton of things that not even inflection or context can solve.
Maybe I’m just grouchy today but how in the world does a word coming up twice in a row translate to a language being flawed?
I’m surprised that that is your criterion.
Meanwhile me getting yelled at for using ð and þ
Shavian, right?
Edit: while some might think it nuts (it’s not like GBS was universally received, he was deliberately inconsistent), the idea of rebaselining phonetics from scratch was impressive.
I borrowed some ideas from it in how I use ðem, but ð letters are old english alphabet originals, same for ƿ but ðat would incur ð wraþ of even more annoying prescriptivists
Well, I celebrate your lunacy and perseverance. Maybe go all out in a few comments. It’s like a puzzle.
About the sign “Alpha and Bravo”, the spaces between Alpha and and and and and Bravo are too large.
