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Shortening The?

Posted: Mon Jul 08, 2013 7:16 pm
by Slava
What a silly suggestion! Gotta love it for it's oddity. Yes, someone has proposed a new character to replace the word the.

Enjoy:

http://www.theatlanticwire.com/technolo ... the/66873/

Re: Shortening The?

Posted: Tue Jul 09, 2013 10:28 am
by Perry Lassiter
Since we steal from Latin all the time, why not steal from Hebrew? They handle both "the" and "and" efficiently with one letter. The Hebrew definite article is similar to our letter H as a prefix. The most frequent Hebrew conjunction is written something like a close parenthesis, ), just a letter stroke. Sometimes they seem to use it like a boxcar coupler, stringing a bunch of words together. Pick up the KJV of the OT and open at random. Or try Genesis 1. All those "and"s in there are waws, also called waw consecutives. They are little more than a quick slash, like the lower case l. So handy they used way too many, and modern translations write around them.

Re: Shortening The?

Posted: Tue Jul 09, 2013 11:11 pm
by saparris
Lts jst frgt vwls. Dh!

Re: Shortening The?

Posted: Wed Jul 10, 2013 11:39 am
by Perry Lassiter
Also like the Hebrews. The Old Testament text had no vowels until a group of scholars standardized the vowels between the 7th and 10th centuries. Changing vowels can change the meaning. Try comparing two or three verses in Proverbs in differing translations. You are almost certain to wonder how they can be so different. The answer is most often a dispute about vowels.

Re: Shortening The?

Posted: Thu Jul 11, 2013 11:47 pm
by Philip Hudson
As Perry said, ancient Hebrew had no symbols for vowels. English could use a few more symbols for vowels. If we went down that slippery slope, however, we might end up with a plethora of vowels.

Re: Shortening The?

Posted: Fri Jul 12, 2013 3:29 pm
by Perry Lassiter
A plethora or superfluity?

Re: Shortening The?

Posted: Sat Jul 13, 2013 12:32 am
by Philip Hudson
A plethora, a superfluity or as the common cant has it, tons. I think tons is a word that has been marred by misuse.