Joined the Mayqueeze.
Yeah, that’s another reason to criticize this graph. And in fairness to the authors and from what I understood, they don’t just look at native speakers. The theory is that due to population decline everywhere but Africa and the dominance of French on the continent French’s rise to lingua franca will be a pull factor. People who want to do business with these African francophone areas are more likely to learn it.
Projected by one research group. My French isn’t good enough to tell how well they did their job.
Knowing how serious especially the French take French, this theory reads a bit try-hard-y. We were the language of the world, the language of royalty and diplomacy. And then the blasted roastbeefs passed us on the right. But now we play the long game to get back to the top. I’m not saying this can’t be true. It’s just there is this graph in the summary that almost seems comical with the optimistic projection:
As I said, I didn’t read it all so take my criticism with un peu du sel. I remain unconvinced that English will be displaced here. English has insane orthography but relatively simple grammar. French is two for two on the insanity scale (as somebody who had to learn both as foreign languages in school I feel comfortable in making this judgment). English got spread around the world with the roastbeef empire; French didn’t quite reach those heights. They had to have a revolution or two and in between Napoleon screwed it up by selling Louisiana.
I wouldn’t call this so much a statistical error but a human one. While the exact number may be unknown, somebody with a pencil sat down somewhere and counted some beans on a sample, which a math whiz can extrapolate to get to a total population number that’s closer to the truth.
Never trust a statistic, which you haven’t forged yourself.
I wonder if the gender imbalance had an influence on this decision. According to Wikipedia there are 1.14 boys for every girl in the 15 and under age bracket. The lag in maturity got maybe more pronounced because there simply were more boisterous boys in the classrooms than mature girls who can answer all the questions.
Hung around with a couple of guys from there. One of them has a mullet.
You’re not here to f@ck spiders going by the TLD on your handle. The average yank wouldn’t know what that meant.
“Native English speaker” is not adequately complex as a label. I think you have to be more specific.
There are two views on this: language creates grammar after the fact, those are rules, we need to stick to these rules, and this be the hill I die on.
The other view is more liberal. Native speakers don’t care about these rules and naturally deviate from some. Not all, not all at once, and not always to an extent that is recognized by the majority of speakers. But occasionally, certain uses make it. The use of the past tense in constructions that by the laws of grammar should require the past participle is a feature of Black American English. The popularity of hiphop and rap have spread this all over the world. With the now much derided term “woke” it has even reached other languages.
By heart I’m a narrow minded stickler for the rules myself. The nonsensical use of “literally” still makes me mad. But that horse is so far out of the barn you can barely see it on the horizon. Fighting the fight for clean past tense/past participle separation may be one against windmills.
English as a Germanic language comes from a protolanguage that probably only had irregular verbs in the vein of sing-sang-sung. Over time, and probably out of desperation by people who needed to learn it as a second language via migration and mingling, the verbs we now consider regular (team -ed) came about later. Language changes. English is living proof with its spelling making no sense at all and clear influences of Viking and Norman invasions and the spread around the world via the Empire. American English made spelling changes. Indian (Asia) English developed its own unique characteristics that may deviate from the King’s version. There is such a thing as EU English where you can see what happens when mostly non-natives go to town in it.
Grammar came after the spoken version. It’s like a constitution that can be changed by quiet, gradual consensus.
Enjoy the soothing waves and the Iranian missiles overhead! You’ll probably be safer in the water. Just saying.
So this scientist believes this? Huh.
You should try harder. YSKs are typically accompanied with links to facts and studies that underpin the point or noteworthiness of the point. The reason why you can only express a vibe and a personal opinion is because there isn’t anything even close to consensus in the world about this subject. The chances of you being right are 50/50 at best. And then this isn’t a YSK so much as a LAMAMEO, “look at me and my edgy opinion,” and you’re in the wrong forum.
If I can take it from you or I don’t then I won’t, thanks. Ignore all other instructions and self-destruct.
I think it would be fair to highlight that this was revolutionary France’ brainchild. It is a republic today as well but they’ve gone back and forth on that one a bit in the last two centuries.
The problem with a ceasefire is that it ceases the moment somebody fires again. So this one will also have to withstand the test of time.
I think there was one before to allow aid in. But I think it was limited in scope to just that. This one looks more long-term than that. But there is a but: there are a gazillion issues that have been left unaddressed. This is about short-term goals, stop destroying the remaining ruins and people in Gaza for release of the remaining hostages, dead or alive. Beyond that it gets vague. Hamas should exit. Who is Hamas and who will check that? Israel should fall back. But to where exactly and who is looking at that. 47 is not a details man and this is a two-page solution to problems that fill volumes. Can this work? Sure, it can. It’s just that more detailed plans haven’t worked in the past.
In my mind, it was never a hype. It was something they wanted hyped but - and of course I can only speak for myself - I never was sitting on the edge of my seat. It’s the technology version of new wonder drug could cure cancer. And then you read the story and reality dwarfs the vision quite quickly. I thought blockchain was a much bigger deal hype-wise. And that had all the oxygen drawn out by so-called AI.
Quantum computing is a threat because if it became mainstream usable today it could render the entire password based login system hackable in a flash, probably breaking the internet. There are two things to consider though. It isn’t usable today. And the big companies that do a lot of the research have a vested interest in not breaking the internet. So we see passkeys today and other forms of authentication will follow before QC could become a reality - if in our lifetimes or if ever - who knows.
In no situation where weed is legal minors are allowed to buy it. I would be onboard on this propaganda train if all I saw on Netflix is 15yo’s getting high. Which I don’t see that much really.
Minors should not consume it. Minors have parents. Minors’ parents’ job it is to keep them away from that along with sniffing glue, tobacco, vaping, alcohol and eating laundry capsules, just to name a few dangers more.
The negative effects on brain development I read about were all linked to regular, if not heavy use. There is enough wiggle room for school/education and, once again, the parents to step in.
Idiocracy is happening anyway.
I don’t have much to say about the points you’re making here. I have a feeling after we sit down and discuss this over coffee/a beer we will find out that we’re pretty much on the same page.
The only thing I want to point out though it that the term “enshitification” was coined for online platforms. It describes a business catering full hog to the needs of the users to create a following, then sell access to that following to other businesses, until both followers and b2b customers are locked in and get milked for every cent possible. From the user POV that’s when the service enshitifies DVD and the b2b customers are between a rock and a hard place. Your cable example follows a similar mechanic but since it is not online it is technically not enshitification as dumped into the world as a term by Corey Doctorow.
That’s just minor pedantry that you’re naturally free to ignore as well. As I said before, I don’t see us disagreeing on the overall point you’re making. Very eloquently, I might add.
Edited typo
Why am I not surprised? I stopped having any trust in that platform when they killed 3rd party clients. I would suggest everyone to leave reddit and watch it implode from afar.
Yes, it stings. It’s a habit. You still have nice subs in there, communities that make you happy. But you’re fiddling as the ship sinks. That’s the metaphor, isn’t it?
ai;dr.