Zompist Bboard Again

Posted: **Thu Jan 15, 2026 6:51 am**

Travis B. wrote: ↑Wed Jan 14, 2026 4:33 pm
Raphael wrote: ↑Wed Jan 14, 2026 4:31 pm But how are they different in the first place?
WINE is plain old [w]. WHINE is a voiceless labiovelar fricative.

Interesting reminder of how clueless I still am about a lot of stuff that everyone else here knows as a matter of course.

I initially came to the ZBB's earliest predecessor as a fan of zompist's work, and then stayed for the cultural, historical, and SF and fantasy related stuff, and the general geekery. I never had any formal training in linguistics, and, frankly, out of all the aspects of human culture, language is the one that interests me least. To the extent that it interests me, it's mainly through its interactions with other aspects of culture.

What I know about linguistics is mostly stuff I picked up through osmosis by hanging out on the ZBB for so much of this century so far. But that was, of course, not systematic in any way, and it left me with a lot of gaps in my understanding. And these gaps can have the effect that when I see terms here that I don't know that well, I can get weird mental associations based on which other words these terms look like.

So, for instance, when I see people here talking about fricatives, I first and foremost think of fricassée, and then I get hungry. When I see people here talking about plosives, I wonder what's exploding, and where, and whether the explosion is close enough that I should take cover. And what I think about when see people here talking about clitics isn't entirely family-friendly.

Posted: **Thu Jan 15, 2026 8:19 am**

Raphael wrote: ↑Thu Jan 15, 2026 6:51 am
Travis B. wrote: ↑Wed Jan 14, 2026 4:33 pm
Raphael wrote: ↑Wed Jan 14, 2026 4:31 pm But how are they different in the first place?
WINE is plain old [w]. WHINE is a voiceless labiovelar fricative.
Interesting reminder of how clueless I still am about a lot of stuff that everyone else here knows as a matter of course.

I initially came to the ZBB's earliest predecessor as a fan of zompist's work, and then stayed for the cultural, historical, and SF and fantasy related stuff, and the general geekery. I never had any formal training in linguistics, and, frankly, out of all the aspects of human culture, language is the one that interests me least. To the extent that it interests me, it's mainly through its interactions with other aspects of culture.

What I know about linguistics is mostly stuff I picked up through osmosis by hanging out on the ZBB for so much of this century so far. But that was, of course, not systematic in any way, and it left me with a lot of gaps in my understanding. And these gaps can have the effect that when I see terms here that I don't know that well, I can get weird mental associations based on which other words these terms look like.

So, for instance, when I see people here talking about fricatives, I first and foremost think of fricassée, and then I get hungry. When I see people here talking about plosives, I wonder what's exploding, and where, and whether the explosion is close enough that I should take cover. And what I think about when see people here talking about clitics isn't entirely family-friendly.

Mind you, if you asked most non-elderly Americans about what the difference between WINE and WHINE was, they'd probably say "what difference?"

Posted: **Thu Jan 15, 2026 9:19 am**

Raphael wrote: ↑Thu Jan 15, 2026 6:51 am
Travis B. wrote: ↑Wed Jan 14, 2026 4:33 pm
Raphael wrote: ↑Wed Jan 14, 2026 4:31 pm But how are they different in the first place?
WINE is plain old [w]. WHINE is a voiceless labiovelar fricative.
Interesting reminder of how clueless I still am about a lot of stuff that everyone else here knows as a matter of course.

I initially came to the ZBB's earliest predecessor as a fan of zompist's work, and then stayed for the cultural, historical, and SF and fantasy related stuff, and the general geekery. I never had any formal training in linguistics, and, frankly, out of all the aspects of human culture, language is the one that interests me least. To the extent that it interests me, it's mainly through its interactions with other aspects of culture.

What I know about linguistics is mostly stuff I picked up through osmosis by hanging out on the ZBB for so much of this century so far. But that was, of course, not systematic in any way, and it left me with a lot of gaps in my understanding. And these gaps can have the effect that when I see terms here that I don't know that well, I can get weird mental associations based on which other words these terms look like.

So, for instance, when I see people here talking about fricatives, I first and foremost think of fricassée, and then I get hungry. When I see people here talking about plosives, I wonder what's exploding, and where, and whether the explosion is close enough that I should take cover. And what I think about when see people here talking about clitics isn't entirely family-friendly.

Fair. You can build a good conworld without heavily embarking on its languages. George R. R. Martin has himself admitted that he isn't much of a conlanger, which is the reason why HBO hired David J. Peterson to build the conlangs for Game of Thrones. Eoin Colfer just created a 1:1 letter substitution cipher for Artemis Fowl. The Star Wars languages are notoriously fake, those that sound like human languages are either repurposed natlangs or random gibberish, and the others are just meaningless squeaks from a synthesizer. And so on. J. R. R. Tolkien was an exception, not the rule - don't forget that he was an academic linguist.

And a world builder may of course have a blank spot, a facet of world building they are not an expert in and which they therefore leave unexplored. Mine are sports and cuisine; yours is language. There's nothing wrong with that. If you find no fun in building something, just don't do it.

Posted: **Thu Jan 15, 2026 10:48 am**

Travis B. wrote: ↑Wed Jan 14, 2026 4:33 pm
Raphael wrote: ↑Wed Jan 14, 2026 4:31 pm But how are they different in the first place?
WINE is plain old [w]. WHINE is a voiceless labiovelar fricative.

Wikipedia calls it a voiceless labiovelar approximant, i.e. the voiceless counterpart of the /w/.

JAL

Posted: **Thu Jan 15, 2026 11:02 am**

jal wrote: ↑Thu Jan 15, 2026 10:48 am
Travis B. wrote: ↑Wed Jan 14, 2026 4:33 pm
Raphael wrote: ↑Wed Jan 14, 2026 4:31 pm But how are they different in the first place?
WINE is plain old [w]. WHINE is a voiceless labiovelar fricative.
Wikipedia calls it a voiceless labiovelar approximant, i.e. the voiceless counterpart of the /w/.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voiceless ... _fricative states basically that it's either a fricative or approximant depending on who you ask, and that up to 1979 it was treated as voiceless [w] according to the IPA people but since then has been treated as a fricative officially.

Posted: **Thu Jan 15, 2026 2:14 pm**

bradrn wrote: ↑Wed Jan 14, 2026 2:47 pm
alice wrote: ↑Wed Jan 14, 2026 2:31 pm
jcb wrote: ↑Wed Jan 14, 2026 3:13 am How do people pronounce "while"? I've realized that when it's a preposition, I always pronounce it /wAl/, identical to "wall", but when it's a noun ("I'll be gone a while."), it's /wAjl/, rhyming with "tile" /tAjl/ (which is distinct from "tall" /tAl/).
Always /ʍail/ for me, rhyming with "tile".
Huh, so you also lack the WINE-WHINE merger. For me that’s been one of the more surprising things about Scottish English.

The <H> is there for a reason, you know

Posted: **Thu Jan 15, 2026 2:18 pm**

alice wrote: ↑Thu Jan 15, 2026 2:14 pm
bradrn wrote: ↑Wed Jan 14, 2026 2:47 pm
alice wrote: ↑Wed Jan 14, 2026 2:31 pm

Always /ʍail/ for me, rhyming with "tile".
Huh, so you also lack the WINE-WHINE merger. For me that’s been one of the more surprising things about Scottish English.
The <H> is there for a reason, you know

Yes, to give English spelling that little bit of extra je ne sais quoi.

Posted: **Thu Jan 15, 2026 2:34 pm**

alice wrote: ↑Thu Jan 15, 2026 2:14 pm
bradrn wrote: ↑Wed Jan 14, 2026 2:47 pm

Huh, so you also lack the WINE-WHINE merger. For me that’s been one of the more surprising things about Scottish English.
The <H> is there for a reason, you know

To give people something to whine about?

Posted: **Wed Jan 21, 2026 3:09 pm**

Question about meaning. In The Hobbit, when the elves have captured Thorin, the text says:

Then the elves put thongs on him, and shut him in one of the inmost caves with strong wooden doors, and left him.

I assume "thongs" here refer to what Merriam Webster describes as "a strip especially of leather or hide". That invokes with me an image of his hands being tied, and/or his feet. But what use is that when he's put in a prison cell, and also they fed him so he must've had his hand free. So what do you think Tolkien meant here? Did Thorin have some kind of leather shackles?

JAL

Posted: **Wed Jan 21, 2026 5:07 pm**

jal wrote: ↑Wed Jan 21, 2026 3:09 pm
Then the elves put thongs on him, and shut him in one of the inmost caves with strong wooden doors, and left him.
I assume "thongs" here refer to what Merriam Webster describes as "a strip especially of leather or hide". That invokes with me an image of his hands being tied, and/or his feet. But what use is that when he's put in a prison cell, and also they fed him so he must've had his hand free. So what do you think Tolkien meant here? Did Thorin have some kind of leather shackles?

That's the idea, I think. But there's no mention of the thongs when Bilbo found him later or freed him. He was in some dark cellar, so maybe the idea is that they bound him only while transporting him to his cell.

Posted: **Thu Jan 22, 2026 7:08 am**

zompist wrote: ↑Wed Jan 21, 2026 5:07 pmThat's the idea, I think. But there's no mention of the thongs when Bilbo found him later or freed him. He was in some dark cellar, so maybe the idea is that they bound him only while transporting him to his cell.

Yeah, that's what I was thinking as well, but given they quite outnumbered him, that seems also strange. Not the first time Tolkien wrote something head-scratching :D.

JAL

Posted: **Fri Jan 23, 2026 1:22 pm**

Which tense of the verb "to have" should you use if you want to indicate that someone or something in the past had/has something in common with someone or something in the present? As in, "There are/were many differences between the 20 year old and the 80 year old version of Jane Smith, but one thing they have/had i common is..."

Posted: **Fri Jan 23, 2026 1:38 pm**

Raphael wrote: ↑Fri Jan 23, 2026 1:22 pm Which tense of the verb "to have" should you use if you want to indicate that someone or something in the past had/has something in common with someone or something in the present? As in, "There are/were many differences between the 20 year old and the 80 year old version of Jane Smith, but one thing they have/had i common is..."

Have, I think.

Posted: **Fri Jan 23, 2026 2:02 pm**

Raphael wrote: ↑Fri Jan 23, 2026 1:22 pm Which tense of the verb "to have" should you use if you want to indicate that someone or something in the past had/has something in common with someone or something in the present? As in, "There are/were many differences between the 20 year old and the 80 year old version of Jane Smith, but one thing they have/had i common is..."

‘Have’, I think, though admittedly I’m a little confused about what you’re asking.

Posted: **Fri Jan 23, 2026 2:31 pm**

It's a bit hard to think of a context for this. In a story I'd expect the past tense. But maybe a newspaper article or something.

"There is one similarity between George Clooney and Kublai Khan: they both have a soft spot for Buddhism."

Honestly both have and had sound weird here. I'd probably rephrase:

"There is one similarity between George Clooney and Kublai Khan: a soft spot for Buddhism."

Posted: **Fri Jan 23, 2026 2:38 pm**

Thank you, Lērisama and bradrn!

I was thinking about something like, "Compare and contrast the Birmingham of 1954 and the Birmingham of today. How [are/were] the different? How [are/were] they similar? What [do/did] they have in common?" Square brackets indicate where I'm not sure which word to use.

zompist: Yes, it's probably best to rephrase. The context that made me think of all this was the question of what, if any, similarities there might be between young radically left-wing boomers in the 1960s and elderly fascist boomers in the 2020s. But I didn't want to derail this thread into politics.

Posted: **Fri Jan 23, 2026 3:00 pm**

Raphael wrote: ↑Fri Jan 23, 2026 2:38 pm Thank you, Lērisama and bradrn!

I was thinking about something like, "Compare and contrast the Birmingham of 1954 and the Birmingham of today. How [are/were] the different? How [are/were] they similar? What [do/did] they have in common?" Square brackets indicate where I'm not sure which word to use.

zompist: Yes, it's probably best to rephrase. The context that made me think of all this was the question of what, if any, similarities there might be between young radically left-wing boomers in the 1960s and elderly fascist boomers in the 2020s. But I didn't want to derail this thread into politics.

What might work for you is what we could call the "immersive present tense." E.g. I don't think anyone would bat an eye at a passage like this:

"Consider the London of 1963. The war is over, a new generation barely remembers its privations. They want to dance, drink, and have a good time."

Alternatively, you could use the recent past instead of the present. "The Boomer of 1966 smoked dope and debated socialism. In 2016 he railed against Joe Biden and wondered where his walker went."

(Also, don't blame anything on me, I'm Generation Jones.)

Posted: **Fri Jan 23, 2026 3:12 pm**

Raphael wrote: ↑Fri Jan 23, 2026 2:38 pmI was thinking about something like, "Compare and contrast the Birmingham of 1954 and the Birmingham of today. How [are/were] they different? How [are/were] they similar? What [do/did] they have in common?" Square brackets indicate where I'm not sure which word to use.

I'd say "are" and "do" are the only options. You just can't refer to the present with a past tense. In fact, I think that even when you'd say "Compare the London of 1945 with the London of 1955", using "how are they different" is fine, since the differences themselves still exist.

JAL

Posted: **Fri Jan 23, 2026 3:15 pm**

zompist wrote: ↑Fri Jan 23, 2026 3:00 pm

(Also, don't blame anything on me, I'm Generation Jones.)

That's actually what I was planning to tell you if you would have been offended by my statement.

Posted: **Mon Feb 02, 2026 5:39 am**

What do you call the process or act of not eating or drinking anything for a while before a medical examination?

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