3 ms·

What's interesting is that English doesn't have a great slot in for gendered pronouns. If we take the example from this article: - "Do you want to meet him?"

What's interesting is that English doesn't have a great slot in for gendered pronouns. If we take the example from this article: - "Do you want to meet him?" There's no genderless slot in for him/her. If you say "them" that infers multiple or an unknown party. You could use their name (e.g. "Do you want to meet Jim?") but that requires information that their system may not have. Is there a singular genderless pronoun that would fit in there? Do other languages have a similar limitation?

lostlogin 8y ago
The persons name works quite well.
- vorticalbox 8y ago
  And if you don't have a person's name? The AIs only option in English is to go for him/her.
  - jkaplowitz 8y ago
    Singular they/them works great. Only in the Victorian era did we start viewing that as a problem. It's got a way longer history than that.
  - lostlogin 8y ago
    Would you often know their gender but not their name? Additionally, if you had the person in front of you and couldn’t tell their gender, would you go 50/50?
recursive 8y ago
> Is there a singular genderless pronoun that would fit in there? By the time English gets this word, if it hasn't already, it will be "them".
jkaplowitz 8y ago
We've long had singular "them" with a history dating back to at least Chaucer. It's the best we've got. Yes, other languages have the same problem.
InclinedPlane 8y ago
Them works just fine here, get over yourself. The use of singular they in English is hundreds of years old.
- dragonwriter 8y ago
  Singular they for known specific persons is not hundreds of years old, singular they for unknown/unspecified persons (e.g., known only from a role) is. OTOH, using it as gender-neutral for a known person isn't a big stretch, and it's the least awkward option for that role.
ryanwhitney 8y ago
"Them" almost always works fine if you don't know the name. You don't really get asked "do you want to meet him?" without getting more details prior in the conversation that help set the context around group/singular.
PhasmaFelis 8y ago
"Them" has been valid English usage for centuries. It fell out of favor somewhat in the late 19th century (thanks to the same sniffy Victorian prescriptivists who decided that you shouldn't end a sentence on a preposition just because it's not allowed in Latin), but has been on the rise again for several decades. Yes, it's somewhat ambiguous, but it's grammatically correct and it's really the best option we have.
Lio 8y ago
> If you say "them" that infers multiple or an unknown party. If it's unknown you can say them. If you know the person then presumably you know their gender. Why can't you say him or her in that case? As I understand it Google is trying to avoid assigning gender statistically to an unknown person based on their job title, not avoiding using the gender to a someone who is known.

lostlogin 8y ago

The persons name works quite well.

vorticalbox 8y ago
And if you don't have a person's name? The AIs only option in English is to go for him/her.
- jkaplowitz 8y ago
  Singular they/them works great. Only in the Victorian era did we start viewing that as a problem. It's got a way longer history than that.
- lostlogin 8y ago
  Would you often know their gender but not their name? Additionally, if you had the person in front of you and couldn’t tell their gender, would you go 50/50?

recursive 8y ago

> Is there a singular genderless pronoun that would fit in there? By the time English gets this word, if it hasn't already, it will be "them".

jkaplowitz 8y ago

We've long had singular "them" with a history dating back to at least Chaucer. It's the best we've got. Yes, other languages have the same problem.

InclinedPlane 8y ago

Them works just fine here, get over yourself. The use of singular they in English is hundreds of years old.

dragonwriter 8y ago
Singular they for known specific persons is not hundreds of years old, singular they for unknown/unspecified persons (e.g., known only from a role) is. OTOH, using it as gender-neutral for a known person isn't a big stretch, and it's the least awkward option for that role.

ryanwhitney 8y ago

"Them" almost always works fine if you don't know the name. You don't really get asked "do you want to meet him?" without getting more details prior in the conversation that help set the context around group/singular.

PhasmaFelis 8y ago

"Them" has been valid English usage for centuries. It fell out of favor somewhat in the late 19th century (thanks to the same sniffy Victorian prescriptivists who decided that you shouldn't end a sentence on a preposition just because it's not allowed in Latin), but has been on the rise again for several decades. Yes, it's somewhat ambiguous, but it's grammatically correct and it's really the best option we have.

Lio 8y ago

> If you say "them" that infers multiple or an unknown party. If it's unknown you can say them. If you know the person then presumably you know their gender. Why can't you say him or her in that case? As I understand it Google is trying to avoid assigning gender statistically to an unknown person based on their job title, not avoiding using the gender to a someone who is known.