4 ms·

What are some other clarifications to that sentence besides those in the forms "My mom and I went with my grandma to her favorite store" or "I went with my mom

What are some other clarifications to that sentence besides those in the forms "My mom and I went with my grandma to her favorite store" or "I went with my mom and grandma to my mom's favorite store"?

airstrike 3y ago
I don't love either one of these but.... My mom took my grandma and I to her favorite store My grandma and I went to my mom's favorite store with her
- hammock 3y ago
  Neither of those sentences is clear
  - nomel 3y ago
    Agreed. Ditch the ambiguous “her”. “My mom, grandma, and I went to my grandma’s favorite store.”
  - mrtranscendence 3y ago
    How about this: “It was my grandma’s birthday and we wanted to make it special! My mom, my grandma, and I all went to her favorite store.” I’d argue that using “my grandma” instead of “her” would be unpleasantly repetitive there.
    - hammock 3y ago
      That approach is marginally better. It’s still arguably unclear. The store could be your mom’s favorite store to get special gifts from If you think using Grandma three times is too much, you could replace the first Grandma in the second sentence with “she.” For instance, “she, my mom, and I went…”
- atlantic 3y ago
  My Mom went to her favourite store, and took Gran and me with her.
- theonething 3y ago
  > My mom took my grandma and I to her favorite store Shouldn't that be me, not I?
maxdoop 3y ago
Yes, you'd need to specify the subject of the sentence as you did in your second example. My rule for students is basically, "If you have the option to be re-specify the thing you're talking about, do it." That's a solid rule for standardized tests, and usually applies to everyday writing (I'll caveat that this rule clashes with "the simplest answer is the right answer", so it is dependent on the actual sentence rather than an "all-or-nothing" rule). Other common mistakes are those you hear about in middle-school (that's not a knock on anyone; rather, I say that to prove how long-ago it was that most of us ever reviewed common grammar and writing rules): "Let's eat, Grandma!" vs. "Let's eat Grandma!" Tying this back to GPT, I've read (and seen) folks write without any punctuation whatsoever. I can't speak to how GPT truly handles that, but if it's anything like "normal writing" and understanding, then punctuation is hugely important.
- lgas 3y ago
  In my experience GPT-4 does much better at handling sentences without punctuation than most people do. I think this is because as a human we might start to interpret something a certain way before we get to the end of the (possibly punctuationless) sentence and then we get stuck a bit where it's hard to adjust... but GPT-4 is trying to generate something based on probability, and all of the wrong interpretations that we might get stuck on are less probable than the proper interpretation (on average). Of course this is just my pourquoi story and I haven't done any actual tests.
hammock 3y ago
The solution is to not use a pronoun (“her”) in cases where it can’t be made clear who or what the antecedent is of that pronoun. In this case, there are two women mentioned in the sentence (not counting the first person narrator), so best to avoid “her” entirely. And yeah I split the infinitive above on purpose
- didgeoridoo 3y ago
  You of course know this but for others reading: split infinitives are a feature of the English language, not a grammatical error! In this case it lets you cleanly state the solution is “to not use…” Forcing the construction “not to use”, in contrast, ends up creating a garden-path sentence as the reader awaits what the solution actually IS (anticipating “the solution is not to use… but rather…”) Split infinitives get a bad rap because they have no equivalent in Latin, and 19th century grammarians got fussy about things like that. Use them freely!
blowski 3y ago
> My Grandma went to her favourite store with me and my Mum. Or if you have an English major: > Encased in the golden fabric of familial bonds, my sweet mother and I stood by the side of my Grandmother as we embarked upon a journey to that venerated haven of retail, which our venerable elder unequivocally deemed her most beloved store.

airstrike 3y ago

I don't love either one of these but.... My mom took my grandma and I to her favorite store My grandma and I went to my mom's favorite store with her

hammock 3y ago
Neither of those sentences is clear
- nomel 3y ago
  Agreed. Ditch the ambiguous “her”. “My mom, grandma, and I went to my grandma’s favorite store.”
- mrtranscendence 3y ago
  How about this: “It was my grandma’s birthday and we wanted to make it special! My mom, my grandma, and I all went to her favorite store.” I’d argue that using “my grandma” instead of “her” would be unpleasantly repetitive there.
  - hammock 3y ago
    That approach is marginally better. It’s still arguably unclear. The store could be your mom’s favorite store to get special gifts from If you think using Grandma three times is too much, you could replace the first Grandma in the second sentence with “she.” For instance, “she, my mom, and I went…”
atlantic 3y ago
My Mom went to her favourite store, and took Gran and me with her.
theonething 3y ago
> My mom took my grandma and I to her favorite store Shouldn't that be me, not I?

maxdoop 3y ago

Yes, you'd need to specify the subject of the sentence as you did in your second example. My rule for students is basically, "If you have the option to be re-specify the thing you're talking about, do it." That's a solid rule for standardized tests, and usually applies to everyday writing (I'll caveat that this rule clashes with "the simplest answer is the right answer", so it is dependent on the actual sentence rather than an "all-or-nothing" rule). Other common mistakes are those you hear about in middle-school (that's not a knock on anyone; rather, I say that to prove how long-ago it was that most of us ever reviewed common grammar and writing rules): "Let's eat, Grandma!" vs. "Let's eat Grandma!" Tying this back to GPT, I've read (and seen) folks write without any punctuation whatsoever. I can't speak to how GPT truly handles that, but if it's anything like "normal writing" and understanding, then punctuation is hugely important.

lgas 3y ago
In my experience GPT-4 does much better at handling sentences without punctuation than most people do. I think this is because as a human we might start to interpret something a certain way before we get to the end of the (possibly punctuationless) sentence and then we get stuck a bit where it's hard to adjust... but GPT-4 is trying to generate something based on probability, and all of the wrong interpretations that we might get stuck on are less probable than the proper interpretation (on average). Of course this is just my pourquoi story and I haven't done any actual tests.

hammock 3y ago

The solution is to not use a pronoun (“her”) in cases where it can’t be made clear who or what the antecedent is of that pronoun. In this case, there are two women mentioned in the sentence (not counting the first person narrator), so best to avoid “her” entirely. And yeah I split the infinitive above on purpose

didgeoridoo 3y ago
You of course know this but for others reading: split infinitives are a feature of the English language, not a grammatical error! In this case it lets you cleanly state the solution is “to not use…” Forcing the construction “not to use”, in contrast, ends up creating a garden-path sentence as the reader awaits what the solution actually IS (anticipating “the solution is not to use… but rather…”) Split infinitives get a bad rap because they have no equivalent in Latin, and 19th century grammarians got fussy about things like that. Use them freely!

blowski 3y ago

> My Grandma went to her favourite store with me and my Mum. Or if you have an English major: > Encased in the golden fabric of familial bonds, my sweet mother and I stood by the side of my Grandmother as we embarked upon a journey to that venerated haven of retail, which our venerable elder unequivocally deemed her most beloved store.