4 ms·

English is the c++ of languages. Wildly useful and used, has accrued eons of complexity, has original sins coming from its parents' and everybody uses it differ

English is the c++ of languages. Wildly useful and used, has accrued eons of complexity, has original sins coming from its parents' and everybody uses it differently

j45 3y ago
Maybe JavaScript sans frameworks
ta23 3y ago
>has original sins coming frome its parents Not really. Its biggest sin is melting-potting too many parents, resulting in an irredeemable mess. And even totally unrelated to the parents: The languages around the globe largely agree on the five vocals. There may be one or two missing at times, but they are pretty much the same everywhere you go, European-descent or not, and then you got fucking English. Where an "a" is more often than not an "e" (or even an "o" like in "ball"). Where an "e" is usually an "i". Where an "i" is pronounced as if it had an "a" in front of it, and where "u" for some fucked up reason has a "y" or "j" in front of it. Granted, "o" is fine as long as you don't double it ("oo") and it becomes an "u". And that's regular British English. American English makes things even worse. English is more like Visual Basic.
- Aloha 3y ago
  ... or PHP Yeah, english is a lot like PHP.
  - coffeebeqn 3y ago
    JavaScript . Everyone has to know it but no one who learned it really loves it
- OkayPhysicist 3y ago
  The chaos that is English vowel spelling comes from the fact that vowels in English are relatively unimportant in differentiating words, and thus allow for a lot drift before becoming unintelligible. If you replace all the sounds in the previous sentence with a long 'a' as in "cane" you'll sound ridiculous, but pretty much intelligible. Even more so if you replace all the vowels with some sort of "shwa" vowel. This creates a lot of English accents, which fundamentally disagree about the pronunciation of different vowels. Even if the accepted spelling accurately represents how the writer speaks, it could be absolutely different from how the reader speaks. It also creates a tendency to let unemphasized vowels slip into a generic "au"-ish sound, which is where the "o" in "ball" comes from.

English is the c++ of languages. Wildly useful and used, has accrued eons of complexity, has original sins coming from its parents' and everybody uses it differently

j45 3y ago

Maybe JavaScript sans frameworks

ta23 3y ago

>has original sins coming frome its parents Not really. Its biggest sin is melting-potting too many parents, resulting in an irredeemable mess. And even totally unrelated to the parents: The languages around the globe largely agree on the five vocals. There may be one or two missing at times, but they are pretty much the same everywhere you go, European-descent or not, and then you got fucking English. Where an "a" is more often than not an "e" (or even an "o" like in "ball"). Where an "e" is usually an "i". Where an "i" is pronounced as if it had an "a" in front of it, and where "u" for some fucked up reason has a "y" or "j" in front of it. Granted, "o" is fine as long as you don't double it ("oo") and it becomes an "u". And that's regular British English. American English makes things even worse. English is more like Visual Basic.

Aloha 3y ago
... or PHP Yeah, english is a lot like PHP.
- coffeebeqn 3y ago
  JavaScript . Everyone has to know it but no one who learned it really loves it
OkayPhysicist 3y ago
The chaos that is English vowel spelling comes from the fact that vowels in English are relatively unimportant in differentiating words, and thus allow for a lot drift before becoming unintelligible. If you replace all the sounds in the previous sentence with a long 'a' as in "cane" you'll sound ridiculous, but pretty much intelligible. Even more so if you replace all the vowels with some sort of "shwa" vowel. This creates a lot of English accents, which fundamentally disagree about the pronunciation of different vowels. Even if the accepted spelling accurately represents how the writer speaks, it could be absolutely different from how the reader speaks. It also creates a tendency to let unemphasized vowels slip into a generic "au"-ish sound, which is where the "o" in "ball" comes from.