4 ms·

It’s more emergent than official. It’s not something I think is ever taught in school and yet everyone intuits it with high accuracy. Even crazier is that we i

It’s more emergent than official. It’s not something I think is ever taught in school and yet everyone intuits it with high accuracy. Even crazier is that we intuitively mix this rule with another implicit rule, where “I” sounds go before “A” sounds go before “O” sounds in similar words, so “big, bad wolf” violates the normal adjective ordering rule but would sound weird any other way because of… reasons. Language is insane.

gerdesj 2y ago
You use the word intuit as a verb where I would go old school and use "understands it intuitively". You slap a letter s on the end to make the word sound correct to your ear. I will eventually use the word intuits in the same way you do but it will jar for a while. However it is concise and conveys the same meaning as "understand intuitively". As you say, language is insane. Now, adjective ordering. I think there is an "official" order but native speakers are not formally taught it because it is largely innate for us. It is likely something taught as a very advanced language feature because you can mix up the order and it still works. I think a few experiments are in order: Dark satanic mills. Jolly green giant. Large blue marble. Long winding road. Darling buds of May. Big fat Greek wedding. OK it looks like: * Emotive (jolly, happy, sad) * Quantitative (big, small, fat, tall, short) * Colour * Shape (winding) * Other adjectives - needs some work * Noun This is going to need more work but there is a bit of a pattern. What I've picked up as emotive probably includes other classes of adjectives
- vulcan01 2y ago
  > I would go old school and use "understands it intuitively" I wonder if this is a regional difference. The OED claims that intuit as a verb has been in continuous use since the 1860s (at least) and I've heard it used as a verb my entire life (various areas in the US).
  - gerdesj 2y ago
    "The OED claims that intuit as a verb has been in continuous use since the 1860s" That's a fair source but I went to a pretty posh school in Oxfordshire! Oxford was about 90p return away by bus from Abingdon in the mid to late 1980s. I studied English to O (Ordinary) level (both language and literature) and bagged a pair of Bs. I might also point out that I also attended schools in Devon, Manchester and multiple places in West Germany (UK Army brat). Obviously, absence of evidence is not evidence of absence and I have only my own recollections to go by but I have never knowingly heard intuit as a verb. I have only ever seen it written by Americans (for a given value of America)! I do like it and will fall in line forthwith!

gerdesj 2y ago

You use the word intuit as a verb where I would go old school and use "understands it intuitively". You slap a letter s on the end to make the word sound correct to your ear. I will eventually use the word intuits in the same way you do but it will jar for a while. However it is concise and conveys the same meaning as "understand intuitively". As you say, language is insane. Now, adjective ordering. I think there is an "official" order but native speakers are not formally taught it because it is largely innate for us. It is likely something taught as a very advanced language feature because you can mix up the order and it still works. I think a few experiments are in order: Dark satanic mills. Jolly green giant. Large blue marble. Long winding road. Darling buds of May. Big fat Greek wedding. OK it looks like: * Emotive (jolly, happy, sad) * Quantitative (big, small, fat, tall, short) * Colour * Shape (winding) * Other adjectives - needs some work * Noun This is going to need more work but there is a bit of a pattern. What I've picked up as emotive probably includes other classes of adjectives

vulcan01 2y ago
> I would go old school and use "understands it intuitively" I wonder if this is a regional difference. The OED claims that intuit as a verb has been in continuous use since the 1860s (at least) and I've heard it used as a verb my entire life (various areas in the US).
- gerdesj 2y ago
  "The OED claims that intuit as a verb has been in continuous use since the 1860s" That's a fair source but I went to a pretty posh school in Oxfordshire! Oxford was about 90p return away by bus from Abingdon in the mid to late 1980s. I studied English to O (Ordinary) level (both language and literature) and bagged a pair of Bs. I might also point out that I also attended schools in Devon, Manchester and multiple places in West Germany (UK Army brat). Obviously, absence of evidence is not evidence of absence and I have only my own recollections to go by but I have never knowingly heard intuit as a verb. I have only ever seen it written by Americans (for a given value of America)! I do like it and will fall in line forthwith!