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This can go on indefinitely, recursively. The story behind this sentence is of two students comparing their texts, the one with "had" (version 1), the other wi
by nathell 14y ago
This can go on indefinitely, recursively.
The story behind this sentence is of two students comparing their texts, the one with "had" (version 1), the other with "had had" version 1, yielding 11 "had"s in a row. Call that story S_0. Now imagine a story S_(n+1) where two students write texts discussing story S_n, with version 1 replaced by the consecutive row of "had"s from S_n, and version 2 replaced by a similar row of "had"s, but one longer.
- philwelch 14y agoAn example which itself suggests a possible recursion: "Wouldn't the sentence 'I want to put a hyphen between the words Fish and And and And and Chips in my Fish-And-Chips sign' have been clearer if quotation marks had been placed before Fish, and between Fish and and, and and and And, and And and and, and and and And, and And and and, and and and Chips, as well as after Chips?"
- vacri 14y agoFish and And and And and Chips The correct way to do this sentence is "I want to put hyphens between the words Fish, And,* and Chips in my Fish-And-Chips sign" *The Oxford comma makes a lot more sense because it reflects how we speak, but even if you omit it, this is the correct way to present a list of items - you don't use 'and' between every one. Edit: I was wondering which other rules I was breaking with that sentence - I'm sure there's more :)
- vorg 14y agoYou'd better write hyphens, as in "I want to put hyphens between the words Fish, And, and Chips in my Fish-And-Chips sign".
- philwelch 14y agoI'm pretty sure the correct way to write any of these grammatical puzzler sentences removes the grammatical puzzle, because grammatical puzzles are difficult and impede understanding, which is presumably the entire purpose of language to begin with.