3 ms·
I doubt there's any set rule but it seems to depend on strength of association. For example it's natural to say "red big toe" because "big toe" is already a str
by zeteo 12y ago
I doubt there's any set rule but it seems to depend on strength of association. For example it's natural to say "red big toe" because "big toe" is already a strong association. Another case where "big" has a stronger association than color would be "white big brother".
On the other hand "red barn" has its own strong association [1]. Hypothetically if we lived in a community of farmers where "big barn" and "small barn" were structures with very different purposes (but color didn't matter much), it may be possible to conceive of "red big barn" instead.
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Barn http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Barn
- robotresearcher 12y ago> "red big toe" because "big toe" is already a strong association. That's because "big toe" is a compound noun that refers to one of your innermost toes only. "big red toe" and "red big toe" mean different things. The set of things they could refer to is different. In your barn example the same thing is true.
- zeteo 12y agoI see your point about the compound noun, but is there something in between when we care more about size than color? I'm thinking of a phrase like "we all went fishing and caught little fish, except for John who caught a black-striped big fish". Does this sound natural to anyone else?