"for" = of

[Jonathan Lighter]

To me, "That's true for all people" is acceptable/standard/whatever but
nevertheless sounds slightly off if the intended meaning is "That's true
*of* all people."  Whichj is what I would say.

Without additional context, "It's certainly true of Ben" (it's one of his
characteristics) means something quite different from "It's certainly true
for Ben" (he thinks it's true even if we think it's nonsense).
Contextually, "true for" could mean either, but I doubt I would ever use it
to mean the former.  It simply sounds "funny."

But the real novelty here is "What is the capital for Kuwait."
While contextually comprehensible, it is, to me, bizarre.  I can only
imagine it in a semi-nonsensical utterance like, "Kuwait needs a capital!
Where can we find a capital for Kuwait?"

If Kuwait did need a capital, I would say something like, "The capital of
Kuwait is an important issue."  Not "The capital for Kuwait..."

OTOH, in that case one could say "A capital for Kuwait is an important
issue."  That's because _a_ capital would be something *yet to be provided*.
Once provided (_the_ actual capital),  "of" is required.

If you ask me.

JL

The problem is that different functions of "of" are involved.

JL








On Thu, Dec 10, 2009 at 6:33 PM, Benjamin Barrett <gogaku at ix.netcom.com>wrote:

> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Benjamin Barrett <gogaku at IX.NETCOM.COM>
> Subject:      Re: "for" = of
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> I'm confused about the issue of "true for" here.
>
> Isn't this just ordinary English, as in this example:
>
> That's true for all people.
>
> If you substitute "cases" for "people," then "in" works as well, but
> what else would you say here?
>
> Aloha from Maui
> Benjamin Barrett
>
> On Dec 10, 2009, at 1:26 PM, Jonathan Lighter wrote:
>
> >
> > Then something screwy is happening in the distribution of "for."
> >
> > Not even a mathematician would write, "What is the capitol for
> > Kuwait?"
> > JL
> > On Thu, Dec 10, 2009 at 2:38 PM, Charles Doyle <cdoyle at uga.edu> wrote:
> >
> >>
> >> Dipping almost randomly into early-20th-century mathematical and
> >> philosophical journals, I find an abundance of such phrasing as
> >> "true for
> >> all values of the variable."
> >>
> >> --Charlie
> >>
> >>
> >> ---- Original message ----
> >>> Date: Thu, 10 Dec 2009 12:24:32 -0500
> >>> From: American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU> (on
> >>> behalf of
> >> Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at GMAIL.COM>)
> >>> Subject: Re: "for" = of
> >>>
> >>> I still think it sounds weird.  To (or even "for") me, to "be
> >>> true for"
> >> means solely "be true in the opinion of," as in New Age-
> >> Deconstructonist
> >> contexts like, "The Law of Gravity may be true for you, but it
> >> isn't true
> >> for me."
> >>>
> >>> http://wiki.answers.com/Q/What_is_the_capitol_for_Kuwait  asks,
> >>> "What is
> >> the capitol [sic] for Kuwait?"
> >>>
> >>> JL
> >>>
> >>>
>
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