ASSORTED COMMENTS

[James A. Landau <JJJRLandau@netscape.com>]

On 1/14/09 at 11:48 AM Zulu minus 0500 (or should we say "negative 0500"?)
RonButters at AOL.COM wrote:
>> "I will have to convince the author to give us a quick revision of
>> her
>> article."
>>
>> My AOL spell-and-grammar checker tells me that this use of
>> "convince" is an
>> "inappropriate preposition." They suggest "persuade" instead. I
>> vaguely
>> remember that some old-time prescriptivists condemn the use of
>> "convince" as a verb
>> meaning "persuade," but this seems bizarrely old-fashioned--and
>> "preposition"
>> has nothing to do with it.

I find a subtle difference between "convince" and "persuade".  To convince someone is to successfully proselytize someone to *believe* in your idea.  To persuade someone is to get someone to perform an action you desire, whether or not you have gotten that person to believe in the value of that action.  For example, a Senator might be *persuaded* to vote for the bailout bill without having been *convinced* the bill is a good idea.

(Going back to a previous thread, I would have no problem using "somebody" instead of "someone" in the previous paragraph.)



On Thu, 15 Jan 2009 15:58:05 Zulu minus 0800 Benjamin Barrett <gogaku at IX.NETCOM.COM> wrote:

"<snip> I noticed the AHD doesn't give AUT LEE ur for "outlier." The
word Outliers is on the lips of many today as the title of Gladwell's
book. I'm trying to change from AUT LEE ur to OUT LAI ur as soon as
possible so I seem less unhip."

"Outlier" is a common jargon term in statistics; if most of your data points are clustered close together, an "outlier" is any data point which falls outside that cluster.  (This meaning is NOT in MWCD10).
I have never heard this word pronounced other than as /OUT lai @r/ where the "ou" of the first syllable is pronounced like "ou" in "outhouse" or the "au" in my last name.


On Fri, 16 Jan 2009 03:01:54 Zulu plus 0000 Tom Zurinskas <truespel at HOTMAIL.COM> writes:

"The latest awe-drop is "inaugeration" which in m-w.com is spoken in-naw-gyer-RAY-shin  ~inaugyerraeshin   being said in news media as in-nog-ger-RAY-shin  ~inaagerraeshin.   If they served egg nog, it would be an egg noggeration."

With that remark you show that you have the true ADS-L spirit(s)!


     James A. Landau
     Test Engineer
     Northrop-Grumman Information Technology
     8025 Black Horse Pike, Suite 300
     West Atlantic City NJ 08232 USA

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