do, v.i.

[Jonathan Lighter]

Since it's on a swamp planet, I'll accept it.

JL

On Mon, Jan 17, 2011 at 5:58 PM, Ronald Butters <ronbutters at aol.com> wrote:

> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Ronald Butters <ronbutters at AOL.COM>
> Subject:      Re: do, v.i.
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Actually, I think what Christ said was "Do unto others as you would have
> them do unto you."
>
> It is transitive if you count the deleted "something" as the direct
> object--but we find a deleted something in all of JL's examples as well.
>
> "Do [something] unto others which is identical to something that you would
> like them to do to you."
>
> Even Yoda on Dagobah had some kind of implied [something}, and so did Bill
> Clinton.
>
> If Yoda, Bill Clinton, the Teabaggers, and Jesus all are doing it, does
> that make it extraordinary?
>
> On Jan 17, 2011, at 3:42 PM, Victor Steinbok wrote:
>
> > On 1/17/2011 10:17 AM, Ronald Butters wrote:
> >> Do unto others before they do unto you.
> >> ...
> >
> > I thought this template only applied to teabagging, as in "Teabag Obama
> > before he teabags you!"--which is the original phrase behind the
> > reference to Teabaggers as Teabaggers.
> >
> > Seriously, however, there is also the variant
> >
> > "Do unto others as they would do unto you."
> >
> > If this were a straight " Do unto others _what_ they would do unto you,"
> > this would be a case of transitive "do", would it not? So should we
> > treat the entire complement "as they would do unto to you" as an object?
> > [I suppose, that's a rhetorical question]
>
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