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[Axxle]

Decline of civility in the Possession in one-player games -- Important? thread.

[Donald X.]

There are limits to descriptivism!  Unless you think there is literally no such thing as an incorrect usage of language.

It's all about usage. If you switch bus and weasel, you're just some guy doing that. If everyone does it, that's the language. At some middle point, you have alternate meanings that some people like to complain about despite their proven success.

I don't do it to feel superior.  Prescriptivism is not all about being snooty and pointing out mistakes.  Rules are important because incorrect usage makes it more difficult to communicate effectively.  For example, transposition of literally/figuratively make it difficult for me to write "literally" and predict that my audience will understand my true meaning.

No-one ever transposes "literally"/"figuratively." "Literally" does not mean "figuratively" in the complained-about usages. The idea that it is being used to mean "figuratively" is just crazy.

Making it harder for you to use the word "literally" to mean "actually" is just something languages do; sure it would be nice if there were no homonyms and you could tell how to pronounce a word from the spelling and ad infinitum, but whatever, languages have these things whether you like it or not. I'm sure the people who were using "literally" to mean "word for word" were sad when people started using it to mean "actually." Couldn't people just say "actually" if they meant "actually?" Why did they need to spoil the word "literally?"

[Donald X.]

Wow, angry much?

Man, you were the one calling Americans lazy.

And you're making the ridiculous assumption that I'm some kind of elitist grammar maven when I just pointed out, hey, if you don't care at all, that means that you couldn't care less. Don't read too deeply into it. Clearly I am not reading deeply into the irony that people elect to use by using "could" instead of "couldn't," because most people whom I have heard use "could" do not actually identify any mistakes in the literal meaning of the expression. They think that it means exactly what they think it means, and those who give it an extra moment of thought wonder whether the proper formulation uses the positive or negative. Then they decide that it's not worth their time or effort and proceed with using the literally incorrect formulation. Isn't this being "lazy?"

No, they are using an English idiom as it is commonly used; they are speaking English.

Complaining about people using a normal English idiom to mean what everyone knows it means, that makes you a grammar maven, to use the Steven Pinker term that I guess you know all about. Your pet peeve is people saying they could care less; my pet peeve is language prescriptivists.

[DStu]

I don't understand how everybody is nitpicking language if there is something Dominion--related to nitpick...  Ah, forget it, now it's not funny anymore. 

[Kirian]

http://www.worldwidewords.org/qa/qa-ico1.htm

"Could care less" truly is an American thing.  The OED indicates it's an American colloquialism.  That doesn't mean Americans are lazy; after all, it's the British who call French fries "chips" and strollers "prams."  This article is interesting, as it suggests the dropping of "n't" may come about from cadence implying sarcasm rather than word meaning implying sarcasm.

http://www.slate.com/articles/life/the_good_word/2005/11/the_word_we_love_to_hate.single.html

It's amusing that the trend with "literally" is actually the opposite direction everyone thinks it is.  It's been used to mean "figuratively" since the 18th century, but that usage is becoming less and less accepted... not more and more accepted!

Meanwhile, I suspect there is both a slim chance and a fat chance of all of us in this thread agreeing on these usages.  I personally dislike the use of these words to mean their opposites, not because it's wrong, but because most people don't understand that the ironic usage is ironic.

Take this with 0.001 mol of sodium chloride, as it comes from someone who prefers the Oxford comma.

(What's the difference between a random Internet grammar Nazi, and someone who actually knows grammar?  The former doesn't realize that there is a verb "to effect" and a noun "affect.")

[GendoIkari]

I guess I'm in the minority... I voted the second option. It's not going to affect my decision to play or not play Goko, but if it's not working correctly, I think it is a cause for concern about the overall quality of code and implementation of Dominion itself. Sure, there are certain edge cases and very weird interactions that probably need to be dealt with on a specific card basis. But as a whole, the code should be organized in such a way that interactions just follow the rule book and the text of the cards... see the on-gain effects flowchart provided by LastFootnote.

If for some reason Possession in single-player mode doesn't work right, it would make me question the quality of the code and the QA process. As a programmer, I find that often times if the code suddenly breaks because the user does something that users don't usually do, it's not because I have to specifically account for the user possibly doing that; it's because the code was poorly written to begin with.

[GendoIkari]

All that said... what IS the actual "correct" rules for one-player Possession? What if, on my Possession turn, I play Ironworks to gain a Great Hall? If it were a 2-player game, you would get no bonus from Ironworks. Do you get a bonus here? My guess:

I am Possessing myself... I play Ironworks, choose Great Hall. I am about to gain Great Hall... Possession kicks in and prevents the gain, replacing it with a different gain. Therefore, no bonus from Ironworks.

[shark_bait]

Take this with 0.001 mol of sodium chloride, as it comes from someone who prefers the Oxford comma.

That's um... actually quite a big grain of salt.

[(0.001 mol NaCl) * (55.45 g NaCl/mol)*(2.16cm^3 NaCl/g)]^(1/3) = 0.3 cm width of cube for said grain of salt.

[Kirian]

Take this with 0.001 mol of sodium chloride, as it comes from someone who prefers the Oxford comma.

That's um... actually quite a big grain of salt.

[(0.001 mol NaCl) * (55.45 g NaCl/mol)*(2.16cm^3 NaCl/g)]^(1/3) = 0.3 cm width of cube for said grain of salt.

Yes, it was intended to be a large grain of salt. (Though I get 0.5 cm on a side, which is a good size for driveway salt.)

(I don't start lecturing on stoichiometry until next week.)

[shark_bait]

Take this with 0.001 mol of sodium chloride, as it comes from someone who prefers the Oxford comma.

That's um... actually quite a big grain of salt.

[(0.001 mol NaCl) * (55.45 g NaCl/mol)*(2.16cm^3 NaCl/g)]^(1/3) = 0.3 cm width of cube for said grain of salt.

Yes, it was intended to be a large grain of salt. (Though I get 0.5 cm on a side, which is a good size for driveway salt.)

(I don't start lecturing on stoichiometry until next week.)

For driveway salt we'd have to make some maladjustments I think.  I hear that people like to put things with more than 2 ionic species in that due to colligative properties of melting point depression.

Those cold days of winter can be nasty! 

[Kirian]

Take this with 0.001 mol of sodium chloride, as it comes from someone who prefers the Oxford comma.

That's um... actually quite a big grain of salt.

[(0.001 mol NaCl) * (55.45 g NaCl/mol)*(2.16cm^3 NaCl/g)]^(1/3) = 0.3 cm width of cube for said grain of salt.

Yes, it was intended to be a large grain of salt. (Though I get 0.5 cm on a side, which is a good size for driveway salt.)

(I don't start lecturing on stoichiometry until next week.)

For driveway salt we'd have to make some maladjustments I think.  I hear that people like to put things with more than 2 ionic species in that due to colligative properties of melting point depression.

Those cold days of winter can be nasty! 

Most driveway salt, and certainly the stuff they use on roads, is mined rock salt, which is probably 80% NaCl with some nitrates.  Sure, you can buy special stuff for home use, which is usually calcium chloride, but it actually isn't better due to colligative properties (it's more massive per ion than NaCl), but because of its greater solubility, lower eutectic point (-50 C) and highly negative heat of solution (-120 kJ/mol).

OK, we now return you to your regularly-scheduled lack of actual discussion about the original topic.

[DStu]

All that said... what IS the actual "correct" rules for one-player Possession? What if, on my Possession turn, I play Ironworks to gain a Great Hall? If it were a 2-player game, you would get no bonus from Ironworks. Do you get a bonus here? My guess:

I am Possessing myself... I play Ironworks, choose Great Hall. I am about to gain Great Hall... Possession kicks in and prevents the gain, replacing it with a different gain. Therefore, no bonus from Ironworks.

So as we are know at least half-way back to topic, maybe I anyway note that the correct way of working for all cards in one player is not to work.

[GendoIkari]

All that said... what IS the actual "correct" rules for one-player Possession? What if, on my Possession turn, I play Ironworks to gain a Great Hall? If it were a 2-player game, you would get no bonus from Ironworks. Do you get a bonus here? My guess:

I am Possessing myself... I play Ironworks, choose Great Hall. I am about to gain Great Hall... Possession kicks in and prevents the gain, replacing it with a different gain. Therefore, no bonus from Ironworks.

So as we are know at least half-way back to topic, maybe I anyway note that the correct way of working for all cards in one player is not to work.

True... but although the game of Dominion doesn't officially support 1 player, there is nothing in any of the card or instruction wordings that should prevent the game from behaving in a predictable manor while playing a 1-player variant. I think all you have to do is agree that "the player to your left" or "the player to your right" is yourself. After that, I don't see any cards that require opponent's, though some cards become terrible if you don't have opponents (Saboteur, Sea Hag, Pirate Ship).

The only question I can think of that the rules don't address is the number of victory cards to use. Iso uses 8 of each for solitaire, but I think you could make a good argument for using 4 of each instead; since in 2 and 3 player you get 4 per player.

[pinkymadigan]

There are limits to descriptivism!  Unless you think there is literally no such thing as an incorrect usage of language.

Everyone agrees that at some point, a sufficiently popular misuse of language is no longer a misuse of language.  But where do you draw that line?  I think that line has to be really damn high if you are talking about literally inverting the meaning of a phrase.  Like if I get my friends to start exchanging the meanings of "bus" and "weasel".  We're still wrong, even if everyone we know starts talking about double-decker weasels.

I don't do it to feel superior.  Prescriptivism is not all about being snooty and pointing out mistakes.  Rules are important because incorrect usage makes it more difficult to communicate effectively.  For example, transposition of literally/figuratively make it difficult for me to write "literally" and predict that my audience will understand my true meaning.

I'm solidly in this camp. I can tell when people are using literally to mean 'even more figuratively than normal' in speech most of the time, but that totally destroys any use the word has.

If a word can mean it's exact opposite, literally, then that word no longer has any value, literally.

[Donald X.]

It's amusing that the trend with "literally" is actually the opposite direction everyone thinks it is.  It's been used to mean "figuratively" since the 18th century, but that usage is becoming less and less accepted... not more and more accepted!

I am not sure why this is unclear, but no-one uses "literally" to mean "figuratively." "I figuratively ate a million hamburgers." No, no-one ever says anything like that, not even with the word "figuratively." "Literally" is used to exaggerate; "figuratively" is not. There is no plain word-substitution going on here.

Meanwhile, I suspect there is both a slim chance and a fat chance of all of us in this thread agreeing on these usages.  I personally dislike the use of these words to mean their opposites, not because it's wrong, but because most people don't understand that the ironic usage is ironic.

When someone says, "I literally ate a million hamburgers," no-one is confused. They're not being ironic there either; they're exaggerating.

[Donald X.]

All that said... what IS the actual "correct" rules for one-player Possession? What if, on my Possession turn, I play Ironworks to gain a Great Hall? If it were a 2-player game, you would get no bonus from Ironworks. Do you get a bonus here? My guess:

I am Possessing myself... I play Ironworks, choose Great Hall. I am about to gain Great Hall... Possession kicks in and prevents the gain, replacing it with a different gain. Therefore, no bonus from Ironworks.

The game rules don't support one-player. If you want to support one-player in order say to have one-player puzzles online, which I think is reasonable, then for sure you don't want Possession in them, because it just degenerates into, what unintended consequences does playing this only-makes-sense-with-multiple-players card with one player have. And if you have those puzzles then it's up to you how many Provinces you want for them.

IRL if a player drops out and only one player is left, I would say that that player wins. So, you immediately win any one-player games, hooray! Online you can have a bot keep playing for the player who dropped; I would make that a choice, do you want the win or the bot. I don't know if/when that will happen.

[pinkymadigan]

It's amusing that the trend with "literally" is actually the opposite direction everyone thinks it is.  It's been used to mean "figuratively" since the 18th century, but that usage is becoming less and less accepted... not more and more accepted!

I am not sure why this is unclear, but no-one uses "literally" to mean "figuratively." "I figuratively ate a million hamburgers." No, no-one ever says anything like that, not even with the word "figuratively." "Literally" is used to exaggerate; "figuratively" is not. There is no plain word-substitution going on here.

Meanwhile, I suspect there is both a slim chance and a fat chance of all of us in this thread agreeing on these usages.  I personally dislike the use of these words to mean their opposites, not because it's wrong, but because most people don't understand that the ironic usage is ironic.

When someone says, "I literally ate a million hamburgers," no-one is confused. They're not being ironic there either; they're exaggerating.

But the hyperbole makes it a figurative comment. Figurative speech is generally considered the opposite of literal speech. Since they are not being literal, they are being figurative. Since they are saying they are being literal, while being figurative, it makes the word mean nothing.

It ruins the word.

[Donald X.]

Take this with 0.001 mol of sodium chloride, as it comes from someone who prefers the Oxford comma.

I say, use as many commas as it takes to get the job done. The extra comma resolves ambiguity more often than it creates it, but if it will create ambiguity, man, get in some dashes there or something, you have more tools than commas available.

[Donald X.]

But the hyperbole makes it a figurative comment. Figurative speech is the opposite of literal speech. Since they are not being literal, they are being figurative. Since they are saying they are being literal, while being figurative, it makes the word mean nothing.

It ruins the word.

The comment is figurative, but the word does not mean "figuratively" in those sentences. People have flat-out said that it does and I am just correcting that helplessly.

"Literal" still does a fine job of managing its original "word for word" meaning - when you say "It's a literal translation," no-one thinks you mean, "It's so much a translation, like you wouldn't believe." The "actually" meaning is an interloper on the original meaning; what does the old interloper have over the new one?

And the word doesn't mean nothing there. Like a second "very," it's not doing a lot of work, but it's doing something. Varying that input changes your output.

[Donald X.]

If a word can mean it's exact opposite, literally, then that word no longer has any value, literally.

A handy list of examples: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Auto-antonym

[pinkymadigan]

And the word doesn't mean nothing there. Like a second "very," it's not doing a lot of work, but it's doing something. Varying that input changes your output.

I'm not contesting it does nothing, I'm saying that the word loses any real value, as people have to figure out whether you are using literal in a literal manner or a figurative one to understand what you are saying. Literally.

[Donald X.]

I'm not contesting it does nothing, I'm contesting that the word loses any real value, as people have to figure out whether you are using literal in a literal manner or a figurative one to understand what you are saying. Literally.

It's almost always very obvious from context. For example, I could not possibly have actually eaten a million hamburgers. It's too many hamburgers.

[pinkymadigan]

I'm not contesting it does nothing, I'm contesting that the word loses any real value, as people have to figure out whether you are using literal in a literal manner or a figurative one to understand what you are saying. Literally.

It's almost always very obvious from context. For example, I could not possibly have actually eaten a million hamburgers. It's too many hamburgers.

Maybe often, I'm not quite sure that it's 'almost always' though. I hear it used when people are only slightly exaggerating as well, or when they mean 'approximately'.

[theory]

If a word can mean it's exact opposite, literally, then that word no longer has any value, literally.

A handy list of examples: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Auto-antonym

That's not the same thing.  The fact that "citation" happens to both mean a commendation and a court appearance is not even "opposites".  Those are terms that have multiple meanings, some of which are amusingly different.  The word "set" has a billion meanings and I'm sure some contradict each other.

Language misuse impairs communication by introducing ambiguity where there was none. 

When I say, "you just bought literally the best card in the game", do I mean it, or is it just a really good card?

When people use "chronic" to mean "acute" instead of "long-term", it makes the term "chronic pain" ambiguous.  When people call every headache that hurts a little bit more a "migraine", it diminishes the impact of what a real migraine is.

When I use the word "flaunt", are people like Jimmy Carter going to misread it as "flout"?

I can't use "disinterested" with its real meaning any more, because people will think I mean "uninterested".  I have to use another term, none of which captures the same meaning as "disinterested".  It doesn't really mean neutral, or even-handed.  It means "without a fish to fry".  What other word works? 

I just don't understand why people are so accepting of bad language usage.  Over time, trends change, and we can't help that.  But that doesn't mean that every particular bastardization of the English language is OK or should be encouraged.

[LastFootnote]

If a word can mean it's exact opposite, literally, then that word no longer has any value, literally.

A handy list of examples: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Auto-antonym

That's not the same thing.  The fact that "citation" happens to both mean a commendation and a court appearance is not even "opposites".  Those are terms that have multiple meanings, some of which are amusingly different.  The word "set" has a billion meanings and I'm sure some contradict each other.

Language misuse impairs communication by introducing ambiguity where there was none. 

When I say, "you just bought literally the best card in the game", do I mean it, or is it just a really good card?

When people use "chronic" to mean "acute" instead of "long-term", it makes the term "chronic pain" ambiguous.  When people call every headache that hurts a little bit more a "migraine", it diminishes the impact of what a real migraine is.

When I use the word "flaunt", are people like Jimmy Carter going to misread it as "flout"?

I can't use "disinterested" with its real meaning any more, because people will think I mean "uninterested".  I have to use another term, none of which captures the same meaning as "disinterested".  It doesn't really mean neutral, or even-handed.  It means "without a fish to fry".  What other word works? 

I just don't understand why people are so accepting of bad language usage.  Over time, trends change, and we can't help that.  But that doesn't mean that every particular bastardization of the English language is OK or should be encouraged.

I just looked up 'disinterested' on dicitonary.com, and apparently 'disinterested' and 'uninterested' used to have their meanings swapped. So at one point 'disinterested' meant 'not interested' and 'uninterested' meant 'impartial; nothing at stake'. So when you say you can't use 'disinterested' with its "real" meaning anymore, is that actually true?