A language question for those of you whose native language is English

Then repeat the word "critical" before the word pressure. Everything better than leaving something to one's imagination.
 
CriedWhenBrucieLeft said:
To be honest with you, the example you give with the dash is, in my opinion, incredibly uncommon English usage; I'm not sure what "rule" they're referring to. In my opinion that usage is very unusual looking. I don't recall the last time I read a sentence written like that. Then again, I don't read a lot of manuals...
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The "rule" they are referring to is obviously a non-existing one.

@Foro: The point is, the reviewer suggested doing this change to all listings of what he understood as compound words. Another example would be "performance and erosion monitoring" where he would suggest writing "performance- ..." which is even more unnecessary. It is an example of nitpickery where the one who nitpicks is actually wrong.

For the example with critical temperature and pressure, I agree that including "critical" a second time would make the sentence clearer. However, the document is written by engineers (me and a colleague) for other engineers in the same field. Therefore, I chose to write things in a more streamlined form rather than being more clear than I have to.
 
Perun said:
Yeah, but "so-called" has the same connotations in German as it does in English, so I really can't explain that mistake other than with a lack of understanding for English idiomology.
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Weird, well if you ever make it down there, I would be curious if it says so-called in the German text
 
LooseCannon said:
The dash makes no sense in conventional English. Absolutely none. And whereas the file is being produced for a Korean and a Norwegian, it really should not include the dash. English has rules for a reason, and someone who is fluent in English will look at the sentence and be much more confused - especially if the person has English as a second language and aren't from a Germanic language tradition.
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Or if you wanted to make this more German .. you could just create a word like criticalpressuretemperature :)
 
Dr. Eddies Wingman said:
The "rule" they are referring to is obviously a non-existing one.

@Foro: The point is, the reviewer suggested doing this change to all listings of what he understood as compound words. Another example would be "performance and erosion monitoring" where he would suggest writing "performance- ..." which is even more unnecessary. It is an example of nitpickery where the one who nitpicks is actually wrong.

For the example with critical temperature and pressure, I agree that including "critical" a second time would make the sentence clearer. However, the document is written by engineers (me and a colleague) for other engineers in the same field. Therefore, I chose to write things in a more streamlined form rather than being more clear than I have to.
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I see what you mean here, although monitoring is more of an action while pressure is a broad individual term. And it's logical that you have to monitor something. So that one is easier, I'd say.

I am afraid the English language has a bit of a handicap when it cannot differentiate that well. The "-" isn't used in some other languages for nothing; it's more clear what we're exactly talking about.
 
Forostar said:
I maintain my opinion.

I see see theorists (and language fanatics specialists ;-) here. Let's not forget that one should be practical because we're talking about a manual here.

The people who'll use those manuals do not have English as a first language. They are no experts of the English language.
They should be instructed as well as possible. That's a rule, I hope. You are not doing that when you leave something (however small that is) to their imagination.

The sentence "Critical temperature and pressure" leaves open more possibilities than "Critical temperature and -pressure".

Yes, but pressure is also a parameter (or at least a well known term).
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I do not meant to pile on, but in 17 years of school, plus a ton of reading outside of school, I have never seen a dash/hyphen used that way in English.

I would read it as a typo or I am supposed to do some kind of subtraction or look for negative pressure (depressurize? .. not sure that exists). I do agree when you say put critical in front of both words. I would assume an expert in the field that was not familiar with this linguistic construct would assume it is was a typo.

I am not language expert, but I have been reading English my entire life.
 
Forostar said:
I see what you mean here, although monitoring is more of an action while pressure is a broad individual term. And it's logical that you have to monitor something. So that one is easier, I'd say.

I am afraid the English language has a bit of a handicap when it cannot differentiate that well. The "-" isn't used in some other languages for nothing; it's more clear what we're exactly talking about.
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I am not sure it is a handicap as much as a difference. While I think putting critical pressure and critical temperature makes it extra clear ... critical X, Y, and Z would infer all 3 are critical, otherwise it would be critical X, Y, and something else Z would be used if Z did not belong in the same grouping,
 
Reviewer A wants matters to be more clear. Reviewer B wants to use correct language. And my last suggestion was; fuck them both, do C (be both clear and correct in language). ;-)
 
Yes, Foro, I am a theorist and I maintain my opinion that using the dash in such a way in English is wrong. And while English does give you some freedom in morphology and syntax, making analogies with your mother tongue is misleading on all linguistic levels.
 
bearfan said:
I am not sure it is a handicap as much as a difference. While I think putting critical pressure and critical temperature makes it extra clear ... critical X, Y, and Z would infer all 3 are critical, otherwise it would be critical X, Y, and something else Z would be used if Z did not belong in the same grouping,
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I am not sure if that's always the case. Is it?

Would be used would be not strict enough for manuals. If it's should be used, then I agree. But is there really such a rule?
 
Forostar said:
Reviewer A wants matters to be more clear. Reviewer B wants to use correct language. And my last suggestion was; fuck them both, do C (be both clear and correct in language). ;-)
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Well, you have to use correct language as the "-" in English does not mean what you think it to mean, at best it means nothing at worst it could change the meaning of what he is saying ... but yeah, putting critical in front of both does make it very clear and is correct.
 
Ariana said:
Yes, Foro, I am a theorist and I maintain my opinion that using the dash in such a way in English is wrong. And while English does give you some freedom in morphology and syntax, making analogies with your mother tongue is misleading on all linguistic levels.
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Because I don't want to be misleading, I went for C (later on).
 
Forostar said:
I am not sure if that's always the case. Is it?

Would be used would be not strict enough for manuals. If it's should be used, then I agree. But is there really such a rule?
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I am not sure it is a hard and fast rule as it is generally understood, meaning does not change until you explicitly change it.
 
Because if it isn't a rule, then -in this case- I'd say English is less specific (= more handicapped) than languages with "-".
For the record: "-" means repeating the word critical (in that sentence).

In manuals, you rather not have double interpretation.
 
or you could re-write the whole thing to include the word both (or all if there were more than 2).

Both temperature and pressure are critical
Temperature and pressure are both critical
X,y,and z are all critical


... or however it would work based on context
 
I seriously don't think "Critical temperature and pressure" allows for much interpretation, especially if it is placed in context. "Critical temperature and pressure" is proper English wording, and proper English is what should be written in an English language manual. Everything else is confusing.
 
Alright.

Well, indeed Per, although I don't think C is confusing. On the contrary: read next post. ;)

Not repeating the word happens 6 times as often as repeating the word (on Google), so Wingman will make a safe enough choice, I guess.
 
Perun said:
I seriously don't think "Critical temperature and pressure" allows for much interpretation, especially if it is placed in context. "Critical temperature and pressure" is proper English wording, and proper English is what should be written in an English language manual. Everything else is confusing.
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I pretty much agree with this, I would read it as both are critical ... but adding an extra critical or both makes it 10000000% percent clear.
 
In any case, this was interesting and I would not mind continuing it with other linguistic examples. This is probably the main place I visit on the internet where Americans are in the minority and enjoy it because of conversations like this.
 
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