Re: Is "is" a verb?

From: DE781 (de781_at_aol.com)
Date: 06/17/04 

Date: 16 Jun 2004 22:18:12 -0700

Robert Bannister <robban@it.net.au> wrote in message news:<caoavo$7v7$1@enyo.uwa.edu.au>...
> DE781 wrote:
>
>
> > Why should "this person's being well" sound weird to you? Does "this
> > person's acting well" or "this person's living well" sound weird to
> > you too? If you THINK about it, they SHOULD sound weird. What about
> > "this person's DOING well"? Sure, it's become something of an idiom
> > meaning that the person's well, in general. BUT how about if the "do"
> > had already referred to something? For example, "how is he doing the
> > wash?". The answer to this question COULD LEGITIMATELY be a simple
> > "he's doing well", which is a shortened version of "he's doing IT
> > well". The "it" is unnecessary. Just as the answer to "how is he
> > acting in the play?" could be either "he's acting it well" or just
> > "he's acting well". I'm sure there are people here who think I'm
> > being a pain in the ass (PITA) well.
> >
> > How am I being (at the role of) a pain in the ass? I'm being (it)
> > well. How is Cooper being at annoying people? He's being well. How
> > good is Raggs at being nice in his posts? He's bad. [adjective form]
> > Or, he's not being (it) well. [adverb form]
>
> It all comes back to the verb "be" being different from other verbs,

The purpose of my posts in this thread is to show people that this is
not true. The way that we THINK about be/is/am/are being used in
every day language causes it to appear to be different from other
verbs. However, it's really not. It's just that we so rarely think
of someone as being capable of "being" well [maybe you're not all
reading this with the right emphasis: it's "BEING well", not "being
WELL".] (i.e. being good at being), whereas it's easy for us all to
comprehend someone reading well or meditating well (being
good/succesful at reading or meditation). If you can do any verb
well, you can also "be" well. This is why people use forms like "I am
well"; it means literally "I'm good at being". Whereas "I'm good"
means that I am good, in general, or I feel good.

and
> also that "well" has two distinct uses (adv. and adj).

Again, not true. The so-called adj use (I am well) is really no
different than someone saying "I dance well" or "I cook well". One
who cooks well is good at cooking, one who dances well is good at
dancing, and one who is well is good at being. The "well" modifies
the verb, "am", not the person.

All your other
> examples are fine; "is being good" is fine;

In that case, "good" refers to the one doing the being, not the act of
being. If I'm "being good", then I have been good for a period of
time leading up to the present. If I'm "being well", then I'm good at
being whatever it is I'm supposed to be.

 "is being healthy" is
> vaguely possible, but "is being well" jars - it's confusing.

It IS confusing. You have to think about the sentence in a different
way, like I said, with the emphasis on "BEING". You have to mentally
picture the syntax and meaning in the EXACT same way as you'd think
about "is walking well" or "is speaking well". Like someone said, in
manye cases "being well" means the same thing as "living well".
Because of this confusion and the in-depth knowledge of the language
that's needed to understand this, most people instead choose to claim
that "well" is an adj in "I am well", rather than trying to force the
truth on the generally gramatically-ignorant public. In other words,
it's "easier" for society to think of "well" as being as adj in "I am
well". "I am well" is NOT the same thing as "I am good", and people
SHOULDN'T think of it as such.

Nor can I
> accept "I'm being it well" - the addition of the "it", while explaining
> it, still doesn't come over as normal English. It sounds like the
> mistake a non-English speaker would make. You'd have to change it to
> "doing" or "going" or rephrase.

"I'm going it well" sounds even more abstract to me than "I'm being it
well". How can you "go it"? And even when you can "go something"
(I'm sure there are times you can), how can you "go it WELL"?

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