Re: Vine ID?

Brian M. Scott wrote:

On Sun, 16 Jul 2006 22:59:41 GMT, Ron Hardin
<rhhardin@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in
<news:44BAC4D7.1B7D@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> in sci.lang:

Brian M. Scott wrote:

On Sun, 16 Jul 2006 21:01:54 GMT, Ron Hardin
<rhhardin@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in
<news:44BAA93C.3F6E@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> in sci.lang:

Brian M. Scott wrote:

The leaf shape isn't right and I don't know about the flowers, but its
way of laying on top of stuff resembles the Bur Cucumber, which
recently I've been working to kill off. It lays on top of just
everything growing around it, and grows suddenly, one day on top
of everything.

What exactly does it lay, on top of everything growing around it?

Lay is correct, taking its sense from the sprawl of various transitive lays.

What it does not do is ``lie on.''

You're wrong, of course.

Fascinating. You would accept ``lays itself on top of ...,'' would you not?

What difference does it make? That's not what you wrote.

I was trying to explain why the word goes where it does, in particular displacing
``lie,'' which is the wrong word for the arrangement.

You were grasping at straws in an attempt to defend your
original error.

I'm indifferent to prescriptivists. Who is more dismissive of ``whom'' than I am?

The deal is finding out what rules have been internalized. They're always hidden,
it seems.

If you're wanting to claim that ``lie'' is the right word, I disagree. The word
doesn't cover that arrangement. A prescriptivist has exactly nothing to say about it.

Your own actual inclinations, on the other hand, have some bearing.

Words don't go where the do without some support having developed.

--
Ron Hardin
rhhardin@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx

On the internet, nobody knows you're a jerk.
.

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