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Joe_Cavalry All Day Every Day


Debate Info

9
12
True Wait..., what? No!
Debate Score:21
Arguments:20
Total Votes:21
More Stats

Argument Ratio

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 True (9)
 
 Wait..., what? No! (11)

Debate Creator

joecavalry(40163) pic



Let's face it. English is a crazy language.

There's no egg in eggplant nor ham in hamburger, neither apple nor pine in pineapple.  English muffins weren't invented in England, quicksand can work slowly, boxing rings are square and a Guineapig is neither from Guinea nor is it a pig.

And why is it that writers write but fingers don't fing, grocers don't groce and hammers don't ham?  Doesn't it seem crazy that you can make amends but not one amend?  If teachers taught, why didn't preachers praught?  If a vegetarian eats vegetables, what does a humanitarian eat?

In what other language do people recite at a play and play at a recital?  We ship by truck but send cargo by ship.  We have noses that run and feet that swell.  We park in a driveway and drive in a parkway.  And how can a slim chance and a fat chance be the same, while a wise man and a wise guy are opposites?

You have to marvel at the unique lunacy of a language in which your house can burn up as it burns down, in which you fill in a form by filling it out, and in which an alarm goes off by going on, and, in closing, if father is pop, how come mother is not mop?

True

Side Score: 9
VS.

Wait..., what? No!

Side Score: 12

I want you people to get the lead out and follow my lead in this debate ;)

Side: True

I'm not sure if crazy is the right word, perhaps flawed though...so very, very flawed. But then again, what language isn't? Besides, the English language is the proud owner of the most illiterate slang words to ever be thought up by man; LOL, BRB, ROFL I'm looking at you ;)

Side: True
1 point

Actually, it is. Other languages are generally straight-forward, but English is constantly contradictory in its grammar and pronunciation rules. That's why it is one of the hardest modern languages to learn.

Side: True
Liber(1730) Disputed
2 points

With about how many other languages have you a sense of acquaintanceship? The manner in which your argument is writ would suggest that you want others to believe that you've a background in the topic which you are discussing, but the substance leads me to believe that you are simply repeating an oft-heard line with which you've no scholastic background. Throughout my manifold studies, while I will not deny that the number of barriers that must be crossed in learning English is large, there is still a sense of regularity and, with enough experience, can often be predicted. While this may be true for most languages, English is far from being one of the hardest modern languages to learn. Whilst it is true that there are many tongues which would rank ahead of English in terms of ease of acquisition, there are also many, many harder languages. I shan't discuss Old Norse, Latin, or Middle High German - the ancient tongues with which I am most familiar - merely because of your reference to modern languages, but of those languages which fall under that heading with which I am also familiar, I would have to say that French and German are harder. Swedish, Icelandic, and the other Romance languages are relatively easy, though this summation is coming from a native speaker of English. Sanskrit is, by far, the hardest language which I have ever studied, but it, too, is closer to the category of ancient than to modern, despite still being spoken as a native language by a number of individuals. The Celtic languages, though I am not very well acquainted with them, are also quite difficult, the grammar being far removed from that of the Teutonic and Romance tongues with which English is most closely related. Then, of course, there are the Uralic languages; namely Hungarian and Finnish, the difficulties of which are infinitely greater than those of the other European languages. I fear, though, that I have focused too heavily on European languages; thus, despite being mostly ignorant in them, I shall now repeat that which I have oft heard. Arabic is, I have learned from those who have studied the language, very difficult not so much in the grammar but in the manner in which the language is writ, for vowels are so often omitted from writing, as with the other Semitic languages. Korean is also an extremely difficult language, having a hellishly complicated system of honorifics. Chinese, like many of the other East Asian languages, is difficult more in its pronunciation and writing systems than grammar.

Side: Wait..., What? No!
Niko(127) Disputed
1 point

Which language was the first one you learned as a child? Based on proven psychology, humans learn languages easier when they are children. If you learned English as a child, then you can't say that English isn't harder, because you don't have the experience of learning it after learning your first language. It's harder to transition to a second language than it is to learn it first as a child.

Side: True
1 point

Thank you for very good explanation. I am sure all that crap has been written by either lazy people or the ones who have never looked at other languages as an object of studies. Russian is much more difficult than English. In this aspect it can be compared with German where every word or form has its ending or suffix. Not to say about synonyms or antonyms. The only verb ходить has plenty of prefixes that completely change the meaning: заходить, уходить, переходить, находить, приходить and so on.

Side: Wait..., what? No!
1 point

Yup! It is a crazy language... But, it's global. It's confusing but most spoken.

Side: True

Of course it is. What is spoken in the USA is not English but a deviation of it. To be English it would have to be called the Queen's English, instead the USA uses the language by those England dumped on its' shores. The outcast of Britain, the uneducated, the criminal and whatever else GB decided to get rid of.

Somehow you expect something not crazy, from a bunch of crazies.

Side: True
Bohemian(3860) Disputed
1 point

To be English it would have to be called the Queen's English

This is false by definition.

Side: Wait..., what? No!
Thewayitis(4071) Disputed
1 point

Go ahead and do the usual, don't provide any proof. You said it is false by definition.

Side: True
1 point

To sum it up in two words how English is just too crazy, it is. That's what I like about it!

Side: True

I see you are up to your usual ironic and overtly facile mischief. Carry on.

Side: Wait..., What? No!

Hahahaha nice Joe ;)

Side: True
1 point

Trust you me, when compared to Sanskrit, English seems rather sane a tongue.

Side: Wait..., What? No!
92nida(1411) Disputed
1 point

Trust you me, when compared to Sanskrit, English seems rather sane a tongue.

What's up with Sanskrit?

Side: True
Liber(1730) Disputed
1 point

Sanskrit has an hellishly difficult system of letter-changing called Sandhi; it comes in two forms: internal and external. If you were to look at a line of Sanskrit text, it would look like a a language filled with extremely long words. It's not. Instead, each of those long lines (eg. समन्तपञ्चकम, or विचित्रार्थपदाख्यानम ) is typically a group of words, combined under one bar. So, if one word ends in a, and the next begins in a, they combine to form ā . That's just an extremely basic lesson on only one of the countless difficulties. Just the script alone takes months to master (it took me two weeks of full-time study to be able to read with some confidence).

Side: Wait..., What? No!
1 point

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Side: Wait..., What? No!

OK..., that response was a little whacked ;)

Side: Wait..., What? No!