
Hacking Language: A New Past Tense - RiderOfGiraffes
http://www.penzba.co.uk/PastTense.html
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russell
> I wonder if it will spread ...

Nope. The irregular forms are slowly disappearing, the least frequent first. I
would give you a citation, but I am supposed to be cleaning out the basement,
not surfing HN.

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kentosi
Indeed. I personally have never used "swum", and I'd struggle to come up with
an example where "swam" won't fit in just as perfectly.

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RiderOfGiraffes
"I had swum to the island, but was too tired to swim back."

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kentosi
i see.. so "swum" is the passive form of "swim" then?

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tokenadult
You have to bear in mind that many languages have no marking for tense
whatever, and English could certainly develop in that direction. The only
language (Mandarin) that possibly has more speakers than English has no
marking for tense on any of its verbs.

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DanielBMarkham
If I'm not mistaken, these verbs are called "strong verbs" and are a nice
holdover from Old English. Stink, stank, stunk. Drink, drank, drunk. Sing,
sang, sung. Etc.

<http://wiki.answers.com/Q/What_is_a_strong_verb>

For people who love where words and such came from, I can't recommend highly
enough the Teaching Company's "History of the English Language"

<http://www.teach12.com/ttcx/coursedesclong2.aspx?cid=2250>

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NathanKP
This classic short story about language modification is always worth a few
laughs. If you want a real language hack then read it:

Mayhem in ce Klasrum by by Dolton Edwards from Isaac Asimov's 'The Golden
Years of Science Fiction'

[http://www.english-zone.com/index.php?page=1114&pid=81](http://www.english-
zone.com/index.php?page=1114&pid=81)

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chanux
Past tense of swim is swam right?

<http://wsu.edu/~brians/errors/swam.html>

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nzmsv
I don't know how many people do this (invent word forms), but I definitely do.
Here's a sample:

 _freak out > froke out > froken out_

the plural of _house_ is obviously _hice_ , and _toothbrush_ becomes
_teethbrush_.

Of course, I have to be careful when speaking in public so I don't end up
sounding like Ned Flanders.

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pbhjpbhj
Then thunk is also the past form of thank. What's the past tense form of "The
weight thunk to the floor"? I think it will be harder to learn, even given the
exceptions, if we remove the common stem from all verbs and their past
participles.

Worth thinking about though.

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eru
Here's a list with a few suggestions:

<http://verben.texttheater.de/Englisch>

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queensnake
I like those, they feel good somehow. Must be the ancestral Germanic genes'
influence. Nice & definite sounding, stronger.

edit: well, a lot of them...

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eru
There are from the Verb Empowerment Society (Gesellschaft zur Stärkung der
Verben). It's a bad pun, since a `strong' verb is a irregular verb in German.

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dzuc
more interesting is david bohm's idea of the 'rheomode'

"One could say that nouns do not really exist, only verbs exist. A noun is
just a “slow” verb; that is, it refers to a process that is progressing so
slowly so as to appear static."

<http://wik.inormous.net/index.php?title=Rheomode>

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RiderOfGiraffes
What he suggests is done, but in a more general way, in the constructed
language "lojban". There the fundamental concept is the predicate (loosely
equivalent to verb) and "nouns" are extracted/abstracted places from the
predicates.

Thus "mi tavla do" is "I speak to you", so "le tavla" is "the speaker" and "le
se tavla" is "the listener". In this example, "mi" and "do" are the equivalent
of pronouns.

<http://www.lojban.org/tiki/Lojban+Introductory+Brochure>

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georgecmu
It's hard to see originality in this. Just google "who would've thunk".

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nrr
Yes, but in your construction, you're using a popular pseudo-participle form
of _to think_. The author of the article is suggesting that we use these weird
ablaut/umlaut morphs in place of the preterite. For example, "I _thought_ "
would then become "I _thunk_ ".

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georgecmu
A few things to note: 1\. It's not at all my construction. That's precisely
why it's hard to see originality in this. 2\. If you read his post carefully,
you'll see that the author isn't aware of distinction between past simple and
present perfect, let alone of ablaut: he confuses "swam" and "swum" and then
proceeds to use the newly invented past tense form of "cutch" in present
perfect. 3\. Ablaut would be along the lines of think-thank-thunk -- something
the author is not suggesting. 4\. Think and catch already have the "weird
umlaut morph". Changing it to the "swim-swam-swum" pattern is, like I said,
nothing new.

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RiderOfGiraffes
I would reply directly, but haven't been able to find your email, so a brief
response here:

Originality is hard to pin down. I've never seen it suggested that this should
be a new regular form, rather than an _ad hoc_ collection of joke forms. I've
never before heard "lunk" and "cluck" used like this. Has anyone else? Is that
original? I'm not a grammar expert, no doubt I've may have missed some.
Besides, if I'm re-inventing, then perhaps it truly is an idea whose time has
come (yes - joking)

I am aware of the differences between present perfect, simple past, past
continuitive, past perfect, past pluperfect, _etc,_ but I was trying to avoid
having this turn into an article on grammar. For one, although I have a
working knowledge I'm not an expert, for another, that wasn't the point.

Good catch about "cutch" in the present perfect. I'll need to re-write an
earlier part to make it clear that it's not really the "past tense", but the
"word form usually used for the past tense" (avoiding technical grammatical
terms).

I appreciate your observations - thanks.

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shaddi
Your hack is broken: run -> ruun?

