effect or affect - It is simple... really

[QueenOfCalifornia]

Please use them correctly. :banghead:

Affect has a totally different meaning than effect. http://owl.english.purdue.edu/handouts/grammar/g_spelprob.html

I am sick to fucking death of this - I am really looking forward to the retrograde arguments - I wonder if it will effect my affect?

I would like to effect a change here... okay???? :shrug:

Gilligan - Grammar Police

[goldcanyonaz]

1. The movie still affected me greatly.

to impress the mind or move the feelings of

[QueenOfCalifornia]

5. first wrong answer

where did you get that?

Affect used in that way is obsolete. Affect is a set of observable emotions. Effect is how the movie "effected" you. Not affected you.

[goldcanyonaz]

8. Umm, from a dictionary.

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/affect

[QueenOfCalifornia]

12. that's news to me

because in the http://www.merriam-webster.com/ it makes no mention of this as an alternative. I come from the effect v affect being very different things - But since you have a reference I apologize.

[Terran]

45. Is English your first language?

How do you call yourself "grammar police" and get this totally backwards? Obsolete my ass!

[rock]

30. If the movie created goldcanyonaz then

maybe you could say it effected him. Otherwise it affected him. (Apologies if I have your sex wrong goldcanyonaz).

(on edit - I can't type worth anything!)

[goldcanyonaz]

31. She, and thank you!

[uppityperson]

36. You are wrong, which is ironic.

The effect of the movie was it affected him.

[AlCzervik]

39. it's hilarious.

[varelse]

37. According to the information from the link YOU provided

The usage was correct, and is not obsolete.

Meanings for the most common uses:

Affect
1. af•fect (transitive verb)

to produce an effect upon, as a: to produce a material influence upon or alteration in <paralysis affected his limbs> b: to act upon (as a person or a person's mind or feelings) so as to bring about a response; influence

[Blue_In_AK]

38. I think you're incorrect there.

The movie affected her greatly. That was the effect it caused. But she had a certain affect to her voice when she spoke about it. And you can effect change, meaning to bring about.

It's simple, really.

[Bluenorthwest]

44. I love spelling and sentax police

Because they have such huge affectations of superiority.

[dorkulon]

47. That's 'syntax,' you filthy dog!

jk

[Buns_of_Fire]

48. What? ANOTHER sin tax?

I swear, the English language is going to drive me to drink. Oh wait, it already has... :beer:

[Midlodemocrat]

54. Actually, she is correct. You're wrong.

I believe you are trying to explain the psychiatric use of the word 'affect', in other words, describing the way a person's face shows reactions or emotions.

[MADem]

2. The misuse of the apostrophe is the crime of the decade.

And the purveyors of "For all intensive purposes" instead of "For all intents, and purposes" need an hour in the stocks.

[TomInTib]

6. It never cease's to amaze me. nt

[MADem]

20. Hehehehehe...! nt

[Sparkly]

7. I never heard the "intensive purposes" one -- that's pretty funny!

I agree about the apostrophe.

My pet peeve: "Try and" do something, rather than "Try TO" do something...

Also: "The reason is because..." "The reason is that" or "That's because" -- the reason isn't "because."...

I know, I know, but they bug me!

[MADem]

23. Well... (sound of fingernail's on chalk board)

We'll just have to TRY AND remember, and the REASON IS BECAUSE, for ALL INTENSIVE PURPOSES, it's important to use proper grammar!

:rofl: A TRIFECTA!!

EDITED to put a BONUS APOSTROPHE in the subject line!!!!!

:rofl:

[Sparkly]

41. .

:spank:

[asjr]

9. I think it has been years since

any grammar has been taught in school. It is addictive. I still chastise my 40 yr old son for saying "I seen it" rather than I saw it. He knows better because he was taught better but has picked up on the "modern" lingo.

[patrice]

21. Listen to pronoun case being abused in the media constantly. No one cares anymore.

I wonder how much all of the confusion costs this country every year, especially since we do business with so many non-native English speaking nations now.

[MADem]

42. That one is the dear friend of "I done seen it!"

As in "I done seen it yesterday, and I seen it today, too!"

[RC]

24. A comma before 'and'?

Tsk, tsk, tsk. When are you reporting for your time in the stocks?

[RebelOne]

52. Rule for comma before "and."

Don't put a comman before "and" unless there is a complete sentence after the glue word.

[October]

33. Agreed! And "none" is singular!

None of those examples given is off the mark!

[Warpy]

3. Barbarians substitute "impact" as noun and verb

because they could never quite master the effect that using proper language to affect the delivery of their points has.

Pity.

[QueenOfCalifornia]

11. why did you do that?

use affect like that?

Trying to make me crazy?

Explain why you did that. It should be effect not affect.

[dorkulon]

43. You are so completely wrong.

Quite a vile combination of peevish snobbery and total wrongness.

[Greyhound]

4. Can I ax you a question? Pacifically why does it matter, isn't it all the same difference?

Irregardless of what you think, Amerikans talk good enough to be understood.

|\|07 70 m3n710n wh3n y0u 7ry r34d1n6 7h15 5h17.

:evilgrin:

[asjr]

10. L O L!

[leftchick]

14. ....

:rofl:

[A HERETIC I AM]

25. I guess I'm not as old as I thought. (I'll be 49 on Tuesday, BTW)

|\|07 70 m3n710n wh3n y0u 7ry r34d1n6 7h15 5h17.

I'll be damned. I can read that.

Took me about 20 seconds, but I can fucking read that.

I'm Dyslexic to a minor degree and I repeatedly have trouble spelling certain words. "Absolutely" is a good example. I'll always leave the "e" out or add a second one after the second "l" (absoluteley), trying to sort it out. Thank Elad for Spell check!

But one thing about punctuation (and I know this thread is about grammar and word usage) I have yet to nail down is when to use a Semi-Colon as opposed to a Colon -- (<-- there's an example. Should a ":" go there or a ";" ?) and when a dash ( - ) is appropriate.

The word "irregardless" drives me nucking futs.


("not to mention when you try reading this shit")

Man.....who thinks up this crap?

[dorkulon]

51. The shorthand rule for semicolons is

only to use them in places where a period would also work, technically. "Catherine is also a size three; we trade clothes all the time."

[patrice]

13. Okay, I'm going to get in trouble here . . .

Aks drives me crazy. It's very clearly A - S - K.

P.S. I promise to be as nice about it as I can, though, because I don't believe in power struggles to the death over this sort of thing - HOWEVER - if I've got to accept aks, folk need to be prepared for me to say FUCK whenever I want to.

[monmouth]

15. I have side Effects from meds, they do Affect my health......

[Nutmegger]

16. Affect the effect!!!

http://grammar.quickanddirtytips.com/affect-versus-effect.aspx

[Lakerstan]

17. I'd love to use an asterick here, but I can't

BECAUSE THERE'S NO SUCH FRIGGIN THING! Asterisk! Asterisk! I-S-K!!!

I would do it as I eat my orange flavored sherBERT, which is also imaginary.

[patrice]

18. And reefer is what some folk smoke, while refrigerators are for keeping food cool.

Maybe you've never run into that one; I think it is an east LA thing.

[PassingFair]

19. Youse guys are kidding, right?

Don't be disrespecting me.

[patrice]

22. Some of us are girls. Get it straight; you're affecting my sanity. nt

[Speck Tater]

26. It bugs me that people don't use "thee", "thou", "thy", and "thine" properly.

Shakespeare would roll over in his grave if he heard how even the best educated among us butcher the language.

Of course Chaucer would have have been equally offended to hear the way Shakespeare abused English. The Bard of Avon clearly knew nothing of proper (i.e. Chaucerian) grammar.

There are few constants where language is concerned. Some of them are:

1. Language is constantly changing.

2. Older people constantly complain about the way younger people use the language, citing their lack of regard for "proper" (i.e. aging presciptivist) grammar.

Why even someone as recent as Mark Twain would find the English of today's best authors grating on the ears, and bristling with grammatical and syntactical "errors".

To complain about people using the language "improperly" is to try to resist the inevitable evolution that takes place every day. It is not only futile, but symptomatic of a certain rigidity regarding a thing which is inherently fluid. It's rather like trying to build levies along a river. They may hold for a while, and it may be called "a disaster" when the levies fail, but where the forces of nature are concerned, the river will win in the end, and there is nothing disastrous about that, except from the point of view of those who are foolish enough to want to live in the flood plane.

So the answer to all such grammar-cop complaints is, wise up and move your intellectual house out of the linguistic flood plane. Then when everyday usage breeches the levies of aging prescriptivism, you will no longer see it as a disaster, but as part of a normal process.

So instead of saying "Wa, wa, wa. There's no such word as 'alot'. It's 'a lot'." Calm down and recognize that you are witnessing the birth of a brand new word; "alot". Letting that word offend you is merely admitting your inability to grow with the language.

In time, one or the other of the spellings "effect/affect" will probably disappear, and the same spelling will be applied to all meanings. Chill out. That's just proves that the language is alive and well, and not locked up and dead like Latin or French.

[LWolf]

35. There has to be a middle ground somewhere.

Somewhere that we can acknowledge and appreciate the development of language while upholding some kind of standard for usage.

I tell my students that they must know how to speak and write standard English in formal situations, regardless of what they do with the language informally.

When they ask me if they can use a word, I tell them that when it is included in the dictionary, it's fair game. Except for the words we are all not allowed to use on campus, lol.

Then I hope that the dictionary never decides to sanction sloppy slang like "my bad," "I likes me some," etc.. I like words. I like them in many forms, not all standard, not all correct. I don't like sloppy usage.

That's my middle ground. I use expressions outside my classroom I would never use with my students. I wouldn't sent a LTTE, or a letter to a politician, or something attached to my resume, that didn't use standard spelling and grammar.

I try to do the same at DU, although when I'm typing in a rush, I'm not always successful. ;)

[Obamanaut]

27. I am sitting here in 'close proximity' to the screen, waiting with

'baited' breath for the final answer.

[Speck Tater]

28. Don't take that answer for granite. NT

[Dora]

29. That this quibbling matter has such an effect on you speaks volumes.

Methinks it is time to let the internal editor take a vacation day.


Affectionately Yours,
Dora

[flowomo]

32. a little attention to "isle" and "aisle" is in order....

since we get a lot of "reaching across the isle" posts.

[Buns_of_Fire]

49. Odd you should mention that. When I'm in the grocery store...

...people keep asking me which one is "Gilligan's Aisle."

[mitchum]

34. My fuzzbox is an effect and I affect a monocle

[Obamanaut]

40. must of, should of, could of rather than 'have'

[HamdenRice]

46. The effect of his strange affect was to affect me to decide to effect change

Frankly, I think the two spellings are archaic and arbitrary and should be scrapped.

[woo me with science]

50. Moral:

Don't be condescending about something you don't understand.

First, it's not grammar. It's word usage.

Second, you were wrong.

[vanlassie]

53. Don't Get Me Started On "I Could Care Less."