• iknowitwheniseeit@lemmynsfw.com
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    6 hours ago

    The Chinese language has different articles depending on what noun it is for. So 一杯可乐 versus 一双筷子.

    In German there are three genders of articles that are basically randomly assigned to each noun.

    Sometimes these make sense, but not always, and with languages you have to learn arbitrary information.

    It feels like the original post is disparaging American English for not using arbitrary nouns for collections of things. As with most differences between American and British English, the American version is simpler and loses very little. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

  • IninewCrow
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    23 hours ago

    It’s even easier than that with most people I know

    They just describe multiples of individual animals, objects, places or things collectively as just … stuff

    Flock of geese? … stuff

    A stack of books? … stuff

    group of cars? … stuff

    A planet? … stuff

    A solar system? … stuff

    A galaxy? … stuff

    A galactic neighbourhood? … stuff

    The universe? … stuff

      • IninewCrow
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        22 hours ago

        lol … I’m Indigenous Canadian and I speak my language Ojibway/Cree

        This made me realize that the modern things we named with our old language sounds like what you describe

        Aircraft -> kah-mee-nah-mee-kook … ‘the thing that flies’

        Helicopter -> kah-kee-noo-kah-wah-nas-kee-pee-nik … ‘the thing that turns fast’

      • IninewCrow
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        22 hours ago

        Yeah I know … like stuff … I dunno … shrugs shoulders and walks away

    • otacon239@lemmy.world
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      23 hours ago

      I once knew a person that ended almost every sentence they could with, “and stuff”. I don’t think I’ve ever used the phrase since.

      • superkret@feddit.org
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        22 hours ago

        Thus “phenomenology” means αποφαινεσθαι τα φαινομενα – to let that which shows itself be seen from itself in the very way in which it shows itself from itself. And stuff”

        ― Martin Heidegger

  • superkret@feddit.org
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    1 day ago

    Fun fact: The English collective noun for multiple Americans is a “volume”.