The "C" in "Acquire"

[manaheim]

Ok, here is the kinda thing that keeps me up at night. You wanna know what makes Chris Russo tick? Here it is, baby.

Who the hell decided to put a "C" in the word "Acquire"?

I mean seriously.

Q is already the absolutely most pointless waste of synapse connections in my brain as it is. The letter, by itself, is worthless. It can only function when paired with another completely unrelated letter; "u". Even then, the letter pair only serves to act as a hard "c" sound, which really is also a total waste since that sound is very aptly handled by the letter "k".

And yet... someone chose to stick a "c" in before the "qu". Why?

WHY?!?!?!

Therein my madness lay.

 

[Chris of Arabia]

akwire?

 

[Eldrich]

Who the hell decided to put a "C" in the word "Acquire"?

I did...

sorry, I didn't think it would upset anybody. I'll take it out.

 

[rufus5150]

From the Latin adquaerere which weaseled its way through the romance languages. At some point ad... becomes ac... (french? spanish retains the ad+...).

 

[manaheim]

akwire?

yes!

I did...

sorry, I didn't think it would upset anybody. I'll take it out.

From the Latin adquaerere which weaseled its way through the romance languages. At some point ad... becomes ac... (french? spanish retains the ad+...).

Unacceptable!!!!

 

[Eldrich]

From the Latin adquaerere which weaseled its way through the romance languages. At some point ad... becomes ac... (french? .

must be the french, they're always trying to steal my ideas. see 'fries' and 'dip'

 

[rufus5150]

Unacceptable!!!!

You mean:

Unaceptable?

 

[manaheim]

You mean:

Unaceptable?

Actually, unakseptabul.

 

[Corry]

See, this is one thing I'm liking about German. For the most part, it's straighforward as far as pronunciation goes. No silent, or un-needed letters.

 

[Joves]

See, this is one thing I'm liking about German. For the most part, it's straighforward as far as pronunciation goes. No silent, or un-needed letters.

You mean like the u in colour for some.

 

[K8-90]

In an English high school class a couple years ago, we read a funny blurb on the english language that I think you would have appreciated... I couldn't find the exact one, but below is a similar article. It's long, but funny....

"Because we are still bearing some of the scars of our brief skirmish with II-B English, it is natural that we should be enchanted by Mr. George Bernard Shaw's current campaign for a simplified alphabet.

Obviously, as Mr. Shaw points out, English is in much need of a general overhauling and streamlining. However, our own resistance to any changes requiring a large expenditure of mental effort in the near future would cause us to view with some apprehension the possibility of some day receiving a morning paper in-to us-Greek.
Our own plan would acheive the same end as the legislation proposed by Mr. Shaw, but in a less shocking manner, as it consists merely of an acceleration of the normal processes by which the language is continually modernized.
As a catalytic agent, we would suggest that a National Easy Language Week be proclaimed, which the President would inaugurate, outlining some shortcut to concentrate on during the week, and to be adopted during the ensuing year. All school children would be given a holiday, the lost time being the equivalent of that gained by the spelling shortcut.
In 1946, for example, we would urge the elimination of the soft "c", for which we would substitute "s". Sertainly, such an improvement would be selebrated in all sivic-minded sircles as being suffisiently worth the trouble, and students in all sities in the land would be reseptive toward any change eliminating the nesessity of learning the differense between the two letters.
In 1947, sinse only the hard "c" would be left, it would possible to susbstitute "k" for it, both letters being pronounsed identikally. Imagine how greatly only two years of this prosess would klarify the konfusion in the minds of students. Already we would have eliminated an entire letter from the alphabet. Typewriters and linotypes kould all be built with one less letter and all the manpower and materials previously devoted to making "c's" kould be turned toward raising the national standard of living.
In the fase of so many notable improvements, it is easy to foresee that by 1948 "National Easy Language Week" would be a pronounsed sukses. All skhool tshildren would be looking forward with konsiderable exsitement to the holiday, and in a blaze of national publisity it would be announsed that the double konsonant "ph" no longer existed, and that the sound would henseforth be written "f" in all words. This would make sutsh words as "fonograf" twenty persent shorter in print.
By 1949, publik interest in a fonetik alfabet kan be expekted to have inkreased to the point where a more radikal step forward kan be taken without fear of undue kritisism. We would therefore urge the elimination at that time of all unesesary double leters, whitsh, although quite harmless, have always ben a nuisanse in the language and a desided deterent to akurate speling. Try it yourself in the next letter you write, and se if both writing and reading are not fasilitated.
With so mutsh progres already made, it might be posible in 1950 to delve further into the posibilities of fonetik speling. After due konsideration of the reseption aforded the previous steps, it should be expedient by this time to spel al difthongs fonetikaly. Most students do not realize that the long "i" and "y", as in "time" and "by", are aktauly the difthong "ai", as it is writen in "aisle", and that the long "a" in "fate", is in reality the difthong "ei" as in "rein". Although perhaps not imediately aparent, the saving in time and effort wil be tremendous when we leiter elimineite the sailent "e", as meide posible bai this last tsheinge.
For as is wel known, the horible mes of "e's" apearing in our writen language is kaused prinsipaly bai the present nesesity of indikeiting whether a vowel is long or short. Therefore, in 1951 we kould simply elimineit al sailent "e's", and kontinu to read and wrait merily along as though we wer in an atomik ag of edukation.
In 1951 we would urg a greit step forward. Sins bai this taim it would have ben four years sins anywun had used the leter "c", we would sugest that the "National Easy Languag Wek" for 1951 be devoted to substitution of "c" for "th". To be sur it would be som taim befor peopl would have bekom akustomd to reading ceir newspapers and buks wic sutsh sentenses in cem as "Ceodor caught he had cre cousand cistls crust crough ce cik of his cumb".
In ce saim maner, bai meiking eatsh leter hav its own sound and cat sound only, we kould shorten ce languag stil mor. In 1952 we would elimineit ce "y"; cen in 1953 we kould us ce leter to indikeit ce "sh" sound, cerbai klarifaiing words laik yugar and yur, as well as redusing bai wun mor leter al words laik "yut", "yore", and so forc. Cink, cen, of al ce benefits to be geind bai ce distinktion whitsh wil cen be meid between words laik:
ocean - now writen - oyean
machine - now writen - mayin
racial - now writen - reiyial
Al sutsh divers weis of wraiting wun sound would no longer exist, and whenever wun kaim akros a "y" sound he would know exaktli what to wrait. Kontinuing cis proses, year after year, we would eventuali have a reali sensibl writen languag. By 1975, wi ventyur tu sei, cer wud bi no mor uv ces teribli trublsum difikultis, wic no tu leters usd to indikeit ce seim nois, and laikwis no tu noises riten wic ce seim leter. Even Mr. Yaw, wi beliv, wud bi hapi in ce noleg cat his drims fainali keim tru."

by Dolton Edwards from Isaac Asimov's "The Golden Years of Science Fiction" 4th Series

 

[Josh66]

^^^
...too much to read in one post. (Just looking at it hurts my eyes...)

The current spelling "seems right" to me. Anything else just seems wrong and pronounced differently.

 

[Corry]

You mean like the u in colour for some.

:er: Get that U outta there!

 

[LaFoto]

I read through all of it and it got more and more difficult the more the "reformation" of the language (as was dreamed up by ... whom? G.B. Shaw? Isaac Asimov? Dolton Edwards?) went forward. Whooo. Makes your head spin.
I like all the long words.
Like "silhouette".
And "colour" spelt with the "u"

Though my favourite foreign word is that for ENT-doc in Spanish!
otorrinolaringólogo <- easy. Reads as it spells!

But my language has some nice words on offer, too. Just found out that this was "Word of the Year 1999" (didn't know it back then, I'm afraid):

Rindfleischetikettierungsüberwachungsaufgabenübertragungsgesetz
(source: http://german.about.com/library/blwort_long.htm)
"(das, 63 letters) "beef labeling regulation & delegation of supervision law"
This was a 1999 German Word of the Year, and it also won a special award as the longest German word for that year. It refers to a "law for regulating the labeling of beef" - all in one word, which is why it is so long. German also likes abbreviations, and this word has one: ReÜAÜG."

 

[Eldrich]

my favorite word is spanish too!

lamentablamente its just fun to say....though i don't think it competes with Rindfleischetikettierungsuberwachungsaufgabenubert ragungsgesetz hehe that was almost as fun to type as lamentablamente is to say!