News for hackers. Stuff that matters.

A comment on A 75-Year Harvard Study Finds What It Takes To Live A Happy Life. Parent comment

Re:A 75-Year Harvard Study Finds What It Takes To Live A Hap... by saraid216 on Friday May 17, 2013 @01:14PM (#5725549)
It's ambiguous.

"You are in a dark forest. A disembodied voice speaks to you. They want you to follow."

How many voices? Would it have been more correct to say "They wants you to follow"? Should you contort the sentence to drop agency, saying "You should follow"? Is the pronoun referring to some group of people not included in this paragraph?

s/They want/Ze wants/ solves all of these questions immediately and simply.

In most cases, it comes down to stylistic preference. Some people like to use "it". Some people like to alternate "he" and "she". My preference is ze/zir/zirself. Some people feel threatened by it, as if someone else coding in a new language means their old standby of C90 is not good enough.

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:A 75-Year Harvard Study Finds What It Takes To Live A Hap... by mseebach on Friday May 17, 2013 @03:35PM (#5726303)
> s/They want/Ze wants/ solves all of these questions immediately and simply.

Hardly 'simply', as it prompted the GGGP to go and Google the term. You're changing some very significant terms in the language, and it's only simple if everybody is on board with the change.

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:A 75-Year Harvard Study Finds What It Takes To Live A Hap... by saraid216 on Friday May 17, 2013 @04:17PM (#5726489)
And he understood it immediately after Googling the definition, just like any other neologism.

The alternative is not having any solution at all.

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:A 75-Year Harvard Study Finds What It Takes To Live A Hap... by tomp on Friday May 17, 2013 @06:38PM (#5727029)
> And he understood

You mean "ze"?

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:A 75-Year Harvard Study Finds What It Takes To Live A Hap... by saraid216 on Friday May 17, 2013 @08:21PM (#5727388)
I'm pretty sure you're male.
[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:A 75-Year Harvard Study Finds What It Takes To Live A Hap... by kghose on Saturday May 18, 2013 @01:53PM (#5729708)
"It". A disembodied voice in a dark forest, regardless of whether you can deduce gender, is most definitely an "it". An "it" I would run away from.
[ Parent | on HN ]