![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ventaI just regaled ChrisC with a story about the lowly position of empiricists at the French court in the 17th or 18th century. The story goes like this:
All the finest minds of the era were busy debating why a bowl of water should become lighter when you put a goldfish into it. The debate was heated and wide-ranging. Until someone came along and said, er, actually, I don't think a bowl of water actually does get lighter when you add a goldfish. Look, I have here a bowl of water, a fish, and some scales.
His comments were immediately discounted because, well, who would be so low as to actually try the thing?
Which is a lovely story. But when I went a a-googling to try and find out whether I really meant the French court, and which century, and whether the man with the scales was someone whom history remembers...
Well, I can't find any evidence that I haven't just made the whole thing up. I'm sure I remember being told it in school. Has anyone else ever heard this story? If you heard it from me, it probably doesn't count.
All the finest minds of the era were busy debating why a bowl of water should become lighter when you put a goldfish into it. The debate was heated and wide-ranging. Until someone came along and said, er, actually, I don't think a bowl of water actually does get lighter when you add a goldfish. Look, I have here a bowl of water, a fish, and some scales.
His comments were immediately discounted because, well, who would be so low as to actually try the thing?
Which is a lovely story. But when I went a a-googling to try and find out whether I really meant the French court, and which century, and whether the man with the scales was someone whom history remembers...
Well, I can't find any evidence that I haven't just made the whole thing up. I'm sure I remember being told it in school. Has anyone else ever heard this story? If you heard it from me, it probably doesn't count.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2012-05-25 08:27 am (UTC)We had it drummed into us that while ne...pas was the usual form of negating a verb, if it was an infinitive, the correct form is ne pas...
Accordingly, we should have "and trying ne pas sprayer...", leaving aside that half the sentence is in English, sprayer probably isn't a real French word and the t key on my keyboard isn't working properly.
no subject
Date: 2012-05-25 08:43 am (UTC)Will now stop failing even to swear properly in French. I'll get my coat now.
no subject
Date: 2012-05-25 08:50 am (UTC)(Canadian French swearing is much more fun, btw.)
cinq six boîtes de tomates vartes!
no subject
Date: 2012-05-25 05:49 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-05-29 11:52 am (UTC)literally, it's 5-6 boxes of green tomatoes but that isn't the point.
Say it aloud and it sounds like "saint-ciboire de tabarnac" or holy ciborium of the tabernacle. For the unchurched, a ciborium is the box that holds the consecrated wafers ("the body of Christ") at communion, while a tabernacle is a most holy church, the original being the prototype for the Temple at Jerusalem. So you're combining a holy thing with a holy place. Naturally, profanity will result...
And as this isn't my thread at all, let's take a moment to remember Lenny Bruce's theory as to why f is a worse word than s. Apparently it's all to with priests too: priests and everybody else will s, but priests don't f.
This theory is quite compelling, as it can be easily extended to explain why c is such a bad word...
If needed, my apologies to Elizabeth for writing such things here.
no subject
Date: 2012-05-29 12:00 pm (UTC)My personal take has always been that I don't give a toss what arrangements of letters people use, it's the sentiment behind them that bothers me. I appreciate that this isn't true for everyone, which is why I don't swear all that much... anyone's welcome to curse as much as they wish on my LJ, though :)
no subject
Date: 2012-05-29 12:37 pm (UTC)