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I understand that this sentence has multiple meanings. Some Google-sources say 6, one says 108. However, I can't even identify that many... does anyone have anything on this? Thanks! ╟─ Treasury Tag► contribs─╢ 07:35, 4 April 2009 (UTC)
Okay, we have "When John met his (A) uncle he (B) took off his (C) hat." A cannot be the uncle, but B or C can. Any of them can be John, and any of them can be another person -- the same or different other people. If you think it seems nonsensical to imagine the sentence referring to 5 different people, you only need to imagine the speaker pointing to someone each time she says "he" or "his". The possibilities for A,B,C are:
Which gives a total of 29 readings. I may have missed one or two cases, but this is going to be close to correct. The number 108 is of course equal to 2×2×3×3×3, and I think the person who came up with that number was ignoring the fact that the number of possible readings depends on how many different people the sentence is talking about, and imagining that the different possible meanings of different parts could be combined arbitrarily. --Anonymous, 11:00 UTC, April 4, 2009.
According to that, it's 4 x 5 x 5 (the first pronoun being any of those five less John), which gives 100? -- PalaceGuard008 ( Talk) 06:42, 5 April 2009 (UTC)
Language desk | ||
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< April 3 | << Mar | April | May >> | April 5 > |
Welcome to the Wikipedia Language Reference Desk Archives |
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The page you are currently viewing is an archive page. While you can leave answers for any questions shown below, please ask new questions on one of the current reference desk pages. |
I understand that this sentence has multiple meanings. Some Google-sources say 6, one says 108. However, I can't even identify that many... does anyone have anything on this? Thanks! ╟─ Treasury Tag► contribs─╢ 07:35, 4 April 2009 (UTC)
Okay, we have "When John met his (A) uncle he (B) took off his (C) hat." A cannot be the uncle, but B or C can. Any of them can be John, and any of them can be another person -- the same or different other people. If you think it seems nonsensical to imagine the sentence referring to 5 different people, you only need to imagine the speaker pointing to someone each time she says "he" or "his". The possibilities for A,B,C are:
Which gives a total of 29 readings. I may have missed one or two cases, but this is going to be close to correct. The number 108 is of course equal to 2×2×3×3×3, and I think the person who came up with that number was ignoring the fact that the number of possible readings depends on how many different people the sentence is talking about, and imagining that the different possible meanings of different parts could be combined arbitrarily. --Anonymous, 11:00 UTC, April 4, 2009.
According to that, it's 4 x 5 x 5 (the first pronoun being any of those five less John), which gives 100? -- PalaceGuard008 ( Talk) 06:42, 5 April 2009 (UTC)