Nikita Skobov - August 01, 2021
I wanted to write a blog post for the last few months but I kept doubting myself that anything I'd write would be interesting. So instead of taking time to write a long post, I thought itd be fun to write a quick list of things I feel strongly about.
In general, I try not to be opinionated because being strongly opinionated means you are less willing to accept other ideas, and I try to be relatively open-minded.
That being said, there are a few things I feel strongly about, and refuse to change my mind about :)
The apostrophes in contractions such as don't, won't, aren't, and couldn't dont disambiguate. The
word is already clear even without the apostrophe. If you noticed two sentences ago, I didnt use an apostrophe in dont
because it is unnecessary and doesnt provide any extra information. If you see dont there is no other word you can confuse it with.
This isnt true with all words with apostrophes. For example, some apostrophes in contractions like he'll, we'll, I'll, and I'd
DO disambiguate with the respective words hell, well, ill, and ID (identification). There are also words that arent contractions
where the apostrophe is necessary such as any possessive word. For example consider the phrase: "The kings will". We interpret that as there are multiple
kings and they will (do something). If we add an apostrophe, we get: "The king's will", which we interpret as there is one king, and he
has a will. For words where the apostrophe is necessary, I try to include it (unless Im texting in which case I never include it simply because it's faster).
Otherwise, the apostrophes in most simple contractions do not disambiguate, and therefore I refuse to use them. (If you are looking at the last
sentence where I use it's, it's because it's (it is) disambiguates between its (possession)).
Read the following out loud: "Those two things are completely separate". Say it again. I dont know where youre from,
but everyone I know pronounces it sep-ret if we are using it as an adjective
(ie: describing that some things are seperate), but we pronounce it seh-pa-rate if we are using it as a verb
(ie: please seperate the new toys from the old toys).
This contributes to a common mIsSpELLiNg where some people think those are two words spelled differently depending on
the meaning, but in fact it is the same word. Maybe there can be an argument made that it should be two different words; after all,
seperate technically isnt an existing word, so why not?
However, instead of adding a new word to the dictionary I think we should just spell it seperate.
Yes, this list is quite short; there are not many things I feel strongly about.
About me:
I am Nikita Skobov.
Contact me via email: skobo002@umn.edu.
Check out my projects: https://github.com/nikita-skobov.
Check out my other blog posts: https://blog.nikitas.link.