Non Sequitur: Re: Python Forum

[Steven D'Aprano]

On Sun, 06 Jun 2010 21:45:44 -0700, Dennis Lee Bieber wrote:

> On Mon, 07 Jun 2010 11:29:59 +1000, Ben Finney
> <ben+python at benfinney.id.au> declaimed the following in
> gmane.comp.python.general:
> 
>> claim to the word. The existing forums are still forums.
>>
> 	I favor "fora" <G>

I see your smiley, but the Oxford dictionary does suggest that "fora" is 
only acceptable as the plural when talking about more than one ancient 
Roman forum. When using it in the context of English, as we are doing 
here, the accepted plural is "forums". After all, we don't use Inuit 
pluralisation rules when talking about more than one anorak.

 
> 	Like the difference between fish (plural species) and fishes 
> (which I tend to use for plural of one specie)


That's a hypercorrection. The singular of species is species, not specie. 
Specie is a different word: coins or hard cash.

There is a phrase "in specie", which means "in kind", which is formed 
from the same root as species, but the words are different and species is 
its own plural.

"Fish" can be either singular (as in "I fed the fish") or a collective 
noun ("there are many fish that live in salt water"). Plural is "fishes", 
as in "I ate three fishes", although in common use people tend to use 
fish/fishes as both plural and collective nouns.



-- 
Steven