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Wish Linguistics

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  • Wish Linguistics

    So the genie pops out of the lantern and gives you the usual spiel. But you're a genre-blind idiot and immediately exclaim, "I wish I was a little bit taller!" Now, technically, you have mangled the English subjunctive mood, because you should say, "I wish I were a little bit taller."

    If this is an ******* literal genie, how does said genie respond? Can the genie interpret your utterance to mean, "I wish that, at some point in the past, I had been a little bit taller than I am now," and then simply shrink you down a couple inches in the present? Or does the genie process the mangled subjunctive as ungrammatical, something akin to "I wish FNORD purple monkey dishwasher!" and ask you to try again? Or does the genie recognize the fact that prescriptivist rules about grammar don't necessarily reflect the reality of how a language is used and that the only proper measure of grammaticality is use, so when someone says, "I wish I was a little bit taller," the genie can infer the subjunctive mood from "I wish" and understand what is being wished for? Or, similarly, does the genie know what the wisher means, even if the wisher doesn't say it exactly correctly, and then provide the wisher with his wish?

    What this gets down to is, in what sense can we talk about the literal interpretation of a wish? For example, if you wish for a "pet brontosaurus," what does a genie provide? The brontosaurus is a creature that never existed, so a genie cannot simply find the Platonic ideal of the brontosaurus and then manifest a live version of one.

    But there are many cases in which a wisher may wish for something not real. If a wisher wishes for a unicorn, for example, unicorns may not be real but the unicorn as a concept is. In that case, does the genie call upon the concept of the unicorn to provide what would be a real unicorn, or provide a book that contains unicorns (the only kind of unicorns that do exist--fictional ones), or does the genie know what kind of unicorn the wisher wants and provide that?

    If the genie pulls from the general concept of a unicorn, what arbiter exists as to the real unicorn--D&D 3.5 Monster Manual, AD&D Monster Manual, or some other non-D&D-related resource entirely? And if there is no true authority on the unicorn, then does that mean we must assume a genie can only provide a unicorn (or brontosaurus) based on what the genie knows the wisher wants? If that's the case, then ******* literal genies cannot exist (unless you wish for one from a real genie) and you should feel safe in knowing that your wishes won't be twisted if you're imprecise with your words (or at the very least, genies will end up saying DOES NOT COMPUTE a lot).

    This all assumes we don't have Wishmaster genies, who take some of the words from any sentence that might be wishful in nature and then kill you in the most horrible way imaginable for some reason. Those are not ******* literal genies as much as they are just ******* genies.
    Click here if you're having trouble sleeping.
    "We confess our little faults to persuade people that we have no large ones." - François de La Rochefoucauld

  • #2
    is the genie a hot blonde girl?

    or some sort of bad, arab ethnic stereotype?
    To us, it is the BEAST.

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    • #3
      I'll revert to those ancient D&D dungeon master days.
      Go for the pimp.
      In your first example it would be simple nothing happens. You would be taller sometime in your past but back to original height. Wish wasted. But consider yourself lucky that I didn't figure out a way to kill you by it.
      I don't see how wishing for unicorn could end well.
      It's almost as if all his overconfident, absolutist assertions were spoonfed to him by a trusted website or subreddit. Sheeple
      RIP Tony Bogey & Baron O

      Comment


      • #4
        Originally posted by Sava View Post
        is the genie a hot blonde girl?

        or some sort of bad, arab ethnic stereotype?
        My original thought was Arabic, because then I thought I could make this thread more boring by investigating how the Arabic language treats the subjunctive mood.
        Click here if you're having trouble sleeping.
        "We confess our little faults to persuade people that we have no large ones." - François de La Rochefoucauld

        Comment


        • #5
          Well if it hadn't been for the old days were we all tried hard to be creative when figuring out how to screw someone when granting wishes in D&D you would have succeeded.
          It's almost as if all his overconfident, absolutist assertions were spoonfed to him by a trusted website or subreddit. Sheeple
          RIP Tony Bogey & Baron O

          Comment


          • #6
            Originally posted by Lorizael View Post
            I thought I could make this thread more boring by investigating how the Arabic language treats the subjunctive mood.
            generally quite well, although i hear that it forgot to buy a birthday present last year, leading to some friction.
            "The Christian way has not been tried and found wanting, it has been found to be hard and left untried" - GK Chesterton.

            "The most obvious predicition about the future is that it will be mostly like the past" - Alain de Botton

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            • #7
              frankly, a wish isn't legitimately granted if the genie does some bull**** like make someone 50 feet tall when someone says "I want to be taller"

              if anything, we need a regulatory agency to make sure these genies are following ethical practices
              To us, it is the BEAST.

              Comment


              • #8
                I disagree. If your wish is not specific you should pay the price. The risk of making a wish.
                It's almost as if all his overconfident, absolutist assertions were spoonfed to him by a trusted website or subreddit. Sheeple
                RIP Tony Bogey & Baron O

                Comment


                • #9
                  I, for one, am against bad-faith wish results.

                  and the subsequent victim blaming
                  To us, it is the BEAST.

                  Comment


                  • #10
                    just as a side note, that always seemed weird to me

                    victim blaming

                    the whole "WELL THEY SHOULDA KNOWN BETTER"

                    how about, no

                    how about, people selling things/providing a service/granting wishes need to follow through on their part of the contract in an honest and ethical way

                    the customer/consumer should not have the responsibility of evaluating the legal or ethical nature of the seller/service provider

                    that's the dumbest thing i've ever heard

                    only a criminal, or person looking to act unethically, would think otherwise
                    To us, it is the BEAST.

                    Comment


                    • #11
                      Originally posted by Sava View Post
                      I, for one, am against bad-faith wish results.

                      and the subsequent victim blaming
                      Well, what if you wish for a semantically ambiguous item, like an unlockable door? Is the genie obliged to peer into your mind and know which word you meant?
                      Click here if you're having trouble sleeping.
                      "We confess our little faults to persuade people that we have no large ones." - François de La Rochefoucauld

                      Comment


                      • #12
                        Sava, also, most genies are slaves from whom we demand services in exchange for literally nothing. How can we possibly say they owe us good-faith exchanges? That's like being angry at a negro for doing a half-assed cotton picking job.
                        Click here if you're having trouble sleeping.
                        "We confess our little faults to persuade people that we have no large ones." - François de La Rochefoucauld

                        Comment


                        • #13
                          Originally posted by Lorizael View Post
                          Well, what if you wish for a semantically ambiguous item, like an unlockable door? Is the genie obliged to peer into your mind and know which word you meant?
                          there's a certain amount of due diligence that is required

                          if you went to home depot and asked for a door, can they just give you any door they choose and take your money?

                          frankly, there's no acceptable argument for allowing for bad faith results

                          "People SHOULD be allowed to screw other people over" by itself, is a complete abortion of an argument
                          To us, it is the BEAST.

                          Comment


                          • #14
                            Originally posted by Lorizael View Post
                            How can we possibly say they owe us good-faith exchanges?
                            we are conscious beings with the capacity for self-determination


                            so far, your argument consists of "people should be screwed over" and "laws? but how can we make laws? THATS SILLY"
                            To us, it is the BEAST.

                            Comment


                            • #15
                              You use a bad example as far as I'm concerned.
                              If I go into Home Depot, I will be paying something so bad faith would be considered a type of fraud.
                              If I'm making a wish, there is no monetary cost so I can't consider it fraud in that sense.
                              However if I consider the price paid for making a wish then you must consider the wording carefully in order to get what you truly desire.
                              If you don't make the effort they you shouldn't get the result.

                              And my example was from a GAME.
                              It's almost as if all his overconfident, absolutist assertions were spoonfed to him by a trusted website or subreddit. Sheeple
                              RIP Tony Bogey & Baron O

                              Comment

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