Talk:1602: Linguistics Club

If biannual is ambiguous, meaning either biennial (every two years) or semiannual (twice each year), then isn't sesquiannual similarly ambiguous, meaning either every 1.5 years (every 18 months), or 1.5 times a year (every 8 months)? Pete (talk) 06:38, 11 November 2015 (UTC)

If I'm confused I think of plants: Annuals, biennials and perennials - this last one being the important one as I *know* there is no such thing "perannual", so the ending I want must be "-ennial". 162.158.34.147 08:58, 11 November 2015 (UTC)

Could it not mean it meets one and a half tines each year, so once during each year then every other new years it meets with half the meeting before the ball drop and the other half after? 108.162.236.181 06:41, 11 November 2015 (UTC)

You know, I always thought the roots of "sesqui-" equated to "six quarters" (i.e. 1½). Today I learn that it's apparently "a half and (the original unit, about to be mentioned)". I'm glad I read this place. 162.158.152.125 06:49, 11 November 2015 (UTC)

...and then I nearly made a total mess of the editing, while trying to add info and 'correct' it, but I think it's back to how it should be, with the correct amount of appropriate justifications. (Note, "sesquicentennial" could be read as "one half (0.5) plus one hundred (100) years", i.e. 100.5 years, but the intended grammatical formation is "one-half-plus-one (1.5) hundred years", i.e. 150 years. Whilst "sesquicentannual" would doubtless be... give or take, according to rigor... something that occured every two days, ten hours and twenty-four minutes, I suppose.) 162.158.152.125 07:32, 11 November 2015 (UTC)

I thought that the root of the Russian word "poltora" (same meaning) was "half of three", but it's actually "half to two". Now if I could only understand why the English phrase "half again as much" also means 1.5 times...

On-topic, I understand "biannual" as "every 6 months", so by extension "sesquiannual" would mean "every 8 months". Not to be confused with "sesquiennial", which does mean "every 18 months" (as in Fifth Sesquiennial Best Article Elections of Russian Uncyclopedia; sadly the Sixth Elections had not proceeded on the account of only having one eligible candidate, and there are still no eligible candidates for the Seventh, due in July). --141.101.79.37 07:52, 11 November 2015 (UTC)

Well, 'round these parts it's generally said in a different order, as "half as much again", which is more obviously 50% on top, or 150%.

If only I could stop people saying "four times less". One can only presume they mean 25%, a quarter (the reverse of the quarter being made "more by four times" to make the whole). But three times less would be a third, two times less a half and one times less... well, that breaks things. Rather than the unaltered 100%, parsing that suggests either 0%, or possibly half, if the reverse is "one time more (on top of the starting point)". In which case "four times less" is 20%, so that "four times more" adds four more 20%s to get you up to the 100%...

Which is a totally different mathematical conundrum from removing 10% then adding 10% to get to 99%. (original - (10%*original) = 90%*original = midstep. midstep + (10%*midstep) = 90%*original + (9%*original) = 99% original.) Or adding 10% (110% original) then removing 10% (-11% original), which is commutatively the same pair of operations (*1.1, *0.9) in reverse.

But that's probably not relevent. 162.158.152.125 08:33, 11 November 2015 (UTC)

'biweekly' means both once every two weeks and twice a week. The explanation implies it only means once every two weeks. --173.245.56.63 13:46, 11 November 2015 (UTC)

The only thing in common there is the prefix. "bi-" means 2 and "sesqui-" means 1.5, no matter what. In the case of "biweekly", that can mean "two per week" or "every two weeks," and that's because "weekly" can take either meaning. The same applies to "monthly" for "bimonthly."

Annual, however, is different. "Biannual" only means "two per year." That's it. It doesn't mean "every two years," because that's a different word: 'biennial'. In other words, the "annual" root means "once a year", and the "-ennial" suffix means "once every X years".

The reason for this is that "annual" and "-ennial" were derived from Latin words that already had the distinction, while "weekly" and "monthly" were created from English words, with no way to distinguish the two meanings.

Confusing? Blame the Romans. 108.162.246.84 23:38, 11 November 2015 (UTC)

I agree with you; however, Merriam-Webster does not. The dictionary definition for "biannual" lists both "twice a year" and "every two years", listing "biennial" as a synonym. This is the problem with descriptive languages: if enough idiots use a word wrong, it becomes right.162.158.56.221 00:14, 12 November 2015 (UTC)

"Regarding the title text, a tautology is a statement that is true because of its logical form, such as "all birds are birds" or "A = A." Maybe tautology in grammatical context is more appropriate here, since the comic is linguistics-themed: "In grammar, a tautology (from Greek tauto, "the same" and logos, "word/idea") is an unnecessary repetition of meaning, using more than one word effectively to say the same thing (...)" or "saying the same thing twice", as in the title text: (...) Tautology Club, which meets on the date of the Tautology Club meeting. 141.101.104.71 14:06, 11 November 2015 (UTC)

Just to add a real-world example for additional confusion on the issue: The Society for the Anthropology of Lowland South America has a sesquiannual conference which is held every 18 months. The last conference was on June 26, 2014 and the next one is January 7, 2016. 162.158.252.155 15:45, 11 November 2015 (UTC)

The current second paragraph says:

On the other hand [and the crux of the comic in general], 'sesqui' can be interpreted as a prefix meaning '1.5'. For example, the US sesquicentennial was celebrated on July 4, 1926 (after 150 years), so the confusion comes from people who think the meetings would be every 8 months (as above) or every 18 months (here). The confusion is related to the distinction between 'biweekly' (once every two weeks) and 'semiweekly' (once every half-week, i.e., twice a week), and bimonthly (twice a month or every two months). 'Biannual' and 'biennial' only furthers this confusion (as in this case, 'biannual' and 'semiannual' are synonymous when the prefixes usually are not).

...which misses the point. Sesqui is 1.5, bi is 2 (c.f. bicycle, 2 wheels), semi is 0.5 (c.f. semicircle, half a circle). The issue is with the -ennial (X years per event) and -annual (X events per year). Semiannual (half an event per year, thus one event every two years) is cognate with biennial (two years between events). Biannual only means 'two per year', unless misused. Semiennual would match that (half a year per event), but I'm not sure that's ever used, like perannual (1 event a year), in the face of the identically descriptive perennial (a year between all successive events). ...I think. Tablet on-screen keyboard obscures most of what I'm typing, so there'll be no proofreading of this point to make sure I've not boobed. It'll have to stand. 162.158.153.35 16:33, 11 November 2015 (UTC)

I'm just going to leave this Google Trends link here... Celloman (talk) 16:45, 11 November 2015 (UTC)

As another note, a group that meets every 8 months and a group that meets every 18 months will only overlap every 6 years. But my sesquibiennual group has the room booked, so they'll both have to reschedule 108.162.214.155 23:48, 11 November 2015 (UTC)

Maybe I am overthinking it, but 1.5 times a year shouldn't be every 8 months, shouldn't it be every9? After all it's is every 1 time period(6 months) and half of that(3), which the sum is 9. Unless it is supposed to be 8 because it is 8/12=2/3 being 3/2(1.5) flipped? -108.162.238.89 00:37, 12 November 2015 (UTC)

Sounds like you have perhaps gone a step further than you should have. One every 9 would be 1.333··· per year, or four every three years if simplified. Not sure where the 6 months for 1 time period idea comes from. The 'flip', i.e. the inverse, of the 1.5 is the point. (See the semi-/bi- thing someone mentioned above. Each of them the inverse of the other, thanks to the annual/ennial distinction of which way up the any fraction applies.) 141.101.106.161 11:30, 12 November 2015 (UTC)