Yet another question about grammer program

[bkwriter]

Yes, I know. Another question to answer. On my word programe there is grammatik, along with spell check.
It looks to me that this program is not always right. Or I'm not understanding it.





Ex "Her eyes were glittering sapphire and her mouth gave way to a sweet smile"

The suggestions come up with, "The verb glittering does not usually take an object.

What does this mean or should I re word it.

[sindy9001]

http://photo-collection.co.cc/img/3177/a08b1010ygij/grin.gif

[sindy9001]

Keep learning is important, repeat practice.http://photo-collection.co.cc/img/3177/a08b1010ygij/grin.gif

[Anna Magdalena]

All spell and grammar checkers are geared towards writing office reports etc. They have no concept of creative writing and are also frequently just plain wrong. Spell/grammar checkers are only as good as the knowledge of the people who write the programs--which in my experience is pretty poor.

[bkwriter]

Thanks Anna and all of you. I do have more to learn

[Dawnstorm]

It looks to me that this program is not always right. Or I'm not understanding it.

No, it isn't always right. Actually, I'd argue that a grammar checker is only useful as a reminder. If you don't know grammar to begin with you may end up hypercorrecting stuff (adding mistakes to a perfectly fine sentence).

Ex "Her eyes were glittering sapphire and her mouth gave way to a sweet smile"

The suggestions come up with, "The verb glittering does not usually take an object.

What does this mean or should I re word it.


No need to reword this on account of what the program said.

The program thinks that (a) "glittering" is used verbally, here and that (b) "sapphire" is the object of "glittering". In other words, it thinks that the structure of
Her eyes were glittering sapphire
is the same as
Her eyes were seeing wood.
But that's not true. A human can tell the difference at a glance. A machine can't tell it at all. It can only follow rules in a predetermined sequence. And that is the problem. The program, because it is looking for mistakes, chooses an interpretation that looks like a mistake.

There are other structures make sense.

Instead of:
WRONG: Her eyes (S) were glittering (V) sapphire (O).
this sentence could be read as:
RIGHT: Her eyes (S) were (V) glittering sapphire (Complement).
This would be roughly equivalent to the structure of:
The wall (S) was (V) solid stone (C).
"Sapphire" would be a material. (Of course, this would probably be read as a metaphor, as eyes made of sapphire wouldn't be too effective.)

I doubt, though, that this interpretation is what you had in mind. I think you meant the following:
RIGHT: Her eyes (S) were glittering (V) sapphire (C).
Here "sapphire" would be a colour. The structure is similarly to:
The sun is shining bright.***

Machine grammars have terrible problems with "garden path sentences" (a type of misleading sentence, that leads you down the wrong garden path at first, so you have to retrace your steps and start again, this time choosing another path). A famous example is:
The old man the boat.
A reader will probably start reading The old man and then rest will make no sense. The old man the boat. Huh?

But if you retrace your steps, you may realise that you've gone too far. The subject is actually shorter than you thought. You have to take an earlier branch of the garden paths, one you've probably missed: The old man the boat.

Now try to find a way to program a machine to reliably tell that difference. Here's a list (http://www.fun-with-words.com/ambiguous_garden_path.html) of garden path sentences. A reliable grammar check would have to be able to interpret them all correctly. But to do this you'd need a non-linear method. (That is a sequential method will not work.)

The field that tries to find ways to program its way around such problems is Computational Linguistics (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computational_linguistics). But, often, new solutions cause new problems. Look, for example, at these articles about translation programs:

Made in USA == Made in Austria|France|Italy|... ? (http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/005485.html), Austria == Ireland? (http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/005491.html), Why Austria is Ireland (http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/005492.html), The (probable) truth about Austria and Ireland (http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/005494.html)

The upshot is: when in doubt, the machine is wrong. Never trust a program. It's a tool, not a teacher.

[MMcQuown]

Spelchek are dumb; grammerchekr are wurse.

[RJK]

It all depends on where you are on the learning curve. For me, occasionally, spell check catches me in an error, and Grammar check still works as a reminder for me to watch for passive phrases. Others may need more reminders, you may not need it at all.

[Bartholomew]

Yes, I know. Another question to answer. On my word programe there is grammatik, along with spell check.
It looks to me that this program is not always right. Or I'm not understanding it.

Ex "Her eyes were glittering sapphire and her mouth gave way to a sweet smile"

The suggestions come up with, "The verb glittering does not usually take an object.

What does this mean or should I re word it.


Your word processor lit up at the word Sapphire because you're using it as, I believe, an adjective, but the program believed it to be a noun. If it had been a noun, you'd have needed to make it plural.

And honestly, I think that Sapphire as an adjective is initially confusing; I'd much prefer Her eyes were glittering sapphires....

That's just me.

[blacbird]

Beyond the grammar question, you may be better finding another adjective or analogy to characterize the blue color. While we normally think of sapphires as deep blue gemstones, they actually can be a variety of colors, including yellow and pink. The sentence as constructed tends to stop me in my tracks.

caw