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What makes it so special for me is the "allow you to," which
(when it seems to be needed) I always replace with "let you."
** I'm never comfortable with either of those words in sentences
like "The text editor allows you to edit your writing."
Truly it allows you to, but so does your boss. So does
your religion. So do I. Go ahead, edit your text.
I don't mind a bit.
To allow something, I think, is to refrain from preventing
or objecting to it. I think that to let has much the same meaning.
If the text editor didn't exist, I suppose one could say that
everything else in the world was then-- by not being a text editor--
not allowing you to edit your writing. But what the text editor
does is not just to allow but to enable you to edit. I understand
enabling is quite a fashionable concept these days, too; may sound
less awkward than a few years ago. Still, though, I prefer "you can"
most of the time. I realize it gets repetitive, but I think that
the brain accepts it as a recurring feature of the text just as the
brain accepts any other recurring phrase, and processes it
extra-quickly, once the recurrentness has registered.
_________________________________________________________________________
Mark L. Levinson | E-mail: mark -at- sd -dot- co -dot- il
SEE Technologies Ltd. | Voice: +972-9-507102, ext. 230 (work),
Box 544 | +972-9-552411 (home)
46105 Herzlia, ISRAEL | Fax: +972-9-509118
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Recurrentness? Recurrency? Recurrenticity?
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