Just for fun...I'm gonna make this disagreement even more absurdly specific: I think this is a disagreement on the definition of 'humming' or perhaps on the form of the word being used (humming/verb/action vs. humming/adjective/sound). In my opinion, the action 'humming' is defined by forcing vocalized air to escape through the nose and you're cheating by letting the air out through your mouth. Though I concede that you are producing a sound that could be described as humming. 😅
Yeah I think if you want to define humming that way than what I am doing is, of course, not humming, but I think if making a humming noise with my lips pursed doesn't count as humming that is, perhaps, a sign that the definition of humming being used might be a bit off. 😛
I guess I feel about this roughly in the same way I feel about a strawberry technically not being a berry (and a banana technically being a berry): When a colloquial term is defined precisely in such a way as to exclude things that would clearly fall under the colloquial usage, that's a problem with the precision not the excluded example.
Agreed! This feels similar to the "is a hotdog a sandwich" debate. Fun to think about, but maybe not worth being disappointed in someone's level of curiosity for failing to investigate. 😅
TBF my disappointment is more prompted by the question "Surely we don't hum with our nose?" than that he didn't figure out how to hum with his nose closed! Although I'll grant it's a bit extra of me, I do also find it confusing to both be interested in the question and not do the experiment.
I had the same reaction as Alaina - I think it's better to call the thing you do with your mouth open "yodeling" or "vocalizing" or something like that.
I did in fact do the experiment when I read Stephen's piece but I kept my mouth closed because to me that's what separates humming from the nonsense singing I do all the time
Look, I acknowledge my post was a bit dickish and it's not unreasonable that I've got your back up as a result, but...
> I’m surprised that someone as forensic as you didn’t consider I was being facetious in the first place
"I was only joking" is the laziest possible defence and this response lowers my opinion of you far far more than the entirely inconsequential thing I was responding to ever could, which was basically not at at all.
You made an error, you weren't paying attention, you didn't think about it much, etc. None of these are a big deal. Maybe you also disagree whether it's an error. Also fine. It's even fine to complain that I'm being a dick by writing this (As I said, I acknowledge I sortof am). But if your response to an error being pointed out is "Well I didn't intend to be correct anyway and you shouldn't have expected me to", that is a far worse indictment of your character than I think you intend it to be.
Ironically the dickishness of this reply lowers my opinion of you more than the (milder, more useful) dickishness of the original post. ;)
(Shared in the same spirit of friendly constructive criticism that I imagine to animate your post and comment.)
It apparently seems implausible to you that Stephen's brief remark was lighthearted. I disagree - why couldn't he be sharing his initial surprise, in a humorous way? Why are you so sure that he didn't take the obvious next step, and trust the reader to do the same? That is how I would have read his comment.
Now, it seems fair for this to still not be your best guess of his intent. But being confident in this seems misplaced to me. (Typical mind fallacy, possibly?)
Therefore, your reply - where you say he must be lying, and lecture him about it - comes across as condescending and small-minded. Maybe it will be easier to see this if you assume he is telling the truth, and see how your comment reads in that case.
TBH it's true that the post makes it seem more like I think he's lying than I do. So you're right about that, sorry. That being said I otherwise stand by my response.
"I was just joking and you should have been able to tell that and the fact that you didn't is a you problem", especially when said in a snide tone like that, is an attitude with a sufficiently bad track record that I don't actually care that much whether he's lying, it's still an extremely bad response that lowers my opinion of the person using it. One consequence of that is that it does indeed cause me to be extra unwilling to extend charitable interpretation to the person saying it.
In contrast, "Yeah, that was an offhand joke, sorry that wasn't clear" would have been fine and I would have in turn just said something like "Oh yeah fair enough, sorry for the misreading".
Fair, thanks for the thoughtful (and highly non-dickish) response!
That does mostly close the gap between us, but you did read a much more negative tone into his comment than I would have. The way I see it, you bid 1 dickishness unit with your initial post. Quite mild and reasonable. He upped the ante with 3 DUs - snide but still reasonably mild. You raised with 6 DUs. Not too bad as things go but a bit rude. I see this as an example of the difficulty of disagreeing with strangers via text without escalation. (Probably your post, a 1, seemed like a 4 to him, so he responded with what he hoped was a 2. His 3 seemed like a 7 to you, so responded with what you hoped was a 3. Etc. IOW imperfect modeling of other people's intentions tends to lead to this escalatory dynamic.)
Thank you for the opportunity to use the word 'dickish' so many times, easily doubling my lifetime count! :)
Yeah, I think without the strong negative association with the content I would probably have been much more charitable about reading the tone!
Agreed that a lot of this is partly just escalation due to difficulty of reading tone and intent via text. It happens, it's a shame. I could probably have done better in my response, but given the specific content I wasn't very inclined to, and TBH I was probably having a bad day at that point (still in COVID recovery and not high on patience).
I was quite surprised to find that it is possible to hum while holding my nose and closing my mouth. I'm able to hum for about a second by directing the air used for humming into my mouth and nose. I'm sure with some practice the humming time could be further extended
I knew how humming worked already (having investigated!) But here is something related I noticed recently - the nasally voice I get when holding my nose is optional! It's possible to talk essentially totally normally while holding your nose. This surprised me! And taught me something about one dimension of how my voice works.
I won't describe the mechanics of how to do this here, in case it spoils it for someone. Instead, you should investigate it yourself!
Just for fun...I'm gonna make this disagreement even more absurdly specific: I think this is a disagreement on the definition of 'humming' or perhaps on the form of the word being used (humming/verb/action vs. humming/adjective/sound). In my opinion, the action 'humming' is defined by forcing vocalized air to escape through the nose and you're cheating by letting the air out through your mouth. Though I concede that you are producing a sound that could be described as humming. 😅
Yeah I think if you want to define humming that way than what I am doing is, of course, not humming, but I think if making a humming noise with my lips pursed doesn't count as humming that is, perhaps, a sign that the definition of humming being used might be a bit off. 😛
I guess I feel about this roughly in the same way I feel about a strawberry technically not being a berry (and a banana technically being a berry): When a colloquial term is defined precisely in such a way as to exclude things that would clearly fall under the colloquial usage, that's a problem with the precision not the excluded example.
Agreed! This feels similar to the "is a hotdog a sandwich" debate. Fun to think about, but maybe not worth being disappointed in someone's level of curiosity for failing to investigate. 😅
TBF my disappointment is more prompted by the question "Surely we don't hum with our nose?" than that he didn't figure out how to hum with his nose closed! Although I'll grant it's a bit extra of me, I do also find it confusing to both be interested in the question and not do the experiment.
Okay, THAT is totally fair. 💯
I had the same reaction as Alaina - I think it's better to call the thing you do with your mouth open "yodeling" or "vocalizing" or something like that.
I did in fact do the experiment when I read Stephen's piece but I kept my mouth closed because to me that's what separates humming from the nonsense singing I do all the time
Yes, if my mouth were open I would agree it's not humming. My mouth is closed in this video! You can force the air out through closed lips.
Here's another video where it's even more obvious https://photos.app.goo.gl/kWUCZmsCW2cYXTQaA
If that is the definition of humming, then it hardly bears wonder that you can't do it while holding your nose.
I’m surprised that someone as forensic as you didn’t consider I was being facetious in the first place. Enjoyed the post, if not the tone.
Look, I acknowledge my post was a bit dickish and it's not unreasonable that I've got your back up as a result, but...
> I’m surprised that someone as forensic as you didn’t consider I was being facetious in the first place
"I was only joking" is the laziest possible defence and this response lowers my opinion of you far far more than the entirely inconsequential thing I was responding to ever could, which was basically not at at all.
You made an error, you weren't paying attention, you didn't think about it much, etc. None of these are a big deal. Maybe you also disagree whether it's an error. Also fine. It's even fine to complain that I'm being a dick by writing this (As I said, I acknowledge I sortof am). But if your response to an error being pointed out is "Well I didn't intend to be correct anyway and you shouldn't have expected me to", that is a far worse indictment of your character than I think you intend it to be.
Ironically the dickishness of this reply lowers my opinion of you more than the (milder, more useful) dickishness of the original post. ;)
(Shared in the same spirit of friendly constructive criticism that I imagine to animate your post and comment.)
It apparently seems implausible to you that Stephen's brief remark was lighthearted. I disagree - why couldn't he be sharing his initial surprise, in a humorous way? Why are you so sure that he didn't take the obvious next step, and trust the reader to do the same? That is how I would have read his comment.
Now, it seems fair for this to still not be your best guess of his intent. But being confident in this seems misplaced to me. (Typical mind fallacy, possibly?)
Therefore, your reply - where you say he must be lying, and lecture him about it - comes across as condescending and small-minded. Maybe it will be easier to see this if you assume he is telling the truth, and see how your comment reads in that case.
TBH it's true that the post makes it seem more like I think he's lying than I do. So you're right about that, sorry. That being said I otherwise stand by my response.
"I was just joking and you should have been able to tell that and the fact that you didn't is a you problem", especially when said in a snide tone like that, is an attitude with a sufficiently bad track record that I don't actually care that much whether he's lying, it's still an extremely bad response that lowers my opinion of the person using it. One consequence of that is that it does indeed cause me to be extra unwilling to extend charitable interpretation to the person saying it.
In contrast, "Yeah, that was an offhand joke, sorry that wasn't clear" would have been fine and I would have in turn just said something like "Oh yeah fair enough, sorry for the misreading".
Fair, thanks for the thoughtful (and highly non-dickish) response!
That does mostly close the gap between us, but you did read a much more negative tone into his comment than I would have. The way I see it, you bid 1 dickishness unit with your initial post. Quite mild and reasonable. He upped the ante with 3 DUs - snide but still reasonably mild. You raised with 6 DUs. Not too bad as things go but a bit rude. I see this as an example of the difficulty of disagreeing with strangers via text without escalation. (Probably your post, a 1, seemed like a 4 to him, so he responded with what he hoped was a 2. His 3 seemed like a 7 to you, so responded with what you hoped was a 3. Etc. IOW imperfect modeling of other people's intentions tends to lead to this escalatory dynamic.)
Thank you for the opportunity to use the word 'dickish' so many times, easily doubling my lifetime count! :)
Yeah, I think without the strong negative association with the content I would probably have been much more charitable about reading the tone!
Agreed that a lot of this is partly just escalation due to difficulty of reading tone and intent via text. It happens, it's a shame. I could probably have done better in my response, but given the specific content I wasn't very inclined to, and TBH I was probably having a bad day at that point (still in COVID recovery and not high on patience).
No worries! And good luck with the recovery
I was quite surprised to find that it is possible to hum while holding my nose and closing my mouth. I'm able to hum for about a second by directing the air used for humming into my mouth and nose. I'm sure with some practice the humming time could be further extended
Love the investigative spirit!
I knew how humming worked already (having investigated!) But here is something related I noticed recently - the nasally voice I get when holding my nose is optional! It's possible to talk essentially totally normally while holding your nose. This surprised me! And taught me something about one dimension of how my voice works.
I won't describe the mechanics of how to do this here, in case it spoils it for someone. Instead, you should investigate it yourself!
Oh, huh. That is indeed super interesting! I shall try to remember to try the experiment, thanks.
Yep - and you probably don't need a huge block of time. I'd rate the difficulty as similar to the humming one.