I am also a really fast speed-reader, and my mind tends to ignore these sorts of words.
I remember one time I opened a fortune cookie, glanced at the slip, laughed, and repeated it to my friend, with perfect grammar. He grabbed the slip, actually read the slip (which apparently had had horrible grammar mistakes), and demanded to know how I had managed to read the slip while unintentionally correcting all the grammar mistakes in it.
I stand corrected; apparently about 20% would have been more accurate.
But to corroborate Alicorn’s story, though, I kept catching myself trying to remove that error during the proofreading stage before I remembered what I was doing.
I actually didn’t even notice it until it was pointed out in the OP, but I think this might be abnormal for me; I generally feel the need to correct errors in grammar or word choice. Outside of signalling my own percieved intelligence there isn’t really a reason for me to do this for most of what I read, so I am inclined to agree with the statement. So even though I didn’t actually perform the act, I’d put myself within his “people who would flinch” at this category, even though I didn’t happen to flinch at that particular error.
My take on this—based on what I read on Language Log, mostly—is that there are two classes of grammatical “errors” (though in some cases the distinction may be not completely clear-cut): 1) actual processing slip-ups due to brain farts or similar resulting in phrasings educated native speakers wouldn’t normally use in the relevant registers, even when they’re using System 1 (fast) thinking alone, and 2) failure to conform to artificial (or artificially-kept-alive) rules introduced mainly for signalling purposes, and which even native speakers don’t normally follow unless they’re using System 2 (slow) thinking to do so. If you see a pattern in the kind of errors people make (e.g. so many people using “less” instead of “fewer”), then you’re likely dealing with an error of the second kind (unless there’s some other explanation for the pattern, e.g. it involves identically- or similarly-sounding words). (In the British National Corpus, “fewer” followed by a plural noun occurs 625 times, whereas and “less” followed by a plural noun occurs 162 times. In actual processing errors, the ratio between the frequency of the correct form and of the wrong form would be much larger than that—for example, “these” followed by a plural noun occurs 29603 times, whereas “this” followed by a plural noun occurs 259 times.)
I can’t speak for others, but “actual” errors usually jump out to me even if I’m not using System 2 thinking, whereas violations of artificial rules don’t unless I’m looking for them.
There’s possibly another category of not keeping up with language shifts. It drives me crazy when people use “jive” when “jibe” is the right word, even though their intended meaning is clear.
I didn’t notice or even really care about that, because
the meaning was obvious
I especially give more leeway on multi-regional forums where not everybody uses identical conventions
I rank solidly in the mid-prole category of that quoted class essay, so I shouldn’t care!
All in all, the article was speculative, but helpful.
The essay was interesting, but woefully dated. I have the gut feeling that the essential points remain true but in a modern context not anticipated by the author. I got the impression that he was pointing out things that everyone may know subconsciously, but never would have pointed out publicly.
BTW, did anyone notice that the comma in the parent was before “by” instead of after it where it logically belongs, before I edited it a few seconds ago?
Upvote this comment if you didn’t notice, or weren’t bothered by, the use of “less” instead of “fewer”.
I am also a really fast speed-reader, and my mind tends to ignore these sorts of words.
I remember one time I opened a fortune cookie, glanced at the slip, laughed, and repeated it to my friend, with perfect grammar. He grabbed the slip, actually read the slip (which apparently had had horrible grammar mistakes), and demanded to know how I had managed to read the slip while unintentionally correcting all the grammar mistakes in it.
Similar here.
I stand corrected; apparently about 20% would have been more accurate.
But to corroborate Alicorn’s story, though, I kept catching myself trying to remove that error during the proofreading stage before I remembered what I was doing.
I actually didn’t even notice it until it was pointed out in the OP, but I think this might be abnormal for me; I generally feel the need to correct errors in grammar or word choice. Outside of signalling my own percieved intelligence there isn’t really a reason for me to do this for most of what I read, so I am inclined to agree with the statement. So even though I didn’t actually perform the act, I’d put myself within his “people who would flinch” at this category, even though I didn’t happen to flinch at that particular error.
My take on this—based on what I read on Language Log, mostly—is that there are two classes of grammatical “errors” (though in some cases the distinction may be not completely clear-cut): 1) actual processing slip-ups due to brain farts or similar resulting in phrasings educated native speakers wouldn’t normally use in the relevant registers, even when they’re using System 1 (fast) thinking alone, and 2) failure to conform to artificial (or artificially-kept-alive) rules introduced mainly for signalling purposes, and which even native speakers don’t normally follow unless they’re using System 2 (slow) thinking to do so. If you see a pattern in the kind of errors people make (e.g. so many people using “less” instead of “fewer”), then you’re likely dealing with an error of the second kind (unless there’s some other explanation for the pattern, e.g. it involves identically- or similarly-sounding words). (In the British National Corpus, “fewer” followed by a plural noun occurs 625 times, whereas and “less” followed by a plural noun occurs 162 times. In actual processing errors, the ratio between the frequency of the correct form and of the wrong form would be much larger than that—for example, “these” followed by a plural noun occurs 29603 times, whereas “this” followed by a plural noun occurs 259 times.)
I can’t speak for others, but “actual” errors usually jump out to me even if I’m not using System 2 thinking, whereas violations of artificial rules don’t unless I’m looking for them.
There’s possibly another category of not keeping up with language shifts. It drives me crazy when people use “jive” when “jibe” is the right word, even though their intended meaning is clear.
I didn’t notice or even really care about that, because
the meaning was obvious
I especially give more leeway on multi-regional forums where not everybody uses identical conventions
I rank solidly in the mid-prole category of that quoted class essay, so I shouldn’t care!
All in all, the article was speculative, but helpful. The essay was interesting, but woefully dated. I have the gut feeling that the essential points remain true but in a modern context not anticipated by the author. I got the impression that he was pointing out things that everyone may know subconsciously, but never would have pointed out publicly.
BTW, did anyone notice that the comma in the parent was before “by” instead of after it where it logically belongs, before I edited it a few seconds ago?