You can't have too many apostrophe's

Paul posted, "This might be my last post in the thread. Now you guy can burn me in effigy; have a blast! :)" Apparently: he can't help himself(five posts post-posting that post), like so many others in these forums. Paul- You said, "Writing "arena's" when you mean "arenas" makes your writing quite awkward to read for somebody who understands the rules of grammar." I understand the rules of grammar fairly well, and yet have no problem whatever discerning what others mean when using even the worst forms of Pigeon English. Perhaps your comprehension problem denotes a certain lack of intelligence, or some failure of mental process, on your part. Have you been doing a lot of drinking/drugs, or experiencing many so called, "senior moments" lately? If you read those troubling posts more slowly, their meanings may come to you more easily . Not to mention- If you were to type slower, you'd probably find yourself posting more clearly as well. Best wishes, and I hope you can resolve your issues. =8^)

Paul,
An assured method of tempering your obsession is to deal with the illiterate on a large scale. The significance of correct grammar versus poor grammar is substantially diminished. The fact that people can convey concepts and ideas effectively is the most important part of our language. To discover the enormously large number of Americans denied the basic ability to read and write is shocking. Whatever the cause, they are in a left in a limbo without at least two-thirds of the ability to communicate. Spoken English has no real punctuation, only affectations, pauses and gestures for expression. Our efforts to duplicate those with punctuation underline the imprecise nature of our language. If you can grasp the concept conveyed then the language has performed its task.

Sure. Do away with apostrophes. THEROMANSEVENMANAGEDTODOWITHOUTSPACESBETWEENWORDSANDHADONLYCAPITALLETTERS

Hi Rodman99999,

You do understand the meaning of "might", right? :)

As for the effect of grammar on comprehension, your insinuation that it makes *no* difference is clearly quite naive. I didn't imply that it makes text impossible to understand, or even require some kind of "great effort", but it does make the brain work harder, and that's a simple fact.

Let me put it in audio terms: an analogy would be the way phase errors in reproduced music cause the brain to burn more calories untangling the audio into something it recognizes, leading to (potential) long-term fatigue.

Hope this has cleared things up for you a bit.

Commcat,

Once again, I didn't complain about lack of punctuation.

I spoke about incorrect punctuation and grammar, which takes more effort than none at all.

Heck, if you don't understand basic grammar rules, there's no need to be greatly offended if somebody points it out. Make a small effort to rectify it and you probably will. Or, just decide you don't care and shrug it off.