Flag proposal [OT]

[Paul D. Anderson]

Alix Pexton Wrote:

> On 12/06/2011 16:11, Steven Schveighoffer wrote:
> > On Sun, 12 Jun 2011 04:36:55 -0400, Alix Pexton
> > <alix.DOT.pexton at gmail.dot.com> wrote:
> >
> >> On 12/06/2011 02:40, Steven Schveighoffer wrote:
> >>> On Sat, 11 Jun 2011 13:04:47 -0400, Andrej Mitrovic
> >>> <andrej.mitrovich at gmail.com> wrote:
> >>>
> >>>> On 6/11/11, Alix Pexton <alix.DOT.pexton at gmail.dot.com> wrote:
> >>>>> On 11/06/2011 06:18, Andrej Mitrovic wrote:
> >>>>>> We should rename Yes and No to Yay and Nay to make them alignable,
> >>>>>> and
> >>>>>> even more importantly to make us appear as old Englishmen!
> >>>>>
> >>>>> "Yay" and "Nay" are too similar looking, but luckily, "Yay" is not
> >>>>> actually a old English word :) A more correct alternative would be
> >>>>> "Aye" (pronounced the same as "eye"), which (along with "Nay") is
> >>>>> still
> >>>>> used for some voting actions (such as councillors deciding where to go
> >>>>> for lunch). I myself say it al least 20 times a day :)
> >>>>>
> >>>>> A...
> >>>>>
> >>>>
> >>>> Oh damn, yay is what teenage girls would say, not old Englishmen. My
> >>>> bad, it really is "Aye". :p
> >>>
> >>> You were phonetically right :) It's yea or nay.
> >>>
> >>> http://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/british/yea-or-nay
> >>>
> >>> My son's most recent birthday (3 years old) was a farm-themed birthday,
> >>> and we asked people to RSVP yay or neigh :P
> >>>
> >>> So I guess there's all kinds of kooky fun you can have with flags...
> >>>
> >>> -Steve
> >>
> >> Nope, its definitely Aye when used for voting, (at least it is round
> >> here) as in "all those in favour, say aye", "ayes to the right" and
> >> "the ayes have it". Maybe southerners say this "yea" word of which you
> >> speak, we don't hold with their strange customs in these parts ^^
> >
> > I don't deny that aye is used frequently for voting. All I was saying
> > is, the correct expression is yea or nay, not yay or nay. Andrej thought
> > it was actually aye or nay, which I've never heard as an expression.
> >
> > I'm not sure it's used anymore, but it's definitely an expression that
> > was used for voting (see my dictionary reference).
> >
> > -Steve
> 
> True, "yea-or-nay" is quite a common, if old fashioned phrase, but "yea" 
> on its own is exceptionally rare (to the point where I doubt ever 
> hearing anyone make such a noise and mean it to indicate the affirmative).
> 
> A...

Then you must not have heard the King James Version of the Bible read aloud, or been to a Shakespeare play.

Admittedly the KJV and Shakespeare's works don't count as modern English, but I doubt you've never "heard such a noise"!  :-)

p.s. The word appears 209 times in Shakespeare's plays. There's a website for everything!