Month: December 2008

A dog with six-pack abs?

Commas, General

I swear that I am not making this up.

I saw an online advertisement yesterday for a physical-exercise program that is supposed to give the user six-pack abs (abdominal muscles).

Near the top of the ad is a photo of the author of the program.

The author’s dog appears in the photo, too.

Now, here is the funny part. The caption beneath the photo was “Craig Ballantyne, and his dog Bally, with 6-pack abs sculpted by Turbulence Training”.

If the advertising copywriter had left out the comma after the dog’s name, then the reader definitely could conclude that the pictured dog is the one whose name is Bally AND that has 6-pack abs — versus any other dog named “Bally” that Mr. Ballantyne might have.

A dog with six-pack abs?

The presence of the comma after the dog’s name in the photo caption essentially turns “with 6-pack abs …” into an aside.

What we cannot say for certain — at least not from the photo caption alone — is who has the six-pack abs.

In other words, we cannot say for certain whether the aside was intended for the man or for the dog.

Given the proximity of “with 6-pack abs …” to the dog’s name, it certainly seems that the advertising copywriter is claiming that the dog is the one with the six-pack abs.

To clearly indicate that Mr. Ballantyne has 6-pack abs, I would rewrite the caption as “Craig Ballantyne with 6-pack abs sculpted by Turbulence Training, accompanied by his dog Bally”.

Or I would leave any mention of the dog out of the caption.

“Preventative” vs. “Preventive”

Adjectives, Nouns, Versus

I often hear these words used interchangeably.

Problem:
It was not clear — at least not to me, anyway — which word is correct.

Explanation:
The word “preventive” as an adjective means serving to hinder or prevent.

The word “preventive” as a noun means a preventive measure or agent.

The word “preventive” dates back to 1630-1640.

The word “preventative” is noted by some dictionaries as being a synonym of the word “preventive” — whether as an adjective or as a noun.

However, at least one dictionary — Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary — says that “preventative” is incorrectly used instead of “preventive”.

Solution:
Given these facts, use “preventive” instead of “preventative” — as either an adjective or a noun.

“A permit had been attained.”

Common English Blunders, Verbs

I heard this yesterday during a television program.

Problem:
The speaker used the wrong verb.

Explanation:
I was watching an episode of “Forensic Files” on the truTV channel.

Someone by the name of Randy Scott, identified as Lead Investigator, was discussing a crime.

Mr. Scott said, “A permit had been attained.”

The verb “attain” — spelled A-T-T-A-I-N — means to accomplish, achieve, or reach as an objective, as in “He attained success on the racing circuit at the age of 25.”

Mr. Scott should have used the verb “obtain” — spelled O-B-T-A-I-N — instead because this verb means to acquire, procure, or get.

Unfortunately, there is not a simple way to search the Internet for mistaken use of “attain” as a substitute for “obtain”; otherwise, I would put some statistics from Google here.

This is not the first time that I saw or heard the mistaken use of these two verbs as synonyms, and I believe that it is a relatively common English blunder.

The confusion between “attain” and “obtain” provides yet another example of the value of knowing the roots of words in the English language.

The verb “attain” comes from the prefix A-T, which means toward or near, and T-A-I-N, which comes from the Latin verb “tangere”, which means to touch.

The verb “obtain” comes from the prefix O-B, which has many meanings including to and on, and T-A-I-N, which comes from the Latin verb “tenere”, which means to hold.

In other words, the T-A-I-N in “attain” the T-A-I-N in “obtain” are from different Latin verbs, so “attain” and “obtain” are NOT synonyms.

Solution:
“A permit had been obtained.”