James while John had had had had had had had had had had had a better effect on the teacher

维基百科，自由的百科全书

“James while John had had had had had had had had had had had a better effect on the teacher”这个英文句子是用来说明用词歧义和标点符号的重要性；[1]标点符号的作用就是代替口语中的语调、[2]重音和停顿。[3]在探讨人类如何处理资讯的研究中，常用这句话来说明读者会借助标点符号来理解句子的意思，尤其在扫读多行文字时更是如此。[4]

句子的背景和意思[编辑]

故事起自有两个学生，James（詹姆斯）和John（约翰）。他们曾经需要在一个英语考试上描述一个曾经着凉的人。约翰写的句子是“The man had a cold”，这句在文法上不正确；而詹姆斯写的句子在文法上正确：“The man had had a cold”。老师于是注记“由于詹姆斯的答案是正确的，所以它对于老师有一个较好的效果。”

如果加了标点符号，这句句子会比较清楚：

James, while John had had "had", had had "had had"; "had had" had had a better effect on the teacher.[5]

（翻译：詹姆斯在当约翰用“had”时用了“had had”，老师认为“had had”的效果更好。）

如果重排句子，意思会更清楚：

James had had "had had", while John had had "had"; "had had" had had a better effect on the teacher.

（翻译：詹姆斯用了“had had”，而约翰用了“had”，老师认为“had had”的效果更好。）

应用[编辑]

这句子可以作为一个文法游戏[6][7][8]或一条考试题目，[1][2]考生需要赋予合适的标点符号来明晰句子意思。汉斯·赖申巴赫（Hans Reichenbach）在1947年出版的《符号逻辑要素》一书中用了一个类似的句子（“John where Jack...”），给读者作为练习，以说明语言的不同层次，例如目标语言及元语言，其用意是让读者为句子添加所需的标点符号，使之具有语法意义。[9]

在说明人们如何理解环境中不同信息的意义是，这个句子被用来证明看似随意的决定能极大地改变其意义。类似于句子中标点符号的变化如何使老师时而喜欢詹姆斯的作品，时而喜欢约翰的作品。例子：“James, while John had had "had," had...”与“James, while John had had "had had,"...”。[10]

这句话也是为了显示“had”（完了）的语义模糊性，也是为了说明用字和提字的区别[11]。也有人以它为例，说明语言的复杂性、语言的解释及其对人的认知的影响[12]。

为了让读者清楚地了解句法结构，这个句子至少要求两个短语之间用分号、句号、横线分开。不过，贾斯珀·福尔德的小说《失落的情节之井》还是采用了这一短语的变体，以说明即使是标点良好的写作也可能产生混乱[13]：

""Okay," said the Bellman, whose head was in danger of falling apart like a chocolate orange, "let me get this straight: David Copperfield, unlike Pilgrim’s Progress, which had had 'had', had had 'had had'. Had 'had had' had TGC’s approval?""

参见[编辑]

参考资料[编辑]

  1. ^ 1.0 1.1 Magonet, Jonathan. A rabbi reads the Bible 2nd. SCM-Canterbury Press. 2004: 19 [2009-04-30]. ISBN 9780334029526. You may remember an old classroom test in English language. What punctuation marks do you have to add to this sentence so as to make sense of it? 
  2. ^ 2.0 2.1 Dundes, Alan; Carl R. Pagter. When you're up to your ass in alligators: more urban folklore from the paperwork empire Illustrated. Wayne State University Press. 1987: 135 [2009-04-30]. ISBN 0814318673. The object of this and similar tests is to make sense of a series of words by figuring out the correct intonation pattern. 
  3. ^ Hudson, Grover. Essential introductory linguistics. Wiley-Blackwell. 1999: 372 [2009-04-30]. ISBN 0631203044. Writing is secondary to speech, in history and in the fact that speech and not writing is fundamental to the human species. 
  4. ^ van de Velde, Roger G. Text and thinking: on some roles of thinking in text interpretation Illustrated. Walter de Gruyter. 1992: 43 [2009-04-30]. ISBN 3110132508. （原始内容存档于2020-05-06）. In scanning across lines, readers also make use of the information parts carried along with the punctuatuion markes: a period, a dash, a colon, a semicolon or a comma may signal different degrees of integration/separation between the groupings. 
  5. ^ "Problem C: Operator Jumble" （页面存档备份，存于互联网档案馆）. 31st ACM International Collegiate Programming Conference, 2006–2007.
  6. ^ Amon, Mike. GADFLY. Financial Times. 2004-01-28 [2009-04-30]. （原始内容存档于2012-07-22）. HAD up to here? So were readers of last week's column, invited to punctuate "Smith where Jones had had had had had had had had had had had the examiners approval." 
  7. ^ Jackson, Howard. Grammar and Vocabulary: A Resource Book for Students. Routledge. 2002: 123 [2009-04-30]. ISBN 0415231701. Finally, verbal humour is often an ingredient of puzzles. As part of an advertising campaign for its educational website , the Guardian (for 3 january 2001) included the following familiar grammatical puzzle. 
  8. ^ 3802 - Operator Jumble. [2012-01-07]. （原始内容存档于2008-10-13）. 
  9. ^ Reichenbach, Hans (1947) Elements of symbolic logic. London: Collier-MacMillan. Exercise 3-4, p.405; solution p.417.
  10. ^ Weick, Karl E. Making Sense of the Organization 8th. Wiley-Blackwell. 2005: 186–187 [2009-04-30]. ISBN 0631223193. （原始内容存档于2020-10-31）. Once a person has generated/bracketed part of the stream, then the activities of punctuation and connection (parsing) can occur in an effort to transform the raw data into information. 
  11. ^ Lecercle, Jean-Jacques. The violence of language Illustrated. Routledge. 1990: 86 [2009-04-30]. ISBN 0415034310. （原始内容存档于2020-05-07）. Suppose I decide that I wish to make up a sentence containing eleven occurrences of the word 'had' in a row ... 
  12. ^ Hollin, Clive R. Contemporary Psychology: An Introduction Illustrated. Routledge. 1995: 34 [2009-04-30]. ISBN 0748401911. Do readers make use of the ways in which sentences are structured? 
  13. ^ Fforde, Jasper. The Well of Lost Plots. Hodder & Stoughton. 2003 [2012-04-30]. （原始内容存档于2020-11-04）. 
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