Re: facts v. history; which and that

On Tue, April 28, 1998, Robert Cumbow <cumbr[_at_]perkinscoie.com> wrote:
>
> Steve Jamar <sjamar[_at_]law.howard.edu> wrote:
> >
> > There is never a loss of meaning by incorrect usage of that or which.
>
> I beg to differ. Consider:
>
> "The room had one window that overlooked the parking lot."
>
> versus
>
> "The room had one window, which overlooked the parking lot."
>
> The first sentence means that the room may have had several windows and
> one of them overlooked the parking lot. The second sentence means that
> the room had only one window, and it overlooked the parking lot. If we
> accept the interchangeability of "which" and "that", then we finally do
> not know what either sentence means for sure. I call that a loss of
> meaning---as well as an impoverishment of our once-rich language.

Well, as Gertrude Stein said of the English language: We all speak English in our own way.

As an intellectual property advocate, I will second that.

Linda Hopkins
<lkhopkins[_at_]intelliwareint.com> Received on Tue Apr 28 1998 - 22:34:55 GMT