Originally Posted by HowlerKarma
Seriously; the man's journal article titles ROUTINELY ran four lines on the masthead and contained semicolons.

LOL. My take on semi-colons is that they're usually a pretentious decoration. Once you understand that their primary purpose in life is to connect two independent clauses, that leads you to one inevitable question: "What's wrong with a period?"

Originally Posted by HowlerKarma
The point about learning a second language is an interesting one.

For me, it took learning a second language to see why it mattered at all. Lots of people have already mentioned how easy it is to play by ear, but you can't do that in a second language.

Also, this illustrates how educational outcomes can be skewed by family background. You can't successfully play it by ear if your ear has been tuned to the wrong key.