Date: Fri, 22 Sep 1995 10:56:14 -0500

From: Molly Dickmeyer dickmeye[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]JBLSMTP.PHL.LRPUB.COM

Subject: acceptability/grammaticality judgments, please -Reply



Bob:



As an editor, if I ran across these sentences I would edit thusly:



1. Kim and Dale think that each other is the best.



Note that two meanings could be derived from the above:

Kim and Dale each think that the other is the best.

Kim and Dale like each other.



But of course, written English is not spoken English. In

conversation, I would find this acceptable and inflection would

indicate which meaning was meant.



2. Who does she think said ate the cake?



This one is harder for me to understand. Perhaps:

Who does she think said "ate the cake"?



Or is there an understood "you" here?

Who does she think that you said ate the cake?

(still not sparkling prose, but...)



If there's another meaning I'm not getting, please do explain.





Molly D.

dickmeye[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]phl.lrpub.com