Which words are allowed? Word games

11 replies. Last post: 2005-11-09

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Which words are allowed?
  • fjord at 2005-11-07

    I don't want to start a religious debate here but I am just curious about the logic behind the following:

    “God” seems to be allowed to become part of the game, but “Allah” is refused. Can someone explain the logic behind this?

    Is there anywhere a dictionary on the web where you can check if a word is permitted. It is handy to know that before you decide how far you want to go with the auto bidding.

    Fjord

  • Abigail at 2005-11-07

    GWG uses the ENABLE word list. A simple web search will find it for you. As for 'God' vs 'Allah', note that it isn't 'God' that is allowed, it's 'god'. Not the name, but the noun. That would include Allah, the Christian God, Zeus, Thor and other fictional beings.

  • ypercube at 2005-11-08

    If you tell me your email with a private message, I can send you the enable word list that is used in this game.

  • Greck at 2005-11-08

    “Allah” is not in the ENABLE list for the same reason as “John”, “Richard” or “Gregorio” are not in.

  • fjord at 2005-11-08

    Thanks for all that info. Interesting this capital difference between (G)god and Allah. Curiosity kills the cat, but where does buddha go in this?

    Ypercube, thanks, I'll send you my email. The dictionary.com I use now seems not the same as it is used here. E.g the word'“regarder” is not allowed on LG, although it is an existing word (without capital) on dictionary.com.

  • Abigail at 2005-11-08

    What's so special about the capitalization? In English (and many other languages), proper names are spelled with a capital. Common nouns are only capitalized when beginning a sentence. Sometimes, a proper name is also a noun. That's what's happening here as well. The noun, 'god', indicates some mighty, fictional, being, commonly linked with with some form of religion. Zeus is the name of one of the Greek gods. Ra is an Egyptian god. Allah is a Muslim god. Thor is a Norse god. Christians call their god 'God' (not very creative), although the god is also know as 'Jahwe', the Jewish name for the same god.

  • fjord at 2005-11-08

    What's so special about the capitalization?

    Yes, most western languages capitalize proper names, but not as much as the English do. First of all your group of proper names is wider than in my language. E,g. the names for months and days are not capitalized in the Dutch language. Adverbs and adjectives are never capitalized in my language, while in the English language they are (we would write 'dutch' and 'english') you do capitalize them too while they are not nouns.

    I realize now, that any word that is capitalized will be refused in this game. That means that words like November, English, Dutch. American, are not allowed

    I didn't expect that. :-)

  • Greck at 2005-11-09

    i think November is in the ENABLE list. you can find the ENABLE list by googling around…

  • Abigail at 2005-11-09

    November isn't. 'march', 'may', and 'august' are. All three words have a different meaning beside being the name of a month.

  • Abigail at 2005-11-09

    And to answer fjord, both 'dutch' and 'english' are in the enable list. A 'dutch' is slang name for 'wife'. Why 'english' is in the enable list, I do not know.

    As for months and weekdays not being capitalized in Dutch, that hasn't always been the case. Dutch used to capitalize

    month and weekdays, and words that were derived from proper names.

  • David Milne at 2005-11-09

    You can add enlish to a pool ball, You can add spin to a pool ball. I think english can mean spin. I think that's right.

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