The Oxford Comma – Why and Why Not (2024) | Hacker News Reader

The Oxford Comma – Why and Why Not (2024)

deborahcourtbooks.com

43 pointstaubek60 comments

There are so many times the Oxford comma prevents ambiguity. I have yet to see a counterexample. Commas separate list entries, don't change it for the last one.

Only tangentially related (but hey, it's HN) - I'm so happy about the support/requirements for trailing commas in the modern language syntax:

It makes editing such a list so much easier. Also, the commit diffs are cleaner (you don't need to add comma to the last element when appending a new one).

My very first programming language doesn't use commas:

The oxford comma debate is so annoying because it clearly has nothing but advantages. Removing commas from a delimited list does nothing to resolve ambiguity, whether lexicographically or syntactically.

It's so useful as a delimiter and anti-ambiguity machine, that you don't even need spaces for it to work! See CSV or Japanese.

> The oxford comma debate is so annoying because it clearly has nothing but advantages.

.. if you care only about data communication and have no sense of beauty, aesthetics, rhythm or personality in writing.

I like this:

Nah, prepending will lead to a messier diff than the parent example.

"I'd like to thank my mother, Ayn Rand, and God" is the usual example.

Yes, you can reorder the list to remove the ambiguity, but sometimes the order of the list matters. The serial comma should be used when necessary to remove ambiguity, and not used when it introduces ambiguity. Rewrite the sentence when necessary. Worth noting that this is the Oxford University Press's own style rule!

I always heard this one...

We invited the strippers, JFK, and Stalin to the party. [three groups invited - strippers, a president, and a premier]

We invited the strippers, JFK and Stalin to the party. [the president and premier are strippers]

Very different visual conjured by those two sentences.

I'd prefer:

We invited the strippers, JFK and Stalin, to the party [two strippers, named JFK and Stalin]

if the goal is to minimize ambiguity.

I can see it being tiresome to read text where the author is continuously interjecting clarification with brackets.

The square-bracket clarifications here are meta-text designed to absolutely clarify the intended reading of the preceding text, so that the reader can contrast their understanding with the intended one.

There is no suggestion that one would do this in "regular" text.

"John helped his uncle, Jack off a horse"

"John helped his uncle Jack off a horse"

Two very different outcomes...

shouldn't there be another comma after Jack?

John helped his uncle, Jack, off a horse.

Because while speaking it I only pause after uncle and "Jack off a horse" together next. feels like there should be another pause after Jack?

If JFK and Stalin were strippers, there’d be a comma after Stalin to denote the parenthetical clause.

I mean first off: no the exact same image is conjured because we are reading this in context of knowing who jfk and stalin are and we know they aren't strippers and all language is contextual.

That said:

We invited the stripper, JFK, and Stalin to the party.

We invited the stripper, JFK and Stalin to the party.

The supposed ambiguity is back. Although again there is no ambiguity to the reader. The juxtaposition of the two versions wouldn't work as a joke if there was any ambiguity

Fine, I’ll be boring…

We invited the strippers, Krystal and Britney, to the party.

We invited the strippers, Krystal, and Britney, to the party.

And yes, if strippers is made singular, poor Krystal becomes Schrödinger‘s Stripper.

Just put the colon there if you need to introduce a list, it's one of its functions. "I'd like to thank: my mother, Ayn Rand and God". The same goes for that "two strippers" example: "We invited the strippers: JFK and Stalin, to the party".

I want you to know that I would only write this in a discussion nitpicking about grammar: :)

> "I'd like to thank: my mother, Ayn Rand and God".

A colon should not connect a verb and its objects; generally you need an independent clause before the colon (i.e., a clause that could be a complete sentence). One could properly say,

  I'd like to thank the following: My mother, Ayn Rand and God.

Also, these examples leave ambiguity. Your mom could be Ayn Rand, and if she was, then you might very well think she was God, or be making a joke about it.

> "We invited the strippers: JFK and Stalin, to the party"

Nope. A colon isn't a parenthetical in the middle of a sentence; that is, you can't continue the sentence after a colonic phrase (there's no such thing so I made up that term :D ). And again, the clause before that colon is not an independent clause. One can use parentheses (of course) or em dashes for parenthetical phrases:

  We invited strippers (JFK and Stalin) to the party.
  We invited strippers - JFK and Stalin - to the party.

A proper colon might be as follows:

  We invited strippers to the party: JFK and Stalin!

But I'd put an em dash there (and to heck with LLMs and their em dash overusage).

Removing the Oxford comma not only fails to resolve the ambiguity, but introduces yet more ambiguity by implying Ayn Rand to be God.

Wikipedia has an interesting example where it's still ambiguous:

  They went to Oregon with Betty, a maid, and a cook.

It's not clear whether Betty is the maid. But tbh removing the comma doesn't help either.

Personally if I wanted to indicate that Betty was the maid I would put "a maid" between brackets or hyphens.

This sounds like a case where we should just change the syntax. If Betty is the maid it should be written:

    They went to Oregon with Betty [a maid], and a cook.

(They (went (to Oregon) (with ((Betty (a maid)) and (a cook))))).

((That (is (the (most natural) syntax))) and ((all (of us)) (should (switch (to it))))).

Many years ago working on natural language to SQL, when we had ambiguities this is how we’d clarify things with the user (albeit with the minimal amount of brackets necessary).

It looks like you might have learned how to diagram a sentence as a youth

It seems you're speaking with a Lisp :P

This is how I was taught. Use ( ) or -- -- here and the Oxford comma for list of 3 or more.

I get lazy with adding the comma before the "and" in list, and without fail I hear my grandmother/father/teachers pointing out how wrong I am for doing so. Same for my use of semicolons followed by "and" or "but".

I never realized the Oxford comma was even something up for debate.

“a maid and cook.”

“a maid, and cook.”

If Betty was the maid and the cook, I would write...

     They went to Oregon with Betty who was a maid and a cook.

If it was three people, I would write...

     They went to Oregon with Betty, the maid, and the cook.

The maid implies there was just one. Who travels with their only maid? Who will keep the manor lights on?

> They went to Oregon with Betty, the maid, and the cook.

Betty could be the maid. English meaning depends partly on word order:

  They went to Oregon with the maid, Betty, and the Cook.

Still ambiguous.

  They went to Oregon with the maid, the cook, and Betty
  They went to Oregon with the maid, the cook and Betty

In the former, I suppose the maid might be the cook also. The latter moves more easily and with less ambiguity.

If Betty was the maid, I would write…

     They went to Oregon with Betty the maid and the cook.

As written it is perfectly clear that Betty is neither the maid nor the cook, neither of whom the author bothered to name in this sentence. If that wasn't the author's intention they should grammar better.

Or just switch the order if Betty is the maid and you don't want to provide additional context:

``` They went to Oregon with a cook and Betty, a maid. ```

It eliminated some ambiguity. It should be quite self evident that even without an example it is quite impossible to eliminate all ambiguity (it’s a feature of human language.) The more important property is that it never introduces more ambiguity. Ie at worst it doesn’t help, but not making it worse.

It did introduce ambiguity though. Without the comma it is 100% clear that sentence lists 3 people.

Practically that would be very likely to be the case to the reader, but grammatically no, it's still ambiguous.

> They went to Oregon with Betty, a maid and a cook.

Betty could be both a maid and a cook. So there is still ambiguity.

My heroes are my parents, Superman and Wonder Woman!

If Superman and Wonder Woman were the parents, wouldn't a dash or colon be more appropriate than a comma?

It's common in English writing to interject additional details in on a noun by using a phrase separated with commas. I've personally found Oxford commas can in certain cases make it unclear whether you're interjecting or not, like so:

Alice, the cook of the house and the guest were very chatty that evening.

Alice, the cook of the house, and the guest were very chatty that evening.

In the second, is Alice the cook of the house or not? This is the ambiguity of Oxford commas.

If you’re one to omit the Oxford comma in your writing, then how do I resolve the ambiguity in your first example?

> There are so many times the Oxford comma prevents ambiguity. I have yet to see a counterexample.

In every counterexample that I have seen the ambiguity involves an appositive phrase set off by commas which is lurking nearby in the sentence.

Commas are the most common way to set off an appositive phrases but most sources say that em dashes and parenthesis are also acceptable.

This means you can use a simple rule and not have to worry about ambiguous lists: (1) always use the Oxford comma, and (2) if you need to set off an appositive phrase for an item in the list set it off with em dashes or parenthesis.

Spoilers: There is no "why not" in the article (aside from "tradition").

There is a book "Eats Shoots and Leaves" that gets at the importance of knowing when (and when not) do deploy the punctuation:

https://www.amazon.com/Eats-Shoots-Leaves-Tolerance-Punctuat...?

I also enjoy how meaning of a whole sentence can be inverted by a bit of punctuation:

a. "A woman without her man is nothing."

b. "A woman: without her, man is nothing."

Lionel Hutz

Works on contingency

No money down

Always the best example for missing punctuation!

It is important to use the Oxford Comma because it is commonly accepted, fits with tradition, and is just correct.

.. and in your example, unnecessary.

Or maybe I missed the joke.

It is necessary because of Tradition.

I reject the validity of other traditions. Also: repent and join my religion.

I give up. How can we ever expect the subtleties of the Oxford comma—or perhaps whether a question mark should end a rhetorical question—to be widely understood when something as simple as use of the apostrophe is widely misunderstood?

If so many consider the apostrophe so complex and confusing to the extent some grammarians are now advocating we abandon its possessive form then for the life of me I cannot see how we can expect more complex rules such as the I before E, except after C with its many exceptions ever to be understood by everyone.

Both the greengrocer's apostrophe (pl: DVDs not DVD's) and the possessive form of the apostrophe are about the simplest notions one can learn in English.

Yes, these rules have nuisances but I'm not referring to them but only their most common simplest forms. (By that I'd exclude unusual forms such as whether it's best to use 'greengrocer's apostrophe' or 'greengrocers' apostrophe' or that it doesn't matter. Or whether three 'Ss' should be used when using the apostrophe such as Kiss's Building — the name brazenly embellished in the frieze on a building near me.)

My marks in English at school were rarely ever much above pass grade but even I had no difficulty in understanding the possessive apostrophe. In primary school we were taught this simplest of rules by just asking "who owns it?" then drop in the apostrophe immediately thereafter.

Q: Who owns the bat? If only one boy owns it then the answer is "It's the boy's bat." If multiple boys own it then "It's the boys' bat."

I cannot think of any rule much simpler than this, same with the greengrocer's apostrophe where just adding an 's' sans any apostrophe is similarly straightforward.

It seems to me that teachers of English ought to actually learn to teach as they did when I was a kid.

It's clear to me we need to bring the population up speed on the basics before venturing into esoterica, for all but the cognoscenti the Oxford comma can wait.

When commas are used as part of a list of items, I treat them as if they’re bullet points written on a single line. For example, if you have items in a bullet list, but don’t want to use up all that vertical space, join the list into a single line and replace the bullets with commas. Or if the items are more complex, use a semicolon as the separator.

I banned the Oxford comma in all writing within my individual business. In fact, I released an entire 100K+ word narrative game without using Oxford commas (I consider it a bug if I left any behind).

I use it religiously just for shits, and giggles.

The Oxford Comma is not used with just two items. This is just improper grammar.

I mean you do you but don't call this the Oxford Comma.

You could make it a compile error like Zig (previously) did with tabs!

You mean "Why, and Why Not"

You'd only use the Oxford comma when the list is 3 or more items.

Still funny.

Oxford Comma ride or die. Give me a break. It is clearly the only way to do it. I will never understand these people.

obligatory oxford comma: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P_i1xk07o4g

obligatory xkcd: https://xkcd.com/2995/

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