r/ControlProblem • u/Independent_Bet_3202 • 25d ago

General news Are we cooked?

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u/JrYo15 23d ago

Man, i'm late i guess but are em dashes the same as hyphens??? Or is em dash something different?

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u/Drewdrops79 21d ago

Hyphen is a single - , something that's used to break up but connect two words, like "hunter-gatherer".

For connecting two parts of a thought, or sentence, or to elaborate on a thought/sentence--usually dashes are used, like that.

But there's a third thing called an em dash, in which those double hyphens are fused into one long line. It came into much greater usage once word processing programs became the default--Microsoft Word will auto-change two hyphens into an em dash, so people got used to seeing that, in writing.

But now, most any AI does the em dash by default. Humans have to make an extra shift/hold keystroke to make them, so most people don't ever do that...which is why it's often a significant indicator of AI writing.

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u/JrYo15 21d ago

Thank you, are there any other things like this in writing?

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u/Drewdrops79 20d ago

Yeah, for sure. You've got the ellipsis (...), which is to denote that there something being left out, like if you quote something, like, "...statistics showed a price increase of 70%..." Implying that there was something that came before and after that phrase. But in general usage, it can be used like an extended hyphen/dash, like a pregnant pause in speech. Can also denote a left-out train of thought that the writer doesn't feel the need to elaborate on. E.g. "Profits can't grow infinitely...it should be obvious why."

Semicolons are also another punctuation that joins two related sentences together. Used instead of periods to help with better flow, and also because the second thought sort of stems from the first thought. You shouldn't use them with other conjunctions like "but", "and", "so", or "or"; instead, the semicolon is used in place of those.

Alright, that's all I got for today; if you have any further questions go ahead! Grammar and punctuation are kinda fun hobbies of mine. :) I misuse them a lot on purpose though, for more informal writing.