How's your vocabulary?

[Elind]

Here's a fun and useful link that one of my children sent me.

Test your own language skills, in English that is.

I made 45, briefly.

http://www.freerice.com/faq.html

[kellyb]

I kept hanging out around 36...

[Walrus32]

46-48...but that's not entirely fair, since many of the words seem to have medical roots. (So do I.)

[TX50]

Got up to 50 before I got bored with it.

[Elind]

Impressive. I'll remember that if we cross swords in the future :) (the part about getting bored, that is)

[JoeEllison]

Hanging out around 46-47.

[Elind]

I should have set this up with a poll range so users could enter scores. Anyone know how to do that?

[casebro]

42. Not bad for a guy who got his GED at 20.

[Complexity]

Cool. Played for a while and ended up at 48. Must play again, but new novel is waiting for me.

[Jeff Corey]

49, but it's a bit british, duncha know? Lucky I do the Sunday times, once in while.I love the aaagrnms, like ALTERBAY.

[billyb1012]

Is there no end to the bloody thing? I was up to 47 a few times, dropped back into the 30's, and kept going, waiting for it to end -- which it never did. I think I was at 42 when I got fed up. I donated enough rice for someone's lunch, though...

[money]

My goodness, you guys are good.

I only made it to 40...

[fishbob]

Score of 45 at 1000 rice grains.
About all I could stand.

[arthwollipot]

42 before I got bored. I had a bit of an issue with some of the definitions. For example "Vervet means monkey". No, it doesn't. "Vervet" describes a specific species of monkey, but it is not a synonym for monkey.

[bruto]

I got up to 50 a few times, but after a while it started repeating and I got tired of it. I always did well on "passive vocabulary" tests, even though most of the words are ones I'd never think of using.

[Megalodon]

Quitted at 44... Not bad for a second language, if I can say so myself...






...and I can :)

[Professor Yaffle]

At 1500 grains of rice I had got up to 47/48 a couple of times, but generally stabl as about 43.

[BME]

46; second language; happy with that!
cheers, Bart

[flimflam_machine]

Generally around 47.

But if I got one wrong I then seemed to get about the next 4 wrong which would relegate me right down to about 44, and then I'd have to take about a dozen questions to get up to 47/48 again.

[Belz...]

How's your vocabulary?

I don't know. He's on vacation since June and I haven't seen him since.

[Molinaro]

It's asking what petcock means. As a man, I am very confident in how I would define that word. Alas, I don't see the apropriate answer in the 4 given.

[Skeptic Guy]

I don't know. He's on vacation since June and I haven't seen him since.

:D *rim shot* Don't worry folks, he's here all week with two shows on Saturday!

Only 42...got to work on it.

[fuelair]

Hanging in 46-49. Will build a vocab - though largely of uncommon words!!

[bruto]

It's asking what petcock means. As a man, I am very confident in how I would define that word. Alas, I don't see the apropriate answer in the 4 given.
I didn't get that one. Last I knew a petcock is a water faucet, a drain valve, or something similar. What options did the test give?

[sackett]

Couldn't break 50. Yes, after a while you've had enough. I found that I couldn't be bothered to unwind the Latin and Greek derivations. A few seconds' thought would in many cases have done the trick.

Now my neck is stiff. But it was fun for a while, and I hope I really did donate some rice.

[INRM]

I guess it shows that I haven't been in school for awhile. I was doing around 35... However I did get 2,000 grains of rice.

Pretty much all terms related to medicine and forensics I got right.


INRM

[baron]

50 and gave up. I give credit to having read a lot of Stephen Donaldson.

[dogguy]

Only 42...got to work on it.

But, but, but, that's the answer..................to life................the universe...............and everything!

Never got past 42 myself. Got there several times but then a wrong answer would knock be back to 38 or 39.

[Uncle Vanya]

My vocabulary? Its very big and very good... thats right, big and good.

Hmmm... wonder why I cant score more than 35.

[luchog]

hovering around the mid-upper 40s, mostly because I'm at work and tired. Surprised how many of the medical terms I knew, thanks to my wife; and my prediliction for Shakespeare as a youth did me good stead for the archaisms.

[Molinaro]

I didn't get that one. Last I knew a petcock is a water faucet, a drain valve, or something similar. What options did the test give?

One of the answeres definitely had the word valve along with another word. I remember that much :)

Havn't been above level 42 yet :(

[bruto]

So far, nobody here has broken 50, which makes me wonder if there is a score above 50. I hit 50 a number of times, and maintained it for a while, with occasional dips down into the mid 40's. Recovery back to 50 was pretty quick, but once there, it seemed to stop or at least to slow down.

[bjornart]

I didn't notice the level at first, then couldn't figure how it worked since I didn't think I'd answered _that_ many questions, then quit and read the rest of this thread.
So I had to play again. Got up to 44 fairly easily.

[bjornart]

So far, nobody here has broken 50, which makes me wonder if there is a score above 50. I hit 50 a number of times, and maintained it for a while, with occasional dips down into the mid 40's. Recovery back to 50 was pretty quick, but once there, it seemed to stop or at least to slow down.

The FAQ, where Elind's link goes, says "There are 50 levels in all, but it is rare for people to get above level 48."

[Professor Yaffle]

On the FAQ page it says that there are 50 levels but it is rare for anyone to get past 48.

Edit: Bjornart beat me to it.

[moopet]

Given that almost nobody read the FAQ (or so they seem to be hinting) I'm slightly surprised to see nobody claiming that they "hardly ever got more than about 52"

[Myriad]

I'm pretty sure 50 is the maximum.

I level off at a mean of about 48. At 47, I know most of the words and usually quickly increase to 48. At 48, I get about two thirds right so I tend to go up or down from there at random (since one wrong answer drops you down, but three correct ones are needed to increase). At 49 and 50, I get about half or less correct, so it's a matter of lucky word choices or lucky guessing to avoid dropping quickly back down. However, I've managed to get occasional strings of 4 or 5 words correct at 50, with no increase to 51.

Respectfully,
Myriad

ETA: As Moopet points out, I too failed to RTFM.

[kellyb]

I'm thinking/hoping there must be some degree of "responder bias" going on here...

[bruto]

I'm thinking/hoping there must be some degree of "responder bias" going on here...I would be surprised if there were not.

[CFLarsen]

Mine is double-plus good.

[Myriad]

Looking at the totals page, it appears very likely that sometime today, the billionth grain of rice will be donated. That's about 20 metric tons total.

(I feel sorry for the guy who has to count it all out 10 grains at a time, though.)

Respectfully,
Myriad

[Elind]

42 before I got bored. I had a bit of an issue with some of the definitions. For example "Vervet means monkey". No, it doesn't. "Vervet" describes a specific species of monkey, but it is not a synonym for monkey.

picky picky, what were the other choices?

[Elind]

I don't know. He's on vacation since June and I haven't seen him since.

You mean your constabulary don't you?:p

[Mongrel]

Hovering in the low 40s but learning some fun new words :)

Now I just have to work out how to segue "fecundate" into a conversation

[Jeff Corey]

Hovering in the low 40s but learning some fun new words :)

Now I just have to work out how to segue "fecundate" into a conversation

"Oh, by the way, I think I fecundated your sister."

[Schneibster]

Averaged between 46 and 47, made it to fifty a couple times; donated about five hundred grains. Cool idea. I might go do it some more.

ETA: yes, veddy British.

EATA: Ever hear the one about putting one grain of rice on the first square of a chessboard, two on the second, four on the third, doubling every time, how much do you have on the last square? Amusing.

[Jeff Corey]

Averaged between 46 and 47, made it to fifty a couple times; donated about five hundred grains. Cool idea. I might go do it some more.

ETA: yes, veddy British.

EATA: Ever hear the one about putting one grain of rice on the first square of a chessboard, two on the second, four on the third, doubling every time, how much do you have on the last square? Amusing.
Yes. 2 to the 64th power -1. Approximately 18,446,744,073,709,551,615.
Sorry, that's the total.
So the last square would be about half of that.

[arthwollipot]

picky picky, what were the other choices?

Don't recall. "Monkey" was the right answer though.

[Jeff Corey]

Don't recall. "Monkey" was the right answer though.

I don't recall the other choices either, but if you are shown "vervet" and the choices are "type of cloth"," synthetic cheese", "plumbing device" or "monkey", what is the best answer?

[Schneibster]

Yes. 2 to the 64th power -1. Approximately 18,446,744,073,709,551,615.
Sorry, that's the total.
So the last square would be about half of that.9223372036854775808 grains. But the question was how much, not how many- divide by a billion and multiply by 20 metric tons. It's 184,467,440,737.09551616 or 184 billion metric tons. That's about the mass of 2,000 mountains.

[Elind]

I tried it again and managed 47, but then screwed up and had to fight hard to get back, but I did find that when one doesn't have a clue what a word means, one can usually eliminate one or two choices just because you know you would have heard it if it meant anything like that, and then that old Latin and French would come in handy for the final guess.

That's not cheating is it?

[Elind]

I don't recall the other choices either, but if you are shown "vervet" and the choices are "type of cloth"," synthetic cheese", "plumbing device" or "monkey", what is the best answer?

Why, I thought we had vervet curtains in the living room.

[Jeff Corey]

Schreibster,
"How much" may mean "How many", especially if you are referring to such entities as grains of rice, which are known to vary in weight. The variation between the long grain, short grain and extremely tiny grain rice can be considerable. So, in the interest of scientific precision, we must only consider the sheer number, not the weight, of the rice grains.

[Schneibster]

LOL, OK, you got me. Maybe it's only 1,000 mountains. :D

[Wildy]

Currently playing, 560 grains and I seem to hover around 38. Made 40 a few times though.

It's funny how you can figure out some of those words.

I managed to get dulcinea, which means 'sweetheart' simply by remembering a war poem with a similar sounding word. Now I don't know if I will ever use it in real life though. Damnnation to my laconic choice of vocabulary.

[wollery]

I hovered around 47/48 most of the time, with occasional drops to 44, and hit 50 a couple of times.

A passing knowledge of etymology certainly helps.

[Jeff Corey]

LOL, OK, you got me. Maybe it's only 1,000 mountains. :D

Mountains? That's a farkin scientific measure? Around here, we got "mountains of garbage" about 300 feet above sea level. North of here we got Mount Monadnock, which is less then a mile high. North of that, we got Mt Washington, which is higher, I know, I climbed it.
So if you want a serious discussion of this grains of rice thing, you must define your terms or else I will be forced to enlist the services of my good friend Claus Larsen (not kidding) to make you show your evidence.

[Jeff Corey]

Currently playing, 560 grains and I seem to hover around 38. Made 40 a few times though.

It's funny how you can figure out some of those words.

I managed to get dulcinea, which means 'sweetheart' simply by remembering a war poem with a similar sounding word.

Also, Cervantes, for me.

[arthwollipot]

I don't recall the other choices either, but if you are shown "vervet" and the choices are "type of cloth"," synthetic cheese", "plumbing device" or "monkey", what is the best answer?

True, but the implication of the site was that "vervet" was a synonym for "monkey" which is definitely not true.

A passing knowledge of etymology certainly helps.

Absolutely! I guessed a number of words based purely on etymological grounds.

[fuelair]

Hanging in 46-49. Will build a vocab - though largely of uncommon words!!

On a second run, I notice that there are many repeats - sometimes with the answer order changed, sometimes not. One of the words came up three times during last nights' run (3,000 + grains) - though there were also non-repeats. I assume it is pulling randomly from a base of, at most, 200 to 300 words given that level of repetition But new ones still coming up.:)

[Ladewig]

I'm in the 40-42 range and feel rather ignorant after looking at everyone else's scores.

[Professor Yaffle]

Did anyone else find that in amongst words that they thought were very uncommon, there were also some words which were in common everyday use? For example in the mid 40s, I noticed the words "fettle" and "peckish" which I probably use everyday and my 4 year old son knows the meanings of. Maybe they are obscure words elsewhere, but just happen to have survived in my dialect?

Edit: and "gammon" for goodness sake!!

[The Don]

49 but couldn't get up to 50.

Bah !

[Jeff Corey]

Did anyone else find that in amongst words that they thought were very uncommon, there were also some words which were in common everyday use? For example in the mid 40s, I noticed the words "fettle" and "peckish" which I probably use everyday and my 4 year old son knows the meanings of. Maybe they are obscure words elsewhere, but just happen to have survived in my dialect?

Edit: and "gammon" for goodness sake!!

"Fine fettle" is not used much anymore around here and "peckish" I learned from the Monty Python "Undertaker sketch".

[Myriad]

Did anyone else find that in amongst words that they thought were very uncommon, there were also some words which were in common everyday use? For example in the mid 40s, I noticed the words "fettle" and "peckish" which I probably use everyday and my 4 year old son knows the meanings of. Maybe they are obscure words elsewhere, but just happen to have survived in my dialect?

Edit: and "gammon" for goodness sake!!


"Gammon" is the act of attaching the rope that holds the bowsprit in place, right? :)

According to the site FAQ, the level of words is determined by how many players actually get the word correct over time.

It seems likely that some words are rated higher because there's a particularly deceptive choice leading to more wrong answers, not because the word itself is more obscure. For instance "parlay" appears at very high level, I think because the choices include "increase" (their correct answer) and "chat". Those thinking of "parley" meaning "negotiate" will likely choose the latter incorrect answer.

For rarer words that I actually know (as opposed to the larger set that I can figure out the correct answer for from the choices), I can often remember specificially where or in what context I know the word from. A surprising number are from amusing sources such as role playing games (obscure mythical creatures, magical devices, weapons and armor), Patrick O'Brien novels (nautical terms -- see "gammon," above), titles of old stories and poems (especially their titles), and Gene Wolfe novels. "Philippic" I got from the title of a Simon and Garfunkel song, and had never seen since in any other context.

Respectfully,
Myriad

[Myriad]

...and "peckish" I learned from the Monty Python "Undertaker sketch".


Are you sure it wasn't the Cheese Shop sketch? (It's used in both sketches IIRC, but in the Cheese Shop sketch John Cleese explains/defines it, in the following lines.)

Respectfully,
Myriad

[fuelair]

"Gammon" is the act of attaching the rope that holds the bowsprit in place, right? :)

According to the site FAQ, the level of words is determined by how many players actually get the word correct over time.

It seems likely that some words are rated higher because there's a particularly deceptive choice leading to more wrong answers, not because the word itself is more obscure. For instance "parlay" appears at very high level, I think because the choices include "increase" (their correct answer) and "chat". Those thinking of "parley" meaning "negotiate" will likely choose the latter incorrect answer.

For rarer words that I actually know (as opposed to the larger set that I can figure out the correct answer for from the choices), I can often remember specificially where or in what context I know the word from. A surprising number are from amusing sources such as role playing games (obscure mythical creatures, magical devices, weapons and armor), Patrick O'Brien novels (nautical terms -- see "gammon," above), titles of old stories and poems (especially their titles), and Gene Wolfe novels. "Philippic" I got from the title of a Simon and Garfunkel song, and had never seen since in any other context.
Respectfully,
Myriad

Interestingly, I got gammon as ham correct (see Miss Jane Marple for why I knew it).

[fuelair]

"Gammon" is the act of attaching the rope that holds the bowsprit in place, right? :)

According to the site FAQ, the level of words is determined by how many players actually get the word correct over time.

It seems likely that some words are rated higher because there's a particularly deceptive choice leading to more wrong answers, not because the word itself is more obscure. For instance "parlay" appears at very high level, I think because the choices include "increase" (their correct answer) and "chat". Those thinking of "parley" meaning "negotiate" will likely choose the latter incorrect answer.

For rarer words that I actually know (as opposed to the larger set that I can figure out the correct answer for from the choices), I can often remember specificially where or in what context I know the word from. A surprising number are from amusing sources such as role playing games (obscure mythical creatures, magical devices, weapons and armor), Patrick O'Brien novels (nautical terms -- see "gammon," above), titles of old stories and poems (especially their titles), and Gene Wolfe novels. "Philippic" I got from the title of a Simon and Garfunkel song, and had never seen since in any other context.
Respectfully,
Myriad

Interestingly, I got gammon as ham correct (see Miss Jane Marple for why I knew it).
Check wiki also.

[Professor Yaffle]

And there's me thinking everyone called it gammon. You learn something new every day!

[Jeff Corey]

Are you sure it wasn't the Cheese Shop sketch? (It's used in both sketches IIRC, but in the Cheese Shop sketch John Cleese explains/defines it, in the following lines.)

Respectfully,
Myriad
It was the Undertaker sketch that I saw first and it was quite clear from the context.
As for gammon, isn't that a win in backgammon?

[CFLarsen]

It was the Undertaker sketch that I saw first and it was quite clear from the context.
As for gammon, isn't that a win in backgammon?

Double normal loss.

[The Don]

I thought gammon was an expression of derision over some piece of nonsense

[Fasto]

Never mind the vocabulary - someone somewhere is actually getting paid to count grains of rice! :cool:

[madurobob]

I've played a few times and hover around 42. But, I think there is a strong cultural bias. I grew up in the US South and I see very few words commonly used in polite southern society. "Sibilance" indeed!

where is "Blacktop" and "Catsup" and "Druthers" and "Feedlot" and....?

This dang public school education is not serving me as well as I'd expected.

[homer]

I got doun to thre and op two fore .doh

[fuelair]

Gammon is all the things listed and more (wiki it). (But the first is either joke or (ham) and the joke derives from the meat - indirectly).

[Orthoptera]

For rarer words that I actually know (as opposed to the larger set that I can figure out the correct answer for from the choices), I can often remember specificially where or in what context I know the word from. A surprising number are from amusing sources such as role playing games (obscure mythical creatures, magical devices, weapons and armor), Patrick O'Brien novels (nautical terms -- see "gammon," above), titles of old stories and poems (especially their titles), and Gene Wolfe novels. "Philippic" I got from the title of a Simon and Garfunkel song, and had never seen since in any other context.

I thought the same thing... Patrick O'Brian novels seemed to be the source for many of the more archaic terms, and there was a surprising number of medieval armory references. Thus I stayed pretty consistently in the 48 range: Thanks, PO'B!

[Elind]

"Gammon" is the act of attaching the rope that holds the bowsprit in place, right? :)

According to the site FAQ, the level of words is determined by how many players actually get the word correct over time.

It seems likely that some words are rated higher because there's a particularly deceptive choice leading to more wrong answers, not because the word itself is more obscure. For instance "parlay" appears at very high level, I think because the choices include "increase" (their correct answer) and "chat". Those thinking of "parley" meaning "negotiate" will likely choose the latter incorrect answer.

For rarer words that I actually know (as opposed to the larger set that I can figure out the correct answer for from the choices), I can often remember specificially where or in what context I know the word from. A surprising number are from amusing sources such as role playing games (obscure mythical creatures, magical devices, weapons and armor), Patrick O'Brien novels (nautical terms -- see "gammon," above), titles of old stories and poems (especially their titles), and Gene Wolfe novels. "Philippic" I got from the title of a Simon and Garfunkel song, and had never seen since in any other context.

Respectfully,
Myriad

Wow. Rainman memory you have.