Thursday, March 29, 2007

More silly signs

This time from the British Museum (which confusingly is in one pokey and overcrowded little corner of Britain along with just about everything else that's meant to be "national")...

This one was on a rail surrounding a large ornamental hole in the floor. What they meant, of course, was "Beware of the Drop!" rather than telling us that there was danger so we should drop. I wonder what would happen if someone with Asperger's (or something) took it literally and dropped, then sued the museum....

And again. This one was on a door. Presumably forcing it open quickly would be fine...

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

Actually, the National Centre for Popular Music was far more central, being in Sheffield. However, its chief asset was that it looked uncannily like a set of curling stones, there was nothing inside of any interest, and it quickly aquired the name, "Top of the Flops", before closing and reopening as Sheffield Hallam Uni SU.

Susan A said...

and since when is London 'pokey'?

John said...

The National Museum of Photography, Film and Television in Bradford is actually quite good - I used to enjoy going there and it had the first IMAX screen in the UK.

And London has been pokey, I think, since about 1735.

Daniel Hill said...

I think 'Danger! Drop below' is fine. Why do you assume that 'drop' is a verb rather than a noun? Of course, in the latter case there would be no verb, but I think even people with Asperger's can understand this construction, since it is familiar from newspaper headlines (e.g. 'Brits in danger').

I also think 'Please do not force open slowly' is fine: you cannot assume that everything it doesn't mention is permitted. It doesn't say 'do not break into a thousand pieces' either . . . .

Anonymous said...

However, you generally assume that they must have inserted the "slowly" for a reason, so "please do not force open *slowly*" means that it's slow forcing that they specifically don't like, ergo forcing it open fast is okay.

Daniel Hill said...

Well, yes, you're right, ds, that normal people generally assume that, but then they also generally assume that if the writing is on two distinct lines it is for a reason, and that the stuff on the second line is independent from the stuff on the previous line (though punctuation would have been nice). My point was that while any normal person would read it as two distinct utterances, one on each line, somebody with Asperger's could still take it as a single utterance and not infer anything about forcing it quickly.

John said...

I'm not arguing that the sign could be taken in the intended sense, only that it could easily be taken in another sense.

John said...

I saw a sign the other day saying

Children Please
Drive Slowly

which has the children driving as the natural reading...