Alternates vs. Alternatives

Log Out | Topics | Search Moderators | Register | Edit Profile

Author Message David E Lorenzini Senior Member Username: deloren Post Number: 34 Registered: 04-2000 Posted on Wednesday, June 30, 2004 - 12:52 am:    What is the preferred choice: Alternates or Alternatives? I guess I am looking more for a consensus than a correct or logical answer. I have always used Alternatives, but my clients often want me to change it because they use Alternates on the drawings. Margaret G. Chewning CSI CCS Senior Member Username: presbspec Post Number: 21 Registered: 01-2003 Posted on Wednesday, June 30, 2004 - 07:32 am:    The PRM and MF04 use the term "Alternates". Curt Norton, CSI, CCS Senior Member Username: curtn Post Number: 50 Registered: 06-2002 Posted on Wednesday, June 30, 2004 - 07:45 am:    I don't know the history behind the decision, but our firm has used alternatives for many years. John Bunzick, CCS, CCCA Senior Member Username: bunzick Post Number: 229 Registered: 03-2002 Posted on Wednesday, June 30, 2004 - 08:47 am:    My recollection from readings is that Alternates is common in the US, and Alternatives is common in Canada. However, I can't cite a source. Are there any Canadian's out there to confirm? David R Combs, CSI, CCS, CCCA (Unregistered Guest) Unregistered guest Posted on Wednesday, June 30, 2004 - 08:57 am:    Per my trusty (but dusty) copy of 1988 MasterFormat: Section (way back then) 01030 - Alternates / Alternatives Commentary in the margin reads: "NOTE: Use either "Alternate," a common United States term, or "Alternative," a common Canadian term; not both." Ralph Liebing Senior Member Username: rliebing Post Number: 84 Registered: 02-2003 Posted on Wednesday, June 30, 2004 - 09:59 am:    Got this from an old grammar source-- may be it helps. "The writers of the dictionaries I consulted agree that the American sense of "alternate" is quite recent, mainly within the 20th century, and increasingly from about the 1960s. Some traditionalists hold that alternative/alternatively should be used only in situations where the number of choices involved is exactly two, because of the word's historical relation to Latin. H.W. Fowler, among others, has considered this restriction a fetish. The Usage Panel of The American Heritage Dictionary is evenly divided on the issue, with 49 percent accepting the sentence "Of the three alternatives, the first is the least distasteful." Alternative is also sometimes used to refer to a variant or substitute in cases where there is no element of choice involved, as in "We will do our best to secure alternative employment for employees displaced by the closing of the factory." This sentence is unacceptable to 60 percent of the Usage Panel, who say that alternative should not be confused with alternate. Correct usage requires The class will meet on alternate (not alternative) Tuesdays. I recommend using alternative when you could substitute "or instead of that." Use alternate when you mean "occuring in successive turns." (Unregistered Guest) Unregistered guest Posted on Wednesday, June 30, 2004 - 10:18 am:    Using "alternate" as a noun bothered me for many years, until I realized that it was probably a shortened form of the term "Alternate Bid"; such truncation is not unknown or unacceptable in English, although I can't think of another example offhand. SpecLink uses "Alternative," perhaps because of a Canadian's involvement in writing its textbase, or perhaps because of BSD's effort to do things a better way, even if it flies in the face of longstanding tradition. As a SpecLink user, I change it to "Alternate," bowing to US custom, although I would prefer the correct noun form. I would support an effort to change the US standard to "alternative," but I doubt if such a movement would catch on, given the hidebound conservatism of the AEC community... Lynn Javoroski Senior Member Username: lynn_javoroski Post Number: 114 Registered: 07-2002 Posted on Wednesday, June 30, 2004 - 10:49 am:    Stop thinking in terms of a verb or adjective and start thinking in terms of a noun. According to the following dictionaries, all based on American usage, "alternate" is the preferred choice. (It's also shorter, long a CSI standard choice). I think the Cambridge Dictionary explains it most clearly. Note that the American Heritage dictionary uses "alternative" to define "alternate". Mirriam-Webster: one that substitutes for The American HeritageŽ Dictionary of the English Language: Fourth Edition. 2000. NOUN: (-nt)1. A person acting in the place of another; a substitute. 2. An alternative Cambridge Dictionary of American English - alternate: noun [C]. one that can take the place of another. David was too sick to attend, so Janet served as his alternate Anonymous   Posted on Wednesday, June 30, 2004 - 10:56 am:    Get a life! William C. Pegues, FCSI, CCS Senior Member Username: wpegues Post Number: 279 Registered: 10-2002 Posted on Wednesday, June 30, 2004 - 11:01 am:    David Combs, I had just reached for my 1988 MF when your response arrived in my email, that's exactly where I knew it was related about Alternates/Alternatives. Lynn, Great response, we always need to look in contemporary dictionaries of the US common use of language. I think we sometimes forget who reads (or who is supposed to be reading) our specifications. Looking at Fowler, looking at traditionalists and heritage of words to their origin can be interesting - but it is common usage as defined in contemporary dictionaries that is best used in what we produce. William Richard L Matteo Senior Member Username: rlmat Post Number: 27 Registered: 10-2003 Posted on Wednesday, June 30, 2004 - 01:59 pm:    Enough already! It is "Alternates" D. Marshall Fryer Senior Member Username: dmfryer Post Number: 30 Registered: 09-2003 Posted on Wednesday, June 30, 2004 - 02:13 pm:    If shorter and more common is indeed better, how about "Options"? John Regener, AIA, CCS, CCCA, CSI, SCIP Senior Member Username: john_regener Post Number: 164 Registered: 04-2002 Posted on Wednesday, June 30, 2004 - 03:22 pm:    How about allowing the alternate/alternative use either? That should drive the obsessive, compulsives over the edge. Lynn Javoroski Senior Member Username: lynn_javoroski Post Number: 116 Registered: 07-2002 Posted on Wednesday, June 30, 2004 - 03:28 pm:    Or into an alternate/alternative life style...