flourescent -> fluorescent

it's probably the lamp emitting the light that is faulty, rather than the light itself.

@sacredceltic
I looked up "light" in the Oxford Dictionary http://www.oxfordlearnersdictio...ight_1?q=light
and definition no 3 is: a thing that produces light, especially an electric light

@raggione

OK. But it can't be both the thing that emits and the thing that is emitted. But that's what the sentence seems to say...

What was faulty ? The thing that emitted
What flickered ? The thing that is emitted

There are 2 distinct subjects in this sentence. They can't be confused in one word.

If you replace "fluorescent light" by "lamp" the sentence would still work. It's the lamp that's faulty and flickers. I can't see a problem there.

no. It's the light emitted by the lamp that flickers, not the lamp itself. a "flickering lamp" is a strange physical concept, of a lamp that would disappear and reappear successively. Maybe it will be built in the future. But it doesn't exist yet.

http://homeguides.sfgate.com/fi...ers-52400.html
How to fix a table lamp that flickers.

People think of the lamp as the thing that flickers. Language does not follow the rules of logic.

It’s a case of metonymy. The concept of light is transmitted onto the thing that produces it, and vice versa.

A thing that emits light can be faulty, but cannot flicker
Light that is emitted by a lamp can flicker but cannot be faulty

This sentence is absurd.

It's absurd to you, Cedric.

As a native American English speaker, this sentence sounds OK to me.

I would assume that since the author of this sentence is Australian, it also sounds OK in Australian English.

What may sound absurd in one language may just be the way that another language works. That's part of what's interesting about studying languages.

The sentence came from a real life situation. I had a fluorescent tube like this in the garage which was faulty and it flickered and buzzed for a few weeks until I bought another tube. The fault was with the tube itself.

https://www.google.com.au/searc...setY01FZ5wM%3A

I'm pleased a native English speaker has offered his opinion on my sentence, which to me is a perfectly OK sentence.

>What may sound absurd in one language may just be the way that another language works.

Absurdity doesn't depend on language. It's logical. It's beyond language.
The situation here has to do with physics.
The assertion made in this sentence, features 2 verbs that CANNOT apply to the same physical object.
Hence, there should be two subjects.

The sentence should be :
The fluorescent light(that emits) was faulty and the light(that is emitted) flickered on and off intermittently.

Using only one subject just because both subjects happen to have the same name produces a syntaxic monstrosity.

It's like : the earth is moist and revolves around the sun.

>The sentence came from a real life situation.

People say a lot of nonsense in real life.
Tatoeba is supposed to be exemplary.

@wezel

The metonymy applies to the naming of the light-emitting object. Fine. But it doesn't transform that object into light.
Here, we have two physical objects of different natures, that each do something specific to their unique nature. A single subject cannot apply to both, whatever their names.

> Tatoeba is supposed to be exemplary.

Tatoeba is supposed to be a sample of spoken language.

Changing this sentence based on your arguments would be as silly as unlinking all French sentences with both "ne" and "pas" on the grounds that logically a double negative makes a positive. Ridiculous, right? Exactly.

I'm not sure if you are arguing because you think your English is better than native speakers, because you have realized you are at fault and are simply not admitting it to save face, or because you want to win some sort of non-existent competition of comments, but there is no more reason to comment anymore. Your time is valuable; please use it doing something more productive. :)

>as silly as unlinking all French sentences with both "ne" and "pas" on the grounds that logically a double negative makes a positive.

I think you don't know what you're talking about. "ne" is a half-negative. I know, it's hard...

examples : ne ... rien, ne ... jamais, ne ... plus

>I'm not sure if you are arguing because you think your English is better than native speakers

No. Just my logic...

> there is no more reason to comment anymore.

But you're still doing it in your usual bullying manner.
What is your added value on this argument, exactly, apart from trying to boss around ?