Tulpae, Tulpæ or Tulpas?

[Black Bane]

Okay, im lost.

How do you guys use the ae combo thing? (æ)

[Bluesleeve]

Older members of this community introduced 'Tulpae' because they wanted to distinguish it from the 'Tulpas' used in the wikipedia, so everyone knows it has nothing to do with magic. I don't know where that combined thing came from, but someone probably thought it looked fancy. It's not based on any language.

 

It's your choice, though. I personally am undecided, and currently find myself using Tulpas more often than Tulpae because it sounds less obtrusive.

The combined thing has no substance and I don't see any reason to have that symbol take my copypasta space.

When someone insists on Tulpae (both variants) I generally go for 'Tulpi'.

[Nordica]

 

The FAQ part of the guides section addresses that, I believe. Basically, tulpa is a Tibetan word, and there are no plural and singular forms in that language. Instead they have entirely different words to mean single or multiple of something. Since people wouldn't associate the actual plural of tulpa with the tulpa community because they wouldn't recognize it, and to illustrate the fact that our concept of tulpae is different from the traditional Tibetan concet, Dane and Irish decided to make up a Latin pluralization for it.

That clear things up. Thank you.

 

Okay, im lost.

How do you guys use the ae combo thing? (æ)

 

In my case the letter "æ" is a part of my language's alphabet, so it has its own key on my keyboard.

[Guest]

I spell it "tulpae" regardless for the sake of not making others feel left outside, even though I have the æ letter as well. :P

[Pleeb]

I should note, that since it's the Latin method of pluralization, technically you'd use the "Æ" character. I can actually type it on my keyboard, and anyone with a mac, US International, Dvorak International, Danish, and probably a few other keyboard layouts can type the "æ" character; it's a real character, being used in the linguistically correct way (denoting a Latin plural), and you can read about it here.

[Guest]

Norwegians have it, too, thanks to 500 years of Danish oppression.

[Jeff0253]

The "ae" is plural in Latin, but only for First Declension nouns in the Nominative or Vocative grammatical case. There's no purely linguistic reason to use it in English, since "Tulpa" doesn't have a Latin root. But there may, of course, be psychological, ethical, or emotional reasons. Personally, I think I like "tulpa" for both plural and singular, but that's just preference for the simplest solution.