It’s common to the point of mootness, but: when describing the planet, Earth is a proper noun and should be capitalized. Otherwise you are referring to soil.

  • Rhynoplaz
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    1293 months ago

    While we’re on the topic, that’s not how colons work.

    • Banana
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      473 months ago

      When you can smell his colon on your pillow 🥰

    • @lmmarsano@lemmynsfw.com
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      163 months ago

      not how colons work

      You had me scanning the image (of text without alt text: bad, OP! BAD!) for a : pretty hard until I settled on The New York Times message

      Breaking News: Susan[…]

      for a while. Had me wondering how else The New York Times is supposed to write that, because it looks correct.

      This is why quoting exists.

          • @suicidaleggroll@lemm.ee
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            3 months ago

            The complaint isn’t about the colon in OP’s image, it’s the colon in OP’s explanation.

            OP complaining about an insignificant capitalization mistake in a Twitter post, while making a far more egregious grammatical error in their explanation is just…*chef’s kiss*

            • @zarkanian@sh.itjust.works
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              33 months ago

              It isn’t even an error, though. It’s just wrong. “Earth” should be lowercase. I can understand being pedantic, but pedantic and wrong is super irritating.

              • @Bazoogle@lemmy.world
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                33 months ago

                The original post is technically correct on the topic of capitalization for “Earth”. When referring to the planet, it is a proper noun, thus capitalized. source

                However, that is a pretty egregious use of a colon XD

                • @zarkanian@sh.itjust.works
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                  3 months ago

                  Keep in mind that idioms follow their own rules. Down to earth, what on earth, and move heaven and earth do not capitalize the planet, and four corners of the earth or salt of the earth take the definite article.

                  “On earth” (e.g. “richest man on earth”) is one of those idioms, so the E is lowercase. See here.

                  on earth

                  used for emphasis. What on earth are you doing?; the stupidest man on earth.

                  It’s a bit confusing, but they aren’t literally referring to “the planet Earth” in an astronomical sense. If you were writing a sci-fi story and comparing the wealth of the richest man on Earth to, say, the richest man on Mars, then it would be capitalized.