Adjective

#9 -- You would use "the least remote" to mean "the most remote"?

Just to add to the confusion: My American English grammar book says that most two-syllable adjectives ending in -y+, +-ow+, +-er+, or consonant ++-le+, with loud stress on the first syllable and weak stress on the second, form their comparative and superlative by the addition of +-er+ and +-est+. Furthermore, it is stated that adjectives that use +-er+ and +-est+ are not ordinarily used with +less+ and +least+. All other adjectives (not counting those which are longer through the addition of prefixes like +-un+ ) use the intensifiers +more+ and +most.

I suppose there are exceptions to every rule.

Edited by: istvan

I hear a blurb every morning from a foundation that sponsors the morning news on (US) National Public Radio, that says the foundation is working for "a more just society." As far as I can tell from the dictionary, it should be "juster". Thatis, the dictionary doesn't say anything one way or the other, implying that the usual monosyllable rule applies. But "more just" sounds better to me. Why?

But "more just" sounds better to me. Why?

Maybe because "a juster society" could sound like "adjuster society" and would thus be at least momentarily confusing. If you take it to the superlative it becomes even worse: Which society in the ancient world was the justest society? "More just" and "most just" do sound better.

It strikes me, as I think this over, that more and most would also sound better if the modified adjective is "august." Can you imagine a monarch being described as "His Augustest Majesty"?

Both options sound a bit awkward to me too. I would say:

"I promise not to say anything with even a remote chance of affecting [or offending?] anyone's sensitivities"

#13 -- But august is a two-syllable word, and not in the any of the categories of two-syllable words that istvan's book says take -er/-est. So it's no problem explaining why it takes more/most.

Googlebooks lets me see the entry in John Algeo's British or American English? A Handbook of Word and Grammar Patterns, which says that "juster" is used 74% of the time in British publications and 86% in Americans.

Apparently "just" is just an exception to the normal rule. "Marked in the lexicon" as linguists say, or used to.