out of

[Anonymous]

Should it be "It happened out of my house." or "It happened outside my house."
Should it be "It happened out of the sight of the camera." or "It happened ouside the sight of the camera."

 

[Casiopea]

Should it be "It happened out of my house." or "It happened outside my house."
Should it be "It happened out of the sight of the camera." or "It happened ouside the sight of the camera."

1. It happened outside (of the confines of) my house.
2. It happened outside (of the range of) the camera's sight.
3. It is out of sight. (I can't see it/ Idiom: It's wonderful, fantastic)
4. It was outside (of the path/range of) my sight.

All the best,

 

[FW]

3. It is out of sight. (I can't see it/ Idiom: It's wonderful, fantastic)

Does this sentence imply that I could see it but now it has gone out of sight? (I am not considering its idiomatic meaning.)

 

[Casiopea]

3. It is out of sight. (I can't see it/ Idiom: It's wonderful, fantastic)

Does this sentence imply that I could see it but now it has gone out of sight? (I am not considering its idiomatic meaning.)

Both I suppose:

Non-idiomatic meanings:

A. I was looking at it, but now it's no longer in my range of sight.
B. I am trying to see it but I can't see it at all. It's out of my range of sight.

All the best,

 

[FW]

Thanks.

This is interesting.
What do you think of:

"My office is out of town."
as opposed to:
"My office is outside the town."

I think you can use "out" here, but in another reply you said that one can't say:"New York is out of France." I think you're right there too.

I think when we think in terms of "distance to be covered" we can use "out". Like in "it is a long way out of my sight" or "it is a long way out of town."

I don't think one would say "New York is a long way out of France."

Am I right? What do you think?

 

[Casiopea]

Thanks.

This is interesting.
What do you think of:

"My office is out of town."
as opposed to:
"My office is outside the town."

I think you can use "out" here, but in another reply you said that one can't say:"New York is out of France." I think you're right there too.

I think when we think in terms of "distance to be covered" we can use "out". Like in "it is a long way out of my sight" or "it is a long way out of town."

I don't think one would say "New York is a long way out of France."

Am I right? What do you think?

Oh, I agree. It's an interesting point. With regards to

EX: New York is a long way out of France.

I think it's OK, especially if you're inside France at the time and asking for directions (hehe).

As for out of town, it sort of clouds the issue since we now have an idiom to contend with,

EX: My office is out of town.

It has two meanings, 1) idiom: your office staff is out of town on business or pleasure, and 2) emphasis on parameter: your office is outside the town's limits.

Getting back to "New York is out of France", I can't get the meaning "New York is outside France's boundaries". Can you? I'm not 100% sure why that is. It may have to do with the fact that we know New York is a city in North America and so relating it to the boundaries of Europe, an ocean away, is somewhat strange.

As for the original sentence "New York is out of Europe", again I can't get the meaning "New York is outside of Europe", but, and here's the real question, why is it that we can get that meaning from "My office (i.e. building) is out of town" (i.e. outside of the town's limits)? Is it that your office is near town (i.e. connected to the town) and that New York is not near/connected to Europe? Hmm.

Along that line of thinking, what about?

X town is out of Paris. (OK, if out means, outside the limits)
X country is out of Europe. (OK, if ....same as above)

Yes. That's probably it. New York is not close/connected to Europe and hence doesn't work with "out of".

What do you thunk?

All the best,

 

[FW]

I think you explain things very well.

This is my theory: When we say "something is right out of town" or "a long way out of" or "the hotel is out of town", we are thinking about a trajectory and a distance to be covered by normal, everyday means. We think about a line from point A to point B and the fact that that line crosses a boundary. In other words we are not really thinking about locations per se, but about a movement and a boundary. You can't think like that when it comes to New York and Europe (there is no boundary in the real sense of the term.) You won't say a hotel in LA is out of town if you were in New York and if you said 'It is a long way out of town.' you'd probably be using irony. Am I right?

When we say "He is out of the building." don't we imply that at one point in time he was in and has now gone out? Movement again.
When we think only about location, we use outside. It is geography we are talking about.

This is only a theory, but what do you think about it? I think it takes into account everything you have said on the subject.