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If a talk is desirable/desired, I can drop by your office any time.

Should I use desirable or desired here? Or some word else?

phenry
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Tim
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    Both sound somewhat awkward. I would say rather "If you would like to speak in person, ..." – Kevin Oct 10 '13 at 01:41
  • Thanks!Why do both sound awkard? – Tim Oct 10 '13 at 01:44
  • I'm not entirely sure. Perhaps the juxtaposition of passive and active voice. Perhaps that the first part sounds excessively formal (not least of all because of the aforementioned passive voice) and the second seems informal, or at least much less formal. Whatever it is, it just doesn't sound like something I'd expect from a native speaker. – Kevin Oct 10 '13 at 01:47
  • @phenry It would be better to edit correctly. CDO: else adverb
    A2 used after words beginning with any-, every-, no-, and some-, or after how, what, where, who, why, but not which, to mean 'other', 'another', 'different', 'extra': Everybody else has (= all the other people have) agreed except for you. If it doesn't work, try something else (= something different).     – Edwin Ashworth Mar 18 '15 at 22:43
  • @EdwinAshworth - At the moment I am focused on editing titles to make them more descriptive of their questions. If that means I don't catch every mistake in every question I touch, that's too bad, but chastising me for it is silly; that attitude will only lead to fewer people doing less to improve the site. Of course, in the time it took you to write that, you could have edited the question yourself... but I guess fixing things wasn't really your goal here. – phenry Mar 18 '15 at 22:50
  • I wonder why you're doing it. If it brings erroneous usages back into focus, you're better letting it sleep. Editing is fine if it really makes the site better. Your edit of the title here is hardly going to make a vast difference; if it did, I'd not mention the more obvious need for correction. Good luck with the badges. – Edwin Ashworth Mar 18 '15 at 23:00

2 Answers2

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Let me give some examples to differentiate between the two

  • Minatchi is a very desirable woman. Many men had desired her. But she is not at all desired by Harwinder.
  • Minatchi is a very attractive woman. Many men (and women) are attracted to her. But Harwinder is gay and therefore has no attraction or desire for her. It is safe to say that Harwinder had never desired the highly desirable Minatchi.
  • Harwinder is a very handsome and attractive man. He could have any desirable woman he desired. But as I said, he desired none of them.
  • The food in the hospital is very edible, but they are often left uneaten. Edible but not sumptuous.
  • I am in a very desirable position. I have desired this position all my life. However, this job was not at all desired by Ragunathan. He quit and enrolled in a seminary.
  • Ragunathan is a genius. He could have any highly desirable job that he could have desired, but he didn't.
Blessed Geek
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"Desirable" usually refers to persons, so "if desired" would be better. This is a little formal, and would work in a business situation. But I agree with Kevin - his version is more straightforward.

ZZMike
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