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The important word here is "the." All of us use "the" to reference people whose names we don't know. We'd never say "the nameless person." Instead, we talk about "the waiter" or "the bus driver"...
Answer
#4: Attribution notice removed
by
System
·
2019-12-20T00:40:40Z (over 4 years ago)
Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/43409 License name: CC BY-SA 3.0 License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/
#3: Attribution notice added
by
System
·
2019-12-08T11:16:51Z (over 4 years ago)
Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/43409 License name: CC BY-SA 3.0 License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/
#2: Initial revision
**The important word here is "the."** All of us use "the" to reference people whose names we don't know. We'd never say "the nameless person." Instead, we talk about "the waiter" or "the bus driver" or "the woman with the red skirt" or "the kid doing cartwheels." When we do this, we assume the person has a name, just not one we know. But think about how we refer to animals. Many animals have names. Animals who are commonly pets usually have names but often don't (feral cats, for instance). Or they might have a name we'll never know (an abandoned dog). Even wild animals often have names. It can be a traditional name, or a research one, like P-22. We can refer to animals without using names and there is no difference between doing this with an animal that actually has a name vs one who doesn't. "The calico with the tipped ear," "the mare with the teenaged rider," "the lobster over there missing a claw."
#1: Imported from external source
by
System
·
2019-03-13T05:37:31Z (about 5 years ago)
Original score: 0