At 08:41 PM 8/14/2002 -0700, Nytemuse wrote: > In studying >language, I was just shocked in some systems where 1 word can mean several >different things, depending on the context. Then I look at English and >realize it's universal. The problem is just that: people decide on a >different definition, get their friends to use it, and soon there are >double-meanings. Take, for example, the word "nauseous". Following the >"rules" of grammar and language construction and such, it ORIGINALLY was >created to mean "causing nausea or disgust; nauseating". But, due to >popular MIS-usage, it now is accepted by the world (and Merriam-Webster >OnLine) to mean "affected with nausea or disgust". Now, as the other post I just read did, we're getting into how language changes. First of all, I'm hardly about to deny that it does so. But it seems to me that those of us who care about language ought to and are able to have some influence, albeit small. Not all changes are the same. Some extend the language. Other changes weaken it. Some changes are just ugly. I do not use the word, "proactive" because I find it ugly. I use "hopefully" to mean, "in a hopeful frame of mind." And so on. We all make those choices. And it is worth mentioning that some dictionaries are more willing accept changes than others. My American Heritage dictionary does not agree with Miriam-Webster about what "nauseous" means. Certainly, when we insist on the more precise, useful term we are fighting a rear-guard action, and are probably doomed. But I consider it a fight worth waging anyway. > > > It seems to me that language, while often subjective, has an objective > > element insofar as it is shared. > >I'll agree to that, while amending that it was originally subjective, >using the definition "characteristic of or belonging to reality as >perceived rather than as independent of mind". Someone perceived that >that object that fell from the sky when it got dark was "rain". And since >there was no name previously, people accepted it willingly. Hell, if I >had been alive when language was being created, and I thought that a rock >should be called an "ouch" or an "aclob", and I could come up with the >word before anyone else, things would be different. Umm...that isn't *exactly* how it happened, but your point is still valid. Apropos--did you know that some students at MIT invented an onomatopoeiatron? > >Exactly...of course slang, also, detracts from these objectives. Hmm. Some slang does. Other slang is, I think, useful. I look at them on a case-by-case basis. I mean, I'd be hard-pressed to give a definition of "cool" as I use it, but I'd have a lot of trouble expressing certain thoughts if I didn't have it available to me.