Steven Brust <skzb at dreamcafe.com> writes: > At 07:25 PM 8/15/2002 +0100, Mike Scott wrote: > > The change has > > > pretty much happened, but I cannot imagine how it could be construed > > > as improving the language. > > > >Sure it could. There is clearly a linguistic niche for a gerundive > >meaning "it is to be hoped". > > Why? That is, what does "it is to be hoped" mean? It is to be hoped > by *whom*? By persons unknown? Why say that? By you? Then say, "I > hope." By me? Then say, "You should hope." By all right-thinking > people? Then say that. Why this insistence on vagueness? > > In fact, "hopefully" in its vague use developed from the German word > that sounds like it but that I can't possibly spell--something like > huffentlich. I asked my father (German lit. professor) what that word > meant, and he said, with no hesitation, "I hope." Drat, I don't have a German dictionary any more. The word is either "hoffentlich" or else there's an umlaut over the o, and I can't remember which. What evidence is there for blaming this innocent German word for the abuse of "hopefully", though? I mean, it looks reasonable on the face of it, but we all know how reliable *that* is! -- David Dyer-Bennet, dd-b at dd-b.net / New TMDA anti-spam in test John Dyer-Bennet 1915-2002 Memorial Site http://john.dyer-bennet.net Book log: http://www.dd-b.net/dd-b/Ouroboros/booknotes/ New Dragaera mailing lists, see http://dragaera.info