Post awful semantic arguments you've been in

[captain]

I mean, at what point does someone start saying "Give me two of those" and when you give them exactly two, they say "Oh, no, I meant an indeterminate small number, not exactly two."

dude get the fuck out of here

[addison]

if we re-define the meaning of the world 'couple', eventually people will be marrying box turtles

this is a faulty parallel, because the whole "marriage means one man one woman" is based on a definition that a bunch of douchebag conservative assholes defined a few years back, not on the naturally evolved actual historical definitionS of marriage, which have been legion.

[Amblin]

i remember as a kid sitting down and figuring out this order: a couple<a few<several

[captain]

if we re-define the meaning of the world 'couple', eventually people will be marrying box turtles

this is a faulty parallel, because the whole "marriage means one man one woman" is based on a definition that a bunch of douchebag conservative assholes defined a few years back, not on the naturally evolved actual historical definitionS of marriage, which have been legion.

so you're saying marriage has a formal and informal definition? and it's okay to use both?

[addison]

if we re-define the meaning of the world 'couple', eventually people will be marrying box turtles

this is a faulty parallel, because the whole "marriage means one man one woman" is based on a definition that a bunch of douchebag conservative assholes defined a few years back, not on the naturally evolved actual historical definitionS of marriage, which have been legion.

so you're saying marriage has a formal and informal definition? and it's okay to use both?

i'm saying the definition drafted by congressmen and conservative religious lobbyists is not an actual definition, but a propagandistic effort to preclude gay marriage by semantics

[patrick cokane?]

"naturally evolved except when addi no rikey"

[Cronos]

pretty sure that that definition has been around a lot longer historically than just a couple of congressmen and religious lobbyists in the past couple of years

[captain]

addison fucking sucks and i'm outta here

[patrick cokane?]

I mean, at what point does someone start saying "Give me two of those" and when you give them exactly two, they say "Oh, no, I meant an indeterminate small number, not exactly two."

dude get the fuck out of here

this quite the strawman from old uni here

[Marigold]

An awful semantic argument in a thread about awful semantic arguments.

Who would've thought?

[patrick cokane?]

addison fucking sucks and i'm outta here in my WHEELDADDY

[Cronos]

Yeah I guess the last couple millenniums of Christian religious teachings were invented a couple of years ago by a few bigot conservatives

[addison]

"naturally evolved except when addi no rikey"

it's true, language can evolve by people using words incorrectly because a large number of barely literate people don't know the definitions
but couple is pretty clearly two, and you'd have to be a literal michigan frat bro to say otherwise
are you a michigan frat bro?

[addison]

Yeah I guess the last couple millenniums of bigoted teachings, most of which people ignore in practice, were legalized a couple of years ago by a few bigot conservatives

basically

[patrick cokane?]

yes i am a michigan frat bro

[addison]

also, the plural for millenium is millenia
tho i'm sure milleniums is filed under "informal"

[Lyndon]

it's actually "millennia" and "millennium"

[addison]

i enjoy the nuance of language,
in fact i revel in it,
but when you're dealing with the hoi polloi who have v. poor vocabularies and likewise abilities at comprehending and using language in general, then you must tighten the yoke o'er 'em
if you can't reach level 30 on free rice, then you're not quite human

[Burt Falcon]

Hall monitors.

[Boog Powell]

I once spent 45 minutes arguing with my brother over whether pasta and macaroni were the same thing. I don't even remember what side I was on.

[Catullus]

also, on the way most definitely means "on the path on which one is travelling" not "nearby"
i mean the words spell it out.
the way means path in this instance
if you are travelling A - B
A 5 B 8
the space between the two is the path
5 is on the path between A and B, 8 is not.

God, thank you! If I'm deviating from my path, I'm going out of my damn way. He's even said 'on the way' to refer to something that would actually require BACKTRACKING.

[gauchebag]

it's actually "millennia" and "millennium"

what's the word for this?

pwnt? something like that?

[jewels]

using the vague use of "a couple" doesn't bother me and I think I do it all the time, and yet it drives me nuts when people use "unique" incorrectly. I guess that's hypocritical of me.

[addison]

you mean using it to mean something "interesting" instead of "singular"

if people cared more about language our adjectives wouldn't all mean the same thing to most people
incredible might still mean unbelievable
fantastic might still mean related to fantasy
awesome might still mean awe-inspiring
great might still mean a large amount
radical might still mean change-inducing
righteous might still mean virtuous
instead, to teenagers and to our shitty commercial culture based around teenagers and children all these words mean literally the same thing, along with cool, nice, good, etc.

evolution of words, plurality of meanings---good
confounding and obscuring meaning by lazy AND unintentional usage---bad

i guess there is a good and a bad
then again, most people read only the cliff's notes to 1984

[addison]

I once spent 45 minutes arguing with my brother over whether pasta and macaroni were the same thing. I don't even remember what side I was on.

macaroni is a type of pasta--
pasta is not a dish that comes premade in microwavable containers
pasta is not noodles+some type of sauce
it is a dried and processed wheat product
if this wasn't your side then you were wrong.

[universe]

People use infer when they mean imply. And they should be executed.

[addison]

People use infer when they mean imply. And they should be executed.

JEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEESUS

also,i hate gift used as a verb
as in, "i was gifted money for christmas."

[jewels]

people use Jesus as an exclamation instead of our lord and savior.

[addison]

yeshua was the name of the man who the kitsch of jesus is reportedly based on
of course that is only a transliteration from the aramaic, whose word for god is Allah.
yeshua prayed to allah
who gives a fuck about the kitsch of jesus

[Savage]

i always order "a few" olives at subway and id be so much happier if they took me literally and gave me three olives instead of the 900,000 they always dump on there