Then someone wanted to argue on the show's message board that "utterly destroy" is right and I end up spending otherwise useful time, arguing with him. It all went something like this...
J*****:
I finally finished listening to this episode while we were waiting for the fireworks spectacular at Disneyland on the 4th of July and have three related points to make...
Finally, for the sake of accuracy, this may clarify the proper use of the term "decimate":
dec·i·mate /ˈdɛsəˌmeɪt/ Pronunciation Key - [des-uh-meyt]
–verb (used with object), -mat·ed, -mat·ing.
1. to destroy a great number or proportion of: The population was decimated by a plague.
2. to select by lot and kill every tenth person of.
3. Obsolete. to take a tenth of or from.
Beware of absolute and obsolete aphorisms.
To which I reply:
This may be a modern meaning adapted through ignorance of the actual mean; however, it has not etymological basis.
http://www.etymonline.com :
Decimation-
1549, from L.L. decimationem, from L. decimare "the removal or destruction of one-tenth," from decem "ten." Killing one in ten, chosen by lots, from a rebellious city or a mutinous army was a common punishment in classical times. Earliest sense in Eng. was of a tithe; decimate has been used (incorrectly, to the irritation of pedants) since 1663 for "destroy a large portion of."
I figured that was a simple enough explanation. But then someone else that they were a language lesson.
M*****:
Like it or not, the only languages that stay fixed over time are the, well, dead ones. The modern *popular* meaning, no matter how it was adapted, is ultimately the correct one because there's no value in a language that stands apart from its use.
This does sometimes mean that stupid things happen to the language (like "scan" becoming very nearly its own antonym), but trying to hold up an antequated or little-used definition for something as the One True Definition flies in the face of how languages are actually used in practice.
I'm half remembering a joke from some sitcom ages ago involving someone being called "obtuse" and replying with something like "I'm rounded at the free end?". Apparently sitcom writers are sometimes English Major Dropouts too.
And thus the fake internet fight begins...
I say:
First, I understand language changes. However, numbers are numbers. Ten means ten, not a hundred or a thousand or ten-thousand. Numbers are kind of just fixed that way. I mean, you can say a three-point shot in basketball really equals twenty points but then you just kind of look stupid.
A decathlon is comprised of ten events, not any other number. A decimeter is comprised of one-tenth of a meter. A dime is made up from ten cents. See the patern. The word has a number (yeah, not the English name for the number; but the Latin number ten and the English number ten are still the same metaphysical concept) and hence, it is really hard to say ten doesn't equal ten.
And let's not get too wrapped up claiming if something is embraced by the masses that it is good or right or truth. I mean, the first Scooby Doo movie opened up number one the week it was realeased and pulled in over $130 million dollars. In no way does that kind of popularity even begin to make that movie any more acceptable.
M*****:
Smash Das Robots (that's me) wrote:
"First, I understand language changes. However, numbers are numbers. Ten means ten, not a hundred or a thousand or ten-thousand. Numbers are kind of just fixed that way."
Numbers are. Language is not. The act of decimating something under the archaic definition carried an implication. That implication grew to take over the word. That's language. By your logic, musicians shouldn't ever refer to an octave because there are multiple instruments capable of playing more than eight distinct notes within that frequency interval.Smash Das Robots wrote:
"A decathlon is comprised of ten events, not any other number. A decimeter is comprised of one-tenth of a meter. A dime is made up from ten cents. See the patern. The word has a number (yeah, not the English name for the number; but the Latin number ten and the English number ten are still the same metaphysical concept) and hence, it is really hard to say ten doesn't equal ten."
Definitions regularly drift from the original precise meaning. We still "dial" phones and "type" messages on boards, and I can't remember the last time I actually saw a phone with an actual dial or a typewriter for that matter. Refusing to accept that sometimes a word ends up representing something different from the original literal derivation is simply denying reality.Smash Das Robots wrote:
"And let's not get too wrapped up claiming if something is embraced by the masses that it is good or right or truth. I mean, the first Scooby Doo movie opened up number one the week it was realeased and pulled in over $130 million dollars. In no way does that kind of popularity even begin to make that movie any more acceptable."
Two things in response to this:
1) The current accepted definition of decimate is not a pop-cultural phenomenon. There's a fundamental difference in the kind of popularism respected in the OED and what you're describing.
2) Even though you were trying to be funny, I think it's worth saying that if it did that much business, then I'd argue that it *does* legitimize the movie at some level, and claiming otherwise is just denying reality again. Shake your tiny fist at the mob, if you must, but that doesn't mean your "taste" is objectively better.
Which I follow up with:
M***** wrote:
"Numbers are. Language is not. The act of decimating something under the archaic definition carried an implication. That implication grew to take over the word. That's language. By your logic, musicians shouldn't ever refer to an octave because there are multiple instruments capable of playing more than eight distinct notes within that frequency interval."
How many four-part trilogies are there? Someone can call a four-movie series a trilogy but in the end they are stupid and ignorant.M***** wrote:
"Definitions regularly drift from the original precise meaning. We still "dial" phones and "type" messages on boards, and I can't remember the last time I actually saw a phone with an actual dial or a typewriter for that matter. Refusing to accept that sometimes a word ends up representing something different from the original literal derivation is simply denying reality."
Um...well you didn't address the issue which was words that are derived from numbers. So again, how many four-part trilogies are there? Are there round squares? Again, some society may rise up were popular opinion can answer these in the affirmative and there leader will be Lindsey Lohan or Ashlee Simpson and their subjectives will love them.M***** wrote:
"Two things in response to this:
1) The current accepted definition of decimate is not a pop-cultural phenomenon. There's a fundamental difference in the kind of popularism respected in the OED and what you're describing."
Well I have to argue with your source of authority. The OED or Oxford English Dictionary. We all know that the Oxford refers to the Oxford located in England. England has a monarchy and we kicked their wigged-topped heads and powdered faces like a hundred years ago hence the little holiday known as the Fourth of July, aka Independence Day. Of course, England wants to give Americans faulty knowledge. They have a long standing grudge. So why should I subject myself to an anti-Democratic source of knowledge? I'm not going to let the terrorists win.
Furthermore, a dictionary is descriptive rather than prescriptive. It merely reports how stupid people are by describing how they misuse words. For example, just because a history books says George W. Bush was a President of the United States, that doesn't mean it was necessarly a good or bad thing (i.e. prescriptive). It merely means that a minority of people voted for him but thanks to the electoral college he became president. It isn't a history book's place to argue if he was a good president. That is in the realm of political philosophy or Fox News. Likewise, dictionaries merely express how people use and misuse words. It is the realm of English majors and college professors in general to mock the rest of society's lack of academic letters.M***** wrote:
2) Even though you were trying to be funny, I think it's worth saying that if it did that much business, then I'd argue that it *does* legitimize the movie at some level, and claiming otherwise is just denying reality again. Shake your tiny fist at the mob, if you must, but that doesn't mean your "taste" is objectively better.
Yes, it legitimizes the movie on the level that it supports the old saying that "a fool and his money are soon separated."
Really, all this silliness needs to end and I need to go do something outside or at least use the internet for the purpose it was intended: desensitizing me to the shock of hot female-on-donkey porn.
