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Ask HN: Why abuse the language so?

5 points by grownseed ↗ HN
There has been a fairly common trend, particularly over the last few years it seems, of people mis-using words in ways that I believe are more detrimental than anything.

Take for instance the word "methodology", which is commonly (ab)used when meaning "method"; "methodology" being the study of the "method".

First, in this case, people are using a word that is longer than the correct one, so I fail to see the advantage in using it.

Second, it mangles/loses the actual meaning of the word "methodology". Are we to expect people will start saying "study of the methodology" or "methodology-logy"?

I understand language evolves, and I have no problem with that, but I fail to see the point of this particular trend, which in my opinion actually devolves the language and makes it more complicated and opaque than necessary.

The reason I'm submitting this to HN is because, as logical people (or likely more so than the general population), one would assume we would be rather sensitive to clear, accurate language. Yet, so many articles posted here are plagued by these abuses.

(This trend would also include common pleonasms, like the popular "inter-personal relationship")

This is an issue that bothers me as I tend to take things rather literally and occasionally end up getting confused. I'm aware this is my own shortcoming, but some people here are often offended by fallacies and will react strongly to them.

Is this not essentially the same thing? Is there a way to kindly correct people? Should we even attempt to?

7 comments

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brudgers
Take for instance the word "methodology", which is commonly (ab)used when meaning "method"; "methodology" being the study of the "method".

Use and reference are not properly distinguished in the above quote. It's ok with me 'cause I get your point. Hopefully, you will get mine.

grownseed
I do and I appreciate it, but are you suggesting we don't correct people as long as we can understand them?

As a non-native English speaker, I certainly appreciate being corrected. So... thanks :)

brudgers
I'm suggesting that correcting people's grammar, usage, etc. is unproductive in an online community in general and on HN in particular. Threads such as this being the rare exception where pointing out linguistic errors might be appropriate. However, this thread being "meta", I flagged it because meta discussions rarely contribute to HN. YMMV.
loumf
Let's say I read an article that is incredibly interesting and useful, but the author uses "methodology" when they could use "method" -- are you advocating that I don't post it?

If someone makes an interesting comment, but makes a word-usage choice you don't agree with, do you think the top voted response should be a correction of that commenter's word choices? I don't mean something egregious -- just a question of style/usage.

If so, I don't agree.

grownseed 

  are you advocating that I don't post it?
I do believe you should post it, that is not what I intended to convey, so my apologies for being unclear. I simply think the author should be encouraged to use the appropriate word if possible, since I believe it is in everybody's interest.

  If someone makes an interesting comment, but makes a word-usage choice you don't agree with, do you think the top voted response should be a correction of that commenter's word choices?
The way I see it, it's not a question of whether it is something I agree with or not, it's simply about trying to be precise whenever possible. And no, I don't believe the top voted response should be a correction, but that doesn't mean correcting someone isn't appropriate either.
brudgers
On HN, yes, it is generally inappropriate. People have better things to talk about.