The internet is well-supplied with useful, clear and sometimes witty explanations of what words mean. Some of these concentrate on distinguishing words with similar spelling or sound but different meaning. Most of these sites seem to be American. This could be because most wise English language wordsters are American or because most people making silly mistakes with English are American. Probably both, given the population.
Well, here's my contribution.
SPECTACULAR: Wearing spectacles or possessing spectacles - "She looks spectacular".
UNSPECTACULAR: Not needing or not having with one a pair of spectacles - "I am unable to read this document because I am unspectacular".
MALEFACTOR: The certain something that defines masculinity or distinguishes the male from the female; the male pudenda - "Those running shorts won't hide your malefactor".
DISEMBARK: Remove the outer covering from a tree - "The deer are disembarking the trees".
RATIONAL: Restricted to small portions - "Food is rational here".
RATIONALIST: Someone who believes in restricting things to small, defined portions - "If you were a rationalist you wouldn't eat so much".
RECTITUDE: Having a posterior - "The Bishop is a man of enormous rectitude".
ALLEGATION: A group of crocodile-like reptiles - "That allegation will not go away".
ALLEGORY: A suitably-prepared place to keep crocodile-like reptiles - "You don't find dragons in an allegory".
SPONTANEOUS COMBUSTION: Growing breasts naturally - "Anna was delighted she had spontaneously combusted".
FRIABLE: Suitable for cooking with oil - "Eggs are not friable unless you remove the shells".
MARINATE: Put something through a sailor - "Don't eat that - it's been marinated".
FASCINATE: Tie something up; become obsessed by uniforms, strong leadership and militaria - "Italians were fascinated by Mussolini".
Any additions?
Showing posts with label language. Show all posts
Showing posts with label language. Show all posts
Sunday, 14 October 2012
Tuesday, 25 September 2012
Tomato or Tomato?
In biology there's a process called "speciation", which is the moving apart of two groups of individuals of the same species, usually geographically separated, until they can be counted as separate species. Something similar happens with languages, although as history has tended to create larger units and faster communication across longer distances as time went on, with languages we also see the process in reverse. At some stage the northern and southern Celtic languages diverged and later the two languages themselves subdivided, encouraged by being separated by non-Celtic speakers, so Cornish, for example, is neither Breton nor Welsh. Distinct dialects spoken by small numbers of people in limited areas, though, have been disappearing quite fast since the 19th century. Languages can also be created by what in biology would be called crossing: cross old Low German with Norman French and you get English. Fortunately the people who speak these languages are fertile, unlike most products of cross-species intercourse.
What on earth is all this about?
It's about British English and American English. Of course there are other Englishes with their own developments - Australian and Indian English, for example - but I fancy looking at these two.
Some characteristics of American English are down to recent crossing or gene-swapping. In parts of the U.S., for example, it seems to be acceptable to say "If I would have done more revision I would have passed the exam" instead of "If I'd done..." (had done). That would be grammatically correct in some other nordic languages. "Fresh" meaning forward (of a girl) comes from German "frisch" (joyful, bubbly). The use of "hopefully" to mean "I hope this" instead of "full of hope" comes from German "hoffentlich". It is better to travel, hopefully, than to arrive.
In other cases American English preserves versions less changed by time. "Dove" instead of "dived" is archaic British English. Pronouncing Lieutenant (a French word meaning place-holder) as "Lootenant" is much closer to the French pronunciation than the British "Leftenant". In fact I really have no idea how we managed to arrive at that pronunciation.
Now for some interesting differences.
The only British English term for the season including October is "autumn". Americans recognise this word, but the common term is "fall". OK until you say something like "What a wonderful fall!" or "She phoned me in mid-fall".
The space for storage at the back of a car in British English is the boot (odd, though you could put your foot in it). Americans say "trunk", presumably because at one time trunks (not the elephant sort) were strapped to the back of the car for storage. So I can put my boot in the trunk or my trunk in the boot. Elephants - please don't try the latter. For that matter, don't submit to the former.
A living-space within a larger building is a flat to the British. The invitation to look at my lovely new flat would not appeal to Americans who, extravagantly, can have up to four flats.
In Britain a lift can take you somewhere in a car, but can also take you up or down inside a building. American lifts are not capable of taking you directly up or down.
"Republican" carries some drastically different meanings depending on whether you're in the U.S., Britain or Northern Ireland. So I may be a Republican in Britain but lose that characteristic by travelling west (but not east unless I go far enough to cross the Pacific).
The two Englishes are, though, coming together now faster than they diverge. "On the weekend" is now common in Britain where once we would only have said "At the weekend" - and we now use "hopefully" in two quite different meanings. Still, there is hope for diversity as Brits may acquire bits of Polish and Americans bits of Spanish.
We may yet be two different species.
Once we're different species, of course, it's hard for us to interbreed.
What on earth is all this about?
It's about British English and American English. Of course there are other Englishes with their own developments - Australian and Indian English, for example - but I fancy looking at these two.
Some characteristics of American English are down to recent crossing or gene-swapping. In parts of the U.S., for example, it seems to be acceptable to say "If I would have done more revision I would have passed the exam" instead of "If I'd done..." (had done). That would be grammatically correct in some other nordic languages. "Fresh" meaning forward (of a girl) comes from German "frisch" (joyful, bubbly). The use of "hopefully" to mean "I hope this" instead of "full of hope" comes from German "hoffentlich". It is better to travel, hopefully, than to arrive.
In other cases American English preserves versions less changed by time. "Dove" instead of "dived" is archaic British English. Pronouncing Lieutenant (a French word meaning place-holder) as "Lootenant" is much closer to the French pronunciation than the British "Leftenant". In fact I really have no idea how we managed to arrive at that pronunciation.
Now for some interesting differences.
The only British English term for the season including October is "autumn". Americans recognise this word, but the common term is "fall". OK until you say something like "What a wonderful fall!" or "She phoned me in mid-fall".
The space for storage at the back of a car in British English is the boot (odd, though you could put your foot in it). Americans say "trunk", presumably because at one time trunks (not the elephant sort) were strapped to the back of the car for storage. So I can put my boot in the trunk or my trunk in the boot. Elephants - please don't try the latter. For that matter, don't submit to the former.
A living-space within a larger building is a flat to the British. The invitation to look at my lovely new flat would not appeal to Americans who, extravagantly, can have up to four flats.
In Britain a lift can take you somewhere in a car, but can also take you up or down inside a building. American lifts are not capable of taking you directly up or down.
"Republican" carries some drastically different meanings depending on whether you're in the U.S., Britain or Northern Ireland. So I may be a Republican in Britain but lose that characteristic by travelling west (but not east unless I go far enough to cross the Pacific).
The two Englishes are, though, coming together now faster than they diverge. "On the weekend" is now common in Britain where once we would only have said "At the weekend" - and we now use "hopefully" in two quite different meanings. Still, there is hope for diversity as Brits may acquire bits of Polish and Americans bits of Spanish.
We may yet be two different species.
Once we're different species, of course, it's hard for us to interbreed.
Wednesday, 1 August 2012
Irregular Plurals
You know the sort of thing - one mouse, two mice; one man, two men; one house, two hice. Someone, American I think, maintained the plural of hippopotamus should be hippopotamice.
I have discoverd some others:
One swan, two swine;
One Beagle, two Biggles;
One lass, two lice;
One loaf, two life;
One salmon, two salmen;
One spat, two spit;
One shot, two ****.
I will gratefully receive other examples.
I have discoverd some others:
One swan, two swine;
One Beagle, two Biggles;
One lass, two lice;
One loaf, two life;
One salmon, two salmen;
One spat, two spit;
One shot, two ****.
I will gratefully receive other examples.
Tuesday, 10 July 2012
Words are little things
Some time ago I mentioned a local mystery. The Kingsway Evangelical Church had suddenly become the Kingsway (large gap) Church on its big name board and its notice board. What was happening, I wondered. Had other Evangelical churches thrown it out for dubious theology or had it revolted?
It's only fair to provide a sequel. It's now the Kingsway Community Church. A nine letter word has replaced the eleven letter one. What change of focus or image does this represent? They don't seem to have a website, or it can't be found easily by keying in the obvious words, but I may run into people who know.
Remember, if you're old and British enough, that scene in The Pink Panther where Peter Sellars as Inspector Clouseau announces with great self-imnportance to a young woman, "I am an officer of the law"? Or rather, he announced in an imitation French accent, "I am an offisaire of the leu!" This last word was pronounced rather as a real Frenchman might pronounce "le". It was famous partly because it came out that the scene had had to be reshot many times because the young woman had to repeat his words wonmderingly with the same pronunciation but kept dissolving in giggles at "leu". Well, Sellars' French accent was not without its critics, but this morning my car radio was featuring French business people criticising new taxes and one, speaking in accented English, said the problem was not so much the level of taxes as the uncertainty created by repeated changes to... the "leu".
Lastly, I take my mother to her GP surgery from time to time and the waiting room features a TV which seems to be running 24-hour news, with the sound on but with the words appearing on the screen for the hard of hearing. However, the transcription is by machine and is not infallible. Last time the item was about the head of British internal security warning about the danger from cyber attacks. Yes, I thought...yes, please...wait...will it...and then it did. Up on the screen came the clear words "Danger of hostile cider attack. Nothing escapes these guardians of our safety.
It's only fair to provide a sequel. It's now the Kingsway Community Church. A nine letter word has replaced the eleven letter one. What change of focus or image does this represent? They don't seem to have a website, or it can't be found easily by keying in the obvious words, but I may run into people who know.
Remember, if you're old and British enough, that scene in The Pink Panther where Peter Sellars as Inspector Clouseau announces with great self-imnportance to a young woman, "I am an officer of the law"? Or rather, he announced in an imitation French accent, "I am an offisaire of the leu!" This last word was pronounced rather as a real Frenchman might pronounce "le". It was famous partly because it came out that the scene had had to be reshot many times because the young woman had to repeat his words wonmderingly with the same pronunciation but kept dissolving in giggles at "leu". Well, Sellars' French accent was not without its critics, but this morning my car radio was featuring French business people criticising new taxes and one, speaking in accented English, said the problem was not so much the level of taxes as the uncertainty created by repeated changes to... the "leu".
Lastly, I take my mother to her GP surgery from time to time and the waiting room features a TV which seems to be running 24-hour news, with the sound on but with the words appearing on the screen for the hard of hearing. However, the transcription is by machine and is not infallible. Last time the item was about the head of British internal security warning about the danger from cyber attacks. Yes, I thought...yes, please...wait...will it...and then it did. Up on the screen came the clear words "Danger of hostile cider attack. Nothing escapes these guardians of our safety.
Friday, 27 April 2012
Politically Correct
Once upon a time, "PC" in Britain meant "Police Constable". It still does. However, now it may also mean "Personal Computer" or "politically correct", so you could have a PC PC with a PC.
Interesting though police constables and personal computers are, I want to focus on those two devious words "politically correct".
I believe the term originated in the U.S.A. as a reaction against tight social or organisational control on what people could say. While essentially the same issues of racism, sexism, disablism and so on exist in the U.S. and the U.K., together with the same approaches to opposing them, it seems clear that the U.S. culture has been more prescriptive and restrictive than the U.K.'s: things that very few people would object to someone saying in the U.K. would meet with shock and condemnation in the U.S., and I'm not talking about grossly racist or sexist language.
In its origin, then, the term may have been a healthy revolt against too much unthinking prescription. The culture of "political correctness", correctly understood, is not a matter of challenging possibly hurtful or contemptuous words, but of ruling them socially inadmissable, thus preventing debate and open learning.
The term crossed the Atlantic at a time when we in the U.K. had come nearer to an orthodoxy of language on sensitive issues than before or after. It was used vigorously in the media to hold up to ridicule people who said terms like "manhole cover" or "history" were sexist or that a local council should not talk about "Christmas". However, most of the examples which hit the tabloid press were invented, the ban on talking about manhole covers being a classic example. There was indeed, I know, an attempt to rename women's history as herstory (a misunderstanding, as "history" is from Latin "historia", a story, and nothing to do with male gender) - but the draft council document concerned was promptly changed, with down-to-earth criticism, by the committed feminist councillor it went to for approval. History survived. The orthodoxy of language declined, except in the field of disability issues.
Now on both sides of the Atlantic it's used almost entirely to sneer. Object to offensive language and it's very likely someone will say, "Oh, right - political correctness!" To question why there are no Black people working in reception, or no women in senior management, is "politically correct" - and as soon as the dread two words have been uttered, people think the argument can be dismissed. So what started as a challenge to unthinking orthodoxy has become unthinking orthodoxy itself. Such is life.
This is not to say that there aren't still reasonable points that end to get frowned at (the unreasonable ones should be easy to rebut in argument). For example, there is undoubtedly racial and religious discrimination in the U.K., but does either explain why the socio-economic profile of ethnic Bangladeshi Muslims has been improving while that of Pakistani Muslims has flatlined - or in particular why Bangladeshi women are improving their work status faster than their Pakistani counterparts? Might there not be a factor to do with those communities? I can think of places where saying this would make one to be looked at with great suspicion - but far more places where challenging the term "Paki" would be unpopular.
Now the term "political correctness" is being used to disparage any kind of political values or commitment. I recently went on a trip to a brew-pub which was strongly committed to environmentally responsible practices. On the way back someone commented that the brewer's methods were "not just politically correct, they make money." From the way "politically correct" was pronounced, I gathered that it was odd or ridiculous to want to reduce your negative impact on the environment, but fine to be motivated by profit.
So it may be politically incorrect to say so, but I wish we'd stop taking about political correctness.
Sunday, 5 February 2012
"Losers and no-hopers"
I recently got involved in an argument on a LinkedIn writers' group. Nothing unusual about that - social media do not encourage nuance or sympathy - but I thought the subject worth exploring a bit.
A man who I assume to be American (because, in the whole wide world, only some Americans, as far as I can see, use these terms freely to indicate contempt) started by saying he could not stand "losers and no-hopers" and could not understand why so many writers wrote about them. Before proceeding with a fairly nuanced discussion of this, I said he must dislike a lot of people, then. This produced an extraordinary, garbled, angry, almost tearful response in which he said my comments were meaningless and I seemed to be attacking him and his long-held views. Well, yes, I responded, I was. I hated the loose dismissal of people as losers or no-hopers. I found it arrogant, complacent and anti-Christian.
I am a Christian, but I probably made that point because this language of losers is so prevalent in America (when other use it, in Britain for example, it has a mannered, imported sound, as if the speaker is using the terms "High Noon" and "ballpark") and the vast majority of Americans are apparently Christians. Admittedly some logical people combine a winner-takes-all, loser-is-despicable philosophy with rejecting all religion, but somehow many combine vocal support for the man who said "Blessed are the peacemakers" and "It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter heaven" with aggressive and self-righteous materialism. Let me stress hard that this isn't an attack on America (the U.S.A.) or my many internet friends there!
What do the terms "no-hoper" and "loser" imply? The former is easier: it's someone with no reason for hope. So presumably a slave, a "lifer" in prison or a dying person is a no-hoper; but of course the phrase is used to imply that those who fail deserve to. From my point of view, of course, no-one can ever be a no-hoper. "Loser" seems to be used mainly with the same superficial thinking: someone is at the bottom of the heap, so (s)he deserves to be there. Just a little consideration of the disadvantages people may face in growing up completely contradicts this way of thought. It is not to deny freedom of choice to point out that if both parents are drug-addicts and petty criminals in a location famous for deprivation, you need extraordinary light or luck not to end up much the same, whereas a start in a prosperous area with loving and prosperous parents makes your path quite a lot easier - and that's just within one country.
There is a sense of the term "loser" that I have a degree of sympathy with. A fairly small number of people have entrenched psychological habits that lead to repeated failure. These can range from a lack of self-belief (based probably on early negative experiences) that leads people to be competent at lower levels, to be good subordinates, say, but given initiative, to give up too easily or to funk the big, risky decisions - or indeed, a gambler's addiction to risk that may bring a few big successes but is bound to lead to utter failure before long - to repeated reaction to any difficulty that it's impossible and unfair, leading to complaining while rejecting practical ways out of the problem. These behaviour patterns, particularly the last one, can be very frustrating for friends and colleagues - but like any addiction, they're horribly hard to break out of, and breaking out needs love and patient support along with inconvenient challenging.
And inconvenient challenging was what I was doing in questioning that talk about losers and no-hopers.
A man who I assume to be American (because, in the whole wide world, only some Americans, as far as I can see, use these terms freely to indicate contempt) started by saying he could not stand "losers and no-hopers" and could not understand why so many writers wrote about them. Before proceeding with a fairly nuanced discussion of this, I said he must dislike a lot of people, then. This produced an extraordinary, garbled, angry, almost tearful response in which he said my comments were meaningless and I seemed to be attacking him and his long-held views. Well, yes, I responded, I was. I hated the loose dismissal of people as losers or no-hopers. I found it arrogant, complacent and anti-Christian.
I am a Christian, but I probably made that point because this language of losers is so prevalent in America (when other use it, in Britain for example, it has a mannered, imported sound, as if the speaker is using the terms "High Noon" and "ballpark") and the vast majority of Americans are apparently Christians. Admittedly some logical people combine a winner-takes-all, loser-is-despicable philosophy with rejecting all religion, but somehow many combine vocal support for the man who said "Blessed are the peacemakers" and "It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter heaven" with aggressive and self-righteous materialism. Let me stress hard that this isn't an attack on America (the U.S.A.) or my many internet friends there!
What do the terms "no-hoper" and "loser" imply? The former is easier: it's someone with no reason for hope. So presumably a slave, a "lifer" in prison or a dying person is a no-hoper; but of course the phrase is used to imply that those who fail deserve to. From my point of view, of course, no-one can ever be a no-hoper. "Loser" seems to be used mainly with the same superficial thinking: someone is at the bottom of the heap, so (s)he deserves to be there. Just a little consideration of the disadvantages people may face in growing up completely contradicts this way of thought. It is not to deny freedom of choice to point out that if both parents are drug-addicts and petty criminals in a location famous for deprivation, you need extraordinary light or luck not to end up much the same, whereas a start in a prosperous area with loving and prosperous parents makes your path quite a lot easier - and that's just within one country.
There is a sense of the term "loser" that I have a degree of sympathy with. A fairly small number of people have entrenched psychological habits that lead to repeated failure. These can range from a lack of self-belief (based probably on early negative experiences) that leads people to be competent at lower levels, to be good subordinates, say, but given initiative, to give up too easily or to funk the big, risky decisions - or indeed, a gambler's addiction to risk that may bring a few big successes but is bound to lead to utter failure before long - to repeated reaction to any difficulty that it's impossible and unfair, leading to complaining while rejecting practical ways out of the problem. These behaviour patterns, particularly the last one, can be very frustrating for friends and colleagues - but like any addiction, they're horribly hard to break out of, and breaking out needs love and patient support along with inconvenient challenging.
And inconvenient challenging was what I was doing in questioning that talk about losers and no-hopers.
Tuesday, 24 January 2012
Signs
No, not signs of the end of the world, though that is an idea. A business opportunity has so far been ignored there. Let's see...WARNING: WORLD ENDING. To the point if a bit uninspired. BEWARE OF DISINTEGRATING PLANETS. Practical and helpful but a bit long. THREE LANES REDUCING TO NONE (OK if there are three lanes. THINK HELP!! Short, punchy, but what use is thinking it? A14 CLOSED BECAUSE OF APOCALYPSE. What about the A120? And is Apocalypse that hard rock band from Banbury?
No, that wasn't what I meant. Yesterday I walked a footpath over a golf course which was marked both ends with notices saying "BEWARE OF FLYING GOLF BALLS". Quite. They're difficult to control and it's very easy to fall off. Stick to planes.
OK, that was perverse. But what about the road sign I saw a few days back: red triangle and black exclamation mark (so, warning sign in the UK). It said, "THINK!" That was it. No indication of what I was supposed to think about. Global warming? The meaning of life? Risky investments? What jacket to wear tomorrow? The road gave no clue: there was a bit of a bend, but nothing unusual.
THINK! Well, I am thinking. I just haven't reached a conclusion.
By the way: UK visits to this site are running at just under twice US visits, which dropped a bit. For a long time, France and Germany were neck and neck, slugging it out (loyal to history, then) with Russia and Ukraine vying with them from time to time; but now France has shot way ahead and is closing on the USA, which is obviously faltering through cheese deprivation. Welcome to newcomers from South (Africa and Korea). I'd love to hear from any of you, here or on simon@ss93.wanadoo.co.uk.
Next post will continue the adventure of Agile Working in Odanglesex.
No, that wasn't what I meant. Yesterday I walked a footpath over a golf course which was marked both ends with notices saying "BEWARE OF FLYING GOLF BALLS". Quite. They're difficult to control and it's very easy to fall off. Stick to planes.
OK, that was perverse. But what about the road sign I saw a few days back: red triangle and black exclamation mark (so, warning sign in the UK). It said, "THINK!" That was it. No indication of what I was supposed to think about. Global warming? The meaning of life? Risky investments? What jacket to wear tomorrow? The road gave no clue: there was a bit of a bend, but nothing unusual.
THINK! Well, I am thinking. I just haven't reached a conclusion.
By the way: UK visits to this site are running at just under twice US visits, which dropped a bit. For a long time, France and Germany were neck and neck, slugging it out (loyal to history, then) with Russia and Ukraine vying with them from time to time; but now France has shot way ahead and is closing on the USA, which is obviously faltering through cheese deprivation. Welcome to newcomers from South (Africa and Korea). I'd love to hear from any of you, here or on simon@ss93.wanadoo.co.uk.
Next post will continue the adventure of Agile Working in Odanglesex.
Thursday, 29 December 2011
Standing on Ceremony
People are often impatient of ceremony. I was when I was young, although I could see the beauty in some ceremonies and a half-hidden meaning in some. Ceremony seemed to get in the way of thought and so often to reinforce the status quo in ways you couldn't question rationally, only ridicule - and that was a great time for satire in the UK.
I still feel moved to remind myself (and others) that something isn't true or valuable because it's wrapped in ancient or impressive ceremony. Ceremony does not make a royal wedding either important beyond the couple, or loving between them. The Nazis deliberately built up a great edifice of impressive ceremony, some of it visually very clever, artistic and effective. Something can be great ceremony, something can be impressive art, and still be evil.
There are two dangers in ceremony. One is that wrong can be wrapped in gold and music and marching till it is accepted by people who might have rejected it. The other is that it is treated as magic. In rejecting so much ceremony, Puritans and Quakers (who differed on so many other things) shared a perception that these things could get in the way of truth.
When a priest raises a chalice with wine, when set words are spoken over a grave, when traditional things are done reverently before a marriage or a battle, do we think the words or the ceremonial acts themselves change anything? Traditionally many people have thought just that. If the right words were not spoken, if the right sacrifice was not made, the enterprise would not prosper and perhaps even the winter would not end. The fate of the dead person's soul would be different. I think one of the several reasons why people reject religion is that they associate it with this claim of effective magic. I reject this magic entirely. But I do not reject the ceremony.
Clearly people educated to believe in certain ceremonies will be affected one way by a ceremony done properly in the traditional manner, and another way by it going wrong. In the second case, for example, the soldier may be more inclined to perceive defeat coming and to run, making defeat more likely and reinforcing belief in the magic of the ceremony. I believe the impact of ceremony can go beyond that.
Ceremony is poetry - sometimes ossified, sometimes in a strange language people struggle now to understand, but still poetry. Ceremony can represent something powerfully beyond words and engage emotions which might otherwise fester and bubble under the surface. Have you watched while a priest threw a handful of soil on a coffin? Stood a moment in silent respect? Wondered why things as everyday as bread and wine could take on huge significance for Christians? Clasped hands at one moment and not another? Sacrificed a small coin into the sea or a river? Sung a song supporters of the same football club sang generations back? All these are ways of saying something, of symbolising something. The soil on the coffin symbolises our dependence on the soil, our bodies' identity with it, that we come from it and go into it. The football song symbolises unity in a common cause, common across time as well as numbers.
Sometimes ceremony becomes too ornate, too dominated by gold and jewels and long processions, just as some poets lose their way in their own clever and creative talent. At the root, though, there should be meaning - meaning we could not so effectively encompass in logic, but that does not make it illogical.
I still feel moved to remind myself (and others) that something isn't true or valuable because it's wrapped in ancient or impressive ceremony. Ceremony does not make a royal wedding either important beyond the couple, or loving between them. The Nazis deliberately built up a great edifice of impressive ceremony, some of it visually very clever, artistic and effective. Something can be great ceremony, something can be impressive art, and still be evil.
There are two dangers in ceremony. One is that wrong can be wrapped in gold and music and marching till it is accepted by people who might have rejected it. The other is that it is treated as magic. In rejecting so much ceremony, Puritans and Quakers (who differed on so many other things) shared a perception that these things could get in the way of truth.
When a priest raises a chalice with wine, when set words are spoken over a grave, when traditional things are done reverently before a marriage or a battle, do we think the words or the ceremonial acts themselves change anything? Traditionally many people have thought just that. If the right words were not spoken, if the right sacrifice was not made, the enterprise would not prosper and perhaps even the winter would not end. The fate of the dead person's soul would be different. I think one of the several reasons why people reject religion is that they associate it with this claim of effective magic. I reject this magic entirely. But I do not reject the ceremony.
Clearly people educated to believe in certain ceremonies will be affected one way by a ceremony done properly in the traditional manner, and another way by it going wrong. In the second case, for example, the soldier may be more inclined to perceive defeat coming and to run, making defeat more likely and reinforcing belief in the magic of the ceremony. I believe the impact of ceremony can go beyond that.
Ceremony is poetry - sometimes ossified, sometimes in a strange language people struggle now to understand, but still poetry. Ceremony can represent something powerfully beyond words and engage emotions which might otherwise fester and bubble under the surface. Have you watched while a priest threw a handful of soil on a coffin? Stood a moment in silent respect? Wondered why things as everyday as bread and wine could take on huge significance for Christians? Clasped hands at one moment and not another? Sacrificed a small coin into the sea or a river? Sung a song supporters of the same football club sang generations back? All these are ways of saying something, of symbolising something. The soil on the coffin symbolises our dependence on the soil, our bodies' identity with it, that we come from it and go into it. The football song symbolises unity in a common cause, common across time as well as numbers.
Sometimes ceremony becomes too ornate, too dominated by gold and jewels and long processions, just as some poets lose their way in their own clever and creative talent. At the root, though, there should be meaning - meaning we could not so effectively encompass in logic, but that does not make it illogical.
Sunday, 20 November 2011
Refuted!
Now here is a thoroughly conservative post. I want to fight in the last ditch to rescue the word "refute".
All right - words change meanings. "Nice" once meant "precise", as in the fossilised phrase "a nice distinction". "Horrid" once meant "hairy, prickly". A "revolution" was once a cyclical movement, in politics as it still is in mechanics.
I still want to stop the word "refute" losing its old meaning.
The established meaning is to prove something false. It's being weakened radically to mean "strongly deny", almost certainly because it sounds too much like "rebut", which does mean deny. Well, if "refute" loses its original meaning, we still have "disprove", though that sounds weaker even if the meaning is the same. But the problem is that "refute" continues in its old, strong meaning in a number of contexts. To refute a proposition in science or mathematics is to prove conclusively and for all time that it can't be correct. The proposition that the sun revolves around the earth has been refuted. The contrary proposition was rebutted, not refuted, by the Catholic Church. In chess, to refute a move is to devise a response so devastating that the best chess players, having studied all the possible lines that could follow, conclude that no-one should ever make that move again. Moreover, a "refutation" still seems to mean a proof of falsehood, not just a rebuttal.
"The minister refuted suggestions that his remarks were meant to undermine the Prime Minister". No he didn't - he rebutted them. How could he refute such suggestions anyway? It's not provable or disprovable.
On another note (semi-deliberate pun), I've just listened once more to Nielsen's Fourth Symphony. It draws out my soul on a string. It is brilliant and moving. Too many people aren't aware of Nielsen's music. Another fight I'm a foot-soldier in...
All right - words change meanings. "Nice" once meant "precise", as in the fossilised phrase "a nice distinction". "Horrid" once meant "hairy, prickly". A "revolution" was once a cyclical movement, in politics as it still is in mechanics.
I still want to stop the word "refute" losing its old meaning.
The established meaning is to prove something false. It's being weakened radically to mean "strongly deny", almost certainly because it sounds too much like "rebut", which does mean deny. Well, if "refute" loses its original meaning, we still have "disprove", though that sounds weaker even if the meaning is the same. But the problem is that "refute" continues in its old, strong meaning in a number of contexts. To refute a proposition in science or mathematics is to prove conclusively and for all time that it can't be correct. The proposition that the sun revolves around the earth has been refuted. The contrary proposition was rebutted, not refuted, by the Catholic Church. In chess, to refute a move is to devise a response so devastating that the best chess players, having studied all the possible lines that could follow, conclude that no-one should ever make that move again. Moreover, a "refutation" still seems to mean a proof of falsehood, not just a rebuttal.
"The minister refuted suggestions that his remarks were meant to undermine the Prime Minister". No he didn't - he rebutted them. How could he refute such suggestions anyway? It's not provable or disprovable.
On another note (semi-deliberate pun), I've just listened once more to Nielsen's Fourth Symphony. It draws out my soul on a string. It is brilliant and moving. Too many people aren't aware of Nielsen's music. Another fight I'm a foot-soldier in...
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