"mortgage" is a very strange word alright. In Dutch (and many .... oh snap LOL, yes, the French, too) use the word "hypotheke" (and variants thereof). It would be interesting to see if money lending for buying property at some point took a very sinister turn in the English speaking world :-)
"attempting to change public opinion is antithetical to a respect for reality or history" can't quite wrap my head around this crazy ass statement. you realize, public opinion is often antithetical to reality its self. maybe i'm not clearly understanding this, but im confident its bullshit. further, at one point in the video you exchange the word change with coerce. Makes me think you are merging separate positions, completely separate attitudes. you can't fight the battle coz you might not win?
@ultimategoobah You realize he's talking about language and words right? Language is defined by public opinion. Words don't have magical intrinsic meaning. The only meaning they have is that which we as people assign them. People like BD and Variablast don't hold some magical authority over language. No matter how many times they try to re-define words to suit their purposes, without the support of the general public they'll get no where.
@ultimategoobah I suspect you weren't listening. My problem is that (and remember this is PURE SPECULATION) if she is saying that the definition "is" something before it has changed in common usage, this is dishonest - because the definition *reflects* common usage. If she is attempting to persuade people to change the way they use the word, then argue that. Lastly, AGAIN THIS IS ONLY IF THAT IS WHAT SHE IS DOING. I'm mentioning it as a possibility here.
Well, words are like anything that are over used. Like love. People say things like: I love coffee. But, you can't fucking love coffee. Love has a real meaning that imbues certain qualities deeper than your like, or enjoyment of an object. Like atheism. The original philosophy was one of debunking gods existence using scriptures, and proving that scriptures were in reality, mans own inspired works. Now, it is just whatever the fuck you want it to be, it's FUN like everything else.
Thanks for a great video. Just what I discussed with her but I said that words have baggage that they get from the culture, the times the context and so one they are used in. so to say that just one definition of a word is the only one is just not true coz a languages that still is in use will change through time. Just some thoughts from me. Regards and have a skilful new year. Pinge
Seems to be a basic thing with her - what she thinks something ought to mean is what it does... All proof is wiped aside and/or ignored up to the point where she calls you names and blocks you. Ah well...
@AmadeusMaxwell Why are you asking me to "as an encore" perform an action that's in the exact opposite spirit from what the point of the video is about? *throws an unabriged OED at you*
I had a discussion with a Christian. He told me I was an agnostic rather than an atheist. I replied that I didn't care what he called me as he hadn't changed my position. This is the problem for Kate's argument as well and one she acknowledges. She doesn't mind that describing an agnostic as an "agnosic atheist" doesn't change anything. Moving the goal posts doesn't trouble her. Word play can be a useful rhetorical device but as you pointed out, it cuts both ways.
In "discussions" with her I always imagine that I could be talking with a dogmatic religious zealot, except we're not talking about god, but words.
She has the same belief in the immutability of words as the fundamentalists do about species. And when I suggest that words are subjected to evolution. I half expected her to retort with " It's just a theory".
@parallelsdumaurier "Bionicdance is a fundamentalist agnostic atheist." - from where I stand she's just a cunt. Sorry, had to say it at least once. Now I feel better. :D
Remember the term "Bright"? A bright was "a person who has a naturalistic worldview. A bright's worldview is free of supernatural and mystical elements. The ethics and actions of a bright are based on a naturalistic worldview."
That went over like a lead balloon in spite of having the support of Dawkins and Dennett.
Still, on youtube, I don't see much wrong with adopting BionicDance's definitions. It might actually enforce some clarity in the debates.
@zarkoff45 I disagree. If we adopt BD's definition of agnostic, then it would become useless in its ubiquity, Right now, by common or broad definition or common usage it has a use: namely describing a middle ground on the belief continuum. I for one will continue to use it in this manor for two reasons: 1. it is more descriptive as stated above. 2. It involves less pushing of air around the piehole area for no particular purpose.
@zarkoff45 "Though you don't seem to mind wasting precious calories on finger movement." --Did I type something superfluous?
"I don't need either the term atheist or agnostic, I've got a better term to describe myself -- I am an "ontological naturalist."" --I see you're an Atheist.
Thanks for making this. Here's a challenge, which I wouldn't blame you for not taking: Have this conversation with a fundamentalist Christian or far right wing conservative. Foolishly, I have tried.
@alowlyapprentice It was tongue-in-cheek, and underscoring the point that not all conversations in which a person is mentioned is that person necessarily invited to participate. :D
I cant recognise any religious label as definable. They are simple labels formed to group people for religions for ease of hating. That is their only meaning and purpose.
It is based on acceptance of delusion rendering the words ludicrous. A new word for non belief of any given thing people can imagine, would provide and endless parade of meaningless words. Agnosticism means the same as abracadabra.
(cont) I.e. here too we need a clear definition that actually describes what people hold and what the attitude is. Problem is internal. Some want a term for fence-sitting (defend the non-Huxleyian use of agnosticism), and some want atheism to mean a particular kind of non-belief in theistic concepts. But see, unless we constantly want to preface our discussion that these definitions then actually strawman our actual positions, it'd be good to be clear with the words we use more broadly.
(cont) On atheism, the problem is that there is a vast variety of ways someone can not be a theist. That is/was the whole babies-are-atheists meme. I am in no particular way active in disbelief. There is no ontological rejection of the god concept at all. The ontological question has instead been rejected as not worth asking. That's the "lack of belief" point, yet theists want us to not state this because it breaks some of their "you too" argumentation. (cont)
(cont) Take agnosticism. BD's definition is not identical to Huxley's but it's close. Problem with agnosticism is that it has split into two meanings. One is "I'm not sure, I'm on the fence" etc, which is uncertainty on the ontological position. The other, Huxleyian one is "I don't know, cannot know, hence cannot take an affirmative position" i.e. an epistemic one. It's easy to see that not being clear on the term causes confusion, incidentally theists tend to love the weak one. (cont)
Frankly I have plenty of sympathy with BD's position. Sure the argument from etymology isn't great, but it is one that one can use to argue for clarity, simplicity etc. But I don't relate to BD's position for this reason. I relate to it for the important underlying reason. See BD's definition is actually one that is clean, good and most importantly describes my actual positions much better than the definitions theists specifically, but also some non-theists like. (cont)
@EsraYmssik1 To quote Lincoln, "How many legs does a dog have if you call the tail a leg? Four. Calling a tail a leg doesn't make it a leg."
If you state that you can make a definitive statement as to the existence of a god, then you are not an agnostic. That does not make you a gnostic, that's something different.
If you state that it is impossible to make such truth statements, then you are agnostic. That is not an argument from etymology, that is from the technical definition of the word.
Sounds as if bionicdance is taking a rather simplistic view of language and how it functions and how meaning works etc. She is ignoring or more likely is ignorant of research on semantics, semiology and other areas of research on language and meaning. Confucius was at his most conservative in his campaign to rectify names. Hanfei was merciless in lampooning of Confucian thought on this point - by running the thought experiment of having people now do the things the ancients did and he laughed.
Excellent talk. You see this problem with language in corporate cultures even within the same industries that tend to share similar vernaculars and lexicons. To over come these types of semantic inconsistencies in complex problem solving, it is often necessary to build an understanding of the current situation with language that bridges the gap between the client culture and a more normative industry vernacular and lexicon. This is often quite difficult, especially as the number of stake (cont)
@0gods (ii) holders increase. Often a more effective approach is develop a synthetic intermediate language and gain buy-in to this vernacular. I see this part of formal problem solving as building the scaffolding of the problem definition. What the ever the answer is--what ever action must be taken--is then expressed in the new intermediate language. Communications and cultural change processes are used to implement the solution. It is a pretty painful process and tends to result in euphemisms.
Yeah, "mortgage" is weird word, especially for non Englsh speakers, when I first received spam about mortgage, I thought someone is trying to sell me a plot in cemetary. 8D
French is not the only controlled language, here in Latvia we too have special institution for that.
Trouble is, sometimes (usually) comission terribly lags behind with their proposed new words and introduces tham long after some word (usually coming from English) have been used for years, it's especially true for dynamic, fast evolving spheres like IT and finances.
you can't claim etymological verity whilst entirely ignoring the philological context of a word. a homosexual does not love people who are 'the same' as him/her they are attracted to the same sex, a lesbian is not an inhabitant of the island of lesbos. And seriously who means happy when they say gay these days.
Incidentally; I don't believe in god, how anyone else chooses to define me is entirely up to them. Heretic and apostate are my favourites:)
Interesting stuff. Personally I think you overstate the fluidity of language, which moors itself to the fairly stable anchors of literature, textbooks and dictionaries and is rooted in hitorical context.
I side with the thrust of what you are saying, though.
@gabiotta I don't know if I agree. There is written language and then there is spoken language. Written language seems to take more time to change but spoken is insanely fluid. Go back 50 years and try and have a casual conversation with someone. I bet it would be interesting. :P
@sofiarune I don't know man. I could totally slide back 50 years on a time/space peace rainbow man and fucking groove on the cosmic vibrations of brothers and sisters in the counterculture revolution fighting against the man, man!
I could get on a soapbox in 1960's haight & ashbury as a time travel from outer and inner space and tell em how in the future pigs and politicians still pull the strings while the blues is all the working man sings... man!
How odd that experience would be is largely down what context of the discussion.
If asking some hep cats where the best place to score some doobie might be, then you would probably encounter the odd wrong turn on your quest for the shizzle. Having a basic theological discussion, not so much.
I wasn't saying language is static, just that it is rather elastic and often snaps back into established shapes because of the anchoring effect of dictionaries etc.
@gabiotta As I said, casual conversation on the street. I already admitted formal written EnglishI changes more slowly. Conversational English tends to change so quickly that you end up with endemic regional sets of words and meanings. If we look even further back than this past half century we find even formal written English taking huge swings. Have you read the Cantebury Tales? If English snapped back then reading that shouldn't be so hard. 500 chars sucks.
@gabiotta Doesn't matter. This conversation applies to all language. In fact, I think that's what Badger was getting at. Casual theological discussion is still a casual discussion. It doesn't get placed on some pedestal because it happens to be convenient (at the time).
You seem to think that I am in stark opposition to what you and, to some extent, Badger, are saying.
I was just pointing out that I thought he was going a little further that I think is actually the case. That is why you had to go back to Chaucer to make your point and not back to, say, Kerouac.
There has been a huge shift over time in spoken English since Chaucer. The modes of speech that were popularised by the Beats have largely snapped back or become anachronistic.
That ruled. Now either she'll pretend you don't exist like she did with me or she'll stamp her feet and repeat herself some more (because we all know that repeating something enough times makes it true).
Seriously though, glad someone finally addressed this. The dictionary is descriptive, not prescriptive damn it.
@sofiarune I argued with her several times about the whole "Atheist = Not a theist" thing. She wouldn't even concede on what etymology was, much less the fact atheist predates theist, which alone destroyed her entire argument.
I've mentioned this before elsewhere, but I find it funny that many of the same atheists who bemoan creationists acting as if they're experts in a given scientific field have no trouble doing the same thing when it comes to linguistics. Cognitive dissonance I suppose.
BionicDance's as cute as a button. 'And more likeable than 99'% of youtube. But she's also cartoonishly simplistic, and if she doesn't "get it" when you disagree, she's way, way too quick to label you a troll unless you surrender, such that she's more likely to block you than hear you.
I disagree with somebody on YT virtually ever time I poke in. But I get more annoyed with BD than is prolly warranted cuz she'll just just so stubbornly unresponsive to reason/evidence.
There is the case of Frank Luntz, who is able to alter public opinion by taking careful study of the words and terms used and then organise all of the rightwing media to use certain terms and phrases which have emotional connotations.
However, to pull such a trick off, you need to be able to influence a massive portion of the mainstream media, otherwise you might as well be Variablast for all the influence you will have.
@dangerouslytalented Also, as with Luntz, to say that you're espousing the "correct" definition when what you're actually doing is attempting to shape public opinion is Orwellian bullshit that is antithetical to a respect for reality and history (hence the "declaring victory before you've achieved victory" comment, if that's what she's doing).
@dangerouslytalented Ah. You mean like how the conservatives in America change the meaning of words by redefining them or reassign new meaning to an act to change public opinion? >.<
If I hadn't already just subbed prior to this...
MrKrov 1 day ago
"mortgage" is a very strange word alright. In Dutch (and many .... oh snap LOL, yes, the French, too) use the word "hypotheke" (and variants thereof). It would be interesting to see if money lending for buying property at some point took a very sinister turn in the English speaking world :-)
rozeboosje 1 month ago
Strange. You actually needed to *explain* this!? :-)
rozeboosje 1 month ago
"attempting to change public opinion is antithetical to a respect for reality or history" can't quite wrap my head around this crazy ass statement. you realize, public opinion is often antithetical to reality its self. maybe i'm not clearly understanding this, but im confident its bullshit. further, at one point in the video you exchange the word change with coerce. Makes me think you are merging separate positions, completely separate attitudes. you can't fight the battle coz you might not win?
ultimategoobah 1 month ago
@ultimategoobah You realize he's talking about language and words right? Language is defined by public opinion. Words don't have magical intrinsic meaning. The only meaning they have is that which we as people assign them. People like BD and Variablast don't hold some magical authority over language. No matter how many times they try to re-define words to suit their purposes, without the support of the general public they'll get no where.
sofiarune 1 month ago
@ultimategoobah I suspect you weren't listening. My problem is that (and remember this is PURE SPECULATION) if she is saying that the definition "is" something before it has changed in common usage, this is dishonest - because the definition *reflects* common usage. If she is attempting to persuade people to change the way they use the word, then argue that. Lastly, AGAIN THIS IS ONLY IF THAT IS WHAT SHE IS DOING. I'm mentioning it as a possibility here.
theinnerbadger 1 month ago
@ultimategoobah Also, stop misquoting me. That too is dishonest bullshit.
theinnerbadger 1 month ago
I like the new expression of dismissal: "go speak French."
That's fun stuff right there.
GoatOfTheMountains 1 month ago
BD's misstep into linguistics betrays a certain character flaw I hope she can address.
MsMrNoface 1 month ago
Well, words are like anything that are over used. Like love. People say things like: I love coffee. But, you can't fucking love coffee. Love has a real meaning that imbues certain qualities deeper than your like, or enjoyment of an object. Like atheism. The original philosophy was one of debunking gods existence using scriptures, and proving that scriptures were in reality, mans own inspired works. Now, it is just whatever the fuck you want it to be, it's FUN like everything else.
SatanRobot 1 month ago
Thanks for a great video. Just what I discussed with her but I said that words have baggage that they get from the culture, the times the context and so one they are used in. so to say that just one definition of a word is the only one is just not true coz a languages that still is in use will change through time. Just some thoughts from me. Regards and have a skilful new year. Pinge
PingeMusic 1 month ago
Seems to be a basic thing with her - what she thinks something ought to mean is what it does... All proof is wiped aside and/or ignored up to the point where she calls you names and blocks you. Ah well...
commanderkruge 1 month ago
Doesn't surprise me after the pissyfit she threw after I tried to explain to her that Star Wars is Science Fantasy and not real Science Fiction... :D
commanderkruge 1 month ago
I prophesy that on December 31, 2011, you will demonstrate that you are, in fact, not done with this!
integralmath 1 month ago
Very nicely done.
Now as an encore can you define "art"? :P
AmadeusMaxwell 1 month ago
@AmadeusMaxwell Why are you asking me to "as an encore" perform an action that's in the exact opposite spirit from what the point of the video is about? *throws an unabriged OED at you*
stealthbadger 1 month ago
I had a discussion with a Christian. He told me I was an agnostic rather than an atheist. I replied that I didn't care what he called me as he hadn't changed my position. This is the problem for Kate's argument as well and one she acknowledges. She doesn't mind that describing an agnostic as an "agnosic atheist" doesn't change anything. Moving the goal posts doesn't trouble her. Word play can be a useful rhetorical device but as you pointed out, it cuts both ways.
GodPatrol 2 months ago
Bionic Dance blocked me when I said I agreed with OMGITSTITS because she's hotter.
2Addicted2YT 2 months ago
Hey stelthbadger! How could you possibly be right if bionicdance doesn't agree with you? Tell me that will you!
itsnotjustyoupal 2 months ago
Bionicdance is a fundamentalist agnostic atheist.
In "discussions" with her I always imagine that I could be talking with a dogmatic religious zealot, except we're not talking about god, but words.
She has the same belief in the immutability of words as the fundamentalists do about species. And when I suggest that words are subjected to evolution. I half expected her to retort with " It's just a theory".
Usually she responds "you're wrong KIDDO"
Dogmatism is not exclusively a religious term.
parallelsdumaurier 2 months ago 8
@parallelsdumaurier "Bionicdance is a fundamentalist agnostic atheist." - from where I stand she's just a cunt. Sorry, had to say it at least once. Now I feel better. :D
commanderkruge 1 month ago
Remember the term "Bright"? A bright was "a person who has a naturalistic worldview. A bright's worldview is free of supernatural and mystical elements. The ethics and actions of a bright are based on a naturalistic worldview."
That went over like a lead balloon in spite of having the support of Dawkins and Dennett.
Still, on youtube, I don't see much wrong with adopting BionicDance's definitions. It might actually enforce some clarity in the debates.
zarkoff45 2 months ago
@zarkoff45 I disagree. If we adopt BD's definition of agnostic, then it would become useless in its ubiquity, Right now, by common or broad definition or common usage it has a use: namely describing a middle ground on the belief continuum. I for one will continue to use it in this manor for two reasons: 1. it is more descriptive as stated above. 2. It involves less pushing of air around the piehole area for no particular purpose.
hatemorethanyou999 2 months ago
@hatemorethanyou999 "It involves less pushing of air around the piehole area for no particular purpose."
Though you don't seem to mind wasting precious calories on finger movement.
I don't need either the term atheist or agnostic, I've got a better term to describe myself -- I am an "ontological naturalist."
zarkoff45 2 months ago
This has been flagged as spam show
@zarkoff45 "Though you don't seem to mind wasting precious calories on finger movement." --Did I type something superfluous?
"I don't need either the term atheist or agnostic, I've got a better term to describe myself -- I am an "ontological naturalist."" --I see you're an Atheist.
hatemorethanyou999 2 months ago
I can't find fault with this explanation. Well presented. Thanks and Sub'd.
RichardRoy2 2 months ago
Thanks for making this. Here's a challenge, which I wouldn't blame you for not taking: Have this conversation with a fundamentalist Christian or far right wing conservative. Foolishly, I have tried.
deepashtray 2 months ago
OMG! You made a VariaBlast support video. XD
alowlyapprentice 2 months ago in playlist part two
@alowlyapprentice It was tongue-in-cheek, and underscoring the point that not all conversations in which a person is mentioned is that person necessarily invited to participate. :D
stealthbadger 2 months ago
I cant recognise any religious label as definable. They are simple labels formed to group people for religions for ease of hating. That is their only meaning and purpose.
It is based on acceptance of delusion rendering the words ludicrous. A new word for non belief of any given thing people can imagine, would provide and endless parade of meaningless words. Agnosticism means the same as abracadabra.
fantasy0coach 2 months ago
(cont) I.e. here too we need a clear definition that actually describes what people hold and what the attitude is. Problem is internal. Some want a term for fence-sitting (defend the non-Huxleyian use of agnosticism), and some want atheism to mean a particular kind of non-belief in theistic concepts. But see, unless we constantly want to preface our discussion that these definitions then actually strawman our actual positions, it'd be good to be clear with the words we use more broadly.
socrates856 2 months ago
(cont) On atheism, the problem is that there is a vast variety of ways someone can not be a theist. That is/was the whole babies-are-atheists meme. I am in no particular way active in disbelief. There is no ontological rejection of the god concept at all. The ontological question has instead been rejected as not worth asking. That's the "lack of belief" point, yet theists want us to not state this because it breaks some of their "you too" argumentation. (cont)
socrates856 2 months ago
(cont) Take agnosticism. BD's definition is not identical to Huxley's but it's close. Problem with agnosticism is that it has split into two meanings. One is "I'm not sure, I'm on the fence" etc, which is uncertainty on the ontological position. The other, Huxleyian one is "I don't know, cannot know, hence cannot take an affirmative position" i.e. an epistemic one. It's easy to see that not being clear on the term causes confusion, incidentally theists tend to love the weak one. (cont)
socrates856 2 months ago
Frankly I have plenty of sympathy with BD's position. Sure the argument from etymology isn't great, but it is one that one can use to argue for clarity, simplicity etc. But I don't relate to BD's position for this reason. I relate to it for the important underlying reason. See BD's definition is actually one that is clean, good and most importantly describes my actual positions much better than the definitions theists specifically, but also some non-theists like. (cont)
socrates856 2 months ago
I'm gay!
Heheh
phenixwryter 2 months ago
@EsraYmssik1 To quote Lincoln, "How many legs does a dog have if you call the tail a leg? Four. Calling a tail a leg doesn't make it a leg."
If you state that you can make a definitive statement as to the existence of a god, then you are not an agnostic. That does not make you a gnostic, that's something different.
If you state that it is impossible to make such truth statements, then you are agnostic. That is not an argument from etymology, that is from the technical definition of the word.
EsraYmssik1 2 months ago
Comment removed
EsraYmssik1 2 months ago
Sounds as if bionicdance is taking a rather simplistic view of language and how it functions and how meaning works etc. She is ignoring or more likely is ignorant of research on semantics, semiology and other areas of research on language and meaning. Confucius was at his most conservative in his campaign to rectify names. Hanfei was merciless in lampooning of Confucian thought on this point - by running the thought experiment of having people now do the things the ancients did and he laughed.
johncrwarner 2 months ago
Excellent talk. You see this problem with language in corporate cultures even within the same industries that tend to share similar vernaculars and lexicons. To over come these types of semantic inconsistencies in complex problem solving, it is often necessary to build an understanding of the current situation with language that bridges the gap between the client culture and a more normative industry vernacular and lexicon. This is often quite difficult, especially as the number of stake (cont)
0gods 2 months ago
@0gods (ii) holders increase. Often a more effective approach is develop a synthetic intermediate language and gain buy-in to this vernacular. I see this part of formal problem solving as building the scaffolding of the problem definition. What the ever the answer is--what ever action must be taken--is then expressed in the new intermediate language. Communications and cultural change processes are used to implement the solution. It is a pretty painful process and tends to result in euphemisms.
0gods 2 months ago
Yeah, "mortgage" is weird word, especially for non Englsh speakers, when I first received spam about mortgage, I thought someone is trying to sell me a plot in cemetary. 8D
SwineNahNah 2 months ago
French is not the only controlled language, here in Latvia we too have special institution for that.
Trouble is, sometimes (usually) comission terribly lags behind with their proposed new words and introduces tham long after some word (usually coming from English) have been used for years, it's especially true for dynamic, fast evolving spheres like IT and finances.
SwineNahNah 2 months ago
She reminds me of the female Napoleon Dynamite the way she directs her shows.
TheKenTerry 2 months ago
But if you're right, then variablast doesn't stand a chance! O_O
TheLaughingOut 2 months ago
i haven't been able to sit through one of her videos for a long time.
BillKiernan 2 months ago
wake me up when December ends
KillingKeymo 2 months ago
Thank you
f417h2GRACE 2 months ago
Are you understanding the meaningless vocal patterns coming out of Bajar's face hole!?
Awesome video, yay!
thecryptqueen 2 months ago
The Académie française is an object lesson in how it is impossible to fossilise language.
jimthepleb 2 months ago
you can't claim etymological verity whilst entirely ignoring the philological context of a word. a homosexual does not love people who are 'the same' as him/her they are attracted to the same sex, a lesbian is not an inhabitant of the island of lesbos. And seriously who means happy when they say gay these days.
Incidentally; I don't believe in god, how anyone else chooses to define me is entirely up to them. Heretic and apostate are my favourites:)
jimthepleb 2 months ago
Prescriptive vs Descriptive.
whistlingdust 2 months ago
Thank you!
SpiritKeeper 2 months ago
She won't listen...but I fully support your right to challenge her on this. ;-)
BobChaos23 2 months ago
NO... HMM-HMM... you are wrong. I vociferously disagree!! ZOMBIES WIN EVERY TIME!
megachepo 2 months ago
This is still going on?! Sheesh.
When people misuse antisocial for shyness or aloofness, my brain screams and weeps.
Dissing zombies? :*(
TheRecoveringZombie 2 months ago
too much is expected from language.
Coquipirate 2 months ago
Subjective subjects are subjective.
;^/
nishbrown 2 months ago
Interesting stuff. Personally I think you overstate the fluidity of language, which moors itself to the fairly stable anchors of literature, textbooks and dictionaries and is rooted in hitorical context.
I side with the thrust of what you are saying, though.
gabiotta 2 months ago
@gabiotta I don't know if I agree. There is written language and then there is spoken language. Written language seems to take more time to change but spoken is insanely fluid. Go back 50 years and try and have a casual conversation with someone. I bet it would be interesting. :P
sofiarune 2 months ago
@sofiarune Word, diggity.
BobChaos23 2 months ago
@sofiarune I don't know man. I could totally slide back 50 years on a time/space peace rainbow man and fucking groove on the cosmic vibrations of brothers and sisters in the counterculture revolution fighting against the man, man!
I could get on a soapbox in 1960's haight & ashbury as a time travel from outer and inner space and tell em how in the future pigs and politicians still pull the strings while the blues is all the working man sings... man!
WhirlingWolves 2 months ago
@WhirlingWolves
Like totally
phenixwryter 2 months ago
@sofiarune
How odd that experience would be is largely down what context of the discussion.
If asking some hep cats where the best place to score some doobie might be, then you would probably encounter the odd wrong turn on your quest for the shizzle. Having a basic theological discussion, not so much.
I wasn't saying language is static, just that it is rather elastic and often snaps back into established shapes because of the anchoring effect of dictionaries etc.
gabiotta 2 months ago
@gabiotta As I said, casual conversation on the street. I already admitted formal written EnglishI changes more slowly. Conversational English tends to change so quickly that you end up with endemic regional sets of words and meanings. If we look even further back than this past half century we find even formal written English taking huge swings. Have you read the Cantebury Tales? If English snapped back then reading that shouldn't be so hard. 500 chars sucks.
sofiarune 2 months ago
@sofiarune
I understand, but this conversation is about a theological discussion.
gabiotta 2 months ago
@gabiotta Doesn't matter. This conversation applies to all language. In fact, I think that's what Badger was getting at. Casual theological discussion is still a casual discussion. It doesn't get placed on some pedestal because it happens to be convenient (at the time).
sofiarune 2 months ago
@sofiarune
You seem to think that I am in stark opposition to what you and, to some extent, Badger, are saying.
I was just pointing out that I thought he was going a little further that I think is actually the case. That is why you had to go back to Chaucer to make your point and not back to, say, Kerouac.
There has been a huge shift over time in spoken English since Chaucer. The modes of speech that were popularised by the Beats have largely snapped back or become anachronistic.
gabiotta 2 months ago
That ruled. Now either she'll pretend you don't exist like she did with me or she'll stamp her feet and repeat herself some more (because we all know that repeating something enough times makes it true).
Seriously though, glad someone finally addressed this. The dictionary is descriptive, not prescriptive damn it.
sofiarune 2 months ago 14
@sofiarune I argued with her several times about the whole "Atheist = Not a theist" thing. She wouldn't even concede on what etymology was, much less the fact atheist predates theist, which alone destroyed her entire argument.
I've mentioned this before elsewhere, but I find it funny that many of the same atheists who bemoan creationists acting as if they're experts in a given scientific field have no trouble doing the same thing when it comes to linguistics. Cognitive dissonance I suppose.
Hockeygod98 2 months ago
@Hockeygod98 More like double think. Cognitive dissonance tends to at least be uncomfortable. :P
sofiarune 2 months ago
@sofiarune
BionicDance's as cute as a button. 'And more likeable than 99'% of youtube. But she's also cartoonishly simplistic, and if she doesn't "get it" when you disagree, she's way, way too quick to label you a troll unless you surrender, such that she's more likely to block you than hear you.
I disagree with somebody on YT virtually ever time I poke in. But I get more annoyed with BD than is prolly warranted cuz she'll just just so stubbornly unresponsive to reason/evidence.
geodgereturns 2 months ago
Whenever The Badger addresses you, you know you are fucked.
iCalintz 2 months ago 11
There is the case of Frank Luntz, who is able to alter public opinion by taking careful study of the words and terms used and then organise all of the rightwing media to use certain terms and phrases which have emotional connotations.
However, to pull such a trick off, you need to be able to influence a massive portion of the mainstream media, otherwise you might as well be Variablast for all the influence you will have.
dangerouslytalented 2 months ago
@dangerouslytalented Also, as with Luntz, to say that you're espousing the "correct" definition when what you're actually doing is attempting to shape public opinion is Orwellian bullshit that is antithetical to a respect for reality and history (hence the "declaring victory before you've achieved victory" comment, if that's what she's doing).
stealthbadger 2 months ago 2
@stealthbadger `Since when do rightwingers have respect for ANYTHING?
dangerouslytalented 2 months ago
@dangerouslytalented Ah. You mean like how the conservatives in America change the meaning of words by redefining them or reassign new meaning to an act to change public opinion? >.<
TheTruePooka 2 months ago
Excellent summary of the issues.
I agree with your analysis.
Language is fluid and often imprecise - and this is both sometimes annoying and sometimes liberating.
richo61 2 months ago
Nah, I'm going to stick to the definitions I like and I'll be an arrogant asshole about it, too.
SAsgarters 2 months ago
nice video. if you dont post anything after the 25th, then merry x-mas and/or happy holidays! (also if you do post something sooner)
gotohellgooglization 2 months ago