[FRIAM] words RE: words

[Prof David West]

Addendum to the narrative below: I suggested that 'spill' and 'flush' were, sort of, synonyms. That is wrong. They are actually good metaphors for each other. If you understand 'spill' for instance, the term suggests a number of referents  (in this case, definitional/usage variants) that are confirmed in 'flush' and that increases your understanding of the latter. The excluded parts of the Venn diagram prevent them from becoming true lexical synonyms.

davew


On Sun, May 5, 2019, at 9:04 PM, Prof David West wrote:
> Just finished Thomas K. Disch's, Camp Concentration, first published in 
> 1968 . Very dystopian future. My pleasure reading ti came from the 
> dozens, perhaps as many as 100, words encountered for the first time. 
> Unusual, obscure, sometimes archaic, (e.g. orthoepy) and yet the author 
> put these words into the mouth of the narrator in a seamless, organic, 
> manner — the words were necessary to convey the precise, nuanced, 
> narrative.
> 
> Hours later I was reading the words," toilette spoelt automatique," 
> above a urinal. I was wondering if "spoelt" might derive from a root 
> common to the English word, 'spill'. it does not - spoelt = flushes. 
> (Spill = morsen.) Before I made myself aware of the facts, I spent some 
> time idly wondering about the circumstances and contexts in which the 
> two words "spill/flush" might be used as synonyms despite the fact that 
> the former word is usually far less lethargic than the latter. I 
> mentally pictured a Venn diagram with significant overlap but with 
> definite areas/contexts where only one word or the other could possibly 
> convey desired precision or nuance.
> 
> On the heels of that musing, a recent FRIAM discussion about vocabulary 
> came to mind. The question was raised about whether or not "big" words 
> were used simply to demonstrate how erudite one was. (I first 
> encountered that word in the 1950s on "Make Room for Daddy" aka The 
> Danny Thomas Show; to describe a learned uncle and I decided I want to 
> be that.) My own observations of the list would suggest that such mean 
> spirited use of vocabulary is quite rare.
> 
> Vocabulary is a vehicle for conveying exact meaning — to the extent 
> that meaning can be either 'exact' or 'communicated'. And yet there is 
> a very definite 'Yin-Yang' stylistic difference observable in the 
> conversation.
> 
> Most participants seem to be grounded in the Yang style inherited from 
> the rationalism of Descartes and scientism of Bacon and use vocabulary 
> as a means for finding precision and accuracy. Others [yes you Nick, 
> despite how you cringe at the characterization] reflect the Yin of  
> hermeneuticism with a soupcon of post-modernism.
> 
> And this, perhaps, explains Nick's simultaneous fascination and 
> frustration with FRIAM  — a well meaning group willing to explore a lot 
> of different topics and the means to communicate a shared understanding 
> of those topics, using the 'best' vocabulary to do so.
> 
> Alas, too often, communication and understanding falter between the 
> accuracy bias of Charybdis and the metaphor bias of Scylla.
> 
> davewest
> 
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