15 replies to this topic

[^Leo^]

Why do people get them mixed up? It's not like they're all that similar. I mean, even if you weren't taught what irony is coincidence is a common enough word for people to figure out what it means. I'm not trying to bag on anyone or something like that, I'm really curious if there's a reason for the mix up.

[kirant]

Because people don't friggin' watch Futurama.

 

[Whitewolf8]

Because people are stupid.

[Snow]

I'm not really sure were I'm going with this, but couldn't you consider one of the meanings of "irony" to mean "coincidence" now that everyone uses it like that? That's how words get made/given new definitions/changed right?

 

Also I have no idea if I use these correctly XD

[^Leo^]

I don't think that words with concrete definitions should be able to change just because people got it wrong. Symbols can have their meanings changed, but I think hello will always be a greeting.

[Rujio]

Dismantle used to mean to take off a coat, decimate used to mean to get rid of 1/10, gay used to mean happy. Meh. Besides that, coincidences can pretty easily be ironic.

[Fire Blazer]

lol

 

yeah ironic is not a "funny coincidence" as people think a lot. (the "funny" part is kinda important to me at least from my experiences)

 

I think some people get it, some don't, I just try to correct people when I can and tell them the real meaning.

 

I agree though it can kind of be annoying... in general when words change due to their meaning being skewed by people long enough it's a little frustrating, it's like we're all succumbing/conforming to other people's stupidity, though it's probably not a good idea to think of it that way and not worth caring much about >_>

[^Leo^]

Oh I don't care a whole lot, but every now and then I go all grammar/spelling/general rules of English nazi. You know, making an ass of myself correcting everything. By the by never ever correct a teacher. For whatever reason they take it personally when a student knows more than them about something(even if it isn't related to what they teach)

[Mercurius]

The main reason why this happens, along with every other word, is because most of the time people don't learn words via definition, but by usage, even if it's incorrect/misinterpreted usage. It is pretty much the only way you can get remotely fluent in another language because there is just way too much vocabulary to remember to bother getting specific about how to use it.

 

On the subject of misused words, I only just learned that I've been using i.e. incorrectly all this time (basically almost every time I used it I should have been using e.g.) but that's Latin and fuck you get out of my English, why are you even in common use anyway. (I wonder how Japanese elders feel about the Engrish craze.)

 

 

That's how words get made right?

It's also how definitions that could have been useful become obsolete without a decent replacement.

[Whitewolf8]

that's Latin and fuck you get out of my English

Doesn't Latin make up, like, 10% of English or something? And even then, English is made up from a lot of words from other languages so yay

[Mercurius]

is that why your initial nationality's royal coat of arms still uses French of all things for its motto

 

OOOH BURN

[Rujio]

Doesn't Latin make up, like, 10% of English or something? And even then, English is made up from a lot of words from other languages so yay

 

Most English words are French/Latin in origin, but most words we use in common speech are still Germanic. "Anglish" wouldn't be hard for most conversations. It would screw over anything academic, though.

 

It's also how definitions that could have been useful become obsolete without a decent replacement.

 

People are pretty good at understanding what's intended. We are way less specific about "love" than the ancient Greeks, for instance, but we get that people love their siblings and lovers differently. On the other hand, we have a bazillion tenses (run, ran, am running, will run, have run, had run, have been running, had been running, will have run, will have been running, and also in some dialects "do be running" [and possibly more mutations of that, not exactly sure] which is more-or-less the same as "go running" but applicable to any verb) while Vietnamese doesn't even have that concept - all of the preceding would be translated as the exact same thing (to the best of my understanding). And considering the number of meanings "ironic" can have anyway the subtle differences between ironic and non-ironic coincidences seems fairly unimportant to me.

[Fire Blazer]

 

Most English words are French/Latin in origin, but most words we use in common speech are still Germanic. "Anglish" wouldn't be hard for most conversations. It would screw over anything academic, though.

 

 

People are pretty good at understanding what's intended. We are way less specific about "love" than the ancient Greeks, for instance, but we get that people love their siblings and lovers differently. On the other hand, we have a bazillion tenses (run, ran, am running, will run, have run, had run, have been running, had been running, will have run, will have been running, and also in some dialects "do be running" [and possibly more mutations of that, not exactly sure] which is more-or-less the same as "go running" but applicable to any verb) while Vietnamese doesn't even have that concept - all of the preceding would be translated as the exact same thing (to the best of my understanding). And considering the number of meanings "ironic" can have anyway the subtle differences between ironic and non-ironic coincidences seems fairly unimportant to me.

 

tl;dr English is stupidly confusing because everything from letters to words to tenses are super confusing/convoluted/redundant/something negative lol

 

that's pretty much what I got out of that paragraph XP haha

 

Oh I don't care a whole lot, but every now and then I go all grammar/spelling/general rules of English nazi. You know, making an ass of myself correcting everything. By the by never ever correct a teacher. For whatever reason they take it personally when a student knows more than them about something(even if it isn't related to what they teach)

 

teachers are sensitive like that, yeah, and if you roll your eyes about it, that's even worse... lol. Just gotta leave teachers be and tolerate them/let them do their thing unless they're the rare cool teacher, haha.

[Knight of Argentum]

 

 

People are pretty good at understanding what's intended. We are way less specific about "love" than the ancient Greeks, for instance, but we get that people love their siblings and lovers differently. On the other hand, we have a bazillion tenses (run, ran, am running, will run, have run, had run, have been running, had been running, will have run, will have been running, and also in some dialects "do be running" [and possibly more mutations of that, not exactly sure] which is more-or-less the same as "go running" but applicable to any verb) while Vietnamese doesn't even have that concept - all of the preceding would be translated as the exact same thing (to the best of my understanding). And considering the number of meanings "ironic" can have anyway the subtle differences between ironic and non-ironic coincidences seems fairly unimportant to me.

English: The language where we have exceptions to our exceptions to our exceptions.

In reality though, tense-wise we still don't have that many in concept. As true in Latin, we still have Present, Imperfect, Future, Perfect, Pluperfect (Past perfect), and Future Perfect. Perfect has more translations than one (your example with "ran" and "have ran" are still both in the perfect tense, and can also be translated as "I did run" in the first person.) English tends to use more helping verbs than most languages, like in my aforementioned example, all of those would be said in one word in Latin, cuccuri (for first person). And it gets worse with the Future Perfect, especially in the passive. "I will have been ran," which doesn't make much sense, would just be cursus ero.

Many languages have differences in which words have more synonyms and antonyms. For English, it can be love, and in Latin, there are many different words for more lewd concepts such as prostitution. It really just boils down to culture. For the case of irony and coincidence, it had a domino effect as more people began to use them incorrectly. It can be compared to the word, "literally," where so many people began to use the word incorrectly the new definition was just accepted. It's nothing we can really fix except for using the two words correctly ourselves.

What really can make languages difficult is the nuance to some languages. In English, we have helping verbs, but we don't have things like Deponent Verbs. Latin has Deponent verbs, which complicates the language too because most Deponent verbs take a different case than just using the accusative case like most regular verbs. It's more prevalent as Latin uses more endings than English does. Specifically, Latin also has no direct translation for the Subjunctive mood, unlike English, which always expresses the mood as uncertainty or desire whereas  in Latin the translation changes from use (Optative subjunctive used as a main verb translates as a subjunctive, but in a purpose clause it translates as an infinitive yet written in the subjunctive).

 

Tl;dr: Languages are weird and too nuance.

[Fire Blazer]

Tl;dr: Languages are weird and too nuance.

 

thanks for this, I kind of agree and can't be bothered to read the entirety of your wall of text *shot*

[Knight of Argentum]

 

 

 

Tl;dr: Languages are weird and too nuance.

thanks for this, I kind of agree and can't be bothered to read the entirety of your wall of text *shot*

Heh, no problem. I pretty much ranted about the simplicity of Latin versus the complications of the English language, and why people confuse irony with coincidence.