[Cialug] [OT] Security and the browser

[Daniel A. Ramaley]

On Wednesday October 22 2008 12:04, Bryan Baker wrote:
>> It's one of those things where some people use it incorrectly, it  
>> eventually becomes accepted practice to use it incorrectly.
>
>Exactly. It literally means to reduce by 1/10 and is now used as a
>synonym for total destruction (an almost 180°spin).

I think that's getting close to the difference between prescriptive and 
descriptive linguistics. I used to have a more prescriptive view of 
language. These days i think (probably as a result of learning some 
Japanese in a non-traditional program) that a descriptive view is 
better. Languages change over time; words change meaning and new 
grammar and vocabulary are developed while old are dropped.

Prescriptivists will tend to think that language should be static and 
not change. I think prescriptivists probably would make better junior 
high language teachers since they are less accepting of "errors". 
Descriptivists who simply try to divine the existing rules of a 
language rather than enforcing some external rules are probably better 
at accepting the change of language over time.

Perhaps slightly more on topic: so what does the word "hacker" mean? 
There's a good example of a word that has changed meaning, and did so 
in a very short period of time.

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Dan Ramaley                            Dial Center 118, Drake University
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