I just picked up Volo's for 5e, and thought the Lizardfolk quirk amusing.
Some like to use metaphors after learning about them, and use them at every opportunity, regardless of how appropriate to the situation they may be.
What've y'all got? Any tales of inappropriate/unrelated metaphors used to good effect?
"My hempenis is an immovable rod"
Get two birds stoned at once
Well, you can misuse sayings in the way that real people do. I don't think I've heard a single person use "beg the question" or "the exception that proves the rule" correctly.
Some metaphors have been misused so much that they've become contronyms, like "moot point."
i just looked up all of those to make sure i knew what they meant and they do. not really sure i hear people misusing then except for people who think its "mute point" even though they basically mean it in the same way
are you sure YOURE not the one who doesnt understand them?
A "moot point" used to mean "a point up for discussion," but so many people have used it for so long to mean "a point too irrelevant to be discussed" that you can't use it either way and make your meaning clear.
Similarly, everyone things "begging the question" means "raising the question" rather than "trying to use the conclusion of your argument as support for itself." "The exception that proves the rule" uses a rather archaic meaning of the word "prove" - it's supposed to mean "the exception tests the rule." Instead people think it means that somehow evidence against a rule is evidence for it.
>waaah words used to mean something different before i was born
language isnt a science. words change meaning all the time. all the ways you are mad that these phrases are used are part of their official definition now. so to recap, the reason people "think" those phrases mean certain things is because they do mean those things
do you also go around pronouncing knee with a K because it used to be pronounced that way and getting mad at people who don't understand you?
Just make up your own.
Dude, I know it's a moot point now, but the guy never said he hates it. Just that in general people use it wrong. What he thought us are a bit exceptions to prove the rule, but nevertheless he thought us some very interesting facts. Which begs the question: what have you thought us today?
*thaught
English is not my native tongue
my only point is that its literally not incorrect. look up the definitions for those words and phrases. its only incorrect if youre a time traveler from the 1800s or some shit
words can have many different meanings depending on how you use them. all the ways the autist wants to use them are correct as well
It's not a problem that language changes. What that means, though, is that you shouldn't use words and phrases that are currently in-between meanings, because people won't know which one you intend. When the newer meaning has won out definitively over the old one, to the point where nobody will even wonder if you're using the old one, then you can start using it. But when both meanings remain in common use for a long time (like with shit like the word "biweekly,") then you just have to stay the fuck away from both of them.
>biweekly
You mean fortnightly?
Clearly he means twice-weekly.
Eh, correct... incorrect... all semantics. Just as the right use of metaphors is dependent on wether you use the old or new definition, so is finding it correct or incorrect. I don't particularly like literaly becoming figuratively, because it changed in my lifetime. Am i correct or incorrect? I don't know. But I do know I'm not going to be persuaded by someone who takes great liberties at interpreting what the guy means and then calls him an autist. Particularly if they use the word autist wrong.
how is the old meaning going to be snuffed out by the new meaning if no one is using the new meaning user? words will basically always have multiple meanings. you just have to deal with that
if you cant get your point across through communication, its not the words fault
A lot of metaphors only work because we're used to hearing them and can infer their meaning from context. Someone who just learned what metaphors are and really wanted to use them would probably make up his own, and they'd only work in his own head, especially if his culture attributed different made-up traits to plants and animals as everyone else's culture. If he just out of the blue called someone a dragonfly or a heron, you'd have no idea what trait he was attributing to that person. It might well be a trait that dragonflies or herons don't actually have.
youre taking my own point and repeating it back to me like its some great insight on youre point. i already told you that language isnt a science the only "right or wrong" there is happens from if you communicate your idea or not
your part*
Because most people are not going to follow that advice - especially ignorant people who don't even know that there's a meaning different from the one in their heads. Ignorance is the cause of most changes in language.
If you choose a very ambiguous word and you get misinterpreted, it is very much your fault. The burden is on you to choose the least ambiguous language possible.
The phrase "begging the question" was originally a mistranslation of the latin for "raises the question," so whoever fucked it up in the first place is to blame, not the person saying the phrase.
Seriously, that one is crap.
"The exception that proves the rule" is a legitimate complaint to have, but people don't think of rules as inviolable anymore, so...
...
the way normal people use it is good enough for me. normally they are just loose on what they mean by rule. its more like the exception that proves the trend
"women make shitty doctors, thats why you never see any"
"no women can be great doctors i knew of one once"
"oh so it is possible for a women to become a doctor if they want, no one is stopping them, there are just very few female doctors because they suck at it"
since if there were literally no female doctors you could easily give other reasons why there are none, like they are being prevented from becoming them by law or something
i know thats not exactly what the phrase means but thats normally how i think of it when people say it most of the time
>the burden is on you to choose the least ambiguous language possible.
Not the guy you were talking with, but yes, that's usually accomplished with context. "I dusted the counter with flour" and "I dusted the counter with a brush" have pretty obvious intended interpretations, even though the parts of speech are the same in both and "dust" takes opposite meanings.
It's definitely the speaker's fault if they're misinterpreted, but at the same time, that doesn't mean that the listener should go out of their way to assume an obviously wrong definition ("hurr hurr you crumbled up a brush and spread it over the counter???"), nor that they shouldn't accept a speaker's clarification.
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