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Joined: Jun 2006
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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"I wonder if this isn't just another example of an existing word taking on new meanings until ultimately you'll be able to write anything at all with a series of words chosen at random, the recipient of which will read into it anything he wishes."
The end of all verbal combat.
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Joined: Nov 2007
Posts: 390
enthusiast
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enthusiast
Joined: Nov 2007
Posts: 390 |
I wonder if this isn't just another example of an existing word taking on new meanings until ultimately you'll be able to write anything at all with a series of words chosen at random, the recipient of which will read into it anything he wishes.
That's just nice. I looked up nice. a clever retort. 
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Joined: Dec 2000
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Dec 2000
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Hi Fal good to hear from you again
But what's nice In this case it'd changed form its original meaning of 'ignorant' to 'stupid'.
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old hand
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old hand
Joined: Feb 2008
Posts: 876 |
Geez, I didn't know I was so nice...
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Joined: Dec 2000
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Nice is the poster boy of semantic shift. And somehow, through it all, the English language has survived and is able to clearly express every one of these concepts.
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Joined: Aug 2005
Posts: 3,290
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Aug 2005
Posts: 3,290 |
Nice is the poster boy of semantic shift.
Yes, it is. But, in the case of nice, its older meanings have, more or less, been replaced by its current meaning. There are some other outcomes. At least two off the top of my head: (a) words like set and file that have multiple meanings but are basically from the same older word (etymologically speaking) and (b) words like mole which has multiple meanings and has almost as many etymologies.
1. Hand me the file.
2. Mary was out standing on the mole.
1. and 2. are ambiguous, except that sentences like these are extremely unlikely to occur in complete isolation. 1. depends on whether we are in a metal shop or a doctor's office; 2., more humorously, depends on whether it's uttered by a dermatologist, zoologist, or harbor master. Context, and in speech, repetition and emendation, usually remove any ambiguity from the text.
Next, the argument that polysemy leads to the eventual failure of communication and the destruction of the language is easily proved wrong by looking, however cursorily, at a page in a dictionary (in any language): there are very few entries for words with a single meaning, and those are usually words that a rare or archaic.
Ceci n'est pas un seing.
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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"Nice is the poster boy of semantic shift"
( sounds like the first line of a T.S. Elliot poem )
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Joined: Dec 2000
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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You'll still see nice used in the sense of 'precise, careful', as in a nice distinction. And certainly as the word shifted in meaning there was always a period when both uses could easily be encountered at the same time.
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Joined: Jun 2006
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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I see it here in the sense of 'precise, careful, as in a nice distinction' because I choose to see it this way. As it has gone from one meaning to the next and then back again, it can be used as you like it. I know you used it meaning foolish, stupid, but I find two different definitions for it. I still say: "Nice meeting you". nice 1 nice 2
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old hand
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OP
old hand
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I found this quite interesting Nice
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