Comments on: Literally Figuratively http://striderweb.com/blog/2005/07/literally-figuratively/ It's all about where you draw the line Fri, 09 Jan 2009 13:17:35 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.7 hourly 1 By: likwidshoe http://striderweb.com/blog/2005/07/literally-figuratively/comment-page-1/#comment-227 likwidshoe Tue, 05 Jul 2005 06:59:20 +0000 http://www.striderweb.com/blog/149#comment-227 She said that she would literally <I>like</I> to shoot him, not that she literally <I>would</I> shoot him. She said that she would literally like to shoot him, not that she literally would shoot him.

]]> By: PawPaw http://striderweb.com/blog/2005/07/literally-figuratively/comment-page-1/#comment-226 PawPaw Fri, 01 Jul 2005 21:56:51 +0000 http://www.striderweb.com/blog/149#comment-226 Good post. People are nowadays unaware of the power of the spoken word. Words are nothing more than code for thought, and we have agreed over the years that certain words will mean certain things. We buy dictionaries so that we can understand the code. Words have meaning and society assigns the meaning. Some words have multiple, nuanced meanings. Some words don't. The problem comes when individual members of society believe that all words have multiple meanings, and those words are interpreted in their most common usage. "To kill" is a fairly straightforward verb, as is "to shoot" Not much nuance there. The problem with Newspeak is that we often don't know what the speaker is saying, because we don't have the code. All we have to go on is the standard meaning of the word, and it often has a dramatically different meaning than the speaker intended. Good post. People are nowadays unaware of the power of the spoken word. Words are nothing more than code for thought, and we have agreed over the years that certain words will mean certain things. We buy dictionaries so that we can understand the code. Words have meaning and society assigns the meaning. Some words have multiple, nuanced meanings. Some words don’t.

The problem comes when individual members of society believe that all words have multiple meanings, and those words are interpreted in their most common usage.

“To kill” is a fairly straightforward verb, as is “to shoot” Not much nuance there.

The problem with Newspeak is that we often don’t know what the speaker is saying, because we don’t have the code. All we have to go on is the standard meaning of the word, and it often has a dramatically different meaning than the speaker intended.

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