Comment on Literally exactly how it works, too.

Donjuanme@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

• Quibblekrust@thelemmy.club ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

  Words mean what people think they mean when they say them. Nothing else. Miscommunication can occur if the speaker and listener don’t have the same concept in their head, but it doesnt change the fact that words are just people serializing their thoughts with sounds or text. Dictionaries are not prescriptive, they are documentative.

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  • TyrionBean@lemmy.ml ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

    Not exactly. If I were to tell you that I believe in creationism and that the world is 6000 years old, but that it means what you think evolution and cosmology mean and that I’m just using different words, you probably still wouldn’t want me teaching your kids in school about science.

    Or, at least, I would hope not.

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    • Quibblekrust@thelemmy.club ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

      We were talking about colloquial use of a word like “literally”, and not entire bodies of science being replaced with religious terms. Those two things are not even remotely similar.

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  • InputZero@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

    Okay but that’s a dishonest argument. Sure reality is just perception and perception is unique to the individual. All that said words have meaning which we have agreed upon. Otherwise I could write gibberish, call it meaningful text, and prove anything. It’s the fact that words have specific meanings which makes them useful. Otherwise it’s baby talk and that’s cute but not great for communication.

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    • Quibblekrust@thelemmy.club ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

      Yes, communication works best when people agree on what words mean, and a great, great many people have agreed that “literally” means things other than “literally”.

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