"NY" wrote in message
...
"Robin" wrote in message
...
But I also think you have a perfect right to lobby for a body similar to
the Académie Française with whatever statutory backing you think fit.
Eg. fines for misusing "screw" and "bolt"

Or "plug", "socket" and (the ultimate abomination) "plug socket" ;-)

Language evolves. France has solved the problem with the Académie
Française which tries to fossilise the language and which wants people to
use a French word rather than one borrowed from English if possible (eg
"ordinateur" versus "computer" or "PC"; "mégaoctet" rather than "megabyte"
etc). At least they allow "le weekend" rather than "le fin de la semaine"
;-) German is a bit easier in that you just string nouns together to
create a new meaning, without all the "of the" superfluity.

We solve the problem by (for most of the population) just not caring -
giving words new meanings that they didn't have before. Trying telling
people that "cheap at half the price" and "I could care less" don't make
logical sense and that it should be "cheap at twice the price" and "I
couldn't care less".

Hopefully "inflammable" will be expunged from the English language one day
(prefer "flammable"

Its flammable that is dying out.

and its opposite "NON-flammable") because too many people thought the "in"
meant "not" and therefore interpreted "inflammable" as "non-flammable".
That's where a little knowledge really can be dangerous!