Category: Language Matters

‘Each Other’ and ‘One Another’

“Style is the physiognomy of the mind.” (Arthur Schopenhauer) Depending on your style of mind, you will find the following either tedious and pedantic or a pleasurable exercise in precise analysis and careful thinking.

Ought the title phrases be used interchangeably by good writers, or is there some distinction we need to observe? Compare ‘less’ and ‘fewer.’ Good writers know that ‘less’ is used with mass nouns such as ‘food,’ ‘furniture,’ and ‘snow’ whereas ‘fewer’ is employed with such count nouns as ‘meals,’ ‘tables,’ and ‘snow plows.’ Correct: ‘If you eat less, you consume fewer calories.’ Incorrect: ‘If you eat less, you consume less calories.’ The second sentence should grate against your linguistic sensibilities.

No doubt there are schoolmarm strictures that good writers may violate with impunity. ‘Never split an infinitive’ and ‘Never begin a sentence with a conjunction’ are two examples. But I deny that the fewer-less distinction is in the same grammatical boat: it reflects prima facie logical and ontological distinctions that need to be acknowledged. They are distinctions of the Manifest Image, to borrow a term from Wilfrid Sellars, distinctions that are to be presumed innocent until proven guilty. Whether these distinctions can survive deeper logical and ontological analysis is a further question.

Bill and Ron are chess players who play each other on Sunday afternoons. But we could just as well say that they play one another on Sunday afternoons. For if each plays the other, then each plays another. And if each one plays another, then each one plays the other given that there are only two players. Now suppose Bill and Ron start a chess club with more than two members. When the members meet they play one another, not each other. Why? Suppose there are four members. Each one plays one of the others; it is not the case that each one plays the other – for the simple reason that there are three others. Since each one plays one of the three others, each one plays another.

The Sage of the Superstitions therefore lays down the following rule. ‘Each other’ and ‘one another’ are stylistic variants of each other, and are to that extent intersubstitutable salva significatione in contexts in which two things stand in some sort of reciprocal relation. In contexts in which more than two things stand in some sort of reciprocal relation, however, ‘one another’ is correct and ‘each other’ incorrect.

How did I arrive at this? Well, I gave an argument that appeals to your reason. I did not invoke any authority – that would be unphilosophical. Nor does actual usage cut any ice with me. Since grammar has a normative component, it cannot merely describe actual usage. For if boneheads prevail, usage degenerates. Describing the details of degeneration may well be a worthwhile socio-linguistic exercise, but conservatives, here as elsewhere, want to impede degeneration rather than merely record it. Grammar must be based in logic, logic in ontology, ontology in what, onto-theology? That is one philosophical project.

What do Democrats Mean by ‘Democracy’?

The Dems are always going on about 'our democracy,' their noble defense of it, and the Republicans' nefarious assault upon it.  But they never tell us what they mean by 'democracy.' One is left to speculate.  Here is David Brooks commenting on the recent gerrymandering/redistricting contretemps:

I understand the argument. But let's do a little ethical experiment here. You're in World War I. The Germans use mustard gas on civilians, and it helps them. Do you then decide, 'Okay, we're going to use mustard gas on civilians?' What Trump ordered Abbott to do in Texas is mustard gas on our democracy. (emphasis added)

One gets the distinct impression that for Democrats, 'democracy' means our party, the Democrat party.  Accordingly, to defend and preserve democracy is to defend, preserve, and enhance the power of the Democrat party by any and all means necessary including gerrymandering.  After all, they are (in their own eyes) wonderful people; so whatever they do must be wonderful too. But when we do unto them what they have long done unto us, we are despicable 'fascists' out to destroy 'democracy.'  

'Fascist' is the pejorative counterpart of the Dem's honorific 'democracy.' 'Fascist' is the Left's favorite F-word, although, thanks to Hunter Biden and others,  the F-word itself may be coming to occupy the top slot in the depredatory Left's deprecatory lingo.  Hunter and the benighted Beto O'Rourke seem incapable these days of uttering  a sentence free of F-bomb ornamentation. 

I should think that both the pejorative and the honorific, as used by the Dems, ought to enter retirement.  For they know too little history to know what 'fascist' means, and their actions show that there is little that is democratic about them.  Or do you think the coup against Joe Biden and his replacement on the 2024 Dem ticket by Kamala Harris was a democratic action? Quite the contrary!

The subversion of language is the mother of all subversion. The contemporary Dems are a pack of subversives out to destroy our republic. And yes, it is a republic, not a democracy , even when the word is used responsibly. It is a constitutionally-based republic and is democratic only to the extent that the people have a say in who shall represent them.  

‘Journo’ Bias at the AP and the Meaning of ‘Shyster’

'Journo' is my term of disapprobation-unto-contempt for liberal-left journalists. It is on a par with 'shyster' as a term of abuse for a certain sort of lawyer. Dig this from today's news:

NEW YORK (AP) — A club shooting in the New York City borough of Brooklyn early Sunday morning has left three people dead and nine others wounded in a year of record-low gun violence in the city.

NYC is quite the craphole these days, both above and under ground, and she seems bent on becoming the cesspool of the nation. Madman Mamdani the Islamo-commie-anti-semite, has a good shot at the mayoralty, I am told. 

On the Etymology of 'Shyster' (written 4 July 2011)

I've often wondered about the etymology of 'shyster.' From German scheissen, to shit? That would fit well with the old joke, "What is the difference between a lawyer and a bucket of shit?' "The bucket." I am also put in mind of scheusslich: hideous, atrocious, abominable. Turning to the 'shyster' entry in my Webster's, I read, "prob. fr. Scheuster fl. 1840 Am. attorney frequently rebuked in a New York court for pettifoggery."

According to Robert Hendrickson, Encyclopedia of Word and Phrase Origins, p. 659:

Shyster, an American slang term for a shady disreputable lawyer, is first recorded in 1846. Various authorities list a real New York advocate as a possible source, but this theory has been disproved by Professor Gerald L. Cohen of the University of Missouri-Rolla, whose long paper on the etymology I had the pleasure of reading. Shakespeare's moneylender Shylock has also been suggested, as has a racetrack form of the word shy, i.e., to be shy money when betting. Some authorities trace shyster to the German Scheisse, "excrement," possibly through the word shicir, "a worthless person," but there is no absolute proof for any theory.

A little further research reveals that Professor Cohen's "long paper" is in fact a short book of 124 pages published in 1982 by Verlag Peter Lang. See here for a review. Cohen argues that the eponymous derivation from 'Scheuster' that I just cited from Webster's is a pseudo-etymology. 'Shyster' no more derives from 'Scheuster' than 'condom' from the fictious Dr. Condom. Nor does it come from 'Shylock.' It turns out my hunch was right. 'Shyster' is from the German Scheisser, one who defecates.

The estimable and erudite Dr. Michael Gilleland, self-styled antediluvian, bibliomaniac, and curmudgeon, who possesses an uncommonly lively interest in matters scatological, should find all of this interesting. I see that the Arizona State University  library has a copy of Gerald Leonard Cohen's Origin of the Term "Shyster." Within a few days it should be in my hands.

‘Asylum Seekers’

Is a home invader an asylum seeker? Only in very rare cases.  So why are people who immigrate illegally called asylum seekers? A few are but most are not. What we have here, once again, is the characteristic 'progressive' abuse of language. You should have learned by now that no word or phrase is safe around a leftist. Conservatives are not against asylum; they are against the abuse of asylum.

At the same time that so-called progressives abuse 'asylum,' they also abuse 'xenophobic' when they apply this term to those of us who stand for the rule of law. You are one dumb conservative if you acquiesce in the Left's abuse of language. 

If you are a conservative, don't talk like a 'liberal.'

He who controls the terms of the debate controls the debate.

‘Pastime’

Whatever we are here for, we are not here to pass time. Our time is to be used and used well. You say it doesn't matter how we spend our time since nothing matters? That may or may not be so.  But it matters which.  If something does matter and you live as if nothing matters you may end up not only having wasted your time but  your eternity as well. So time  spent getting to the bottom of this question is time well spent. 

‘Per’ versus ‘As Per’

I have become annoyed recently by the increasing use of 'per' instead of 'as per' by journalists. Here is an example:

And that essentially was the end of her [Kamala's] campaign. Per Democratic strategist James Carville, “It’s the one question that you exist to answer, all right? That is it. That’s the money question. That’s the one you want. That’s the one that everybody wants to know the answer to. And you freeze, you literally freeze, and you say, ‘Well, I can’t think of anything,'” he said in a postelection analysis.

Is my annoyance misplaced?  I love the English language, my beloved mother tongue, and it angers me when people misuse and maltreat her. But in this case I may have overreacted.  Merriam Webster:

The fact is that both per and as per have existed in English in the sense “according to” for a very long time–since the 15th and 16th centuries, respectively. The choice of which to use (or avoid) is entirely a matter of taste. The more ponderous as per is often found in business and legal prose, or in writing that attempts to adopt a formal tone. It is not incorrect to use, but some find it overly legalistic and counsel avoiding it for that reason.

Retribution and Psycho-Political Projection

'Retribution' has two main senses in English, and they are importantly different. The word can refer to revenge or to a form of justice, retributive justice. Do I have to explain that justice is not revenge? Conflating the two, journalistic shills for deep-state malefactors try to dismiss as revenge what is a quest for justice to right the wrongs perpetrated against Donald Trump by said malefactors.  

Tulsi Gabbard's exposure of the Russia Collusion Hoax has leftists in our government sweating. Jonathan Turley names names: John Brennan, James Clapper, James Comey, and Andrew McCabe.

But of course one cannot expect our political enemies to play fair in what they take to be a war.  So this comes as no surprise:

Former Attorney General Eric Holder told MSNBC on Sunday morning that the Justice Department is being politicized to attack enemies of the Trump administration and "put at risk the lives and well-being" of people who oppose the president.

Talk about projection!  What Holder & Co. are accusing our side of doing is precisely what they have been doing all along. 

There is also the underhanded ploy of accusing us of putting lives at risk when our side rightly responds to their illegal actions.  We are supposed to accept the injury meekly, lest our legitimate objections to their outrages inspire some lunatic to go on a rampage. Yet another application of the Left's double-standard 'principle.' 

We should never forget what sort of sorry specimen this Holder was and is. See Photo ID: Eric Holder's Assault on Common Sense.

Are Catholics Christians?

A fellow philosopher writes,

While reading Clarence Thomas’s opinion in Ames v. Ohio Dept. of Youth Services (2025), I came across this sentence: “Americans have different views, for example, on whether Catholics are Christians.” I’ve heard it said, before, that Catholics aren’t Christians, but never knew what to make of it. (The same thing is said about Mormons.) Have you written about this (about whether Catholics are Christians)? What must one think Christianity is in order to believe that Catholics aren’t Christians? Strange.
I haven't written about this topic because it is perfectly obvious that (Roman) Catholics are Christians.  Proof: The Catholic Apostle's Creed. Every Catholic is a Christian, but not conversely.  Calvinists, for example are Christians but not Catholics. Similarly for all the other Protestant sects. No Protestant is a Catholic. That too is obvious.  
 
Did Justice Thomas, for whom I have great respect by the way, cite anyone who claimed that Catholics are not Christians?  Who would say such a thing?
 
People say the damndest things. There are people who say that math is racist. Now that does not even begin to make sense, involving as it does a Rylean category mistake. Not making sense, it cannot have a truth value, that is, it cannot be either true or false. Mathematics does not belong to the category of items that could sensibly be said to be either racist or non-racist.  Compare: 'How prevalent is anorexia nervosa among basketballs? More prevalent than among footballs?' Those questions involve category mistakes.  Other examples: What is the volume of the average thought? What is the chemical composition of the number nine?  What size shoes does God wear?
 
People who assertively utter 'Math is racist' are using those words to say something else, although it is not clear what. Perhaps they  mean to say that since blacks as a group are not good at mathematics, giving them math tests is a way of demeaning or oppressing them and can have no other purpose. Or something.  Speaker's meaning in this case strongly diverges from sentence meaning.
 
Can this distinction help us explain what people mean when they say that Catholics are not Christians?  Going by sentence meaning, the claim is obviously false.  But one might use those words to express the proposition that Catholics are not true Christians, where a true Christian is defined in some narrow and tendentious way, as, for example, someone who refuses to accept the Hellenically-tainted doctrines emanating from a magisterium (teaching authority)  that interposes itself between the individual soul and God as revealed in Holy Writ.
 
We are now in the vicinity of No True Scotsman.  Among the so-called informal fallacies is Antony Flew's No True Scotsman. Suppose A says, "No Scotsman puts sugar in his porridge." B replies, "But my uncle Angus puts sugar in his porridge." A responds, "Your Uncle Angus is no true Scotsman!"
 
Similarly, A says, "No Christian is a Roman Catholic." B replies, "But my Uncle Patrick is a Roman Catholic."  A responds, "Your Uncle Patrick is no true Christian!"

Slop Talk

'Due process' is a term of legal shop talk.  Those of us who know something about the law — I know a little — know how to use it correctly. And those of us who think that words ought to be used responsibly in serious discussions should take offense at the 'slop talk' use of 'due process.' Trey Gowdy knows a lot more about the law than I do. But a couple of Sundays ago he  asked how much 'due process' Laken Riley's assailant showed her. Sean Hannity is another who has asked this question.

That got me thinking about what sort of 'due process' Ibarra should have shown Riley. "You have the right to plead, to pray, and to protest your upcoming rape and murder; you have in addition the right to avail yourself of the services of any well-armed Good Samaritan who might come along."

What were Gowdy and Hannity driving at? That wide-open borders are a recipe for disaster? That the very notion of legal due process needs to be re-thought? Unclear. Commentators who want to be taken seriously  should say what they mean and mean what they say.

Democrats are slop heads in the main; we expect incoherence, inanity, and slop talk from them. Conservatives ought not ape them.  Does my use of 'ape' make me a racist? What if I were to use such words as 'niggardly' and 'denigrate'?

The WAPO fentanyl 'mystery' is another good illustration of how contemptibly stupid our political enemies can be. Karoline Leavitt has fun with it.  In other news, her intersectional and highly 'wokified' predecessor has quit the Dems, and like 'Fake Jake' Tapper and others will endeavor to tap into the money to be made from telling tales of dementia and dysfunction in high places.

Further examples are easily multiplied beyond all necessity. "Tampon Tim" Walz is a bloody good source of them.

‘Old Hat’

It's an expression I have often used.

To say of something that it is old hat is to say that it is old, or well-known, or passé.

Wondering about the origin of this curious phrase, I turned to Robert Hendrickson, Encyclopedia of Word and Phrase Origins, 2nd ed. (2004), p. 529. What I found there surprised me:

Today old hat means out of date or not new, and it has meant this for at least a century. But back as early as 1754 it was "used by the vulgar in no very honorable sense," as Fielding put it. It then meant, in Grose's punning definition from his 1785 Classical Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue: "a woman's privities: because frequently felt."

This is no doubt interesting, but how does it explain the origin of the the adjectival phrase 'old hat'? That 'old hat' was once used as a noun by a certain class of people to refer to "a woman's privities" does nothing to show the origin of 'old hat' as currently and adjectivally used.

Journalists and the Spread of Illiteracy

CNN reported at the time that the footwear rule came into play after the local mountain rescue crews became exacerbated by having to rescue so many people tripping over their own feet. "These are difficult paths, in some cases, similar to mountain paths,” Patrizio Scarpellini, director of the Cinque Terre National Park, told CNN Travel. “Essential to have proper shoes!”