Vocab!!

Anton_

Anton_
I would not presume to criticise a fellow poster's use of any language, but I do think that GalNet news should be getting it right. The latest Falisci article is a case in point:

View attachment 18574

"Decimate" means to kill one out of every ten (see here). As the GalNet text stands, "Imperial forces have killed one in ten of the majority of the Falisci Purple Gang's fleet, ... etc." I'm no mind reader, but I'm pretty sure that's not what the author had in mind!
 

Anopheles

Anopheles
Anton_ said:
I would not presume to criticise a fellow poster's use of any language, but I do think that GalNet news should be getting it right. The latest Falisci article is a case in point:

View attachment 18574

"Decimate" means to kill one out of every ten (see here). As the GalNet text stands, "Imperial forces have killed one in ten of the majority of the Falisci Purple Gang's fleet, ... etc." I'm no mind reader, but I'm pretty sure that's not what the author had in mind!
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THe meaning of words change. 'Horrid' no longer means 'prickly', 'nice' no longer means 'precise', etc. Al Fresco in English means to eat outside, in the original Italian it developed into 'in prison'.
 
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ijam

I
I agree in principle with the original poster, but...

From the Oxford dictionary:
"Historically, the meaning of the word decimate is ‘kill one in every ten of (a group of people)’. This sense has been more or less totally superseded by the later, more general sense ‘kill, destroy, or remove a large proportion of’, as in the virus has decimated the population. Some traditionalists argue that this is incorrect, but it is clear that it is now part of standard English."

I'm crying inside a little.
 

Engadine

E
decimate
ˈdɛsɪmeɪt/
verb
verb: decimate; 3rd person present: decimates; past tense: decimated; past participle: decimated; gerund or present participle: decimating

  • 1.
    kill, destroy, or remove a large proportion of.
    "the inhabitants of the country had been decimated"

    • drastically reduce the strength or effectiveness of (something).
      "public transport has been decimated"





  • 2.
    historical
    kill one in every ten of (a group of people, originally a mutinous Roman legion) as a punishment for the whole group.
    "the man who is to determine whether it be necessary to decimate a large body of mutineers"



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Does this put the OP's mind to rest?

/Thread
 

Vasious

Vasious
It is the wrong use of the word, but everyone uses it wrongly and it gets in the dictionary and becomes correct.
And that is why, if we still have dictionaries and not just app icons, future dictionary will be in text-speech.
 

kaaldesh

K
Agreed with others in this thread. There are several Gal-Net examples of blatantly wrong words, and misspelled words - this is not one of them. Decimate stopped meaning kill one in every ten about the time Romans pulled out of England.
 

Korenwolf

K
Anton_ said:
"Decimate" means to kill one out of every ten (see here). As the GalNet text stands, "Imperial forces have killed one in ten of the majority of the Falisci Purple Gang's fleet, ... etc." I'm no mind reader, but I'm pretty sure that's not what the author had in mind!
Click to expand...

That may have been the original meaning during the roman period, however it hasn't meant that for a very long time, if you're going to pick a pendantic argument at least pick one where you have a chance of actually having a point.

http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/decimate

--[ - ]--
Historically, the meaning of the word decimate is ‘kill one in every ten of (a group of people)’. This sense has been more or less totally superseded by the later, more general sense ‘kill, destroy, or remove a large proportion of’, as in the virus has decimated the population. Some traditionalists argue that this is incorrect, but it is clear that it is now part of standard English.
--[ - ]--
 

metatheurgist

metatheurgist
kaaldesh said:
Agreed with others in this thread. There are several Gal-Net examples of blatantly wrong words, and misspelled words - this is not one of them. Decimate stopped meaning kill one in every ten about the time Romans pulled out of England.
Click to expand...

I think it's actually fairly modern. I'm not a fan of the modern use, "decimate" was a unique word, there were already plenty of great sounding words that covered the same ground - destroy, annihilate, devastate, obliterate, exterminate....
 

Jukelo

Jukelo
The funny thing about language, is that words have the meaning that people give them.
As cultures evolve and the shared experience of the people belonging to these culture changes, new concepts are associated with words and old concepts become obsolete.

In short, get with the times.
 
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