SC - Feast Stories from 11th Night Investiture (LONG)

[Laura C. Minnick]

In a message dated 12/11/99 3:30:24 AM Eastern Standard Time, 
cclark at vicon.net writes:

<< BTW, I checked my dictionary and didn't find any definitions equating
 grains/kernels with berries. And that is as it should be. >>

I suppose this is correct if you wish a language to become stagnant and dead. 
There are many languages that fit the picture of perfection you describe. 
Latin comes first to mind. No one speaks Latin. So if you wish the standards 
you tout so highly to be rigorously and unyieldingly applied to English, I 
would assume that you wish English to become a dead language? 

Agriculture and food sciences recognizes the term wheat berries' a a precise 
term. We are discussing food science and agricultural on this under list most 
circumstances. When we are not this is readily apparent to all. So I submit 
that botanically correct terms, while sometimes useful to a few people on 
this list for specific needs, for the most part add confusion and unnecessary 
burdens when they are applied in situations where using industry standard 
terms (e.g., wheat berries) immediately creates common ground and facilitates 
communication.

Amazingly, you seem to be the only person that I know, or have ever known, 
that seems to have any difficulty differentiating between strawberries and 
wheat berries without being confused.

(BTW, going by the 'ideal' language standards you propose, the word 'silly' 
in the manner you used it was incorrect since by those standards it means 
'happy, innocent, pitiable.' It's use as a term for helpless/weak (archaic), 
rustic/plain, lowly in station (obsolete), humble, weak in intellect 
(foolish), exhibiting or indicative of a lack of common sense or sound 
judgment, trifling/frivolous and being stunned or dazed well outside the 
original meaning of the word).

Ras

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