I try to use it to mean ~ 1/10th - given the origins of the word, and the availability of 'devastate' as a more appropriate word to describe 'near total destruction'.

I think it's one of those cases where people have heard decimate, not known what it means, think it sounds more sophisticated than devastate, and have substituted it in. It makes the language poorer for people who understand the distinction, as our communication would benefit from increased nuance, rather than myriad synonyms.

Hah. I only use it when members of a group are forced to encircle and club one in ten of their comrades to death in front of their officers.

I don't use it very often.

Very droll.

I think if we were speaking Italian (or similar) and using the word 'decimātus' or 'decimatio' then that could be more convincingly argued.

In the case of English assimilating, as it does so often and so eagerly, words from other languages, decimate was probably first used in English only a half millennia ago - so it was adopting the generic 1/10th, rather than the murder your friends, context.

I note dictionary.org has a nod to the etymology. From https://www.dictionary.com/browse/decimated :

"The earliest English sense of decimate is “to select by lot and execute every tenth soldier of (a unit).” The extended sense “destroy a great number or proportion of” developed in the 19th century: Cholera decimated the urban population. Because the etymological sense of one-tenth remains to some extent, decimate is not ordinarily used with exact fractions or percentages: Drought has destroyed (not decimated) nearly 80 percent of the cattle."

I don't know if this works as proof that languages get poorer (overall). What I do know is that it is not uncommon for meanings to evolve and for new words to appear to (possibly?) cover for lost meanings.

Considering that most languages now are considered to be part of handful root-languages (ie. Indoeuropean) the macrotrend I see is for languages to get more diverse - for many a measurement of richness.

I think it's a somewhat snobbish assumption that a language becomes poorer because the meaning of particular words drift. It doesn't take into account, as you say, the many, many new words that enter our lexicon.

Of course, those who make this assumption will probably thumb their nose at how 'unsophisticated' these new words are.

It's a weird hill to die on. Language should be fun!

> I think it's a somewhat snobbish assumption that a language becomes poorer because the meaning of particular words drift.

This is very much not what I said.

My claim is that by reducing the variation and nuance available in the language by reducing the precision of some words such that they are then mere synonyms of several other words -- results in a poorer language, and (perhaps) poorer cognitive opportunities for speakers & writers of that language.

Meaning of words definitely do drift, and that's okay. What I resist is the perhaps ineluctable drift towards a lowest common denominator of usage.

For what it's worth I find language much more fun when I can stretch it to its (or rather my) fullest, appreciating the history and subtlety of words and phrases I employ, rather than wishing for language to be pedestrian and exclusively utilitarian.

>> Of course, those who make this assumption will probably thumb their nose at how 'unsophisticated' these new words are.

> For what it's worth I find language much more fun when I can stretch it to its (or rather my) fullest, appreciating the history and subtlety of words and phrases I employ, rather than wishing for language to be pedestrian and exclusively utilitarian.

Thanks for confirming my suspicion.

You're dismissing the ever-evolving lexicon as 'pedestrian' and 'utilitarian'? I mean, really?

"Pedestrian": the cup final was a pedestrian affair: dull, plodding, boring, tedious, monotonous, uneventful, unremarkable, tiresome, wearisome, uninspired, uncreative, unimaginative, unexciting, uninteresting, lifeless, dry; unvarying, unvaried, repetitive, repetitious, routine, commonplace, average, workaday; ordinary, everyday, unoriginal, derivative, mediocre, run-of-the-mill, flat, prosaic, matter-of-fact, turgid, stodgy, mundane, humdrum; informal OK, so-so, bog-standard, vanilla, plain vanilla, nothing to write home about, not so hot, not up to much

How does that describe the vibrant new words used all around us? "Lol" is old-skool at this point, perhaps, but it carries meaning that is very different from "Haha" or "That's funny". "old-skool" itself has kind of made a come-back, but not quite. it's confusing, but far from dull. I imagine anyone using it to be either a millennial or a Gen-X'er.

Then we've got 'woke', which is definitely not 'woke' anymore, but it was, and it means something specific.

That's not to mention how local slang may or may not break out onto the national stage. A word like 'matties' could be considered similar to 'buddies' or 'mates', but it's not. it's a bit more like 'brothers' or 'bros' but then it really isn't.

I fully respect and share your enjoyment of the history and subtlety of language. I probably look up etymologies of various words more than once a day. It excited me to find out what decimate meant once upon a time.

But holy fucking shit is it not possible to enjoy all that without being a snob? I can't even. Surely you can enjoy what has been without dismissing what is going on and what will come? I mean, are you like fifty and mad about it or some shit? Gosh!

(that last paragraph was me mashing together what I feel are generationally distinct expressions, more than me actually being really upset about all this)

My point is that I love the exact meanings of words but I really don't have any reason to believe language is becoming more impoverished as it evolves. If anything English is like the Borg assimilating all other cultures or languages. I'd love to hear anything but what seems to me to be plain pretentiousness or snobbishness as an argument to the contrary, though. Truly.

> You're dismissing the ever-evolving lexicon as 'pedestrian' and 'utilitarian'? I mean, really?

Again, you're attributing things to me that I am not saying.

> "Lol" is old-skool at this point, perhaps, but it carries meaning that is very different from "Haha" or "That's funny".

It sounds like you actually do understand my point -- that the subtle distinctions between words that may, prima facie, appear synonyms, is a useful feature of the language.

Imagine your reaction to 'lol' being given the same meaning as 'haha' or 'that's funny' ... and you will understand my point about 'decimate' becoming just another way of spelling 'devastate'.

It has nothing to do with English. It was a practice that some ancient armies (Romans, IIRC) did with defeated populations, when they had refused to surrender.

It's now used when you mean that a sizeable part of a population dies, not necessarily one tenth, but it's interesting to remember the origin of the expression.

It was actually used on Roman soldiers for capital offenses (cowardice, rebellion/treason, etc). The cohort being punished would be divided into groups of 10, then draw lots. The "lucky" 9 were then expected to kill the 10th.

That's incorrect. It had nothing to do with defeated populations either.