Language changes. Words frequently develop the opposite meaning of what they originally had—opposites seem to be semantically closer and more prone to switching than completely unrelated words. When a word changes meaning, it is not wrong to use it in the new way, and at some point it even becomes wrong to use it in the original way: if you used "terrific" to mean "inspiring terror", you would confuse most of your audience!
In this particular case what I find funny is that the author acknowledges that this semantic shift has been going on for hundreds of years and all that was holding it back was the language purists. According to their own account, when the purists fell out of favor in the 60s it was like a dam burst.
The "incorrect" usage recently overtook the correct one in published books:
https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=%22comprised+o...
My favourite examples, because it also emphasizes some kind of ambiguity in the concept itself, are the english words "host", "hosting", "hospitality", "hostile", "hostage", with roots in the latin "hostis" (enemy), and the indo-european "ghosti" (guest, stranger).
Gardens also grow. But if you don't maintain your garden, they ahem literally become weeded, cough figuratively speaking.
Languages belong to their speakers, and the only way we have to vote at the moment is with our idiolect.
If you write a patent, statement of work, product specification, or contract with the wrong word out of ignorance, you only have yourself to blame
The teachers lost that battle, like they'll lose all the similar battles to come, because they were trying to enforce communicating like old people.
The sentiment that I disagree with is defending an incorrect or at least ambiguous word choice when there is a clear alternative. The strikes me as simple stubbornness.
It's the weird value judgements that people like the author assign to different usages that really bother me. Objectively, "comprises of" is correct usage. It's the majority usage in books published today, and it's in all the dictionaries.
If TFA had left it at "it's ambiguous" I wouldn't blink, but they had to go off on a rant about how wrong the modern usage is, and that's a problem. It feels elitist and reactionary.
And I'm all for "language evolves" - but there's always going to be a time when you correct people. If you have a kid who calls the ambulance the "ambliance" (common one for kids where I'm from) you don't just shrug and say "language evolves", you try to teach them the correct way to speak, spell and write.
I don't know where the line is - what should be corrected and what should be absorbed in to English - but I feel like "comprised of" should be corrected.
I'd be the last person to say you're wrong. Matters of grammar and usage ultimately boil down to does it feel right and current usage. As is usual with these things, other people have different feelings about it. That's what dialect is I think.
"The teachers were unable to utilize the new computers" means something different from "The teachers were unable to use the new computers"
"use" - the teacher was unable to operate the computer at all (maybe they couldn't use the mouse, for example).
When X comprises Y, then Y constitutes X.
Or to use passive: X is made up of Y, X is comprised of Y. Y are encompassed by X.
"Is comprised of" is a totally cromulent use and I would claim it is more logical and more easily understood than the "X comprises Y" usage.
This post comprises good points.
This post consists of good points.
As a native speaker, I would say:
* Good points comprise this post.
* This post is comprised of good points.
I'm sure there's an interesting historical linguistics reason for the way things developed, but "comprised of" is well-established usage.
Additionally the verb to comprise isn't suitable here either, so it's going to sound awkward no matter how you try to rearrange the sentence. The "composed of" or "consists of" alternatives mentioned in the original page aren't really a good fit either.
There's no need to complicate things: this post contains many good points.
In truth if someone said or wrote any of these sentences, I wouldn't mind whatsoever. I know exactly what they meant and that's what matters. However since we're having a bit of fun, I figured I'd weigh in :)
I don't know how universal this is (I don't see anyone else making similar points yet..), but I use all three phrases because at least in my head they have subtle differences:
* "Comprised of" means the pieces make the whole, or at least the basis for the whole, and are an important part of it.
* "Composed of" drops the "important part of it" from "comprised of".
* "Consists of" is even broader, not only including "parts that make the whole" but also "a unit that can be broken into parts".
The differences aren't always relevant, but meaning is lost if they're treated as the same thing.
Edit: Found two further down on this page who each made one of my points, but not all three, so at least I'm not alone here.
The "is" shouldn't be there. I might be wrong tho, I'm not a native speaker.
There are items in the set that are good points.
All the items in the set are good points.
> 2: Compose, constitute
> //… a misconception as to what comprises a literary generation. — William Styron
> //… about 8 percent of our military forces are comprised of women. — Jimmy Carter
See also 'Due to the fact' -> 'because'
No, that doesn't work.
You could, however, say "Gaul is comprised of three parts".
https://www.englishclub.com/vocabulary/cw-comprise-comprised...
The verb ‘to comprise of’ can exist and have a different meaning that ‘to comprise’ or its passive ‘to be comprised by’ - and have a different passive (to be comprised of).
Like, the verbs ‘smell’ and ‘smell of’ do not mean the same thing, nor is one the passive of the other.
- I smell roses - roses are smelled by me - I smell of roses - roses are smelled of by me
Four very different meanings.
Acronyms are confusing.
But some people also say AC -acronyms confuse.
I thought of a byzantine WordPress site with editing history or something as well, for a moment, despite the context.
Wait, WP for Wikipedia isn't even an acronym, just an abbreviation!
If you read this far, sorry for wasting your time.
I'm still learning :high_five:
And, in defense of WP, W would not be a better option really, except for URLs.
Ironically, my locale's WP edition has failed to or didn't want to adopt /w/ instead of /wiki/ as the leading path segment for Wikipedia articles, as opposed to the English edition.
Also, thinking about this makes me want to search for edit wars and discussion about US vs British spelling on Wikipedia.
Wickedly Pernicious.
That makes as much sense as saying that "ne... pas" in French is a double negative and therefore "simply wrong" to use as a straight negative.
No -- language isn't math, and English and other languages are chock-full of inconsistencies and seemingly "illogical" things. Language ultimately rests on convention, on real life usage -- not logic. Arguing that a common usage is illogical is fighting against the tide.
It's absurd that English speakers are so tolerant of incorrect usage. It's partly the pedagogic principle that "All shall have prizes" at the school sports day; but it's significant that if you try to correct incorrect usage, you get referred to literary figures such as poets and playwrights that used some term incorrectly, as if people like (e.g.) Pepys are authorities.
Or, one can just as easily say it's absurd that certain pedants are so intolerant of evolving usage.
Language does not proceed by logical deduction. It is shared convention, no more and no less. If a majority of people think a new usage is right, then that's just what the usage is.
When you say "incorrect usage", incorrect according to whom? You? A minority? Why should anyone else take that seriously when they're already communicating just fine?
The reasons given were 1) British colonialism 2) Post WWII American hegemony 3) No one cares if you speak it poorly.
And this is maybe just a slightly more charitable rephrasing of #3 but very open to loan words and alternative ways of phrasing things.
Isn't it common to drop the "ne" in colloquial speech?
The son in the family I stayed with on on a school trip back then found it hilarious how often I used "ne ... pas" instead of just "pas", e.g. "c'est pas grave" [1] rather than "ce n'est pas grave".
[1] Here's a song titled "c'est pas grave" by French group Columbine: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_yyjPxvNLGk
It's almost as if, contrary to what the person three comments up says, languages evolve over time...
You have absolutely no idea what you’re talking about. Please learn French before spouting off so confidently about it.
Thank you so much for this. I do it to. Same with "incentivize" -> "incent
stop the madness!
In order to examine natural languages using the scientific method, linguists gather data (i.e. native speakers' spoken or written communication) and then analyze this (i.e. find predictive models of this data). Gathering data, then claiming the data is wrong is epistemologically unfounded. Languages simply are the way they are. This would be like gathering data from Hubble and then deciding photons are wrong because their behavior mismatch with Newtonian laws.
Not necessarily true. There are authoritative guides on English (e.g. the Webster dictionary) that grammar is measured up against. In fact, the main reason we have standardized spelling instead of people just writing what seemed right is because people actively tried to enforce a right and wrong way of spelling.
This is exactly wrong. Webster's is not prescriptivist; a dictionary describes a language as it is, not as it "should" be (indeed, there is no such thing).
For instance, the word "biweekly" now means both "once every two weeks" and "twice per week". I don't mind usage of that word for those two meanings. Obviously, linguists can gather data and analyze how it's being used. They may conclude that one meaning was more favored 50 years ago and the other meaning is now.
But when I'm reading an encyclopedia, I'd prefer it to avoid this ambiguous word.
Some time later, I came across the usage "X comprises Y and Z" and, based on my previous understanding that "comprise" == "compose," I took that to mean "X composes Y and Z" which, in other words, means "Y and Z are made up of X". But really, it means the other way around which is that "X is made up of Y and Z!" Only when I learned about the dual meaning of "comprise" did I correctly understand it to mean the latter.
To this day, I still have to actively juggle this arbitrary "dual-rule" in my head when I come across "comprise."
This is what an editor should do. What's the problem? Let them spend their time on it if they like, it seems like most times no one even notices the change.
It's not being pedantic if you are doing it to improve real life readability based on real feedback, even if it seems trivial.
What “bet”, “cap”, “rizz” and others used by the younger population isn’t wrong, it’s different and an evolution of certain terms.
I don’t study linguistics, but I can be sure there are terms we use today and take as normal-speak that were once the center of a younger generation’s slang vernacular.
An extreme example is the word retard. Years ago in normal speak you could say “After the EPA enacted stricter emissions regulations, this initially retarded the development of sports cars until new technology was implemented” other obvious examples are the medical angle of the word.
Today, you could use the word in such a way, it’s technically correct, however you’ll most likely get some odd looks.
Most uses of it today are either in specific comedic circles, or derogatorily towards another person/thing/animal etc
Some rate of language change has to be accepted, but it needn't be as fast as if we rejected all prescriptivism.
We each prescribe or refuse to prescribe language rules as we see fit, and thus the language evolves at some natural rate.
We do need some grammar/spelling pedantry.
More importantly, taken to an extreme, descriptivism describes language in the way a map describes the territory. Any time a person speaks and is understood, no matter how badly, end-stage descriptivism has to allow their diction as syntactically and semantically valid in the language in which they spoke. The most you can say is that some expressions are rarer than others (you see "was done well" much more often than you see "was done good").
But this is also a wrong way of talking about language, just as much the old prescriptivist way was wrong. People are not static language replication machines, learning how to speak purely from imitation of their elders and community, and observed from on high by language anthropologists seeking to observe how they behave. They are concept-builders, rule-learners. They have a sense for not just how to speak in particular cases, but also what it is to speak well. It is this public sense of correct speech that is the subject of evolution over time, and is therefore also the proper target for descriptivist accounts of language.
Writing is similar to speech, but in writing most people are even more keyed to correctness, and less keyed to achieving the bare minimum of communication. Rules are stickier. We ought to understand this Wikipedia editor not as a noxious outsider to the evolution of language, who like the anthropologist inserts prescriptivist rules where they are unwanted, but as someone who is part of the normal evolution of language itself and therefore part of the terrain to be described! There have always been people who have been sticklers for particular rules.
This is nonsense. Do you really believe language is subject to intentional human control?
(Of course if a dictator comes and kills half a million people for things including changing language like it happened in my country, then it is, but this is a very rare exception.)
Some, yes. You speak roughly the same language(s) as your parents, friends, teachers, etc. Their influence on how you speak and write -especially when you were young- is quite large.
Yes, as is not splitting infinitives. All nonsense. But "comprised of" is not nonsense. "Irregardless" is wrong". Etc. Not all prescriptions are nonsense.
seriously tho if descriptivists had the courage of their convictions they would just stop capitalizing, there's no reason to
Good usage improves clarity. This is why editors have style guides.
It may not be your personal preferred usage, but it certainly isn't "bad usage" if a major American dictionary approves.
For instance, I was once CC'd on an email thread at work where a senior leader made an obvious typo in reference to some Thing and everybody else on the thread blindly parroted it. This "alternate" usage was established and used systematically in the local context, but it led to a significant decline in general clarity and interpretability, and it was also not durable beyond the context of that thread. It was a mistake, simple as that.
"Comprised of" is probably past the threshold at this point, much like "rate of speed" and "how <thing> looks like" and so on and so forth. But—and I know this is shocking to some people—"correct" use of language does have significant advantages for communicating clearly, especially in writing. Prescriptivism and descriptivism both have their adherents because neither is right or wrong in the naive absolutist sense—balance is key.
Think about
“I walk to work.”
and
“I walk in order to work.”
Close, but not quite the same.
I think you mean "leverage".
Not all heroes wear capes. I also chafe at that misuse so I'm glad to read of your efforts.
In every other respect, "use" is indeed better.
I've never heard of that usage for utilize in my life. In a cursory search, I see that the definition of utilize is "to make use of", which to me sounds the same as "use".
Whenever I come across the word "utilize" in WP, I change it to "use" (with the edit comment "Don't utilize utilize"). Nobody's ever reverted me for that.
I think there is a proper use for the verb "utilize": it means "to render useful". But usually, it's just a substitute for "use" that sounds more erudite, or something. I think to utilize something is to take something that is useless, and turn it into something useful. That's not the same as using the thing.