And you think they decide what goes into the dictionary on a whim?
I said nothing of the sort--YOU put "whim", "guess", etc into that statement, not me, and I'll thank you to limit your criticisms of my arguments to my
actual arguments. I perhaps wasn't very clear, but I did point to what criteria they used: the use of the word by writers in English. I also pointed out the differnece between a definitive version of the language--such as Arabic has and French tries to have--and informing readers of how words are used--such as English has. I've no doubt that Lexicographers put a great deal of effort into ensuring that they have the most up-to-date versions of the words; I've some knowledge of the process, and it's quite involved and difficult, as well as mostly objective (no insult here; a certain amount of subjectivity is inevitable and frankly advisable). But that still leaves you with two undeniable and insurmountable problems:
1) Lexicographers don't generate the definitions, they report them. Therefore dictionaries cannot be the definitive version of the English language; use of the language is.
2) Anyone can change the definition of the words via altering their use (this is how slang arises), and therefore lexicographers are ALWAYS behind the times. Not a bad thing; every textbook is out of date when it's published. It's just something we must bear in mind.
These don't destroy the utility of dictionaries, but they do place limits on the usefullness of the books (again, not a bad thing--acknowledginig the limits of a tool is the first sign one understands that tool). And they certainly demonstrate that merely pointing to a dictionary is an insufficient argument, which is MY pet peeve.
Dictionaries are important. They help establish the uses of the words, and
in general provide a common basis for understanding of what terms mean. If I use a word that you're not familiar with, a dictionary is a fantastic starting point for figuring out what the word means. However, the limitations of dictionaries should be acknowledged along with their utility. Because English is a living language, and because English dictionaries don't have the authority to dictate what the language is, and instead rely on reporting how words are used, one must always be prepared to discover that a word is being used in a discussion in a novel way (or at least a way that is novel to you). That's all I meant.
It's not just me saying this, by the way. I've had numerous discussions of this with my sister (a professor of British Literature, so she's not exactly a slouch when it comes to this topic) and she's the one that convinced me of this stance.
Plus, there's the fact, rather inconvenient to your arguments, that the dictionaries themselves agree with me.
Merriam-Webster said:
To decide which words to include in the dictionary and to determine what they mean, Merriam-Webster editors study the language as it's used. They carefully monitor which words people use most often and how they use them.
As I understand it, they focus on writing because diction is far too transient (often less than a single generation).
Quite obviously, different dictionaries have different criteria, both formally (ie, the written protocols) and informally (ie, a human being makes the final choice, and it won't be the same human being for every dictionary). However, I've yet to see an English dictionary that didn't follow some version of the above. Some dictionaries take a more agressive role in keeping the language sophisticated, but the history of English more or less demonstrates that to be a classist tactic more than anything else.
And just what are these "true definitions" to which you allude? Are they handed down from on high by the Great Gods of Language?
Well.....pretty much, yeah.
Here's one example. It's not handed down form the Great Gods of Language, but it's certainly handed down from an authority over the French language. The efficacy of this authority is of course subject to question; my point is that the existence of the body demonstrates an attempt to provide a definitive version of the language, in contrast to the role dictionaries play in the English language.
As I said earlier, Arabic is another example of this. The Qoran/Koran/however you spell it in these letters is viewed as the definitive version of Arabic by many Muslims. Since no holy book originated in the English Language, there is obviously no correlary in the English language.
There are other languages which have similar authorities, but I can't think of them off-hand. People have tried with English, often in attempts to make it more like Latin, but they've been met with resounding failures, particularly in the vernacular (a lot of the rules appear to be intended to re-enforce class distinctions). You yourself, in your ravings about finding the Holy Grail, admit that English has no such authority. That leaves dictionaries with the still-tremendous task of informing us on how the words are used, rather than the task of telling us definitively what words mean.
mike3 said:
However, I didn't see anything about the specific use of the incantation "Bloody Mary" in the process. Has any research been done as to whether or not using "Bloody Mary" changes or affects the image somehow, or speeds the process (which it might, since you're making a prompting to your mind when you say it)?
It's a children's game, not part of any psychological protocols. When I was a kid, we'd try to get each other to say it to a mirror in a dark room during sleep-overs.
