I do agree that the terminology isn't ideal and easily misleading, that's why it's so commonly used incorrectly. And weakening might be more fitting than punish

I do agree that the terminology isn't ideal and easily misleading, that's why it's so commonly used incorrectly. And weakening might be more fitting than punishment. > So, linguistically speaking, using the term "negative reinforcement" to mean "weakening by removal of a positive stimulus" rather than "reinforcement via application of a negative stimulus" is simply misleading, and bad choice of terminology. Using your terminology "Negative reinforcement" actually means "reinforcement by removal of a negative stimulus". "Weakening by removal of a positive stimulus" is the description of negative punishment. The crux of the problem is that positive and negative are not a descriptive property of the stimulus in this context, but just synonyms for additive/subtractive and I agree that this is misleading.