4 ms·
OT: Am I wrong in thinking the correct word to use here would be "deceptive" instead of "deceiving"? "Deceiving" in this context just sounds wrong to me but I f
by modeless 4y ago
OT: Am I wrong in thinking the correct word to use here would be "deceptive" instead of "deceiving"? "Deceiving" in this context just sounds wrong to me but I feel like I'm suddenly hearing it a lot these days.
- P5fRxh5kUvp2th 4y agoDeceptive is the better word as it's passive, deceiving is more active. I think they're both technically correct, but there's a nuance in their meaning.
- jhanschoo 4y agoThey are words that have come to English via different routes. "Deceiving" is the present participle of "to deceive", with the earliest common ancestor being the Latin noun decipio. The passive past participle of this noun in Latin is "deceptum", and on this form it is common to derive an adjective with a postfix "-ivus", hence "deceptivus". This word then enters English in a parallel manner, giving "deceptive". In this case they have identical meaning in context, but there's frequently unpredictable semantic drift in these pairs, if both do end up in English.
- jhanschoo 4y agoSmall correction: > The passive past participle of this noun should read > The perfect passive participle of this verb
- SteveNuts 4y ago"Deceivingly dangerous" would sound better, imo
- brigandish 4y agoIf only because of the novelty in that phrasing, but ascribing some kind of (nefarious) intention to an object is a common rhetorical technique.