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I'm not trying to 'get past this', I'm trying to express my disbelief at the fact that: A - Things have gotten to the point where we can't talk about a damn se

I'm not trying to 'get past this', I'm trying to express my disbelief at the fact that: A - Things have gotten to the point where we can't talk about a damn season without personal interpretations of it; B - This has seeped into Hacker News, a forum I thought was for more diligent folks.

lozenge 4y ago
For a street artist, winter might mean when it's too dark to perform. For a farmer, it might mean when the animals need to be kept in a barn. And for a commodities trader, it means when demand for gas is high.
EdwardDiego 4y ago
Language is fluid. And with climate change, traditional seasons aren't nearly as useful in discussion as they used to be. In my area of my country, our autumn used to be the time of big stable highs giving rise to clear days and frosts overnight. Great time of year to go hiking, minimal chance of intense rainfall or snowfall in the high country. Now the weather in autumn resembles that in spring - predominant north west winds that bring intense rainfall to the west, heavy snowfall on the tops, and hot dry days to the east. I feel you're still getting hung up on definitions that are becoming more obsolete by the year. Lastly, from my limited experience of Germany, the most miserable weather tends to come late October - November. It's not technically winter, but it's a frigging cold and miserable time of year.
- ThalesX 4y ago
  > And with climate change, traditional seasons aren't nearly as useful in discussion as they used to be. It's definitely a bit more useful than arbitrary subjective interpretations of said terms based on hyperlocal weather patterns. > I feel you're still getting hung up on definitions that are becoming more obsolete by the year. I feel like you're not getting hung up enough on the definition of a definition. This might or might not be true, just how like if I feel that April is cold, it doesn't make it winter.
  - EdwardDiego 4y ago
    Agree to disagree I think.
  - dogcatter 4y ago
    Lolol, you're the best example I've seen of "hacker news guy meets ambiguities in real language usage, can't handle it". > I feel like you're not getting hung up enough on the definition of a definition. This might or might not be true, just how like if I feel that April is cold, it doesn't make it winter. Meet interpersonal linguistic negotiation. Since in most Northern places most people feel cold roughly between November and March, no your one personal experience doesn't matter. Just like 'tall' is a perfectly useful word, even though it doesn't have a precise meaning in terms of number of millimetres.
    - ThalesX 4y ago
      - dogcatter 4y ago
        The only reason discourse has degenerated is because you made it about the meanings of words. Everyone else on this thread is having a pretty productive conversation.
- rocketbop 4y ago
  > Lastly, from my limited experience of Germany, the most miserable weather tends to come late October - November. For what it's worth, if anything, this is certainly not true. Generally January and February are the coldest months in Germany, and if by miserable you mean dark, grey or snowy, it's also January and February.
  - luckylion 4y ago
    I believe they might have meant that it comes in October/November, not that it's gone by December. It stays "miserable" until spring, with January and February being the coldest and snowiest.
    - baq 4y ago
      The point is that just freezing cold is not miserable. Autumn weather with days getting very noticeably shorter and it’s cold but not freezing and gray for weeks is quite depressing for many. In contrast, proper winter with snow and days getting longer feels much better even if you need warmer clothes and more heating. This year and next will be a bit different as everyone will be very conscious about gas prices, but purely from weather perspective early December is the worst.
      - saghm 4y ago
        > The point is that just freezing cold is not miserable I think the fact that what is most "miserable" to people varies so much is why trying to use the names for seasons to apply to whichever weather you dislike the most is confusing. I prefer the cold to the heat, and I'm much more miserable in hot humid days due to sweating than I am in the cold when I can bundle up and feel mostly fine, but it would be absurd for me to refer to June through September as "winter" in the northern hemisphere based on this.
lucumo 4y ago
You must be fun at parties. Things haven't "gotten" to this point. It has always been thus. Kindergarten definitions leave out many nuances. Definitions are nearly always dependent on context, are nearly always fuzzy around the edges, and are nearly always subject to usefulness. And then we aren't even discussing metaphors, hyperbole, pars pro toto, tota pro paribus, other kinds of metonymy, and more figures of speech. Context made it perfectly clear what was meant here. It's a far more useful usage than the kindergarten level definition where winter starts at the winter solstice and not a day sooner.
NikolaNovak 4y ago
I'm normally the pedantic one but I've observed and participated in casual usage of term winter over the last 40 years across 5 countries three languages plus dialects and two continents. This isn't new :) Very large number of people in large number of countries will consider e. G. November "winter". It's cold, it's dark, it's snowing - the informal but practical definitions of "winter". It's not a sign of linguistic or social apocalypse. It's just people communicating.
- NikolaNovak 4y ago
  Update : I've talked to a few of my friends and one point they made was that winters arr not equal everywhere in the colloquial daily sense. It's quite normal and meaningful and easily interpreted to say that "winters are longer in Canada than in North Carolina". Or that Nova Scotia has longer autumn than Ontario. In other words there are places that may have a short winter (I.e. Short period of extreme cold and snow, with very dark nights etc) and places that have long winter. Not astronomically correct but semantically and practically useful.
ReptileMan 4y ago
>Things have gotten to the point where we can't talk about a damn season without personal interpretations of it If by personal you mean around the 5-600 million people that will totally get the context of winter = heating season especially when we are discussing gas for heating.
hnfong 4y ago
> can't talk about [...] without personal interpretations Congratulations, you've discovered a Truth. Further reading: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Language_game_(philosophy) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Language_game_(philosophy)

lozenge 4y ago

For a street artist, winter might mean when it's too dark to perform. For a farmer, it might mean when the animals need to be kept in a barn. And for a commodities trader, it means when demand for gas is high.

EdwardDiego 4y ago

Language is fluid. And with climate change, traditional seasons aren't nearly as useful in discussion as they used to be. In my area of my country, our autumn used to be the time of big stable highs giving rise to clear days and frosts overnight. Great time of year to go hiking, minimal chance of intense rainfall or snowfall in the high country. Now the weather in autumn resembles that in spring - predominant north west winds that bring intense rainfall to the west, heavy snowfall on the tops, and hot dry days to the east. I feel you're still getting hung up on definitions that are becoming more obsolete by the year. Lastly, from my limited experience of Germany, the most miserable weather tends to come late October - November. It's not technically winter, but it's a frigging cold and miserable time of year.

ThalesX 4y ago
> And with climate change, traditional seasons aren't nearly as useful in discussion as they used to be. It's definitely a bit more useful than arbitrary subjective interpretations of said terms based on hyperlocal weather patterns. > I feel you're still getting hung up on definitions that are becoming more obsolete by the year. I feel like you're not getting hung up enough on the definition of a definition. This might or might not be true, just how like if I feel that April is cold, it doesn't make it winter.
- EdwardDiego 4y ago
  Agree to disagree I think.
- dogcatter 4y ago
  Lolol, you're the best example I've seen of "hacker news guy meets ambiguities in real language usage, can't handle it". > I feel like you're not getting hung up enough on the definition of a definition. This might or might not be true, just how like if I feel that April is cold, it doesn't make it winter. Meet interpersonal linguistic negotiation. Since in most Northern places most people feel cold roughly between November and March, no your one personal experience doesn't matter. Just like 'tall' is a perfectly useful word, even though it doesn't have a precise meaning in terms of number of millimetres.
  - ThalesX 4y ago
    - dogcatter 4y ago
      The only reason discourse has degenerated is because you made it about the meanings of words. Everyone else on this thread is having a pretty productive conversation.
rocketbop 4y ago
> Lastly, from my limited experience of Germany, the most miserable weather tends to come late October - November. For what it's worth, if anything, this is certainly not true. Generally January and February are the coldest months in Germany, and if by miserable you mean dark, grey or snowy, it's also January and February.
- luckylion 4y ago
  I believe they might have meant that it comes in October/November, not that it's gone by December. It stays "miserable" until spring, with January and February being the coldest and snowiest.
  - baq 4y ago
    The point is that just freezing cold is not miserable. Autumn weather with days getting very noticeably shorter and it’s cold but not freezing and gray for weeks is quite depressing for many. In contrast, proper winter with snow and days getting longer feels much better even if you need warmer clothes and more heating. This year and next will be a bit different as everyone will be very conscious about gas prices, but purely from weather perspective early December is the worst.
    - saghm 4y ago
      > The point is that just freezing cold is not miserable I think the fact that what is most "miserable" to people varies so much is why trying to use the names for seasons to apply to whichever weather you dislike the most is confusing. I prefer the cold to the heat, and I'm much more miserable in hot humid days due to sweating than I am in the cold when I can bundle up and feel mostly fine, but it would be absurd for me to refer to June through September as "winter" in the northern hemisphere based on this.

lucumo 4y ago

You must be fun at parties. Things haven't "gotten" to this point. It has always been thus. Kindergarten definitions leave out many nuances. Definitions are nearly always dependent on context, are nearly always fuzzy around the edges, and are nearly always subject to usefulness. And then we aren't even discussing metaphors, hyperbole, pars pro toto, tota pro paribus, other kinds of metonymy, and more figures of speech. Context made it perfectly clear what was meant here. It's a far more useful usage than the kindergarten level definition where winter starts at the winter solstice and not a day sooner.

NikolaNovak 4y ago

I'm normally the pedantic one but I've observed and participated in casual usage of term winter over the last 40 years across 5 countries three languages plus dialects and two continents. This isn't new :) Very large number of people in large number of countries will consider e. G. November "winter". It's cold, it's dark, it's snowing - the informal but practical definitions of "winter". It's not a sign of linguistic or social apocalypse. It's just people communicating.

NikolaNovak 4y ago
Update : I've talked to a few of my friends and one point they made was that winters arr not equal everywhere in the colloquial daily sense. It's quite normal and meaningful and easily interpreted to say that "winters are longer in Canada than in North Carolina". Or that Nova Scotia has longer autumn than Ontario. In other words there are places that may have a short winter (I.e. Short period of extreme cold and snow, with very dark nights etc) and places that have long winter. Not astronomically correct but semantically and practically useful.

ReptileMan 4y ago

>Things have gotten to the point where we can't talk about a damn season without personal interpretations of it If by personal you mean around the 5-600 million people that will totally get the context of winter = heating season especially when we are discussing gas for heating.

hnfong 4y ago

> can't talk about [...] without personal interpretations Congratulations, you've discovered a Truth. Further reading: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Language_game_(philosophy) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Language_game_(philosophy)