Oh, you want to hit people with garbage cans? Now I got to cut ya. It may be the case that most of the popular usage runs afoul of Fowler. But that was only to

Oh, you want to hit people with garbage cans? Now I got to cut ya. It may be the case that most of the popular usage runs afoul of Fowler. But that was only to point out that, leaving aside some more or less confusing idioms, language doesn't stay put for the grammarians and dictionary writers, embrace change. My point was an aesthetic one. Regardless, abusus non tollit usum. In my own usage, I don't see the logical flaw you do. I gave special leave for surgeons and pianists to leave off changing their own tires. Consider if my post were in a legal code or on a sign. "Surgeons and pianists are exempted from tire-changing duty." Does that make it clearer? How is that different from what you're claiming is the "logically" correct use? I like Bacon's formulation: "In Lawes and Statutes of a compendious stile, extention may be made more freely; but in those Lawes which are punctuall in the enumeration of Cases Particular, more warily: for as exception strengthens the force of a Law, in Cases not excepted; so enumeration weakens it, in Cases not enumerated." I punctually enumerated the limited exceptions (surgeons/pianists), thereby strengthening the force of the compendious rule (change your own tire, if reasonably able) in cases not excepted (able-bodied men). QED. On a meta-argument level, I agree logic isn't a popularity contest but I don't need to point out to you your logical sins of commission here: Appeal to extremes (reductio), appeal to false authority (verecundiam), slippery slope (reductio), ridicule (ridiculum), tradition (antiquitatem), intensional fallacy, false distinction...what else? I would add it's a "discourse red flag" when people confidently try to weaponize logical forms and legal maxims they can't handle. It's like watching a child fighting with a stick he can barely lift. It quickly becomes comical. Maybe you are missing your mistake because you're engaging in open-ended exceptionalism, the form that weakens the rule in cases not enumerated. In other words, because you proposed hypothetical disconfirming evidence (a bit ham-fistedly, tbh), maybe you are mentally carrying that forward in your own mind thinking you could come up with other examples that would further strengthen your case, but without making them explicit (minimal enumeration -- you proposed a list of exceptions with one element). Not very persuasive and actually a particularly obnoxious way to argue which I didn't point out initially because it's so common and has to be worked around in a spirit of charity (pro tip: you can't cavil with every objectionable point, there isn't time). Somehow people think pointing out instances of exceptions wins the day when all it does is suggest the need for enumerated exceptions. It may be a particularly American instinct because of a general bias to universalism (not possible in practice) consistent with ideals of egalitarian justice: One rule to bring them all and in the darkness bind them. The Decalogue is another good example of the American ideal law (Constitutionalism). Theoretically, you should be able to derive an entire legal code from such a short list of universal laws. But then why did they write Leviticus? I guess it wasn't enough. You can also see this spirit at work in the legacy of the English constitutional tradition of 'everything not forbidden is permitted' and the convention debates over whether or not to enumerate the Bill of Rights or fall back on the English tradition, yada yada yada... Thankfully, persuasive speech is a broader field than logic so I won't hold any of this against you. The fact that you like to try to argue credits you with me. All is forgiven. No harm, no Fowler. Ite in pace.