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I specifically said in this context because I had this certainty you would form an argument from the origins of the word.
by burnished 3y ago
I specifically said in this context because I had this certainty you would form an argument from the origins of the word.
- feoren 3y agoMy whole point is that "earthquake" refers to the material called "earth", meaning "dirt", or "soil", or "the material making up the top layer of a planet", and that we should stop making up new words for everything that remotely shares an origin with the word for the name of our planet. This is my entire point. We should not be beholden to the origins of the word (and even if we were, we still don't need to rename earthquakes that happen on Mars). So you say: "geo-" and "terra-" don't refer to a specific planet in this context and I agree with you. That's the point. Neither does "earth-" in "earthquake". Are you trying to make the argument that "earth-" in "earthquake" refers to the planet Earth (rather than the material), unlike "terra-" and "geo-", or are you just completely agreeing with me on everything? I'm having trouble telling which is which.
- burnished 3y agoLets reset then and try to get to the root issue; your characterization of this as someone insisting is a total buzzkill, do you have to treat this like a bizzare moral pronouncement that you must denounce? If you can be chill about marsquake then I'll swear by all the fruit you can name to defend the use of 'earthquake' as correct regardless of the planet being discussed.