Talk:Alan Civil

It's a French Horn
This article uses the ideology-based "horn" to refer to the French horn. That was a fad in the late 20th century, voted in not by people with expertise in the way language works but by French horn players who fell for the logic that since there's nothing French about this instrument it should be called simply "the horn", ignoring the fact that "horn" is a word that refers to ANY BLOWN INSTRUMENT, including wooden ones, ones with reeded mouthpieces, and all flutes. My belief is that they later conceded that that's a ridiculous way to think, and unvoted it. In any case, an encyclopedia should not honor a vote taken by experts in the use of wrenches stating that "cuckoo" is the proper term for referring to a wrench. Sane people do not delegate the authority to determine the name of wrenches to people expert in their use. It's as if someone found out that there's nothing English about "English muffins" and campaigned to change the term not by replacing "English" with a more-accurate adjective, but, rather, by eliminating the adjective altogether and calling the thing just "a muffin", with a willful obliviousness to the fact that "muffin" already refers to many things that aren't the particular muffin in question. It's fallacious to believe that the opinion of the person who favors deleting "English" should carry greater weight because that person is someone who is an expert in making English muffins, as if that expertise in English muffins conferred expertise in the workings of language and logical distinctions. The information-conveying capacity of language is degraded by such actions, because we don't know WHICH blown instrument a "horn" is if we refer to French horns as "horns", and we don't know WHICH bakery-product is a "muffin" if we refer to English muffins as "muffins". It may not be true that French windows, French doors, French cuffs, French kisses, and all the rest originated in France. But we can't simply DELETE the adjective "French" without replacing it with another one. For instance, I've heard people say "tongue kiss". "Long horn" would have been an acceptable replacement for "French horn". "Horn" just quite simply isn't, and it's an arrogance on the part of French-horn players to believe that THEY should have say-so on an issue of language for which their expertise in PLAYING French horns does not in any way shape or form give them more insight than that of someone who does NOT play French horn.2600:1700:6759:B000:E894:BFCC:705D:880 (talk) 18:11, 27 June 2024 (UTC)Christopher Lawrence Simpson
 * And the Wikipedia article on this instrument is titled "French horn". Again, Wikipedia, you with your banners asking for my money. Where's the STANDARDS? Where's the consistency? Where's the proofreading? Who is it that makes sure that one article doesn't contradict another? It seems like it's ME who does that, and you should be OFFERING me money, not requesting it.2600:1700:6759:B000:E894:BFCC:705D:880 (talk) 18:28, 27 June 2024 (UTC)Christopher Lawrence Simpson