Talk:Etymological fallacy

Inappropriate examples
I am unhappy about the choice of examples on this page. 'Boy' may only mean 'male human child' in the writer's dialect of English, but in many parts of the world - South Africa, parts of the USA for example - it still has the connotation of inferiority and is regarded as a racist term. In Britain, also, the meaning 'assistant' is by no means dead, though perhaps now confined to 'trades' - i.e. occupations involving primarily manual skills. A plumber who recently repaired my central heating had a 'boy' older than he was. Similarly the association 'boys are unruly' is very much part of our social conditioning: here in Britain, the papers regularly use 'gang of boys' even when girls are involved too, but 'abuse of children' even when all the children are male. For a wikipedia entry we need examples which are independent of dialect.

There is a converse fallacy to the etymological fallacy: that 'how I use a word' is 'the way everyone always uses and has always used the word'. For example, I recently heard a pundit on the radio advocating that women should behave inconsiderately because 'manners maketh man' and therefore politeness is only relevant to males and is an instrument of male domination. This commits the fallacy twice over (alongside other fallacies).

The last section, on Extremes, is not an example of the etymological fallacy, and does not belong here. It is an example of 'a little learning is a dangerous thing', commonly known nowadays as the 'wikipedia fallacy'.OldTownAdge (talk) 10:16, 8 May 2009 (UTC)


 * Agree that the last section does not belong here. I will therefore delete it now.  Ignorance of the meaning of an abbreviation (like "frequent.") is not an "etymological fallacy."  It's simply ignorance of an abbreviation.  A comparison -- The term "ANOVA" is often used in statistics for models that analyze variance.  If I were to read an article where statistics are mentioned, and I misinterpreted that term to mean that the authors were arguing against the PBS Series NOVA, I would not be committing a "statistical fallacy."  I would just be grossly ignorant about the terminology of statistics.  It certainly isn't an "extreme" version of any kind of "statistical fallacy."  And anyone who is tempted to revert because this section has a "source" -- please realize that the "source" is only to the quoted etymology, not to the actual content of the section and its argument about what constitutes an extreme case of an "etymological fallacy."


 * Also, there needs to be at least at least some reference to the fact that etymologies often are actually useful for thinking about and learning about the meanings of words. Yes, it is a fallacy to conclude that a word means something now only because it is derived from another word that hasn't been used for a thousand years.  And it's a fallacy to assume that a modern meaning is incorrect because it conflicts with such an etymology.  But, on the other hand, there is a good reason why so many dictionaries contain etymologies.  Most sources for words do in fact have some clear relationship to the modern usage of the word, so learning about the etymology and history of meanings and usage of a word can give insight into its modern meaning, just as the history of a country or a person can give insight into their current actions.  So, not all use of etymology to think about the meaning of a word is a "fallacy." 65.96.161.79 (talk) 18:53, 16 September 2009 (UTC)

the examples are not very good, and the article is also starved for references, especially references establishing notability of the concept. The concept certainly exists, but the question is does it need its own article. Here is a decent example, the Old English word gethrofta is glossed as "one who sits on the same rowing-bench, companion". This is presented as two possible meanings by the glossators, while all evidence we have indicates that the first is simply the etymology, while the second is the only attested meaning. The etymological fallacy is, then, the false assumption that a word may still be used etymologically while it is not in fact so used any longer. An exactly parallel case would be a glossing of companion as "somebody with whom one shares bread, partner", or comrade "room-mate, partner", or fellow "one who pays a fee, partner". Perhaps a similar example would be world "age of mankind, place inhabited by mankind" (while in fact world today means a place, not an age). Another type of etymological fallacy is the translation by etymological cognate (false friends): translating German faul "lazy" as foul, you have correctly recognized that faul and foul have an identical etymology, but you have failed to observe that they do not mean the same thing and thus do not translate one another. Perhaps this page should be merged into false friend. --dab (𒁳) 15:10, 12 July 2010 (UTC)

All of the listed examples are fallacious. Evidence of absence, false friends and anecdotal evidence, total POV BS

- Just because there are fewer examples of hound meaning just 'dog' does not mean it is incorrect to refer to any dog as a hound.

- Knight obviously was not equivalent to servant, or they would have just called them servants. The increase of 'rank' is literally inherent, it just means 'servant (of a higher rank)'

- Same as above, knave was never used in English to be equivalent to 'boy.' It meant 'boy (of a lower rank)'

- Stupidest one so far. 'Breadwinner' is still a valid term, basically the household equivalent to Lord, which would make the household equivalent to Lady the 'Breadmaker.' Absolutely valid context.

- The only thing wrong with Chase's conclusion is the word 'merely.' Logic is the manipulation of words, yes, but also more than that.

- An apology is no less a speech in defense today than it was in 500 BC Greece.

- Anyone criticising the contrary terms in 'grow smaller' or 'climb down' must have real trouble doing the equation 5 x -5 The Quiet Pirate (talk) 21:29, 4 August 2017 (UTC)


 * Your understanding of language is naive. "Knight obviously was not equivalent to servant, or they would have just called them servants" contains the following assumptions:
 * The word "servant" existed back then.
 * People do not invent new words for a thing if another word for the thing already exists.
 * All people at all places use the same word for the same thing. (If this assumption is wrong, people can use "servant" in the North and "knight" in the South for the same thing, for example.)
 * I don't know about the first assumption, but the other two are obviously wrong. Your other claims are equally doubtful, but since the purpose of this page is improving the article, I will refrain from taking them apart. --Hob Gadling (talk) 06:36, 5 August 2017 (UTC)


 * "Your understanding of language is naive." Feels weird to say here, but uh, citation needed.
 * Serf, servant and slave were all 'English translations' of Latin words that existed before even the advent of Old English.
 * If it ain't broke don't fix it, also how am I supposed to prove a negative?
 * To imply that Knight itself has to mean the same thing in English as it did in German is a false friend
 * Also no, I think you chose the only point I gave that has any doubt whatsoever, I would like a second opinion. And who's to say us having this debate won't result in a better entry? I think it's worth a shot. The Quiet Pirate (talk) 02:33, 11 August 2017 (UTC)

POV on true meaning
The article currently claims:

A variant of the etymological fallacy involves looking for the "true" meaning of words by delving into their etymologies.

This statement has several problems, including at least:

o It makes a presupposition about what the true meaning of a word is.

o It overlooks that this is often quite right and proper, say in the case of the so-often abused word ``decimate''.

o It does not make any discussion of the issue of when a word should be considered having changed in meaning, when a new meaning is a misuse, when an old meaning becomes (too) archaic, and similar. (This, incidentally, is a very tricky problem, with aspects of the sorites paradox combined with issues of geography and demography.) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Michael Eriksson (talk • contribs) 12:44, 11 August 2010 (UTC)


 * It does not look like a presupposition to me – "true" is quoted to indicate it's problematic to talk about "true" meanings anyway.
 * I agree that the article would need a discussion of etymology vs. "present" meaning, which is indeed tricky. Perhaps this is already discussed elsewhere (Etymology, Language change...?) and could be linked from here.
 * Incidentally, Sihler (Language History) gives "decimate" as an example of an etymological fallacy :-) Who decides on the true meaning? --ἀνυπόδητος (talk) 21:50, 9 December 2010 (UTC)


 * In my reading, "true" (quote marks included) is used to indicate that the meaning is, in fact, not the true one. To me, they do not in anyway remove the presupposition, but introduce an element of disparagement. At best, then, a reformulation for less ambiguity is needed.Michael Eriksson (talk) 11:46, 14 December 2010 (UTC)


 * I see what you mean. At the moment, I can't think of a more neutral way to bring the point across. People committing an etymological fallacy typically argue on the lines of "This word does not mean X but Y because its etymology is so-and-so", so it's hard to imagine a way of conferring this to our readers without suggesting that the fallacy (or the one committing it) is concerned with an alleged true meaning as opposed to the one that is actually used in current everyday speech. At least two of the sources use a similar wording.
 * This seems to be a more general problem with the fallacy articles, one of the more extreme examples being the sentence "Gee, it can't be worth much if someone local thought of it first." in Invented Here. If you can think of a phrasing that makes clear the fallaciousness of the arguments while being not disparaging towards people who use them, feel free to edit. --ἀνυπόδητος (talk) 12:36, 14 December 2010 (UTC)

In the case of the phrase "anti-Semitism" it is evident that historically the phrase is used to identify Hatred of a Jewish person or collective. While in common culture we see a shift of People making the case that, Arab hate is also considered anti-Semitism. While this may not have been the intended meaning of the phrase, its seems as though the meaning of it is evolving as per culture. Associating Anti-Semitism with Arabs is not yet part of common culture but we see that articles are starting to appear that use anti-Semitism be associated with Hatred of an Arab or collective. It should be stated that the word "Muslim" and "Arab" are NOT interchangeable. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 198.24.6.139 (talk) 02:54, 23 May 2015 (UTC)


 * There are further problems with the antisemitism example. Firstly, the contributor is amusingly unaware that, by harking back to the meaning intended when the phrase was created, and assuming that must be the current meaning, they are also committing the etymological fallacy. It also seems strange to bring such an emotional phrase into this article; that is not to say it can't be used but we may be entitled to consider the possible motivations of the contributor. Here, little details such as "One word with an unchanged meaning and a misleading etymology" (why does this person get to decide these two things?) or "fallacious argument is made that .... opposition to other would-be Semitic peoples should also be considered antisemitism." Would-be semitic? Leaving aside the racist overtones, the contributor here is obviously deeply concerned to restrict the reference to a small group, rather than any other possible interpretation. In terms of general usage, they may even be correct, but I would suggest their interest is largely political, which is unhelpful for this article in particular and WP in general. Pingulion (talk) 22:20, 4 November 2022 (UTC)

Who defines meaning
I find this silly. If it is so that there is a fallacy based on 'historical meaning' and 'current meaning' then it is easy to conceive that the 'new' or 'current' meaning find a new word to express itself rather then completely alter a word, especially if this word itself derives/includes/uses other ones. And, who/what "defines" meaning anyway? This is a political act and yet this article is as if "meaning" was a fixed proposition rather than the result of socio-political struggle. "Meaning" does not just appear. It is constructed indeed. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 188.60.241.194 (talk) 22:47, 13 February 2011 (UTC)
 * I don't think meaning is constructed except in a few cases where new objects (like a computer mouse) are consciously named. Changes of meaning just happen, like changes of pronunciation. No one ever devised the Great Vowel Shift, and no one ever actually "altered" the word hound, deciding it should not refer to all kinds of dogs any more (see Semantic change).
 * The question who defines meaning is the crucial point. No one, actually – the sense of a word is how the majority of speakers use it; and this is, of course, a source for misunderstandings and fruitless discussions about the "real" meaning. We should have an article about this, but I can't find one. --ἀνυπόδητος (talk) 09:46, 14 February 2011 (UTC)--ἀνυπόδητος (talk) 09:46, 14 February 2011 (UTC)

Suggestion for an example
I think that a good example could be sourced to http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/theodore_drange/definition.html un☯mi 23:28, 21 March 2012 (UTC)

Hounds?
I don't find this to be a particularly good example. I thought hound just meant dog generally. I thought the article was going to say the opposite thing. --WikiDonn (talk) 21:26, 26 June 2012 (UTC)
 * My dictionary (Cassell) defines a hound as a "dog used in hunting"; see also . However, I certainly wouldn't object if you exchanged this for a better example :-) --ἀνυπόδητος (talk) 08:23, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

Tolkien
Reading the original essay, it seems to me that Tolkien didn't mean the same thing by "etymological fallacy" as this article is about.

I think Tolkien meant that we should not be misled into thinking that Old English words which look similar to Modern English words are related gssq (talk) 04:11, 23 July 2012 (UTC)
 * Yeah. This whole page really doesn't sound like Tolkien at all! --BenMcLean (talk) 05:15, 18 May 2013 (UTC)

gypped
I think this article could use some NPOV. These examples seem controversial. I'd like to hear the explanation why it would pass muster to say that someone gypped you out of your money, but not that he jewed you out of it. Wnt (talk) 18:50, 25 October 2012 (UTC)
 * The "gyp" example is poor for a lot of reasons. In addition to what you mentioned, there's also the fact that offense is a subjective thing, so someone saying that they, personally, find something offensive and giving a reason is a statement of fact not an argument.24.185.99.22 (talk) 00:05, 28 August 2013 (UTC)

Protagoras (dialogue)
Plato represents Socrates as arguing against the idea of shifting definitions in the Protagoras, the Euthydemus (dialogue) and many other places. Many great philosophers would strongly disagree with much of what this page says. I expect that most metaphysical libertarians, for example, would argue against Compatibilism from the idea of the word "freedom" or the term "free will" having an essential, true meaning. Many great philosophies have held that words correspond to true essences. This page dogmatically takes controversial positions on these and a whole slew of other philosophy of language-related objections. --BenMcLean (talk) 05:11, 18 May 2013 (UTC)

Tagged for cleanup
See the rest of the talk page above for specifics, especially the last comment about philosophical disagreements. This is NOT a logical fallacy, but rather an informal fallacy. (that needs more discussion than a "See Also" link) Additionally, it is POV to presume that the definition of a word is what some plurality of humans determine it to be. Many words (such as xenophobic, homophobic) don't mean the same thing to everybody. The fallacy is only invoked when used to base an argument on a word's definition alone. Examples of when something is vs. isn't a fallacy would be good. --129.106.31.105 (talk) 13:39, 22 April 2015 (UTC)

validity of assuming this is a fallacy in the first place
I dispute that this is a fallacy AT ALL. It is more like an ad hoc movement by people who doesn't understand that words are intended to have a meaning, and that changing it (through history) renders their arguments invalid. Why is this considered a fallacy? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Bodhidharmazen (talk • contribs) 15:53, 14 August 2015 (UTC)


 * Words and meanings obviously do change throughout history or you wouldn't have posted that in modern 21st-century English, would you? Equinox ◑ 13:04, 28 June 2017 (UTC)

Isn't this just a typical semantic fallacy, 'argument is invalid if argument relies on contrary definition?' The Quiet Pirate (talk) 21:29, 4 August 2017 (UTC)

Should this even be a unique page?
After some thought, I can't even think of a single etymologically fallacious argument that isn't also some other, more accurate genetic fallacy. I assert that this page should be chopped up and dispersed among the other genetic fallacy pages i.e. the association fallacy page, the non sequitur, even the ad hominem (circumstantial), and to make it so any search for 'etymological fallacy' redirects to the genetic fallacy page, with a statement on the genetic fallacy page explaining the situation for anyone who gets redirected and is confused. If no one disagrees, I'll go ahead and do the edit to the other sections myself in about a week, then tag this AfD The Quiet Pirate (talk) 22:42, 4 August 2017 (UTC)
 * You misunderstand the purpose of an encyclopedia. What we do here is:
 * explain an existing concept,
 * point the reader to existing literature about the concept.
 * We just reproduce what reliable sources say. We do not decide that a concept makes no sense, invent new concepts, or develop ideas about the concept. If you want to do that, please go somewhere else, such as a scientific journal, a blog or a forum. --Hob Gadling (talk) 06:26, 5 August 2017 (UTC)
 * That is not what I meant to suggest. My premise was not to conclude that the concept of the etymological fallacy makes no sense, but that the original author had made various conclusions without what I understand to be sufficient proofs for a Wikipedia article. Perhaps the tags that were already there are enough, now you mention it I'll try do what the tags say and see if I can come up with an article I think does deserve to exist. I'm pretty new, so I'll just draft it here? ALSO: Is there a fallacy for if someone asserts the modern definition is more relevant like a reverse etymological fallacy? I feel like that would be helpful to mention if so, I can't seem to find one though.
 * The etymological fallacy is an informal genetic fallacy holding that the present-day meaning of a word or phrase should necessarily be derived from an historical usage. This is a linguistic misconception, and is sometimes used as a basis for linguistic prescription. An argument constitutes an etymological fallacy if it makes a claim about the present meaning of a word based exclusively on its etymology. This does not, however, show that etymology is irrelevant in any way, nor does it attempt to prove such.
 * Prerequisites
 * The etymological fallacy occurs when a criticism is made that a word's historical usage is more relevant than any other usage of the same word, or when an allegation that a certain definition or usage for a word is objectively either right or wrong as justified by an appeal to the word's etymology. Not simply any criticism of a word's usage constitutes a fallacy, the easiest way to prevent any argument from employing an etymological fallacy is to provide more justification for the validity of their alleged 'true' definition than simply the word's own history.
 * Examples
 * Dilapidated should only be used in reference to products made of stone, because it is derived from the Latin word for stone
 * Decimate should not be used to refer to a reduction greater than 10%"
 * You can't use manure to mean fermented animal dung as it first meant to work the land
 * It's offensive to say one was gypped in reference to being stolen from or cheated as it is [rumoured to be] derived from Gypsy
 * How's that? The Quiet Pirate (talk) 00:38, 11 August 2017 (UTC)

Idiot
I added the following text:
 * An example of a reverse etymological fallacy is to conclude that the ancient Greeks disparaged those who did not participate in public life because the Greek word ἰδιώτης idiōtēs 'private person, private citizen, layman' is the origin of the modern word idiot, meaning 'fool'.

reverted, saying: "This is a significant misrepresentation of what the (quite instructive) source say". In what way is it a misrepresentation? The cited article starts off:
 * It is well-known that our word 'idiot' is derived from the Greek word 'idiotes' which meant 'private person*, 'non-participant in public (i.e., political) affairs. On this pebble of etymology, large assertions are built about differences between Greek and modern attitudes to political participation and private life. Hannah Arendt, for instance, says that the Greeks believed that a life spent in the privacy of 'one's own' (idion) outside the world of 'the common' is 'idiotic' by definition (1958:39). The foundation is insufficient and ignores the rich ambiguity of 'idiotes'.

And it concludes:
 * Of course, there are differences between Greek and modern political attitudes, but, if we want to talk about them, we should first take a good hard look at the documents, not rely on a scrap of not very accurate philology.

This says clearly that the political interpretation is founded on a "pebble of etymology" which is a "scrap of not very accurate philology". That is, it establishes that etymology is not a reliable indication of the ancient meaning of "idiot" (hence 'reverse' etymological fallacy). It also establishes that Arendt is interpreting the word based on its history ("by definition"). What additional evidence is needed to show that this is an instance of a reverse etymological fallacy? --Macrakis (talk) 14:52, 10 May 2018 (UTC)
 * This is your interpretation of the term. The source does not refer to any fallacy. Hence this is original research, not to say your invention of the definition of "reverse eti fa". I can go further and argue this is not a fallacy at all, but this is not the point. Your example is contestable, therefore even if your interpretation is correct, you have to prove it by a direct statement. Staszek Lem (talk) 16:06, 10 May 2018 (UTC)
 * What exactly do you think that Sparkes's point is other than to point out the etymological fallacy? -- couched, of course, in very polite academic language.
 * He starts by mentioning the etymology of the modern word "idiot"; he then says that "large assertions" are made based on a "pebble of etymology"; he quotes Arendt's use of the English word "idiotic". He establishes that ancient idiotes has a range of meanings (none of them derogatory, and certainly none corresponding to the modern word 'idiot'), and he concludes that we should "not rely on a scrap of not very accurate philology". True, he does not use the word "fallacy", but wikipedia articles are about concepts, not words.
 * I agree that "reverse etymological fallacy" is not a widely-used term (though it does appear in various places); it simply describes the fallacy of using the modern meaning to interpret its etymon rather than vice versa. Do you have better phrasing to suggest? --Macrakis (talk) 16:56, 10 May 2018 (UTC)
 * Please... This is not "etymological fallacy" as defined in the article. Just give me a reference or let it go . Staszek Lem (talk) 18:34, 10 May 2018 (UTC)
 * The opening sentence of the lead is "The etymological fallacy is a genetic fallacy that holds that the present-day meaning of a word or phrase should necessarily be similar to its historical meaning."
 * The modern meaning of "idiot" is clearly not similar to the ancient meaning as documented in LSJ. The first citation as a term of abuse ('ignoramus') is very late (Lucian, 2c CE).
 * The cited article shows Arendt interpreting the ancient term via the present-day meaning.
 * I really wonder why you're so insistent in this case, when it is better documented that most of the other cases in the article. (see below) --Macrakis (talk) 20:29, 10 May 2018 (UTC)
 * No it is not documented: it is your opinion inferred from the cited text, but not directly stated there. Staszek Lem (talk) 22:35, 10 May 2018 (UTC)
 * I am insistent for a single reason: WP:CITE . You are interpreting what Sparkes is interpreting what Arendt was interpreting. A wee bit longish chain of interpretation prone to turn into Chinese whispers. I have a different interpretation: making an assumption and try to draw a conclusion is a normal way of scientific inquiry. Words change their meaning not without reason. I did not read Arendt and don't want to, but I may assume that Arendt assumed that semantic shift started in antiquity. Failed assumption is not the same as fallacy. (You will be surprised how much of historical science is based on rather shaky assumptions, which acquired "truthiness" per authority (a fallacy to you :-) In particular, a sizable chunk of olden, pre-literate history is based on "pebbles of etymology" found in toponyms, so I find Sparkes' condescending tone out of place). And I do not care I may be wrong about Arendt and Sparkes and Aristophages, and no, I am not discussing this any longer, per WP:SOAP.  Staszek Lem (talk) 21:37, 10 May 2018 (UTC)


 * It is strange that you invoke WP:CITE, when this case has a better source, Sparkes, than most of the other examples, and it says exactly what needs to be said. I don't understand what you think is missing. Arendt is just an example for him of the fallacy -- there are certainly many more.
 * I'm afraid I don't follow some of your other arguments, but since you don't want to discuss them....
 * Since we don't seem to be understanding each other's positions, I suppose the most productive way forward is to ask for a third opinion. --Macrakis (talk) 22:58, 10 May 2018 (UTC)
 * No! Sparks does not say it is etymological fallacy. He just mocks poor scholarship. And my argument is an explanation that poor scholarship is not necessarily fallacy. Staszek Lem (talk) 23:40, 10 May 2018 (UTC)
 * No! Sparks does not say it is etymological fallacy. He just mocks poor scholarship. And my argument is an explanation that poor scholarship is not necessarily fallacy. Staszek Lem (talk) 23:40, 10 May 2018 (UTC)


 * I think I see your point. Let me rephrase it in my words to see if we agree: Many modern authors have assumed that the ancient word idiōtēs 'private citizen, layman' also had the derogatory meaning expressed by the modern 'idiot', and thus concluded that the ancients considered those not involved in politics to be idiots. This is incorrect, but not an etymological fallacy.
 * I think we could have closed out this discussion faster if you'd been more explicit.
 * Best, --Macrakis (talk) 15:53, 11 May 2018 (UTC)
 * Yes. The assumption that a person "out of our circle" is disliked and therefore the term referring to them becomes derogatory, is sound, and we have many examples of this. The second  assumption, that the "not one of us" are viewed as stupid, is also common. However  the overall conclusion discussed here is on rather shaky grounds. It is OK as a hypothesis, but to state it as a fact requires more solid evidence. This kind of poor scholarship is surprisingly common. Of my Wikipedia watchlist a good example is "Bolokhovians". These people are mentioned in 2-3 chronicles, possibly coming from a single source. But basing solely on linguistic similarity with the term "Vlah", Romanian scholars declared them to be Romanians and wrote long treatises about where these people lived and what they ate. Staszek Lem (talk) 16:38, 11 May 2018 (UTC)
 * I think you are giving too much credit to those who assume that ancient 'idiot' was derogatory. No one presents it as a 'hypothesis'; they just assume it based, probably, on something they heard from someone else. I doubt that any of them actually read the Greek sources or even consulted standard dictionaries before making this claim, which seems to persist as "folklore". I'm trying to track down its origin, but so far no luck. --Macrakis (talk) 18:11, 11 May 2018 (UTC)

Article quality
The "prerequisites" section makes no sense. Why do we need examples of semantic shift? The semantic change article is much better. The examples given (hound, knight, knave, lady) don't seem to have any particular relevance to the etymological fallacy.

The source for logos/logic is a blog, fallacyfiles.org, which is not an WP:RS... but, it give a source: Gula's Nonsense. Let's follow that lead. Hmm, that book does not in fact use the exact term "etymological fallacy", though it does have one paragraph describing them; nor does it give the logos/logic example.

The point of the bullet "some dictionaries" is unclear. I think it is trying to say that some dictionaries can be misinterpreted because they don't clearly separate etymologies from senses. But that is not an etymological fallacy.

I don't see where the etymological fallacy is in the apologize example. It just seems to describe the sense-development of the word. Does any modern person claim that it must mean "a speech in defense" rather than "expressing regret"?

"Grow smaller" and "climb down" are not etymological fallacies at all. "Grow" continues to mean "to get larger" as well as "to develop in some direction" and "climb" continues to mean "climb up" as well as "climb down". Etymology is not the issue at all.

So far, the only examples we have with a WP:RS are "decimate" and "idiot", and the "idiot" example was recently deleted.... --Macrakis (talk) 17:20, 10 May 2018 (UTC)


 * You are free to handle all unrefereced the way you want: delete highly dubious and tag what makes sense. Staszek Lem (talk) 18:40, 10 May 2018 (UTC)
 * About grow: whether you are right or not depends on the definition of the term. The definition here in Wikipedia is tagged as unreferenced. Possibly it comes from Columbia Guide cited later, but I am lazy to verfy. You cannot judge things without sound foundation, right? Staszek Lem (talk) 18:40, 10 May 2018 (UTC)
 * About prerequisites. I agree that examples in this section are redundant. Staszek Lem (talk) 18:45, 10 May 2018 (UTC)
 * 'logos': you tracked the source which you say has exapmle. Why don't you cite them?Staszek Lem (talk) 18:45, 10 May 2018 (UTC)
 * And so on.... WP:BE BOLD to rewrite everything, as long as you have sources as hand. Staszek Lem (talk) 18:45, 10 May 2018 (UTC)


 * Yes, I know all that -- I have, after all, been editing Wikipedia for over 13 years and have >30k edits -- but I didn't want to do it until we'd discussed the 'idiot' case more thoroughly.
 * As for 'logos', the cited source in fact does not mention 'logos', but gives another example.
 * I think it's agreed on this Talk page (see above) that the "prerequisites" needs to go. --Macrakis (talk) 20:29, 10 May 2018 (UTC)

Proto-Indo-Europeans
Bernspeed (talk) 23:50, 30 March 2020 (UTC) Could the Ancient Greeks and Indians' sense of "true meaning" be considered to be traced back to a Proto-Indo-European concept?
 * Hi Bernspeed! Maybe they have had this concept. The question relevant for the Wikipedia article is whether there is a reliable source saying so. One of the main principles of Wikipedia is that we don't include original research, that is, we don't include information just because we think it is true, even if we are quite certain about it. We only use reliable information that is already out there in the world, e.g. in textbooks or peer-reviewed scientific journals. (At least that's the idea. Wikipedia is not perfect, of course, but we aim to be.) --ἀνυπόδητος (talk) 08:08, 31 March 2020 (UTC)

Validity of assuming this is a Fallacy in the first Place, pt. 2
I know that the titularization of this, let's say "thought process", as a fallacy is sourced; however, the way in which it is worded, as "a [...] fallacy that holds that the present-day meaning of a word or phrase should necessarily be similar to its historical meaning", makes it in itself a curiously inverted is-ought fallacy to categorize it as a fallacy. The normative statement what the meaning of a word or phrase should be cannot in itself be factually wrong or mistaken, the term "fallacy" hence does not seem appropriate. --Don Ecchi (talk) 20:03, 11 August 2021 (UTC)
 * Thanks for this analysis! I think the problem is indeed the wording of our definition. Sihler (the source given for this sentence) says that to "declare for example that the real meaning of doctor is teacher" constitutes an etymological fallacy. No is–ought fallacy here as far as I can tell. I'll try to reword our lead. --ἀνυπόδητος (talk) 06:42, 12 August 2021 (UTC)

Relevance in debating
This article seems completely focussed on prescriptive views of language, the idea that people who are conservative about language might think that a new meaning of a word must be wrong because they know an older meaning, which is a fallacy. But surely that is a very trivial use of the concept, hardly deserving its own article, especially as the point is perfectly well covered at linguistic prescription. I would have thought that the "etymological fallacy" really becomes important in completely different concepts, when people cite etymologies to sway political arguments etc. The English word abortion comes from a Latin word that meant "miscarriage". If someone were to build that detail into an argument in the abortion debate to argue that abortion is just a form of miscarriage then we would disallow their argument on the basis they have committed the fallacy of thinking that etymology is relevant to the use of the word in the case at hand. In theological debates you hear a lot of this kind of thing: baptism should be by immersion because the etymology of the word baptism implies "dipping". Surely it is in the context of debating that logical falacies become interesting. Doric Loon (talk) 12:34, 21 November 2022 (UTC)


 * The etymology itself is the entire catalogue of meaning that a word has had over its chronological lifetime. While the original meaning may be outdated, the present derived meaning may be manipulated, hijacked, propagandized. Just look at any political concept (like socialism, capitalism, etc) from the 1850's, and then look how people described them by the 1950's. Most scientific terminology goes through the ringer, including the chronological timeline of events that describe the phenomena. Without an etymology, you have fewer references to the historical meaning of the language that recorded events to this point. Even if no direct written evidence of a culture is left, the existence of a derivative language that has that word means that you know certain concepts were in play at a particular time. Semantics and semiotics are necessarily intertwined across time in that way. 2607:9880:3118:34:BD9B:6E7B:88ED:8977 (talk) 19:50, 12 July 2023 (UTC)

Anti-semitism
An anonymous editor posted to my talk page to disagree with the slant of the article:


 * Since we were talking about the concept of etymology, which, of course, is the catalogue of a word's meaning across time, we can very clearly see that the coinage of the term goes back to Gottenberg school, who explicitly coined the term with racial connotations and conflated semites with Jewish people. As we both agree, there is no world where the definition of semite is independent of its etymology. Semites now, of course, refer to all the speakers of semitic languages, not a specific set within that set. So, if you're conflating anti-semitism and judeaphobia, then you're necessarily resorting back to a racial meaning. And if you're using racial terminology, then I'm afraid that you're classifying people by race."

First off, I'm not doing anything. I'm just reporting what sources say. Sources say that anti-semitism is the same as anti-Judaism (judeaphobia) as you put it. If you disagree with that, well, that's the whole mistaken belief that this section is contesting. Secondly, reporting on the beliefs of racists does not mean endorsing them. Anti-semites are scum. Just... if you ask the anti-Semites themselves...  their writings from 1870-1945 or so make pretty clear that they're specifically opposed to Jews.

Nobody uses the term "Semites" seriously aside from crazed Jew-haters, but it'd be especially incorrect to think it means "speakers of Semitic languages." Is Pope Benedict XVI a "Semite" because he knows how to speak Hebrew? While "Semitic languages" is still a family tree in linguistics, "Semite" to mean "speaker of a Semitic language" is not a term in use. SnowFire (talk) 02:12, 13 July 2023 (UTC)