• jjjalljs@ttrpg.network
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    18 hours ago

    Thanks for the reasonable response.

    In essence I’m contesting that strict language standards are necessary to be understood. I mean, of course some standards are still required, just not strict enough to be all uptight about it when people start to bend them.

    We agree on this, I think. I’m mostly a linguistic descriptivist - that is, language is what people speak more than what’s written in a rulebook somewhere. I’m not a linguist but I have an undergraduate degree that required some courses on English language.

    It can be annoying when there’s a word for something (eg: enshittification, gaslighting, woke) and people then over extend it to mean “things i don’t like”. There’s not much to stop that, other than as an individual trying to be more precise in language. I think it’s not good for one’s brain to only have a few catch-all words for stuff.

    I think “slop” specifically is a very old word (1400ce, if etymology online is to be trusted). But like if there was a word for “low quality LLM content” (let’s say… slopplement), applying that to any low quality writing would kind of suck. it would almost certainly happen, though, because all of us humans are kind of lazy.

    Anyway. We mostly agree. I would just recommend being mindful of one’s word choices, because a narrow vocabulary can be a drag on thinking and communication.