Innocent until proved guilty

Wilson Gray hwgray at GMAIL.COM
Thu Feb 1 04:51:27 UTC 2007


I agree with you entirely, Benjamin. What I've done is to compromise,
so as to bend without breaking. I use "proved" as the verb form and
"proven" as the adjective. "That is a proved fact." Oh. My. God. No
bleeping way!

-Wilson

On 1/31/07, Benjamin Barrett <gogaku at ix.netcom.com> wrote:
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Benjamin Barrett <gogaku at IX.NETCOM.COM>
> Subject:      Re: Innocent until proved guilty
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> For me, it's until proven. Proved always sounds funny :)
>
> Wilson Gray wrote:
> > ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> > Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> > Poster:       Wilson Gray <hwgray at GMAIL.COM>
> > Subject:      Re: Innocent until proved guilty
> > -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >
> > I wonder why it is that the "until" version is the more popular
> > rendering, as opposed to, e.g. "An accused person is presumed innocent
> > _unless_ proved guilty." "... _Until_ proved guilty" permits the
> > interpretation that the accused is guilty and it's necessary only to
> > wait till authority proves that guilt. If authority is unable to prove
> > that guilt, then a guilty person goes free.
> >
> > -Wilson, off-topic
> >
>
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--
All say, "How hard it is that we have to die"---a strange complaint to
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-----
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