"etymological fallacy"

Laurence Horn laurence.horn at YALE.EDU
Wed Aug 14 01:08:06 UTC 2002


At 8:25 PM -0400 8/13/02, Frank Abate wrote:
>Larry H pointed out ... that Mill first mentioned this, and I'm sure
>that's right.  Likely I heard it somewhere, liked it, and didn't realize the
>source.
>
>In any case, the validity of the etymological fallacy applies, then and now.

Equally likely, you independently invented the expression, as I did,
and only later discovered, as I did, that J. S. Mill beat you to the
punch by 125+ years.  (One advantage, or disadvantage, of teaching
this stuff is to have students who use their "journals of linguistic
awareness" to call one's attention to one's having been thus
punch-beaten.)

larry



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