Yes, but this is not one of those words that is slightly changing in its meaning. Instead, it is flipping the meaning altogether. This misuse sabotages core boolean constructs of the language. Imagine if we lose the word "drop" to this trend. What then will we use to actually mean "drop"? Will they go after "delete" next to pretend to be cooler? Is nothing sacred?
No, nothing is sacred. I'll note the "literally" case in GP is arguably even more of a flip than drop.
The only way for a human language to stay the same is for people to stop speaking it, i.e. Latin - France has trouble keeping French the same, and English is the polar opposite with no ruling body and a history of katamari damacy-ing words from every other language.
Words can mean multiple things, and if there's enough of a gap a new word or usage will rise to fill its place.
Delete works, of course, and I think the opposite to "new feature just dropped" in tech circles is "killed" or "killed off", as in killedbygoogle.com
But no, nothing is sacred. Not only that, from a historical perspective, the current pace of language change is shockingly slow because of the impact of media. It would not be at all unusual for a word like drop to move entirely to a new metaphorical meaning causing other words to have to fill in the gap. In German, you "let fall" something. Even if anything was sacred, "drop" would be far, far from sacred. It is very easy to replace.
(The closest thing to sacred is words for familiar, every day objects and people. "Mama" is pretty nearly universal, for example. But even so, we literally don't even know where the word "dog" came from, so no, nothing is sacred.)
There are many many examples if you search (or even better, read the book!), but here are a few:
"silly" originally meant something more like "blessed"
"fear" meant "danger", referring to a thing feared, not the feeling
"nice" meant "foolish" and literally comes from roots mean "not knowing"
This kind of change in meaning is very, very normal. This is just how language works. I really think you will enjoy the book. The author is very easy to read and covers a ton of linguistic ground.
OutOfHere|8 months ago
miloignis|8 months ago
The only way for a human language to stay the same is for people to stop speaking it, i.e. Latin - France has trouble keeping French the same, and English is the polar opposite with no ruling body and a history of katamari damacy-ing words from every other language.
Words can mean multiple things, and if there's enough of a gap a new word or usage will rise to fill its place.
Delete works, of course, and I think the opposite to "new feature just dropped" in tech circles is "killed" or "killed off", as in killedbygoogle.com
EdgeExplorer|8 months ago
But no, nothing is sacred. Not only that, from a historical perspective, the current pace of language change is shockingly slow because of the impact of media. It would not be at all unusual for a word like drop to move entirely to a new metaphorical meaning causing other words to have to fill in the gap. In German, you "let fall" something. Even if anything was sacred, "drop" would be far, far from sacred. It is very easy to replace.
(The closest thing to sacred is words for familiar, every day objects and people. "Mama" is pretty nearly universal, for example. But even so, we literally don't even know where the word "dog" came from, so no, nothing is sacred.)
There are many many examples if you search (or even better, read the book!), but here are a few:
"silly" originally meant something more like "blessed"
"fear" meant "danger", referring to a thing feared, not the feeling
"nice" meant "foolish" and literally comes from roots mean "not knowing"
This kind of change in meaning is very, very normal. This is just how language works. I really think you will enjoy the book. The author is very easy to read and covers a ton of linguistic ground.