I love language (Off-Topic)

by General Vagueness , The Vault of Sass, Tuesday, May 12, 2015, 03:48 (3279 days ago) @ naturl selexion
edited by General Vagueness, Tuesday, May 12, 2015, 03:59

False dichotomy. Words and meanings are socially negotiated. While there may indeed be expressive vs technical language, you cannot make the claim of being more precise.

I don't think I said I was more precise, but I guess that is what I meant. Nor did I say that there were only two ways to communicate. I said "more emotional" or "more technical" - lots of room between the extremes. Sure, I guess you could find the mid point then declare that there are only two sides. Like saying that some people are more short and some are more tall. We know that the world consists of more than just short or tall people.

One meaning or another isn't even any more emotional or more technical in practical terms. I defy you to find a journal that would accept "a couple" as part of a formal definition of anything.

As you noted there is "technical" language, where words have very defined meanings. Law, medicine and science are good examples. My initial response was regarding something technical in nature so to say "several" where only "two" was correct prompted me to make a clarification/correction. In this case I will claim to be more precise.

Using "a couple" like that is more precise, but it isn't any more accurate-- again, in practice. It so happens I've met precisely two people in real life who use "a couple" to mean precisely two of something, and even they're somewhat flexible about it.
My understanding was always that "a couple" is less than "several", and "a few" spans a lot of the territory covered by "a couple" and "several", but anyone that got picky about it was always labeled, well, too picky. They could all be anything from two to a little over five, and almost up to ten if you were stretching it. If you were lucky, you could get away with including one, even. That is, that was my understanding from living in different areas of the southern part of the lower peninsula of Michigan for the last 25+ years. The Internet, as it tends to, throws a bit of monkey wrench into that, but the fact is everyone I've ever used the terms with in real life (as far as I can remember) has used them with remarkable consistency, and a lower degree of precision than most people in this thread seem to be used to.