At least it has now reverted to being an adjective. Ken Livingstone (and others) used it as a noun, 'nuclear-free'. Not, of course, that he removed all the radioisotopes from London's hospitals, universities etc.
OT: Where did our language go?
Sep 18, 2024
Last reply: 1 year ago
282 Replies
Or the 40K in people….
Or indeed from the environment.
The only place that is actualy nuclear-free is inside a vacuum. And even that has billyuns of neutrinos shooting through it (from the Sun) every second.
I think Scots is the only language where a double positive means a negative.
"Aye, right".
In US English, that would be 'Yeah, sure'.
Or blocked out all incoming sunlight.
The green generation are so completely technically illiterate that it's mind boggling. They live in a world where there is an ideal climate, a perfect number of species, a non varying 'average' temperature and a planet totally free of all 'nuclear' materials and filled with magically 'renewable' resources.
A sort of childish notion of the Garden of Eden before Original Sin...
That sounds as though it could lead to the concept of Manifest Destiny, and we know what happened based on that idea.
A few yeara ago, a Parish Councillor in Somerset wanted to ban all electromagnetic radiation from his village.
Litotes is understatement rather than emphasis.
Sounds like the "sunk cost fallacy" where you "send good money after bad".
Not quite, there's no concept of investment.
1) Try socialist answer to problem2) It fails
3) a. Normal answer: try something else: too much socialism b. Socialist answer: try much more of the same: not enough socialismThe 'double down' policy assumes that the right thing is being done and that isn't ideologically open to question, ergo, if it isn't working, it's not being tried hard enough. Sometimes that is true, usually it isn't.
A "press" in Scotland is a not walk-in cupboard .
BIn message <vcs337$2p11f$ snipped-for-privacy@dont-email.me, Davey snipped-for-privacy@example.invalid writes
Half as little again, Work that one out.
B
Sounds like a Northerner talking. It actually makes more sense than the original ‘Four times smaller’, though.
Because you get pressed if you try to walk in and close the door?
A f****ng typewriter? How does that work?
My wife is from an Irish family and insists on clling the "airing cupboard" a "hot press".
I wouldn't know, I've only ever had a typing typewriter.
Maybe a connection to My Ding-a-Ling?
No. Meiosis is understatement. Litotes is "A figure of speech, in which an affirmative is expressed by the negative of the contrary". (OED)
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