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'''Many of the "common" usages here have become accepted definitions of the words listed. Do not treat a definition as incorrect simply because it is listed here.'''
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* '''Venomous''' and '''poisonous''' are not interchangeable, which is a common mistake in usage. ''Venomous'' means the subject has the ability to actively transmit poison. ''Poisonous'' means the subject transmits poison passively (ie. is eaten). Therefore, a poisonous frog means that it will poison those eating it, while a venomous snake means it will poison its victims by biting them and injecting toxins. As the mnemonic saying goes, "If it bites you and you die, it's venomous. If you bite it and you die, it's poisonous." [[note]]Similar issues happen in other languages -- for instance, in Spanish, ''venenoso'' (venomous) is very often used where ''ponzoñoso'' (poisonous) should be (although the opposite almost never happens), to the extent many assume both words are now synonyms, and that ''ponzoñoso'' is just an old word that is not used anymore.[[/note]] This means that, technically, if you are bitten by a snake or stung by a scorpion, the correct past tense is "I have been envenomed." This may be because most animal venoms are ''not'' harmful if swallowed...not that we'd recommend drinking it, since it can still enter the bloodstream through any cuts in the mouth.
* There is a famous (for a given value of "famous") poem by Lt. Col. Jeff Cooper, inventor of the "modern technique" of handgun combat:[softreturn]''A clip is not a magazine[softreturn]A mag is not a clip[softreturn]Neither is a grip a stock[softreturn]And "stock" does not mean "grip".[softreturn][softreturn]I do not mean to nitpick[softreturn]But improvement might be seen[softreturn]If we could bring ourselves to say[softreturn]Exactly what we mean.''
** A '''clip''' and a '''magazine''' are often used interchangeably, but military terminology is that a clip feeds a magazine (or the cylinder of a revolver) quickly; a magazine feeds into the weapon itself. A removable magazine is often referred to as a clip even by military sources, however.
*** This was highlighted early in 2014 when a California state senator delivered a press conference tirade where he kept using "30 calibre clip" and "30 magazine clip" to characterize the supposed firing speed of a gun.
** A '''stock''' is the part of a rifle, shotgun, or occasionally SMG or pistol that is braced against the shoulder; a '''grip''' is the part that is actually, well, [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin gripped]]—it's specifically the part of the gun that is held by the hand that pulls the trigger, and includes the trigger itself (though sometimes also used as a shortened form of "foregrip", the part of a long gun that is held by the off-hand to steady the weapon). The stock and grip are together part of the '''receiver''', the framework that holds the whole thing together (often called a '''frame''' on handguns).
*** To make things more confusing, in most classic rifles (i.e. non-automatic), a ''stock'' refers to the large wooden (or plastic) part all the metal parts (barrel, bolt and trigger assembly) are connected to. In this case, a part of stock behind the grip that is put against shooter's shoulder would be a 'butt'.
** A '''bullet''' is the metal slug fired from a gun. A '''cartridge''' or '''round''' is the unfired ammunition. A '''casing''' is the spent part of the cartridge ejected otherwise. Referring to unfired cartridges as bullets is a classic error. Similarly, '''shot''' is what's fired from a ''shotgun''. '''Shell''' can be both the unfired ammo and the spent casing.
*** To be extra confusing, old style cannon fired '''shot''' (solid projectiles) and '''shells''' (explosive projectiles). Explosive projectiles are still called shells.
** A '''barrel''' is the tube a bullet travels down when fired; before firing, the bullet sits (contained in a cartridge, see above) in a '''chamber'''. Revolvers have multiple chambers which rotate in a '''cylinder'''; other guns load their chambers (or "chamber rounds") from their magazines.
* For small arms, '''caliber''' means the width of the barrel at the narrowest point. "High caliber" is not, in fact, a way of saying "high power". E.g. A 7.62x39mm round fired from an AKM will not impart as much energy to a target as a 7.62x54mm round fired from a SVD Dragunov, nor will the 9x19mm Parabellum round impart as much energy as the 7.62x25mm Tokarev round.
** Another way to think of it is that a "high caliber bullet" will ''generally'' be fired from a bigger gun. However, caliber has nothing to do with strength ''by itself'' - if anything, the length of the cartridge (i.e. how much space there is in the casing for gunpowder behind the bullet) has more to do with the energy the bullet imparts on a target than the diameter of the bullet. If you're trying to say that a high caliber hand gun is more powerful than a low caliber rifle, chances are that you're ''wrong''. Unless you want to get into the specifics of grain count, rifling twist, bullet velocity and weight, you're better off assuming that handguns are less powerful than rifles.
*** To put it another way, "caliber" is absolutely not the same thing as [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stopping_power#Energy_transfer "stopping power"]]. A small-caliber bullet fired from a high-powered rifle is a lot more likely to kill you than a large-caliber bullet fired at a much slower speed -- the latter bulldozes its way through the entire region via [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydrostatic_shock hydrostatic shock]]; the former punctures its way through a narrow path. Kinetic energy is a function of the mass times the ''square'' of the speed.
** On the same subject, '''bore''' and '''caliber''' are not necessarily interchangeable. Traditionally for rifled weaponry, especially rifled artillery, "bore" denotes the number of turns in the number of calibers (i.e. how many times the width of the projectile down the barrel the projectile must travel to have one complete turn imparted on it by the rifling). So a rifled late Victorian artillery piece with one turn per 38 calibers is a 38 bore, but a smoothbore early Victorian cannon is a zero bore. To confuse matters further, in the UK the word "bore" is also used to mean the same as "gauge" in regards to shotguns: a measure of barrel diameter based upon the weight of a solid lead ball that will fit perfectly into the barrel, expressed as the denominator of a vulgar fraction of a pound if the numerator is one. Thus if the largest lead ball you can fit into the shotgun barrel weighs one twelfth of a pound, you have a 12-bore (or, in the US, 12-gauge) shotgun.
** To confuse matters, there are two separate meanings of the phrase "high-caliber," one of which means larger bullets, and the older of which means "fits the mold ideally." Therefore in other usage, higher caliber always means "better," but in guns it's just a straight technical term with no better/worse meaning.
** To confuse the situation even further, the term caliber is also used to indicate barrel length of artillery pieces, especially naval artillery. So when one refers to a 5"/ 38 caliber gun, one is referring to a gun with a barrel that is one caliber, or 5", internal diameter, and 38 calibers, or 190" long.
* '''Point-blank''' does not mean "at very close range". Point-blank refers to the maximum distance between a firearm and its target before one's aim needs to be adjusted for elevation. Of course, for field artillery or naval guns designed to launch shells in long parabolic arcs, that ''is'' quite a close range. For handguns or rifles, not so much.
* The word '''factoid''' is often used as if it meant "little fact" or "trivia," as in "here's a little factoid for you". It actually means "[[LittleKnownFacts something resembling a fact but with no evidence to support it]]"[[note]]"Factoids ... that is, facts which have no existence before appearing in a magazine or newspaper, creations which are not so much lies as a product to manipulate emotion in the Silent Majority." [N. Mailer, "Marilyn," 1973][[/note]], much like ''android'' is 'something that resembles a man'. Amusingly, this can often make the word more appropriate than the speaker's intention.
* '''[[RoyalBlood Royalty]]''' is not the same as '''[[BlueBlood nobility]]''' or '''gentry'''. Royalty is basically the nearest family of a ruler, while nobles are descendants of knights and landowners. There could be royal dukes and noble dukes. Gentry is somewhere between a subclass of nobility and a category of its own, as people in that class usually own land and are descended from well-established and well-connected families, but don't have hereditary titles or offices.
* '''Ironic''' doesn't (simply) mean "funny", "unexpected", "coincidental" or "cruel." See {{Irony}} for more on the subject, and IsntItIronic for more on the misuse.
** And on a similar note, '''cynicism''' isn't "sarcastic but more". Sarcasm is mocking, cynicism is jaded negativity.
*** And before '''cynicism''' got its current meaning, it was a Greek philosophy which taught that happiness is independence. From as much as possible - pleasures, law, other people...
* '''Impeach''' does not mean to remove someone from office. Impeachment is the process by which an individual is put on trial for unlawful activity. So Congress did not "''try'' to impeach" Bill Clinton, they did. He was not removed from office, though.
** In the legal context, it means to attack someone's credibility. At trial, both lawyers are trying to impeach the other's witnesses and it has nothing to do with elected office.
* '''Irregardless'''. While taken literally it could mean "not regardless", its usage is near-invariably as an erroneous synonym of "regardless." Linguists often refer to this fairly common phenomenon as "overnegation". In a case of ''actual'' irony, this is almost the exclusive purview of [[DelusionsOfEloquence people trying to sound more literate than they are, and achieving the exact opposite]]. In a case of ''further'' irony, you're vastly more likely to encounter this word in a style guide or as part of a joke than you are to ever hear anyone using it naïvely; we're calling out people who "don't know the language" by accusing them of using what was originally a non-word, even in a descriptivist sense. It is so common that the SAT has at least one question per writing section testing it. It is usually under the hardest questions, too. The Brothers Chaps lampooned this in their ''VideoGame/PeasantsQuest'' flash game by using the word "irredisregardless". The funny thing is, despite the word having no precedent, it's a triple negative, so it's technically correct.
* A '''Scientific Theory''' is [[GravityIsOnlyATheory not a guess, hypothesis, or conjecture.]] It's an established framework of one or more hypotheses with a significant body of evidence backing it. In other words, it's been "proven" to the extent it can be. If a model makes accurate predictions and is consistent with testing and/or observation it can eventually be called a theory, while the word hypothesis is reserved for an idea that you think might work but you haven't had the chance to rigorously test yet. As for why the word theory is used rather than, say, fact or law, this is simply a result of the general understanding that any theory may be incomplete or inaccurate. \\
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This doesn't mean we have any doubts about the validity of the theory itself, but that we may not know everything about it. Gravity is a good example, gravity is "only a theory". That is, our model of how gravity works may not be entirely correct; in fact we know it isn't, since our current theory does not incorporate quantum effects. That doesn't stop gravity from being real. Similarly evolution simply means change, and in the context of biology simply means change from one generation to the next in terms of genetic makeup. Our current theory of how species evolve through natural selection is a theory because the model may not be perfect, but the fact that organisms change from generation to generation is an observable fact. \\
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Incidentally, even in non-scientific usage the word '''theory''' did not always mean guess. If you look at how, say, Literature/SherlockHolmes would use the word theory, it would be a model explaining a crime, which is based on evidence, is testable, and has explanatory powers.
** It should be noted that this word is now subject to a misconception of the opposite sign, as a result of an overzealous response to the above mistake. The word "theory" does not imply that an idea is unproven, but neither does it imply that it is proven: it really doesn't say anything about the degree of confidence in it. For example, the theory of phlogiston is a thoroughly disproven scientific theory on combustion. It's still a theory, i.e. a system of ideas that aims to explain scientific phenomena on the basis of general principle - it's just that nobody believes in it any more.
** The core "essence" of a proper theory (and by extension hypothesis) is it has the property of ''falsifiability.'' This merely means that it's possible to construct a repeatable experiment to test ''if'' it's wrong. The actual outcome (proven correct or proven wrong) is irrelevant.
** As a further, a scientific '''law''' doesn't mean it's "more proven" than a theory. A law is (loosely) is something derived from a theory to cover a certain point. If your theory were "[[Series/{{Torchwood}} Jack Harkness]] is the sexiest creature in existence." then a one law might be "If you are in Jack Harkness' presence for more than 31.2 seconds, you ''will'' snog him." In more scientific the classic e=mc^2 is a law derived from the Theory of Relativity.
* The word '''Decimate''' is very frequently used a synonym of words like destroy, annihilate, or obliterate. Its actual definition is literally to destroy one tenth of something. [[note]]And being more pedantic, its a form of punishment used on Roman legions where legionaries draw straws and 1/10th are killed[[/note]]. The definition has loosened to mean, "kill a large percentage of" but it's still wrong to use it to mean "almost destroyed" or "completely destroyed" like some people do.
* The words '''racism''', '''prejudice''' and '''stereotype''' are often confused. Racism is defined as any policy or belief based in whole or in part on the pseudo-scientific theory that all humanity consists of biologically distinct races and that every member of each race has the distinct physical and/or behavioral characteristics of that race[[note]] Genetically, there are either tens of thousands of races or none, depending on whether you want to go for meaningful biological differences (none) or extremely minor ones (tens of thousands). The main problem with "racial" theory is that races aren't distinct, and not all the members of the supposed "races" have the characteristics they're supposed to have. [[/note]]. Prejudice means the belief that "[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prejudice a group of people [are] characterized by their race, social class, gender, ethnicity, sexual orientation, age, disability or religion]]." Stereotypes, on the other hand, are "generalizations of existing characteristics that reduce complexity" (also copied from Wiki/TheOtherWiki). So, the belief of the USA's 'Southern' slave-owners that anyone who was not an Anglo-Saxon European was by default of an inferior race was racism, the belief of Anglo-Saxon settlers that the USA's Amerindian peoples were savages was prejudice, and the belief that all Canadians constantly say "eh" is a stereotype. Stereotype is a ''neutral term''; often when people use the term in a pejorative manner, it is to attack a ''lazy'' stereotype -- that is, a blanket statement that assumes homogeny among an entire spectrum of demographic.
** Similarly, people often use '''discrimination''' to mean negative treatment based on prejudice. In fact, discrimination simply means ''any'' differential treatment, regardless of what such differentiation is based on or whether such treatment is positive or negative. Which is why we have an article for PositiveDiscrimination. Discrimination can and is perfectly rational and justifiable in many situations: for instance, the practice of hiring the more qualified candidate for a job is a form of discrimination. Another example would be to discriminate between foods one likes and doesn't like (i.e. ordering the strawberry shortcake over the apple pie because you do not like cinnamon)--this last sort of "discrimination" is why "discriminating" is a compliment in dealing with matters of taste (e.g. the ''discriminating'' wine-drinker can tell the ''Grand Cru'' Bordeaux from the [[ATankardOfMooseUrine plonk]], and is considered to have Good Taste because he "discriminates" in favour of the former over the latter). You will often see this used correctly in military contexts. If armed forces are said to be indiscriminate, they have crossed the MoralEventHorizon.
** Finns have become really, really bad at misusing "racism" ("rasismi") in the past ten years or so. People talk about "age racism" or "fat racism" or god forbid, even "sex racism" because they think "racism" just means "discrimination". Part of this stems from the English loanword "rasismi" replacing the old, 100% Finnish word "rotusyrjintä" (literally "race discrimination"). Nobody in their right mind would use a term like "ikärotusyrjintä" ("age race discrimination"), but "ikärasismi", "age racism" is ridiculously popular.
** '''Bigotry''' is often generalized into discrimination of any kind. In actuality, [[http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/bigotry bigotry]] is merely intolerance of beliefs other than one's own. Other factors, such as race, are not relevant to the designation.
* There appears to be a confusion about the words '''sexism''' and '''misogyny'''. Sexism is discrimination and stereotyping based on sex, and encompasses all forms of discrimination based on sex (indeed, even men who believe that women are inherently better than men, for example). '''Misogyny''' and '''misandry''' are hatred of women and men respectively. Some dictionaries have expanded this to include deep-seated prejudice against women or men respectively (so a womanizer who sees women only as sex objects would be a misogynist, despite his claims to love women).
* '''UsefulNotes/{{Feminism}}''' often gets misused for '''misandry'''. Feminism is the advocacy of women's rights on the grounds of political, social, and economic equality to men and nothing more. Unfortunately, due to a VocalMinority of feminists who tend to skew issues into an "us vs them" rhetoric, their advocacy for equality is often conflated with outright hatred for men.
* There is some confusion as to what a '''Justification''' is in the wiki's jargon, due to the everyday use of the term in Administrivia/JustifyingEdit. A JustifiedTrope ''does not'' require a Administrivia/JustifyingEdit. A trope is justified when the in-universe explanation for its use makes sense in context. A Administrivia/JustifyingEdit is just a fan of a work complaining that another editor [[FelonyMisdemeanor dared]] list that work under [[Administrivia/TropesAreTools a particular trope page]].
* '''Polygamy''' is "marriage of one person to more than one spouse" (to distinguish it from "group marriage"). It is not just a synonym for "polygyny", "marriage of a man to more than one wife". Most arguments brought up in response to "What's wrong with polygamy?" (e.g., "It oppresses women") are just irrelevant to "polyandry", "marriage of a woman to more than one husband". (And not just because "polyandrists do not exist", which is also factually incorrect.)
* A '''Battleship''' is a combat vessel that relies primarily on large caliber guns (11 inches or bigger) to do damage and is armored to withstand guns of equal power, if not greater power. It is not any ship meant to do battle, that would be a '''Warship'''. Nobody builds or uses battleships anymore[[note]]The last used were the American ''Iowa'' class[[/note]] (though several are preserved as museums) because missiles and aircraft carriers have rendered their construction uneconomical.
* While we're at it, a '''Cruise Ship''' and a '''Cruiser''' are very different types of ships. A cruiser is a medium-sized, long-range military vessel while a cruise ship is a passenger ship designed for pleasure cruises. Scifi writers screw this one up all the time [[SpaceIsAnOcean when naming spaceships,]] to the point that it's not unheard-of for one setting to use the terms both correctly and incorrectly.
* You can only ''truly'' '''plead the Fifth''' in a particularly bad court of HollywoodLaw. The correct phrase is to "TAKE the Fifth" (for those non-Americans unaffected by the EaglelandOsmosis: "The Fifth" is the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States, one clause of which protects against self-incrimination; better known as [[ReadingYourRights "you have the right to remain silent"]]). Pleading in a criminal prosecution[[note]]In a civil action, pleading is "the pleadings": the plaintiff's complaint (i.e. "the defendant did this, and this, and this, and that's such-and-such tort/breach of contract/other issue) and the defendant's answer to that complaint (which usually consists of responding to the complaint point-by-point by saying "Admitted" or "Denied" but can also be quite complicated--the least complicated being the common "This is a conclusion of law requiring no response, but to the extent it alleges any fact it is denied.").[[/note]] requires a '''plea''', most often "not guilty" or "guilty". (There's also ''nolo contendere'', "no contest": "I didn't do it, but I will not fight the charges," usually done to avoid civil liability on the grounds of [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Res_judicata res judicata/collateral estoppel]]--particularly when the criminal penalty is relatively light but the damages in a subsequent civil suit will be ''massive'' if the case goes against you.)
** While 'The Fifth' is not a plea, most courts will understand the statement "I plead the fifth" as a suspect explicitly invoking their Fifth Amendment right to avoid self-incrimination. According to the Supreme Court, while a suspect must explicitly invoke the right, "No ritualistic formula is necessary in order to invoke the privilege" ([[https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/349/155/ Quinn v. United States, 349 U. S. 155, 164 (1955)]]).
* Similarly (and technically), '''pleading insanity''' is shorthand used outside of court for pleading "not guilty by reason of mental disease or defect".
** Also worth noting is that one cannot be '''diagnosed''' as insane, because insanity is a legal concept, not a medical one. Even if a medical professional determines a person is mentally ill, a court must decide if that mental illness is legally relevant. In general, while having a mental illness or severe cognitive difficulty is an element of the court's decision, at the end of the day you are '''adjudicated''' insane, not diagnosed as such.[[note]]In the English-speaking countries, there are four standards for determining whether someone is legally insane. The oldest, called the ''M'Naghten'' rule after a case where the defendant believed the person he was shooting was Sir UsefulNotes/RobertPeel, articulates the rule that you (1) had a "mental disease or defect" such that (2) you either didn't understand what it was you were doing or didn't know that it was wrong. Some US states thought this too harsh, and changed the rule to be that (1) you had some kind of mental disease or defect and (2) it created an "irresistible impulse" to perform the criminal act. In TheSixties, some US states ''still'' thought this was too harsh, so they said that if (1) you had some kind of mental disease or defect and (2) that mental disease or defect "caused" you to commit the crime, you were insane. Finally, the authors of the Model Penal Code, an American attempt (mostly failed) at unifying the 50 states' criminal laws, thought that both the ''M'Naghten'' rule and the "irresistable impulse" rule made good points, sort of combined the two, stating that if (1) you had some kind of mental disease or defect such that (2) you could not (a) understand what you were doing OR (b) that it was wrong OR (c) you could not "conform [your] conduct to the law", the defense would be applicable.[[/note]] Similarly, on the civil side, you can also be adjudicated legally incompetent to do any number of things (to sign a contract, to commit a tort, to make a will, to serve as trustee of a trust); although the standard for that is a lot lower--"incompetence" can include moderate senility, for example--it is possible to have some kind of mental illness or cognitive difficulty and still be deemed legally competent to handle one's own affairs.
** Similarly, '''insanity''' means someone being mentally ill or being extremely illogical/foolish. Most people use the pop culture version taken from ''VideoGame/FarCry3'' where a character states that insanity is "doing the same thing over and over, expecting things to change". While someone who is mentally ill can exhibit such a behavior, it is not what insanity is all about.
* The phrase "'''compare and contrast'''" is redundant. '''Contrasting''' involves comparing—contrasting is comparing only the differences, while '''comparing''' in the broader sense may also note similarities. This error in rampant in this very wiki.
* '''Exponentially''' means "increasing at a rate which is also increasing", not merely "increasing" and certainly not "a lot". Mathematically speaking, "exponentially more" refers only to the difference between the rates of increase of two functions, and has a much more specific meaning than "this is growing faster than that"[[note]]The mathematical meaning of "exponentially more/less" is about the asymptotic complexity of a function equal to the difference between two functions. (More specifically, a function f(x) is said to be "exponentially greater" than another function g(x) if their difference (f(x) - g(x)) is a function that has the same asymptotic complexity as some function h(x) that grows exponentially with x. Another, probably more common definition is that their ratio (f(x)/g(x)) grows faster than any power of x. If one starts to be pedantic, the latter is called super-polynomial, and most people insist on using ratios (2^x doesn't really grow faster than 2* 2^x)) This means that it's incorrect to say that something is "exponentially more/less" than something else when the two things being compared are just constant quantities, rather than quantities that increase as functions of some variable (such as time).[[/note]] Values that stay the same or increase at steady rate are not, by definition, "exponentially" ''anything''. Most people who say this mean "orders of magnitude greater". An "order of magnitude" is (usually) ten times[[note]]Mathematically speaking, an order of magnitude is a factor of whatever the base value is. Saying that it is "usually ten times" reflects the generic standard that most mathematics is done in base ten. An order of magnitude in binary, for example, would be a factor of 2, while an order of magnitude in hexadecimal would be a factor of 16, ''et cetera''.[[/note]], so more than one would be 100 times, 1000 times, or more. That said, a quantity that is ten times larger than its starting value after one year, 100 times larger after two years, and 1000 times larger after three, can be said to be growing "exponentially" as the relation between value N and time t is one of N=10^t or N≈44.7e^t.
* A '''quantum''' is a discrete unit of something. Therefore, when Film/JamesBond finds his Film/QuantumOfSolace, he doesn't feel that much better[[note]]Which was how it was meant in [[Literature/ForYourEyesOnly the original story]]. The idea was that when the last quantum of solace is removed from a relationship a man might do anything[[/note]]. A quantum ''leap'' is a change directly from one state to another, without any defined intermediate states happening along the way. The distance leaped over does not need to be the smallest possible. [[http://www.irregularwebcomic.net/1554.html Some pedants have not quite grasped this]].
** To better describe, think of the word "quantity". When you have a quantity of something, i.e. a specific number of units of it, those units are ''quanta''. In physics, a quantum specifically means "the minimum amount of a physical entity involved in a physical interaction" (from Wiki/TheOtherWiki).
* '''Inflammable''' is not an antonym to '''flammable'''; it's a synonym. The antonym is '''non-flammable'''. (Granted, this is played for comedy more often than it's used seriously...)
** The confusion here is mostly due to the fact that inflammable (derived from "inflame") doesn't come from the typical [in-] negation, it comes from [en-], to give or receive. "Flammable" is actually the newer word, created because people knew that this exact mistake would be made. It makes sense once you consider that the archaic ''enflame'' is similar to enrage and enjoy.
** [[WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons "Inflammable means flammable? What a country!"]]
** [[VideoGame/MassEffect2 "Flammable! Or inflammable, forget which. Doesn't matter!"]]
** '''Creator/GeorgeCarlin''': "Flammable... inflammable... non-inflammable. Why are there three of them? Either it flams or it doesn't!"
** [[VideoGame/KingdomOfLoathing "It tries to set your face on fire, but you're inflammable."]] Wait, that means flammable. You're [[BuffySpeak "un-light-on-fire-able."]]
*** Of course, if someone ''did'' successfully light your face on fire, you'd suffer '''inflammation''', which is a physiological response to injury. So you'd be '''inflamed''' as well as inflammable.
* '''Mano a mano''' is a commonly used Spanish and Italian term that translate as "hand to hand," (which means the same thing as in English, but with a connotation of "evenly matched"). It '''does not''' means "man to man"[[note]]as two man on man kisses were described at the 2009 MTV Movie Awards[[/note]]. This is what is known in linguistics as a false friend. Sincerely saying that you want to settle things "mano a mano" before [[NeverBringAKnifeToAGunFight pulling out a gun is an example.]]
** Although, technically in some countries people shorten the word "hermano" (brother) to just "mano". So it could also be "brother to brother" ("hermano" or "mano" has been used as an identifier even if the person in question is not a sibling at all.)
** Even worse is when someone says "mano y mano" which is hand and hand, making no sense in relation to fighting, and even less sense when they think they are saying "man and man". [[HoYay Unless...]]
* The word '''whom''' is used by many as simply "who, but fancier." "Whom" is a ''direct or indirect object'', so if you ever see someone use it otherwise ("Whom are you?" for example), they're futzing it up. As a general rule, replace the usage of "whom" with "them" (and, correspondingly, "who" with "they") and see if it still makes sense.
** "Whom" is used to describe people something happens ''to'', and "who" describes people who ''do'' something. You might ask about a proposed business deal, "Who affects the deal?" and "Whom does the deal affect?"
* "Wherefore", as in Shakespeare's ''Theatre/RomeoAndJuliet'', does not mean "where", but "why"; "wherefore" is to "therefore" as "what" is to "that". Juliet was not wondering where Romeo was, but rather wondering why the man she loved had to be Romeo, one of her family's hated rivals. (Juliet's whole thing in the balcony scene is a meditation on the meaninglessness of labels.)
* People have been told not to say "Me and Joe went to the park", but "Joe and I ...". For too many, this has morphed to a general anxiety around the word "me", so they always use '''and I'''. This is a mistake. "He saw Joe and I" is wrong (it should be "Joe and ''me''").
** "I" is when you are the subject, and "me" is when you're an object. This does not change if you are accompanied by someone else.
** First person singular pronouns always go after anything else when multiple subjects or objects are involved, so "I and ..." is never correct. (This is courtesy, not grammar.)
** If you have trouble knowing whether or not to say "I" or "me", [[https://youtu.be/N4vf8N6GpdM?t=67 take out the other person/thing/whatever and see if the sentence still makes sense]]. ("Joe and I went to the park" changes to "I went to the park", not "Me went to the park")
** This is only the case in formal English, however. In discourse, almost all speakers will accept "Me and Joe went to the park" as an informal but grammatical variant. "Me and Joe" is somewhat more common than "Joe and me", an interesting inversion of the above "first person last" rule.
** Similarly, "He saw Joe and I" is used consistently by some speakers of e.g. Northern Californian English. This is probably hypercorrection in avoiding "me" entirely, as noted above, which has been adopted into the dialect.
** People who have been told that ''and I'' is not a panacea will often abuse the word '''myself'''. This is a mistake as well. Myself is ''reflexive'' -- when you're both the subject and the object. "I wet myself", "I touch myself" and "I cut myself" are all okay (grammatically, that is). "Please send the memo to Joe and myself" is wrong. You mean "... to Joe and me."
** Settling this and the above immediate point of grammatical confusion: In all cases where you list any series of individuals, ending with "and I/me", the way you settle the "I vs. me" is to eliminate everyone else from the list and isolate the "I/me". For instance, "Joseph, Victoria, and I went to the amusement park and rode the Thunderstrike," is correct because "I went to the amusement park..." would also be correct. Similarly, "Grandma Robinson regularly sent Joseph, Victoria, and me $5 checks on our birthdays," is also correct because "Grandma Robinson regularly sent me..." would also be correct.
** Possessives can get awkward as well, such as the cringeworthy "Joe and I's apartment." If you absolutely cannot get away with "Me and Joe's apartment," and the context isn't clear enough to just say "Our apartment," then the correct formal phrasing would be "Joe's and my apartment" for the same reasons listed above: "Joe's apartment" and "My apartment" are both correct by themselves.
* Ah, '''passive''' is another great example. Passive is a ''voice'', not a ''tense''. Similarly, '''indicative''' and '''subjunctive''' are ''moods'', not tenses.
** Also, people tend to confuse progressive aspect with passive voice. "I was kicking the ball" is not in the passive voice. "The ball was kicked by me" is.
*** A quick and easy way to identify passive voice- can you add "by [whatever]" after the verb/is it already there? Thus, you get "His brains were eaten (by [[EverythingsDeaderWithZombies zombies]])"- passive voice, "Zombies were eating his brains (by zombies)"- not passive voice.
*** Well, the examples in [[http://www.bartleby.com/141/strunk5.html#11 Strunk and White]] are a little painful, but not as painful as a [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E-Prime movement to discard passives and all other uses of "be"]].
* A '''vaccine''' is a component of a pathogen designed to induce immunity to it, not a miracle cure. Typically they are most effective before being exposed to the pathogen, though the rabies vaccine, which is typically given to humans after they are exposed to the rabies virus, is an exception. '''Vaccination''' and '''immunization''' are often, incorrectly, used interchangeably, but an immunization is simply anything that induces immunity, which includes vaccinations as well as antibody therapies that can cure a disease after exposure.
* '''Bemused''' has nothing to do with being "amused" -- in fact it means "utterly confused."
** Similarly, '''Nonplussed''' does not mean "aloof" or "unimpressed". It means "bewildered".
*** Or "unperturbed". Non-reacting due to confusion, or just non-reacting.
* '''Slander''' and '''libel''' tend to be used interchangeably. Libel is defamation in the form of ''written'' words, while slander is defamation in the form of ''spoken'' words. '''Defamation''' is a catch-all that covers both. With the advent of the Internet and lower barriers to publishing, the definitions are changing, but libel is generally public postings and slander is generally private words.
** The distinction (in the UK at least) comes from the permanence of the defamatory statement. If I said it to someone in a restaurant it's slander. If it happened to be inadvertently recorded and put in a movie soundtrack or written in an article, it's libel.
*** A.P. Herbert took this to the length of parody in "The Lawyer's Dream", where a bench of judges are arguing interminably about whether an audio recording is libel or slander?
** Mentioned in the first ''Film/SpiderMan1'' movie, as follows:
--->'''Peter Parker:''' Spider-Man wasn't trying to attack the city... he was trying to save it. That's slander.\\
'''J. Jonah Jameson:''' It is not. I resent that. [[ITakeOffenseToThatLastOne Slander is spoken. In print, it's libel.]]
** Also note for EaglelandOsmosis purposes that in all civil-law jurisdictions and many common-law ones (e.g. Virginia), slander and libel do not exist/have been merged and there is only "defamation" to cover injury arising from false statements, whether spoken or written. Also note that even in common-law jurisdictions that still respect the distinction, the only significant difference (in most jurisdictions) is in the proof needed for damages: with libel, all you need to show is "general" damages, i.e. put forward a good-faith estimate as to how much the damage to your reputation has cost you, but with slander, you need to prove "special" damages, i.e. need to point to at least one situation in which the injury to reputation had actually and directly harmed you (e.g. cost you a job) before you can collect anything (although if you can prove special damages, you can usually collect general damages as well).
* In {{Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game}}s, people often say, "Spell X has been '''casted'''" or "I have casted spell X". There is no word "casted". The word "cast" covers both present and past tenses. So both, "I will cast spell X on the monster" and "I have cast spell X on the monster" are the correct forms. The same conjugation is also used regardless of the specific thing or person being cast: Some sculptures are cast, actors are cast in movies.
* '''Puritanical''' means keeping "practicing or enforcing strict religious behavior." Its only tangentially related to anything sex related, and most certainly does not mean enforcing current laws about the age of consent (which in most countries is higher than the age specified in the dominant religion and derived from quite secular legislation). This does not stop more than a few pedophiles from calling such laws "puritanical."
* Another mistake frequently made in fantasy contexts is the conjugation of '''slay'''. As seen on acres of Disney World merchandise, "I slayed the dragon" is incorrect. "Slay" doesn't work like "play." Instead, it should be "I ''slew'' the dragon." Alternatively, "I ''have slain'' the dragon."
** {{Lampshaded}} in ''Series/BuffyTheVampireSlayer'', where Willow on one occasion had difficulty coming up with the right form. Giles, surprisingly, says either ''slew'' or ''slayed'' will do.
** You do not '''seen''' something. You ''saw'' it, or you ''have seen'' it, but you never '''seen''' it.
*** Most uses of the phrase "I seen it," especially those with enough emphasis to rule out a slurred "I've", are identifying the speaker as a hick.
* '''Inbreeding''' means [[KissingCousins breeding among]] [[BrotherSisterIncest closely related]] [[ParentalIncest individuals]]. Not breeding with members of another group or anything else. The confusion likely comes from the similar-sounding word "interbreeding." But ''in'' or ''intra'' refers to the inside and ''inter'' refers to the outside. [[note]]Other-word example: business between Los Angeles (in California) and Las Vegas (in Nevada) (e.g. an Angelino sells his 1964 Impala to someone in Vegas) is "interstate trade" or "interstate commerce". Business between Los Angeles and San Francisco (also in California) (same Angelino sells same car, but to someone in SF) is "intrastate trade" or "intrastate commerce".[[/note]] By the same token, '''interbreeding''' should not be used to mean marrying your sister.
* Similarly, a '''butler''' is the head of a large household of servants, dealing specifically with the wine cellars -- "butler" is, in fact, a corruption of "bottler". Because Jeeves is Bertie Wooster's only servant, his first job title would be "valet", although butlers may double as valets and vice versa.
** In one story, Jeeves' feelings are actually hurt when he is called on to buttle. That the normally unflappable "gentleman's gentleman" takes offense at something that seems trivial to us says that at one point it was a much more important distinction.
** Additionally, valet, when referring to a gentleman's servant, is always pronounced such that it rhymes with "pallet" or "mallet". Valet prounounced in the French style, such that it rhymes with "chalet", is an attendant who parks your car. In the United States, anyway. In the United Kingdom, they don't seem to make a distinction.
* While we're on the subject, '''claret'''--meaning a type of red Bordeaux wine and its associated colour--is pronounced to rhyme approximately with "merit". The word is a very old English borrowing, deriving from [[GermansLoveDavidHasselhoff medieval English nobles' love of a kind of dark rosé Bordeaux]] called ''clairet'', which the English eventually changed to "claret" as they began speaking English rather than French as a first language. They eventually began just calling any Bordeaux "claret," and when the preference of the English nobility (who [[UsefulNotes/NationalDrinks still love French wine, especially Bordeaux]]) shifted from a rosé to dark red, the name didn't change. Pronouncing it in the French manner is a hyperforeignism and frowned upon by the people who actually drink it. (You might be forgiven for your first offence if you're from a region or group that isn't familiar with the term--for instance, the same wine marketed as a "claret" in England will just be called a Bordeaux in America--but once you've been warned, you're on your own.)
* '''Interstellar''' means traveling between stars. Earth to Alpha Centauri is interstellar; Earth to Mars is interplanetary (and for heaven's sake not ''intergalactic''). ''Intrastellar'' travel would be travel within a star; ''transstellar'' would be across one; do not try either of these without serious heat shields or cooling tech unless you want to get fried to a crisp[[note]]You'll also get crushed; the sun masses c. 2 nonillion tons and averages half again as dense as water.[[/note]]. If you absolutely want to keep the ''stellar'' root for some reason, you might want to try ''circumstellar'' or ''parastellar'' on for size.
* To '''infer''' and to '''imply''' are different things. Person A may infer that Person B is stupid from the latter's misuse of words. Person A may then imply Person B's stupidity through witticism. Person B's inevitably incorrect response will be "Are you inferring that I'm stupid?" Person B is, in fact, inferring that Person A is implying that Person B is stupid, and they're right.
** The difference has been lampshaded by [[WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons Lisa Simpson]] and [[Series/LawAndOrderSpecialVictimsUnit John Munch]]: "You infer. I imply."
** As annoying as this can be for anyone with an interest in logic or literature, the use of infer to mean "suggest" is in fact ''very'' old; John Dryden is just the most famous writer to have used it that way. The difference between "infer" and "imply" is very useful, but it's actually wishful thinking to claim that the words have always meant different things.
** {{Lampshaded}} and PlayedWith in ''Series/TheDresdenFiles'' TV series:
-->'''Harry''': [[OurDragonsAreDifferent These drakes]], right, they can change shape? They're magical, immortal and all that. But you can change your appearance and you're magical and [stutters] you've been around a long, long time.
-->'''Ancient Mai''': Are you inferring something?
-->'''Harry''': Technically, I'm implying. You're inferring.
-->'''Mai''': Well, it's dangerous either way.
-->'''Harry''': You didn't answer my question.
-->'''Mai''': You didn't ask one. Which, at least, shows some common sense.
** {{Lampshaded}} in ''Series/TheThickOfIt'' Series Two, Episode Three:
-->'''Hugh''': Just tell me, truthfully, did you send that email?
-->'''Terri''': No I didn't... and [[IKnowYouKnowIKnow you know I didn't.]]
-->'''Hugh''': Sorry, are you inferring...?
-->'''Terri''': Implying.
-->'''Hugh''': You're implying that... it was me?
** One of Adam Warren's ''ComicBook/DirtyPair'' short stories has this as its main plot.
** This mistake is one of the [[MinorFlawMajorBreakup minor flaws]] that bother Music/WeirdAlYankovic so much in "Close But No Cigar".
* '''Disinterested''' is ''not'' a synonym for '''uninterested'''; it means, rather, that you are unbiased or have no vested interest.
** Though it wouldn't be unreasonable to be uninterested because you are disinterested.
** A good judge is disinterested; a tough audience is uninterested.
*** Ironically, the earliest recorded use of "disinterested" is in the sense that now belongs to "uninterested".
* A '''light-year''' is a measure of distance: the distance light travels in a year. Many writers have [[UnitConfusion made the mistake]] of using the term to describe a very long period of time. This is the one mistake ''guaranteed'' to infuriate pedants.
** In ''VideoGame/PokemonRedAndBlue'', the only trainer in the first Gym remarks, "You're light years away from beating Brock!" but then admits "Light years isn't time! It measures distance!" when beaten.
** Of course, often what a pedant interprets as literal but incorrect time could also be figurative and correct distance; a SufficientlyAdvancedAlien might well be light-years more advanced than us if you take it to be a metaphor using distance in place of quantity of technical and scientific knowledge.
*** In fact the construction "light-years ahead" is parallel to "miles ahead". Some pedants need to actually pay attention to the language they're using.
*** Literally, "to advance" is "to move forward", so if we define forward to be the direction of the alien planet, then it is most mechanically literal to interpret that as true, even if the aliens are using rocks. To interpret "advanced" as meaning the aliens have more sophisticated technology and comprehensive scientific knowledge is itself a figurative use of language.
** Of course, it's possible to get this both right [[http://www.answersingenesis.org/articles/kw/stars-far-away and wrong at the same time]].
* Similar to "light year", '''parsec''' is short for "parallax second", but is also a measure of distance, not time: 3.3 light years.[[note]]The distance to an object from the Sun if it has a one second yearly wobble in its appearant position in the sky due to being viewed from ''the Earth at different positions in space'' (different sides of the Sun). Even the closest star is a bit further away, meaning its parallax is smaller than one second.[[/note]] "Second" in this case refers to "seconds of arc", ''i.e.'', 1/3600 of a degree = 1/21,600th of a full circle. The ''[[Franchise/StarWars Millennium Falcon]]'' was able to shave ''distance'' off a smuggling run.[[note]]Or, as some fans like to believe, Han Solo was simply talking rubbish. (The original script actually contains stage directions to this effect, i.e. "Obi-Wan reacts with skepticism to Han Solo's attempt to impress them with obvious misinformation"; unfortunately, WordOfGod says it didn't quite come through on-screen, due to some poorly-timed film cuts between Alec Guinness and Harrison Ford.[[/note]]
* '''Conspicuous''' means "obvious," not "suspicious," no matter the way it sounds. Thus, if something was conspicuously absent, you are merely able to notice that it was absent; you do not necessarily have to raise an eyebrow at its absence.
** This may come from a character saying that they need to remain "inconspicuous" while in disguise or something similar. The character wants it to not be obvious they are in a disguise and consequently not be suspicious. Since they can say, "I want to be inconspicuous," or, "I don't want to be suspicious," interchangeably in such a situation, this may be why people equate them.
** By itself, conspicuous may not mean suspicious, but in that particular context it is implied the same as saying something is remarkably or questionably absent.
* '''Fascism''' is a loose political ideology that combines nationalism, militarism, anti-socialism and conservatism ([[EnemyMine insofar as Fascists and Conservatives can both agree that socialism and liberalism are bad]]). It's also associated with [[YouHaveOutlivedYourUsefulness anti-conservatism]] (because unlike conservatives they look to the future and not to the past for their ideal end-goal society), futurism, corporatism (i.e. Country-Corporation co-operation), military expansionism, and Social Darwinism. It's not a synonym for authoritarian, since one can be oppressive without being fascist. Most modern people and political parties that don't self-identify as "fascist" probably aren't fascists. Definite no-no's include communists, socialists, anarchists, feminists, environmentalists, liberals, libertarians, inter/anti-nationalists, pacifists, the USA's Republican and Democratic Parties, [[Creator/GeorgeOrwell Youth Hostels, Gandhi, women and dogs]]. To be more precise, even people showing antisemitic or xenophobic cannot be called "fascists" indiscriminately, as the original fascism introduced in Italy by Mussolini wasn't heavy on ethnic- or race- based xenophobia (fascists' aggression was usually directed towards their internal political enemies, chiefly the Catholic Trade Unions and Socialist Parties, while also strongly promoting Italian language and culture based nationalism). It was German National Socialism ("Nazism" or "Hitlerism") that introduced the ideas of racial superiority.
* '''Corporatism''' is the doctrine promoted by Mussolini that society should function as a body (Latin: ''corpus'') in which each of the various sectors of society (government, business, labor, etc.) are treated as "organs" within the body, interdependent and working toward the betterment of the whole. The term can include big business, but is broader than a simple collusion between business and government; "corporatism" has absolutely nothing to do with the English word "corporation."
** Relatedly, '''corporate personhood''' does not refer to letting companies vote or adopt children the way individual citizens can. It means a group of people ("a body") are treated as one person for administrative and certain legal purposes (particularly certain economic rights, including, most importantly, the right to enter into contracts and the right to sue and be sued). Perhaps ironically, "abolishing corporate personhood," if done without extremely fine precision, could ban labor unions, Indian tribes petitioning for reparations, and class-action lawsuits.
** And while we're at it, '''Corporation'''(public) and a '''Limited Liability Company'''(private) are two different things. Most people haven't even heard of the latter but their rights are the ones people often attribute "Corporate Personhood." To summarize, from a financial, and only financial, standpoint, a Limited Liability Company (LLC) is a person. This is because the whole reason [=LLCs=] even exist is so that a person can create a bufferzone between their business and their personal wealth. I.E. so no one can sue your local Mom and Pop coffee house for all their worth if their coffee ends up being too hot. Corporations do not have all of the same privileges that [=LLCs=]. For example a corporation can't discriminate on who it hires but an LLC ''can.'' On the other hand, [=LLC=] don't enjoy as many tax exemptions as corporations. From a legal perspective an LLC is person who enjoys the same, no more no less, privileges as an individual doing business.
* Strictly speaking, there is no single period in prehistory called '''[[OneMillionBC the Stone Age]]'''. The term originates from a listing of the three stages of a prehistoric society: Stone Age, Bronze Age, and Iron Age. In the most literal sense of the term, cowboys fought members of the Stone Age in the Wild Wild West; heck, there were still "Stone Age" people living in isolated parts of the world by the time ''WesternAnimation/TheFlintstones'' first went on air. The term is usually limited to Eurasian cultures, which complicates things.
** Strictly speaking, humanity as a whole had a single "Stone Age" (during which no sub-group had advanced beyond stone tools), after which the "Stone Age" becomes a term with more limited application, and terms such as "Bronze Age" began to apply as soon as one group use bronze for this purpose, even though they were the only ones. Likewise, the Stone Age would have begun with the first evidence of stone tools rather than the point at which stone tools become ubiquitous. Arguing otherwise would be akin to stating that we don't really live in the Space Age because most people alive right now have never ventured into space.
** Similarly, '''prehistoric''' does not necessarily mean ancient. "History" is "the study of what ancient people ''wrote'' about themselves," so for something to count as prehistoric, it merely has to predate the invention of writing (which was about 3500 BC). For this reason, there still exists a number of societies today which count as "prehistoric".
** Also, the Stone Age, Bronze Age, Iron Age were more a reference to the archaeology of Europe, the Middle East, and North Africa.
* '''Yea''' is an an archaic version of "yes" (sometimes still used in very formal context where one is asked to vote "yea" or "nay"). It is not an alternative spelling of "yeah", and is pronounced differently.
** And cartoonists often confuse it with "Yay!", which sounds the same but is a different word, an interjection expressing delight or enthusiasm. ("Yay/Yea, we won the game!")
** This is very probably simple coincidence due to onomatopoeia. The real instance of this trope would be those who misinterpret the older usage as being the newer usage.
* '''Object''' (the noun acted on by the verb) and '''subject''' (the noun [[BuffySpeak doing the verbing]]) are opposites.
* People use the word '''vagina''' to describe both a woman's vulva (external genitalia) and vagina (internal genitalia). Even the author of ''The Vagina Monologues''.
** Just to avoid making a false equivalency, "vulva" describes the entire external genitalia of the female, while "vagina" is one element of the internal genitalia (which also include the uterus, ovaries, etc).
*** Explained [[http://www2.ljworld.com/news/2003/may/04/v_is_for/ here]].
** Similarly, people seem to use '''Anus''', '''Rectum''' and '''Colon''' interchangeably, when [[ArtisticLicenseBiology they are very different parts of the digestive system with very different functions]]. Look 'em up!
* '''Consequences'''. It's commonly used to mean the negative results of an action; the opposite of a reward or benefit. Its actual definition is ''all'' results of an action, positive ''and'' negative.
* '''Infamous''' is frequently used to mean "very famous," which is far from correct. While it is not the opposite of fame (that would be obscurity), it actually means "having a very bad reputation", as in "the infamous UsefulNotes/JackTheRipper." Don't make the mistake that the Film/ThreeAmigos did when you're asked to meet someone infamous.
** Confusion may also arise from: 1) Deliberately-ambiguous sarcastic use and/or 2) the Jerry Springer effect, i.e. "I want my 15 minutes no matter what I have to do to get it".
** As described above, '''Infamous''' is not an antonym of ''famous''. Just wanted to clear it out: if something is ''infamous'', it actually ''has'' to have at least some (evil) fame.
** It is interesting, because original meaning of this word, now mostly forgotten, meant something different. Infamy was a form of punishment technically stripping the convicted of any legal protection, in other words, [[{{Outlaw}} outlawry]] (in the feudal world 'no fame' meant 'no one heard of him and no one will defend him'). Of course, the infamous had nothing left to lose, so they often were getting infamous in modern sense of this word.
* For another nice self-referencing example, compare the definition of '''{{trope}}''' in any reputable dictionary to the one used on this site. (For the sake of pedantry, assume the other wiki is not reputable.)
** Merriam-Webster agrees with us!
** So does the OED!
* '''Good''' vs '''Well'''. Good is an adjective. Well is an adverb. You look good, because good is describing you. You see well, because well is describing how you see. (You can look well, but in that cause 'well' is being used as measure of health, i.e. the opposite of 'You look ill'.)
** You can also correctly use 'look well' for 'look carefully', or 'look skillfully'. Similarly, the above could correctly describe a product that as part of its function interprets visual data. (A robot or something; if it's solely a camera, then its working is synonymous with its looking, and so it's still incorrect.)
** In ''Series/ThirtyRock'', Tracy Jordan even corrected the resident Harvard grad in the first episode: "No, Superman does good. You do well."
* Some people, including many English teachers, insist that the statement '''I feel bad''' is only correct if it is used to mean that the speaker's sense of touch is functioning improperly, and the proper way to express that one is suffering is to say "I feel badly." This is totally incorrect, and in fact, the reverse is true: in the first case, "bad" is a predicate adjective modifying "I" and linked to it by the linking verb "feel," whereas in the second case, "badly" is an adverb modifying the action verb "feel," and describes how one's sense of touch is functioning. Likewise, the statement "I feel good" is a completely correct response to the question "How are you?", since "good" is, again, a predicate adjective modifying "I"; pedants who insist that one say "I feel well" are incorrect, although that statement is also grammatically correct.
** As a rule, "feel" (in the sense of feeling a certain way), "look" (in the sense of looking a certain way, not looking ''at'' something), "sound", "smell", "taste" and all forms of "to be" ''do not take adverbs'', for the reasons given above.
** Like "no split infinitives," this is another example of a Latin rule being shoehorned into English. In Latin and Romance languages, "good" and "bad" are defining characteristics, akin to "saintly" and "evil" - to say that one is feeling evil today is a far cry from being tired. Instead, "I feel well" or "I feel unwell" (or a more specific feeling) are the typical answers in those languages. In English those words do dual duty as vague placeholders and as strong characteristics.
** This is possibly the best single example on the page that exemplifies the [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_language_processing natural language problem]], as well as why SesquipedalianLoquaciousness is sometimes quite justified. (i.e. "I feel bad." becoming "I feel less healthful." or "My epidermis is less sensate.") It's also how someone that WillNotTellALie can also be a ConsummateLiar through clever use of near synonyms, logical misdirection, etc.
* '''Literally''' is often used as a generic intensifier, a "smarter-sounding" substitute for "extremely" or similar. The irony is that the usage is most often figurative, when it ''actually'' means "not figuratively." Example of misuse: "It was literally a slaughter!" in reference to a sporting event, assuming said sport isn't a BloodSport. See LiteralMetaphor. Then there are the people who correct this by saying "You mean 'figuratively'," as in [[http://xkcd.com/725/ this]] ''Webcomic/{{xkcd}}''. That's also incorrect, as the desired effect was to speak hyperbolically, and using the word "figuratively" completely removes that meaning; what they really mean to say is an intensifier like "totally".[[note]]Incidentally, this isn't the first time a word has shifted from meaning "not figuratively" to being used as an intensifier. "Very" (from "verily," meaning "true") and "really" also have their roots in words meant to distinguish factual truth from exaggeration. Perhaps in time the original meaning of "literally" will have also become so diluted by being used for emphasis that we'll have to come up with another word to take its place.[[/note]]
* '''Peruse''' means "to read thoroughly", not "to skim."
** [[http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/peruse The dictionary.com entry has an interesting usage note concerning this]].
* '''Scan''' has been similarly diluted in common usage, perhaps because computers scan things so quickly.
** In language teaching, both ''scan'' and ''skim'' refer to quick-reading techniques: ''scanning'' is quickly reading through a text to find a particular piece of information, whereas ''skimming'' means quickly reading through a text to catch the general gist.
* '''Incredulous''' means "not believing," not "incredible." If someone sees something incredible, then they can be incredulous.
** It helps to think of it this way: the base of the two words is 'credible' (meaning 'can be believed') and the negation prefix 'in'. If something is 'incredible', it is not believable, or unbelievable (similar to 'fantastical'. If you are being 'incredulous', you are being the opposite of credulous (which means 'easily believing'), not treating something with credulity, or you don't believe it.
** Another mnemonic: In general ''people'' are incredulous while ''things'' are incredible.
** In ''Film/TheAccidentalTourist'', it's pointed out that '''lacking credence''' is the proper use of the word.
* The difference between "rob" and "steal": You '''rob''' a person when you '''steal''' their property.
** Technically, robbery is defined more narrowly than this: it's taking someone's goods by threat of violence. But yes, it's never correct to say "My wallet got robbed" or "He robbed my wallet", but "I was robbed of my wallet" is correct.
*** If someone solely stole the money without stealing the wallet itself, one could argue that the wallet was robbed of its money. This would also apply if the victim were a self-aware wallet.
** "Burglary" is a different kind of theft from "Robbery". If you leave your wallet at home, and when you get back, discover that it was ''stolen'', you've been ''burgled''. Or "burglarized" if you're in the United States.
*** Legally speaking, burglary doesn't have to involve stealing (larceny and theft cover those). Burglary is the entrance of a building with the intent to commit a crime therein. You don't even have to actually complete the act you entered the building to do. If Alice enters Bob's house with the intent to murder Bob (or steal from him, assault him, or write a bad check while sitting on his couch), she has committed burglary, whether or not she actually does the deed. In some areas, [[{{Thoughtcrime}} even if you change your mind about committing the crime once you're inside,]] you can still be on the hook for burglary. As a result, burglary is a favorite of prosecutors as it can be added as a charge to many different acts. The case law of what constitutes "building" and "entry" can get a little silly.
* The term "Assault and Battery" exists because the two represent different parts of the same act. '''Assault''' is a a threat which suggests that "immediate harmful contact" will occur; '''battery''' occurs upon contact. Swinging a bat at somebody is assault. Hitting somebody with a bat is battery. Consequently, the latter usually depends on the former, except when the threat is unknown until contact. Generally, the contact doesn't have to be violent; the rule is that any unwelcome ''touching'' is battery (although as a practical matter you have to meet a certain threshold in order to get the authorities to prosecute). An unwanted pie in the face or kiss on the cheek constitutes assault and battery; thus some statutes on sexual assault actually call it "sexual battery" on the theory that you're punishing the touching, not the threat.
** Different jurisdictions have different definitions. Example: what the MPC and the above call "Battery" is called "Assault" in Delaware, and what the above calls "Assault" is named "Menacing".
** Bear in mind that both assault and battery are not only crimes, they are also civil torts in most [[UsefulNotes/TheCommonLaw common-law]] jurisdictions. This means that you can be prosecuted by the state and sued for damages by the victim for one act. Battery suits often address things that the state just lets slip; in one case frequently used in law schools (''Garratt v. Dailey''), an old woman successfully sued a five-year-old boy for $11,000 (in 1952 money!) after she got a hip fracture when he moved a chair she was trying to sit in.
* "'''Affect'''" and "'''effect'''": In ''general'' terms, "effect" is usually a noun and "affect" is usually a verb. However, there are actually ''five'' words there, not two.
** af-FECT (v) - To have influence on. "The heavy rains affected the water level."
** af-FECT (v) - To pretend, often to pretend to have a degree of sophistication. "At the wine club, Bob affected a fake French accent to be a douche."
*** This is also the base word of "affectation," or a behavior adopted to evoke that air of sophistication. "Even though Bob is from America, he crosses his 7s as an affectation."
** AF-fect (n) - Usually only used in psychology circles, and it's basically a term for an emotional response.
** Effect (n) - A consequence or result of something. "The effect of all the heavy rain was flooding."
** Effect (v) - To create a change. "Due to the flooding, the city effected changes in flood channel construction."
** The things you carry on your person (in your purse or pockets) are your "personal ''effects''"
* Off the northwestern coast of Europe are the '''British Isles''', a collection of two large and many small islands, the largest of which is '''(Great) Britain''' and the second largest of which is '''Ireland'''. Together they contain two countries: the '''United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland''' and '''Ireland''' (called the "Republic of Ireland" to differentiate it from the island, of which it covers about five-sixths.) The United Kingdom is a country composed of four constituent countries: '''Scotland''', '''Wales''', '''Northern Ireland''' and '''England'''. '''Cornwall''' is a politically united but culturally distinct area within England. There also exists the '''Isle of Man''', the '''Bailiwick of Guernsey''', and the '''Bailiwick of Jersey''', which are not part of the United Kingdom, but which have its Queen as their sovereign and which the UK provides for the military defence thereof. It is confusing but please, for your own safety, NEVER use ''England'' to refer to anything besides the land south of the River Tweed and east of the Rivers Vyrnwy and Tamar (Cornwall may be a more debated case but the Cornish will like you for it).
*** [[http://i.imgur.com/cuq3P.png Relevant.]]
*** [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rNu8XDBSn10 Also relevant]].
** The term "British Isles" is also disputed by many Irish people, who object to the term "British", given its usual usage as "of or pertaining to Great Britain". The governments of the United Kingdom and Republic of Ireland both avoid using the term, as do most Irish people, but it is a common term in Great Britain, where it is seen as an entirely neutral, geographic term, akin to "Indian Subcontinent" or "North America".
*** Well the British Government uses it, just not in international documents. The neutral term often used is '''Islands of the North Atlantic (IONA)'''. (This does, mind, include the islands of Faeroe, which are really quite un-British, being ruled by Denmark and speaking their own North Germanic language and all...)
*** Not to be confused with the island of Iona off the west coast of Scotland.
*** At least in the travel industry, the "Indian Subcontinent" is now the "South Asian Subcontinent".
** Also, it's standard practice to refer the UK as "Britain", even though Northern Ireland is part of the former but not the latter.
** Also, a person from Scotland is "a Scot"; many people from Scotland are "Scots." You may describe their nationality and their institutions as "Scottish" (so it's perfectly to say "my friend is Scottish" in the same way that one would say "my friend is English"), but ''only'' in that sense.
*** 'Scottish' is an adjective qualifying someone or something from Scotland. 'Scot' is a noun. While it's preferable to refer to people from Scotland as "the Scots" rather than "the Scottish"[[note]]though historically, the Scots -- or the Scoti -- were from Scotia, which was in fact a Roman name for ''Ireland''[[/note]], it is not wrong to refer to someone as Scottish by way of an adjective. On that note, the adjective is indeed 'Scottish'. Don't use the adjective 'Scotch' outside of Scotch whisky, Scotch eggs or Scotch pies, at least not if you don't want to be [[https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/scotch#Verb scotched]] yourself.[[note]]However, at least as recently as Agatha Christie, "Scotch" and "Scotchman" were acceptable English idioms, no matter what the Scots themselves may have had to say about it.[[/note]]
*** And while we're at it, place-name adjectives like "Parisian" or "Viennese" do ''not'' simply mean "from Paris" or "from Vienna", but rather "typical or characteristic of the place in question". Thus, you can have a ''Viennese café'' in London (i.e. it embodies characteristics commonly associated with Vienna), but "Le Monde" is a "Paris newspaper" (i.e. a newspaper based in Paris).
** These rules similarly apply to people. Hugh Laurie was born in England, Ewan [=McGregor=] in Scotland, and Catherine Zeta Jones in Wales. All three are British[[note]]though both Welsh people and Scots generally prefer the more specific demonym[[/note]], but only Laurie is English. Pierce Brosnan is neither (he's Irish).
*** And just to make things more complicated--people from most of the British Isles wince at the expression [[IAmVeryBritish 'British accent']]. Usually because they know what foreigners mean by that, and resent the implication that's how they sound. 'English accent' is marginally better (not that people from much of England will take kindly to being told 'all British accents sound posh and educated to ''me''...', as they'll still feel that their existence is being denied and aren't always as pleased as you'd think to be told they sound 'classy', but it narrows the offence a little.)
** The '''Isle of Man''' is not part of England, Scotland or even the UK; it's a separate dependency of the British Crown. The '''Bailiwick of Jersey''' and the '''Bailiwick of Guernsey''' (known collectively as the Channel Islands) are the other two Crown Dependencies. ("Bailiwick" being an archaic term meaning the area under the jurisdiction of a bailiff -- a bailiff being a sheriff's appointee, so a bailiwick would have been a part of a shire). There are also 13 British overseas territories, and the Sovereign Base Areas of Akrotiri and Dhekelia (both on Cyprus).
** On that note, now you know where the idiomatic expression '''bailiwick''' got its meaning: it means an area specific to one's jurisdiction (department, profession, area of expertise): "not my bailiwick".
* '''Russia''' is a country (specifically, a federation of a number of states and republics) running from Finland to the Pacific Ocean, from Belarus to China, from Mongolia to the Arctic Ocean and immediately north of Kazakhstan. The '''Soviet Union''', or more formally, the '''Union of Soviet Socialist Republics''' is actually what it sounds like: a country, specifically a supranational federation of different republics with a federation government sitting in the capital of Moscow (at least in a constitutional and formal sense--like many large nations who used the same model, the actual distribution of authority is highly circumstantial and dependent on the period). They are not the same thing, but often times (particularly in, though not limited to, the West) it is convenient to make them interchangeable. Russia ''was'' one of the constituent republics, specifically, the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic, a founding republic of this federation state.
** This even confused foreign audiences at the time of the country's founding: "Soviet Russia" was founded in 1917 and 1918, with the collapse of the Petrograd-based Russian Provision Government (that came into power after the abdication of the Tsar) and the Petrograd Soviet moving the capital to Moscow, with the adding of "Soviet" to the name "Russian Republic." The "Soviet Union" was not founded until 1922, when said republic and five of its neighbors entered into a treat to become a supranational federation. Foreign observers were typically less familiar with the other states, and continued to use the name "Soviet Russia" commonly.
** This is particularly problematic when talking about geographic locations that were in the Soviet Union, but not in the largely-unchanged borders of Russia (for example, ''Series/{{Friends}}'' speaking of "the Russian City of Minsk" in regards to the capital of Belarus).
** Another common error is referring to pre-1992 Soviet organizations where a Russian counterpart did not exist, or was clearly not the subject: the ''Russian'' atomic bomb (when, obviously, nuclear weapons are controlled by the national government), the ''Russian'' Air Force (which might refer to the Russian contingent of aircraft in the republic-level Border Forces, but obviously is intended for the ''Soviet'' Air Force), the ''Russian'' Olympic athletes (referring to Russian athletes alone, but likely intended to reference the entire ''Soviet'' Olympic team). Mother ''Russia'' is a national personification predating the creation of the Soviet Union, the term used in literature or philosophical speech for the Soviet Union (where it most commonly appears in fiction) is Mother ''Homeland'', or the nonspecific ''Motherland''. Some other republics had their own national personifications in the same period (for example, Mother Armenia, whose statue was erected in 1950). Very few post-war monuments are, accordingly, of Mother Russia.
** In an inversion, most residents of the Soviet Union spoke Russian, as there were dozens of native Soviet languages and Russian was linguistically dominant. To say someone is speaking ''Soviet'' is nonspecific and oddly-worded, especially since when not a modifying adjective (in other words, alone) "Soviet" is a noun meaning "council."
* '''Immoral''' is knowing it's wrong and doing it anyway; '''amoral''' is, generally, not having a sense of right or wrong in the first place. Gravity and a large rock are amoral; my dropping a large rock on your head to kill you is immoral (unless, perhaps, I'm mentally disturbed in such a way that I'm incapable of making moral judgments). Furthermore, '''nonmoral''' deals with things that are not a question of morality, such as the choice between chocolate or vanilla ice cream. [[note]] Although it should be noted that [[FelonyMisdemeanor choosing vanilla over chocolate is a sign of pure, unmitigated evil.]] [[/note]]
* '''Non-zero-sum''' does not mean "win-win" or "opportunity to cooperate." It refers to some valuable resources (money, time, oil, wood, etc.) being permanently lost or gained during the event. A zero-sum game merely means that everything the participants begin with is redistributed. Non-zero-sum games can easily be lose-lose instead of win-win, and, while the Prisoner's Dilemma and a few other well-known non-zero-sum games are cooperative, others, such as the dollar auction, are normally non-cooperative.
** Whether something is win-win vs. lose-lose or cooperative vs non-cooperative is usually a function of the players' choices, not of the game itself. If the players in a dollar auction agree beforehand that only one person will bid, and that the profits will be shared equally, that is a cooperative/win-win strategy. Some games can be structured to always be lose-lose, but aren't as interesting to study.
*** If by "win" one means "end with more than one started" and by "lose" one means "end with less than one started", it is also ''not'' a requirement that someone ''must'' win and someone ''must'' lose in a zero-sum game; if everyone ends with ''exactly'' as much as each one respectively had at the start, it is still a zero-sum game.
** Also, usually game theorists do not use "zero sum game" but "constant sum game". That's partly for ease of mathematics behind it, but it also can mean that all players lose or win if compared to the status quo before the game. It is just that each win of one side is countered by a loss of equal amount on the other side (and let's not start about more-than-two-player games). Also in many to most games meta gaming (e.g. side payments outside of the game itself to counter asymmetric payouts in a win-win situation) is not considered, thus not every non-zero-sum means opportunity to collaborate.
* '''Stupid''' and '''ignorant''' are not interchangeable: a stupid person lacks intelligence, an ignorant person lacks knowledge. So, if someone crosses a street on a red light because they didn't know that red means "stop", they're ignorant. If they cross a street despite seeing a car coming at 50 mph and get hit, they're stupid.
** Lampshaded in the Simpsons episode "The Way We Was":
--> '''Homer:''' Wait a minute. That word you keep calling me?\\
'''Artie:''' Ignoramus?\\
'''Homer:''' Ignoramus! It means I'm stupid, doesn't it?\\
'''Artie:''' There is a difference between ignorance and stupidity.\\
'''Homer:''' Not to me there isn't, you... ignoramus!
** If someone misuses the words on this page, they're ignorant, but not necessarily stupid.
** "Ignorant" also does not mean "belligerent" or "impolite"
** Perhaps a better example of the difference between intelligence and knowledge: knowing what the Pythagorean theorem is and what it's used for takes knowledge; being able to work out the equation mentally requires intelligence.
** Once you've read the Pythagorean theorem, understanding what it means would require intelligence.
** If someone doesn't know that a tomato is a fruit, they're ignorant. If they know it's a fruit, so they put it in fruit salad (without knowing what they're doing),[[note]]You ''can'' create a tasty fruit salad with tomato in it, but it needs a special recipe and it exists in a neither-here-nor-there universe of being sweet and savory and neither at the same time.[[/note]] then they are stupid.
** Interestingly enough, '''idiot''' can be interchangeable with '''ignorant''' given its root in a Greek word for someone who does not take part in the affairs of his city, someone who ignores those affairs.
** You could also say that since no human is omniscient (as far as we know) everybody is ignorant about something. On the other hand, not everybody is stupid.
* On that note, '''stupid''' originally meant '''numbed''' or '''stunned''', hence the phrase "He was struck stupid." The sense lives on in the verb '''to stupefy'''.
* '''Omniscient''' means all knowing. It does not necessarily mean '''Divine''' or '''decides right from wrong.''' A lot of tropers seem to be misusing OmniscientMoralityLicense under the latter assumption.
* '''Née''' means "born". It does ''not'' mean "formerly known as" or "otherwise known as" or even "maiden name" except in the context that a woman's maiden name is generally her birth name. If a woman is born as Mary Smith, marries and changes her name to Mary Robinson, then divorces, remarries, and changes her name to Mary Jones, it would be correct to say "Mary Jones, née Smith"; it would ''not'' be correct to say "Mary Jones, née Robinson."
** Secondly, "née" is feminine. If a man changes his name, it's '''né''' (e.g. "Malcolm X, né Little").
** For transsexuals, as a general rule of thumb, you use the gender-specific words of the gender they identify as, rather than their genotype, if you are trying to be polite to them. So for example if you know a [=FtM=], it is "He" "Him" "né" etc.
* Similarly, French-derived adjectives should retain their French masculine-feminine endings. A woman with flaxen hair is '''blonde''', but a man is '''blond'''. More obscurely, and only in English, a man with dark hair is not a '''brunette''' but a '''brunet'''. It would all be pronounced the same in English, though, where articles don't have gender.
** In French, "brunette" carries the literal meaning of "little brown-/black-haired girl." A woman who is dark-haired is "brune", and a dark-haired man is "brun". The nouns, "une brune" and "un brun" can also be used, especially with adjectives ("une jolie[[note]]pretty[[/note]] brune"/"un beau[[note]]handsome[[/note]] brun"). "Blondinette" (blond-haired girl) is an endearment. There is no male equivalent for "brunette".
** Also, when one is engaged to be married, the proper word depends on the person's gender: a man is a '''fiancé''', whereas a woman is a '''fiancée'''. As with other French-derived terms, they may be pronounced exactly the same, but their gender matters.
** Another place where people often drop the gender declension in English is for words like aviator. Saying "female aviator" is incorrect, the term is "aviatrix."[[note]]Though it's perhaps better, if the pilot's genitalia aren't relevant, to stick with "pilot".[[/note]] Same with "male dominatrix." It's just "dominator."
* People keep using '''pragmatic''' to describe someone who appears to be thinking quite ideally, or something along the lines of that. This is used frequently to describe politicians during political campaigns. The word means "of or pertaining to a practical point of view or practical considerations." In a related sense, '''pragmatism''' is a "character or conduct that emphasizes practicality." So depending on the case, one may be correct or not.
* If you're '''waiting on''' someone, then you're performing the job of a waiter or servant. If you're looking at your watch wondering where the hell they are, you're waiting ''for'' them.
** [[SeparatedByACommonLanguage Dialect difference]]. Like how people from parts of the eastern US--especially New York City--say "on line for tickets" instead of "in line for tickets". Slight differences between preposition use are a common dialect variation, especially in Germanic languages (anyone who took high-school German probably read that word "preposition" and began to weep softly, like a ShellShockedVeteran).
*** Trust me, we Germans aren't happy with English prepositions either.
* A '''narcotic''' is any sedative defined as drug with morphine-like effects (to quote Wiki/TheOtherWiki). Most people use it as an umbrella term to include all illicit drugs.
** The term was corrupted as soon as the ''stimulant'' cocaine was classified as a narcotic in US federal law (the original Harrison Narcotics Act was written to deal with opium trafficking), so for legal purposes it is - despite being a stimulant.
* '''Argumentum ad hominem''' is (to quote Wiki/TheOtherWiki) [[LogicalFallacies "an argument which links the validity of a premise to a characteristic or belief of the person advocating the premise."]] It's not just a fancy word for a personal attack. "You suck, therefore your argument is false" is ''ad hominem''. "You suck" on its own isn't, neither is "your argument is false, therefore you suck,"[[note]]which, thanks to how implication works, means that the person could still suck even if their argument is true[[/note]] nor is "Your argument is false and you suck." It's certainly rude, but not fallacious.
** In many cases, the "therefore your argument is false" part is left implied. The intent is still to discredit the advocate rather than (probably more difficult) rebuttal of the premise; that the link is not explicitly stated doesn't necessarily mean it isn't ad hominem - if the attack is trying to bring down the premise, it is. If the person being attacked is not advocating anything, though (or if anything they might be advocating has nothing to do with the attack), it isn't ad hominem - just a personal attack.
* '''Semitic''' doesn't necessarily mean Jewish. It means of Akkadian, Arabic, Aramaic, Ethiopic, Hebrew, and/or Phoenician ancestry.[[note]]By the process of history, most Phoenicians, Akkadians, and Aramaeans have been mixed so much with Arabs -- to the point that nearly all of them have Arabic as a first language and many if not most of them consider themselves ethnically Arab -- that they're hardly worth mentioning today.[[/note]] On the other hand, the terms '''anti-Semitic''', '''anti-Semitism''', and '''anti-Semite''' typically only refer to hatred of Jews; these words were coined in 19th century Europe, during the era of "scientific racism" which claimed that all apparent religious and cultural conflicts of Jews and (Christian) Europeans were actually born of conflict between Semitic and "Aryan" races,[[note]]See also Woodrow Wilson's brilliant idea that Serbs, Croats, and Bosniaks should have one country because they're all the same race and thus won't have any conflict. In fairness to him, many Serbs, Croats, and Bosniaks actually had the same idea at the time; they figured their commonality of language (their languages are completely mutually intelligible and were at the time argued to be dialects of one language) was more important than their religious differences.[[/note]] and the terminology has stuck ever since.
** Contrast with the lesser-known word '''anti-Judaism''', which refers specifically to opposition to the Jewish religion, and not to Jews as a nation, race, tribe, or ethnicity. Then there is '''anti-Zionism''', which specifically refers to opposition to the ''political'' nation-state of Israel and[=/=]or Jewish Nationalism in general (some of the most vocal anti-Zionists are Haredi ''Jews'', [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sikrikim some of whom]] have committed violence in the name of their position).
*** Both anti-Judaism and anti-Zionism can, of course, be covers for anti-Semitism. Even without deliberate dishonesty, the three tend to shade into each other, especially given how tightly interwoven Jewish religion and nationalism are to the rest of Jewish identity (it's similarly difficult to distinguish opposition to Hinduism from opposition to Indian nationalism or hatred of Indians).
* '''Populist''' has done a complete turnaround of meaning since the 1890s. Political scientist David Nolan once used it as roughly a synonym for ''socialist''. Actually, while the Populist (or People's) Party of the 1890s that thrived in much of the western and southern United States was more anti-"big business" than anti-business generally, it did call for some reforms that are usually thought of as socialistic (such as the nationalization of particularly lucrative industries). Nowadays, the word has been shorn of almost all economic connotations. To be a ''populist'' is to bear resentment against society's elites, who need not necessarily be "the rich." Class is still a factor to some extent, but differing educational levels and the contentious nature of American popular culture also enter into the equation.
** The broadest definition of populism is opposition to the elite, whatever "elite" may mean at the moment. As such, it's perfectly correct to use it for the political movements of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, marked for their socialist tendancies and dismantling of corporate giants, as it is to use it for the current anti-intellectualist bent in the American social and political landscape.
*** Populist is not about opposition to the elite but about favouring and aiming efforts at the greater populace. To be a populist is to promote oneself to be liked by the majority, the non-elite, if they happen to like the elite it would be populist not to go against the elite...
*** To complicate matters further, ''populist'' may also refer to politicians who aim their efforts on any majority, thus changing sides and agendas to maximize their support, not to represent any group in particulat. It is more or less political equivalent to 'opportunist'.
* '''Objective''' (as in the opposite of '''Subjective'''), especially when used with the word '''review''' (as in a ''critical review''). There is no such thing as an '''objective review'''. A review, by definition, is subjective. A ''consensus'' may be derived from many reviews, but there will never be a definitive, objective review. An actually objective review would look something like this [[http://www.destructoid.com/100-objective-review-final-fantasy-xiii-179178.phtml review of Final Fantasy XIII]] by [[WebVideo/{{Jimquisition}} Jim Sterling]].
** The word one should use when speaking about review that is as unbiased as possible and takes into account multiple point of views is 'intersubjective'.
* The use of a somewhat archaic word has clouded its meaning, but nibbling on hors d'oeuvres serves to '''whet''' one's appetite, not ''wet'' it. ''Whet'' means "to sharpen," as seen in the term ''whetstone'', a stone used for sharpening knives--if something is sharpening your appetite, it's leaving you hungry for more, not dampening (or ''wetting'') your enthusiasm. So, "whetting your appetite for destruction" would mean starting small as a prelude to becoming more destructive, not sating the urge altogether.
* There are so many examples of psychological and psychiatric terms that are misused that it almost warrants its own page. To start with:
* '''Psychotic''': It does not mean [[InsaneEqualsViolent "going around and killing people for no reason"]]; someone who does that is just homicidal. Psychosis is a loss of touch with reality, characterized by disorganised thinking, delusions, and sometimes (but not always) auditory, visual, and tactile hallucinations. While people with psychosis can be homicidal, it is extremely rare (violence by psychotics is more usually related to paranoid or other delusions).
* '''[[TheSociopath Psychopath / Sociopath]]''': They are usually not murderers; in fact, many successful [[CorruptCorporateExecutive CEOs]], [[AmoralAttorney lawyers]], and [[SleazyPolitician politicians]] are psychopaths or sociopaths. Psychopathy and sociopathy both mean lack of a conscience, a limited emotional range, and difficulty in forming significant relationships. They also often lack impulse control. Both psychopaths and sociopaths can be classed as having antisocial personality disorder, though not all people with the disorder are psychopaths or sociopaths. Psychopathy and sociopathy are typically held to be synonyms under the umbrella of antisocial personality disorder (which is the term the DSM-IV uses that includes psychopaths and sociopaths), and when a distinction is made it has nothing to do with the origins of the disorder, since the origins are not definitely known. The typical distinction is that sociopaths have a more normal temperament and are better able to adapt to societal norms. While statistically speaking murderers are likely to be psychopaths or sociopaths, psychopaths and sociopaths are not very likely to be murderers.
** In the pilot of ''Series/{{Sherlock}}'', Holmes objects to being called a psychopath, preferring to be recognized as a "highly functional sociopath."
*** "High-functioning sociopath." "Highly functional" is a very common misquote; the actual line follows the same pattern as high-functioning autism or high-functioning alcoholism, etc., denoting a person who might have some disorder but is more capable than is common among those who have that disorder. It is not clear what Sherlock actually meant by that statement, since sociopaths follow a "normal" (as in, not distinct from the wider population) distribution curve. All subsequent evidence points to Sherlock just being a (high-functioning) autistic person in denial.
* '''Antisocial''': Sometimes used to mean someone who dislikes or fears socializing. In the psychological sense, it doesn't mean that at all. Antisocial attitudes or behaviors are against society, from extreme acts like murder to more minor transgressions like simply being a manipulative, self-centered {{Jerkass}}. Someone who fears interacting with other people should be said to be '''asocial''' or suffering from social phobia, not "antisocial" tendencies. As a matter of fact, ''social phobia'' is an outdated term, and is usually now called "social anxiety disorder." In other words, people who are antisocial are ''hostile'' -- not merely indifferent -- towards society.
** "Antisocial" is also used to denote "rebellious" individuals actively fighting (not necessarily by violence, also by dissent or passive-aggressive behavior) any authority and are incapable of operating under external influence.
** An increasingly more popular and accurate term for the above disorder is ''agoraphobia'', from the ancient Greek term for "fear of the marketplace." But to be honest, I've always understood that ''agoraphobia'' is fear of the ''entire'' outside world, not just the "social" parts of it. Thus, an agoraphobe would be just as afraid of being lost in a forest or a desert as they were of crowds.
*** It makes more sense once you know that 'agora' in this case is what the Romans called the 'forum', rather than your run-of-the-mill farmers' market.
** ''Agoraphobia'' is more specifically a fear of being unable to ''escape'' from whatever situation you're in (sometimes amended to include 'without severe embarrassment'), rather than the situation itself. In the above examples, the phobic response would be due to the fear of never escaping the forest, or being lost in the desert forever. Being in a busy place (e.g. a football crowd) could count if you couldn't leave your set without making a huge scene.
** What "agoraphobia" misses is the ''social'' part of "social anxiety disorder". Sartre's "Hell is other people" hits a nerve - and as unjustified as that hit may be, it's still felt.
** Perhaps more appropriate word would be "asocial", and it is sometimes used, though it implies lack of interest in social interaction while not fear of it.
*** This is exactly the term used in psychological parlance to describe people avoiding social situations due to social phobias, egomania, extreme introversion or any other factor.
** Agoraphobia is a disorder more focused on the area and getting to safety (without embarrassing yourself) if needed and usually has to do with panic attacks or some of the symptoms of them. A fear focused on actual people or socializing is called social phobia or social anxiety disorder (and is much more severe than shyness so should not be used lightly despite its commonness -- the most common mental disorder in adults other than substance abuse or depression, which is saying something). The best replacement for "antisocial" is "avoidant" -- avoidant personality disorder is associated with extreme social phobia. "Asocial", as pointed out above, is different. Most shy/socially anxious/avoidant people would love to be social if they weren't anxious about it. There are people who simply do not like to be around other people without being either avoidant or antisocial; these are asocial. "Asocial", however, may look like a typo in writing "antisocial" to a reader.
** On a related note, '''introversion''' is not being antisocial; being introverted is simply ''preferring'' solitary activities to social activities.
* '''Manic-depression''' is more properly known as '''bipolar disorder''', and ''does not'' mean "severe depression" or "wild mood swings;" the highs and lows last for days or weeks at a time. Neither one is a catch-all for "crazy ex." (See '''borderline''', '''histrionic''', and '''narcissistic''' disorders for what most people think of as "crazy ex syndrome.")
** [[Franchise/TheHitchhikersGuideToTheGalaxy Marvin the Paranoid Android]] is a ''manically'' depressed robot, ''not'' a manic-depressive robot, which is true - he's enthusiastically depressed.
** Also, bipolar is an ''adjective'', not a noun. It's either "my friend is bipolar" or "my friend has bipolar disorder," ''not'' "my friend has bipolar."
** And it doesn't have anything to do with {{tsundere}}s, no matter what certain fansubs say.
* On the subject of '''borderline''', saying someone is borderline does not mean they're on the cusp of having a personality disorder; it means they ''do'' have one. ''Borderline'' is a name for a very specific pattern of behaviour involving emotional instability, poor self-image, impulsiveness, and [[BlackAndWhiteInsanity black-and-white thinking]] (what psychologists call "splitting"), as well as a fear of abandonment. The name is only used because of historical reasons which are too complex to get into here, and the existence of the disorder has been questioned, with some seeing it as a variant of post-traumatic stress disorder (specifically, one that the profession slaps on female PTSD sufferers, as the overwhelming majority of borderline personality disorder diagnoses are of women).
* '''Depression''' is yet another psychological term (seeing a trend here?) that's casually thrown around but has a different meaning in a medical or therapeutic context. Depression is not just sadness, but much more persistent and disabling, and includes many other mood changes and physical symptoms like: anhedonia (loss of the ability to feel pleasure), changes in sleep and eating habits (either much less or much more than usual), and a lack of energy and motivation.
* '''OCD''' is [[SuperOCD often thought of]] as the concept of a NeatFreak taken to the extreme. That's because the most visible sign of it is the rituals that people who have OCD do (counting, checking, hand-washing, climbing stairs and so on). The reason it's called ''obsessive''-compulsive disorder is because people with it have certain obsessive thoughts that are highly distressing and which they cannot get rid of (things like fears of their entire family dying, or their house burning down, or accidentally harming a baby). The compulsions they have are a coping mechanism of sorts - performing these rituals helps the obsessions go away, but only temporarily. To describe someone as "kind of OCD (adj.)" because they like order and cleanliness is not even close to reality.
* '''Chronic''' does not mean "severe". It means "recurring/habitual" and/or "happening for a long time;" it comes from a Greek root meaning "time" (same as "chronological" or "chronicle"), so you should think "over time." Contrast '''acute''', which means "rapid onset". Too many people associate "acute" with "small" due to its meaning in geometry (they should be associating it with "sharp" for the same reason).
** Also an illness being acute does not necessarily mean that it is serious, it only means that full set of symptoms display themselves quickly (a papercut is acute). So calling a disease Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) is not tautological.
* '''Paranoia''' and '''paranoid''' are a particularly egregious case. '''Paranoia''' is a full-blown psychosis, not just thinking people are out to get you. However, someone who really was diagnosed with paranoia would be '''paranoiac''' (literally '''out of his mind'''), not '''paranoid''', which denotes a neurotic '''paranoid state'''.
** This is lampshaded in the movie version of ''Film/TheCaineMutiny'', where Maryk admits that until Keefer talked to him, "I didn't even know the difference between paranoid and paranoia."
* '''Schizophrenia''' does not involve multiple personalities. Multiple personalities are a form of dissociation known as Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID). It is an extremely rare diagnosis, so rare that its existence is very hotly debated. In addition, one of the major prerequisites is that the separate personalities are [[http://www.nami.org/Content/ContentGroups/Helpline1/Dissociative_Identity_Disorder_(formerly_Multiple_Personality_Disorder).htm usually]] not aware of each other--something that is often overlooked in both real life and the media, as the protagonist in ''Series/UnitedStatesOfTara'' was quick to point out.
** Especially confusing for those who like their Greek roots, because 'Schizophrenia' literally means "split mind".
*** The full etymology for schizophrenia is ''skhizein'' (σχίζειν, "to split") and ''phrēn'', phren- (φρήν, φρεν-; "mind, intelligence") not the same thing as personality.
** If we wanted to do right by the etymologists we should switch from Schneider's 'schizophrenia' name for schizophrenia back to Emil Kraepelin's 'dementia praecox'.
*** ''Dementia praecox'' wouldn't work though because it means "precocious madness", so a degenerative disease of young people. However, schizophrenia isn't degenerative like dementia is, and it's treatable, whereas Alzheimer's and other forms of dementia aren't really and treatments for them are mostly palliative. Also, schizophrenia does most often manifest for the first time in young adulthood (late teens to early twenties) but it can develop at any age, including in the elderly.
** The confusion is likely from some schizophrenics having auditory/visual hallucinations and sometimes speaking back to them, giving the [[IncrediblyLamePun illusion]] to some people that another "personality" is speaking to the schizophrenic.
*** If psychology texts are reliable, the confusion is the above misinterpretation of "intelligence" as "personality", plus failure to understand that "divided" in this instance means something closer to "shattered" than it does to "split".
** The "split" portion of the word actually refers to a divergence of the mind from reality, not that it's split internally.
** The word '''schizoid''', which is a personality disorder, does use this root to mean "cut off (from other people)". But this is a very different thing than schizophrenia.
** If a person has '''anorexia''', then she is '''an anorectic''' or she is '''anorexic'''. She is not an anorexic, nor is she anorectic. "Anorectic" is a noun; "anorexic" is an adjective.
*** In strict medical terms, '''anorexia''' refers generally to loss of appetite as a symptom, the psychiatric disorder involving distorted body image and fear of weight gain is '''anorexia nervosa'''.
* The words '''psychologist''' and '''psychiatrist''' are often confused. A psychologist is someone who has an advanced degree in psychology (normally a doctorate or at least a master's) and does psychotherapy and psychological testing. They can diagnose people, but can't prescribe medication (except in a few jurisdictions) or order medical imaging. A psychiatrist, on the other hand, is a medical doctor who specializes in psychological disorders and they can do these things because of their broader scope of practice. Psychologists study nothing but psychology in their training; psychiatrists have to learn about other branches of medicine first before specializing in it.
* '''Quean''' does not mean, as [[{{Literature/Redwall}} Brian Jacques]] claimed in interviews about ''The Sable Quean'', "wicked woman". Nor, as some readers might assume, does it mean "queen". It means "prostitute" or "promiscuous woman". Then again, this is probably actually a case of GettingCrapPastTheRadar.
* To be '''bereft''' of something does not just mean to be without something. It means to be without something ''that you previously had''.
* '''Peasant''' is not a general term for a poor person. A peasant is a tenant farmer, a free laborer who rents a farm and works it himself. The hierarchy is: slave (who is owned property that can be bought and sold), serf (has some rights, but is required to work his lord's land and give the lord a portion of the harvest), sharecropper (a free man who works on someone else's land and pays the landowner a portion of the crop) peasant, crofter (a farmer who owns his own house, but still rents land to farm), yeoman (owns enough land to support a family), gentleman (owns enough farmland to support himself by renting it out). Admittedly, a lot of this depends on time period and the distinctions can be blurred; for instance, consider someone who rents a piece of land and works it himself but has agreed to pay the rent by sending the landlord crops equivalent in market value to the rent (e.g. "the rent is $600/year; in lieu of cash, tenant may send crops with market value of $600"); is this person a sharecropper or a peasant?[[note]]If he agreed to send a fixed portion or amount of the crops (e.g. 1/3 of all corn harvested, or 100 bushels of wheat"), he would be a sharecropper. If he sold the crops and paid the rent in cash with the proceeds, he would doubtless be a peasant. Since the market value of crops changes, and there may be practical considerations keeping the tenant from using cash (for instance: there aren't many coins in the area to go around, so the economy mostly runs on barter), the distinction is hard to make.[[/note]] To no small degree this depends on whether he's in medieval England (where he would probably be called a peasant) or the post-Civil War American South (where he would probably be called a sharecropper). Poor farmers can loosely be called "the peasantry," but that's about it.
** Note that TranslationConvention can introduce confusion in dealing with non-English-speaking societies. Everything after "peasant" is often called the same thing in many other languages (because "doesn't work for someone else" is a decisive characteristic). Many other European languages also often use their cognates for "peasant" in senses closer to English's "crofter" and "yeoman" (a French peasant could be a full-blown landowner, for example, or a "métayer", a sharecropper).
* A '''Chaingun''' is a single-barrel weapon with an electrically driven bolt operated with a chain. It is not a '''rotary gun'''. This comes from ''VideoGame/{{Doom}}'' misusing the term; usually, the reasoning for the mistake is that the latter is fed with a "chain" (ie a ''belt'') of ammunition, or that the barrel group is driven by a chain.
** More accurately still, a "Chain Gun" is the specific model of weapon used on many US and NATO aircraft. Any autoloading (generally fully automatic) weapon larger than a machinegun is called an "autocannon" regardless of mechanism. A multi-barrelled weapon in this class that rotates is called a "Rotary Autocannon." A single-barreled weapon that uses a rotating loading mechanism is a "Revolver Autocannon". The most accurate name for ''Doom'''s "chaingun" would be "Rotary Submachine Gun", as it uses pistol ammunition.
* "'''Decapitated''' head" is paradoxical: to decapitate someone is to behead him. Cutting a head off of itself is...well...[[YouKeepUsingThatWord inconceivable]]. A ''body'' can be decapitated; a better adjective for a head on its own is '''severed'''. (''Disembodied'' usually means 'intangible'.)
--> "Newsanchor overheard in ''Film/{{Highlander}}'': "It also left a man's decapitated body, lying on the floor next to his own severed head."
* Related: "decapacitate" is a rarely-used word that means to reduce someone or something's capacity for action, essentially a milder version of "incapacitate." It doesn't necessarily have anything to do with the head; in fact, decapitating someone is far more likely to incapacitate them (by killing them) than decapacitate them.
* '''Differential''' is both a noun and an adjective, but in the noun form, it is a mechanical device used for combining torque from different inputs, ''not'' a synonym for '''difference'''. This is a favorite of television sports announcers ("There's a three-point differential in the game!").
** A differential is also used in mathematics to refer to infinitesimals in calculus and differential geometry i.e. dx, dy etc or to the Jacobian matrix of partial derivatives.
* A '''demigod''' is not a lesser "category" of deity. "Demi" means "half", i.e. "half god". A demigod has both mortal and divine parentage. For example, Hercules (son of Zeus, a god, and Alcmene, a human) ''is'' a demigod, whereas a dryad (a forest spirit) is ''not''.
** Note, however, that the term was invented by 19th century classicists; the Greek word for "of mixed divine and mortal parentage" was "hero" (which originally ''never'' applied to pureblood mortals—and also had intrinsically cultic connotations, since all the mythic heroes were considered appropriate for worship, especially Heracles).
* Something being '''random''' means that it has no clear predictability or arrangement. It doesn't mean "kooky" or "off the wall", and neither sporks nor waffles nor [[DoomyDoomsOfDoom doom]] are "random" (see also: the 4chan meme "Katy").
* '''{{Prequel}}''' doesn't mean "a previous installment in a series". It means "a sequel to an existing work that takes place earlier in the timeline of its [[TheVerse 'Verse]]".
* The suffix '''mancer''' does not mean "magician". A [something]mancer is a very specific type of magician who uses [something] to predict the future. (A "necromancer" used bones and entrails to divine.) A better suffix, -urge, means "worker", as in "one who creates or works with". A thaumaturge (worker of wonders) is a magician, but a dramaturge (playwright) isn't, and neither is a metallurgist nor a demiurge.
* The Internet usage of '''{{Troll}}''' does not mean "someone who has a different opinion from mine", "someone who has an unpopular opinion", or "someone who does something for attention". A troll is someone who does/says things for the sole purpose of trying to piss people off. Someone can legitimately have an unpopular opinion, but he's not a troll unless he states it just to be annoying.
** A well known real-life troll is Fred Phelps, who travels around the country saying the most upsetting things he can to emotional audiences (mainly at funerals), in the hopes that someone will cross the legal line so he and his family (all lawyers) can sue them.
** The term comes not from the mythical creature, but from a ''trawling'', the method of fishing involving moving through the water while waving the bait behind you. An internet troll is fishing for reactions, waving their 'opinion' as bait.
*** Its earliest use, in the early 90's, usually referred to 'fishing out' new users and lurkers (often in a good-natured attempt to encourage them to write) by presenting an argument that had been already thoroughly discussed by regulars.
** In even narrower sense, trolls do not even have to have an unpopular opinions. They cause also can cause stir by simply initiating a [[FlameWar discussion that is bound to cause an argument]] but they may do so without taking sides themselves. (However, [[HanlonsRazor be careful with accusations in this case; they may simply have]] triggered an event by accident.)
*** Not to mention the ChewbaccaDefense.
** Lately the term has been used as a synonym for "bully" or "harasser" in that it constitutes behavior used to belittle or demean a target. It's also often confused with the term "flaming" which is any sort of negativity towards a specific user. While the initial trolling might involve any of those, the end goal of the troll is to ''incite'' flames rather than just insult somebody.
* A '''[[UsefulNotes/FurryFandom furry]]''' is not the same thing as a zoophile. A zoophile gets off on real animals, while furries like fictional anthropomorphic characters, most of whom would be intelligent enough to consent if they were real.
** Also, many if not most furries are not interested in the sexual aspect of the fandom at all, they simply like drawing/dressing up as/writing about anthropomorphic animals.
** The confusion about the definition of the term is not helped by the fact that it is often used interchangeably to refer to both fans of anthropomorphic animal characters and the characters themselves. The especially pedantic may insist on referring to the former as "furry fans" and reserving the term "furry" for the latter, but even that may be confused by the practice of taking on a "fursona," at which point a person is both a furry fan and a self-identified (though not literal) furry (i.e. anthropomorphic animal).
* '''I.e.''' ("id est," "that is") and '''e.g.''' ("exempli gratia," "for example") are not interchangeable. I.e may be used to expand upon a point or to exhaustively list every possibility, while e.g. merely gives possible answers but leaves the list open.
-->"There are many varieties of pasta, e.g., spaghetti, macaroni, and gnocchi."
-->"Pasta should be made ''al dente,'' i.e., firm and chewy, not overcooked."
** A useful mnemonic is to remember i.e. as "in essence" and e.g. as "example given."
** On a similar note, '''etc.''' ("et cetera," "and other things"), should never end a list introduced with "e.g." or "i.e." (or the plain English "for example" and "such as"). Etc. and e.g. are redundant, and it makes no sense to abbreviate i.e.
* A '''[[ImAHumanitarian cannibal]]''' eats members of its own species. Something that is non-human, but eats humans, is an '''anthropophage'''. "Anthropophage" is a pretty pedantic word, but come on; use "man-eater" or something. Technically a human [[ImAHumanitarian who eats other humans]] would be a cannibal ''and'' an anthropophage, but "cannibal" seems superordinate in this case. The word "cannibal" derives from the Carib people (after whom the Caribbean Sea is named) who were once believed to chew and spit out the flesh of a defeated enemy.
** This was actually mentioned in ''Film/DawnOfTheDead1978'', where it was said that the undead were not cannibals, because they were no longer human.
** This is also pointed out in ''VideoGame/DragonAgeOrigins'' by Alistair when he remarks that it's not cannibalism if ''Dog'' is eating fallen foes.
** However, in fantasy/sci-fi settings, the definition is sometimes extended to any [[YouKeepUsingThatWord/VeryPedantic sapient]] creature [[SapientEatSapient eating another]] (Elves eating humans, or even lizardfolk, would be considered cannibals in such a setting).
* The phrase "'''more highly evolved'''" means nothing: [[GoalOrientedEvolution evolution doesn't work like a ladder that animals climb to the top]]. No biologist has thought of it that way since Darwin. You could say that a species that hasn't changed for a few million years is "unevolved" but that would be a rather simplistic way of looking at it. After all evolution is still working on the species, because they aren't changing, evolution is "selecting" for no change. Evolution is always working on a species, unless they reach a very specific and almost impossible set of conditions.
** The word ''evolution'' can mean a lot of different things, from the scientific "natural selection", and "development of life from single-celled organisms to current situation", the same but including emergence of life from non-life, and the less scientific "change over time", "change for the better" or simply "huge change", as used in advertising.
*** Evolution may also refer to specific terms of conditions. If we speak about, say, the operating systems that are meant to be user-friendly and efficient then we can say that better-developed systems are 'more evolved'. In the case of natural selection such judgment makes little sense because that would have required an objective knowledge of the meaning of life which is, as all things objective, beyond the grasp of human mind.
*** And if we were to put this in the "very-Pedantic" entry, "evolution" originally meant to ''unroll something''. The word has been documented since the 17th century and might be even older. The word "evolution" is a prime example of a dead metaphor, where a metaphor becomes an actual term no longer considered metaphorical (e.g. electric current). The word was used a metaphor for the unrolling of time/fate and over the ages, its, well, evolved so that not only has the metaphorical meaning lost its metaphorical use, the original meaning has been completely forgotten.
** Similarly, terms such as ''devolution'', ''de-evolution'', ''reverse evolution'', etc. carry no meaning in biology (although "devolution" carries a separate meaning in politics), since complex forms of life can become less complex and physical traits that were once advantageous can disappear (or remain as vestigial traits) over generations when confronted by a new environment. That doesn't stop the writers of science fiction from occasionally using this term when a member of one species "returns" to an ancestral form, nor does it stop [[{{Music/Devo}} some people]] from adopting the term to mean "reverse progress."
** Also: By the millions of years their species have been around with few significant changes, two of the least highly evolved creatures are alligators and sharks. Evolution doesn't have any direction, but once it stumbles on a winning combination, it is ''really good at sticking with it''. Some prominent biologists have used sharks as examples that sapience and intelligence are not evolutionary imperatives, and that they are in fact entirely up to chance.
* '''Castration''' is specifically the removal of ''testicles''. The correct term for the removal of the penis (or the male genitalia as a whole) is '''emasculation'''. Though it might be argued that the correct term for either one is [[ShareTheMalePain ouch]].
** The surgical removal of the penis is called a ''penectomy'', while ''orchidectomy'' is the term for the surgical removal of the testicles. (And now you get the joke in ''Series/MadMen'' about Bert Cooper's "unnecessary orchidectomy.")
** One can be castrated without the testicles being removed (still less the whole scrotum- very dangerous without modern techniques, it has a heavy blood supply)- the only significant part is the ''testes'', the glands within them. These can be permanently decommissioned by drugs or, in the case of the Italian castrati singers of the 14th to 19th centuries, by being deliberately ruptured by being squeezed by one who knows where to apply pressure. (They can also be ruptured by accident, though you'd have to be very unlucky to lose both this way.)
* A '''totem''' is not a personal spirit guide, even if it ''is'' an animal. A totem animal protects an entire ''group'' of people, such as a family, clan, or tribe.
* '''Asexual''' is applied in general to [[{{Asexuality}} anyone who doesn't have sex for any reason]], but, as a proper sexual orientation, there are several more nuanced shades of meaning. ''Asexual'' in the strict sense means that a person does not feel physical attraction to others. A person who wants to have sex but has physiological or psychological reasons preventing them from having sex is not asexual. Similarly, someone who identifies as asexual does not see themselves as suffering from a medical disorder like lack of sex drive.
** An asexual can and often does experience attraction but it's more of the platonic/aesthetic type. There are as many different types of asexuals as sexuals, but it should really be pointed out that it has nothing to do with desiring relationships. There are many sexuals who do not desire relationships, for example, Creator/CharlieSheen's character on ''Series/TwoAndAHalfMen''.
** Being asexual does not necessarily mean that the person doesn't want relationships-- an ''aromantic'' person is uninterested in relationships. One can be asexual but romantic (enjoys friendship, love, kissing or hugging, but is uninterested in sexual activity) or sexual but aromantic (interested in sex but not in relationships).
** ''Autosexual'' can refer to a person who enjoys masturbation, but not sex (with another person). Autosexuals are not considered asexual.
*** Technically, as an orientation, an autosexual is someone who is in love with themself. Otherwise, autosexuality or autoerotica is a behavior, not a sexual orientation. Otherwise, sexuals who masturbate would also be called autosexuals.
** Finally, asexual can also refer to "not having a sex" (as opposed to a sex ''drive''), most commonly in the term "asexual reproduction". However, context is usually sufficient to distinguish the terms - it depends on whether you're discussing humans, or non-human species.
* Relatedly, '''abstinence''' is a willing choice not to engage in some activity--such as, for example, ''sexual abstinence'' (which might range from "doing everything but intercourse" to much stricter levels of abstinence, like refraining from masturbation and from sexual contact with others). '''Celibacy''' originally meant simply "being unmarried", but now generally means being unmarried ''and'' sexually abstinent. '''Chastity''' means obeying the appropriate moral rules for sexual behavior, which does ''not'' necessarily imply sexual abstinence: in traditional Christian teaching, for example, a chaste husband and wife would be sexually active with each other (but with nobody else), but a chaste, unmarried person would be sexually abstinent.
* '''Comprise''' and '''compose''' are (roughly) reciprocal, not synonyms. An archipelago ''is composed of'' many islands, and ''comprises'' those islands; it is not ''comprised of'' the islands -- if anything, the islands are comprised of the archipelago (though this use of ''of'' is very archaic; ''comprised by'' might be better--although not by much, since ''comprised by'' is hardly a common expression either).
* '''Erstwhile''' is not laudatory; it means 'former'.
* In chemistry, '''[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volatility_%28chemistry%29 Volatile]]''' does ''not'' mean "explosive" or "flammable"[[note]]and certainly not that it [[FanFic/QuarterLifeHalfwayToDestruction does not have a half-life but quarter life so you must observe with haste]][[/note]], it means how likely the substance is to vaporise. Vapours of a given flammable substance likely ''will'' be even more flammable than say the liquid form, but that's just coincidental. The correct words to describe something which is likely to go boom or ''otherwise react spontaneously'' is either ''unstable'' (for when it is energetically likely) or ''labile'' (when it is kinetically likely); in particular, gasoline and oils are volatile but not particularly unstable, compared to compounds like acetylene.
** In regular English, the other meaning ("quick to anger" or "prone to violence") is perfectly correct, however.
* '''Holland''' is a region in '''The Netherlands'''. It comprises most of the coastal region and the best-known cities from The Netherlands lie in Holland, namely [[FreestateAmsterdam Amsterdam]], Rotterdam and The Hague. Holland is not a valid name for the country, nor is it the name of a province anymore. The region that was once Holland now has the imaginative names North Holland and South Holland. This is akin to referring to the UK as "England".
** It should be noted that in several languages the official name of Netherlands is derived from the name of the Holland province (e.g. 'Holandia' in Polish or 'Holland' in Danish and Estonian). It is used however to denote only the European part of the Kingdom of The Netherlands that incorporates also Aruba and former Dutch Antilles).
** Of course, it doesn't help avoid confusion when the ''pars pro toto'' shorthand "Holland" is used in the name of the national football team and by local fans who shout "Holland!" and "Hup Holland Hup!" at matches (so the word "Holland" is prominently implied to denote the whole country to the rest of the world's spectators), and "Holland" is currently used by the Netherlands Board of Tourism and Conventions to refer to the entire country in literature for prospective visitors. The main tourist website is Holland.com which contains a brief description of why Netherlands is technically correct but why it's nonetheless preferred to use Holland to attract visitors. The Dutch may actually be less pedantic on this point than many English speakers.
* A '''rabbi''' is a person sufficiently versed in Jewish law to have obtained this designation from a religious authority, not unlike an academic degree (you are still entitled to be addressed as Doctor even if you "don't do anything" with your Ph. D.). A rabbi:
** is ''not'' the Jewish equivalent of a priest (there still exists a hereditary priestly class within the Tribe of Levi, called Kohanim, although their duties have been significantly reduced since the destruction of the Temple in 70 CE);
** is ''not'' a person who certifies kosher food (this is a ''mashgiaḥ'', which literally means "inspector", and it is certainly not done through "blessing" food as [[ArtisticLicenseReligion Hollywood seems to think]]);
** is ''not'' a person who does circumcisions (this is a ''mohel'', who is generally a licensed physician these days),
** is ''not'' a person who leads prayers in the synagogue (this is a ''ḥazan'' or cantor, or often just a lay member of the congregation); and
** is not exclusively the spiritual leader of a synagogue (rabbis who do this are usually called "pulpit rabbis", but there are thousands of individuals with rabbinic ordination who do not work for synagogue congregations, including those who simply study full-time).
** Now to be fair, there is overlap among these categories -- some kohanim become rabbis, some rabbis work as mashgiḥim, etc., but the fact of being a rabbi does not mean that one is/does any of them. Also, any bearded man wearing black is not a rabbi -- this is standard appearance for all ultra-Orthodox Jews whether or not they have rabbinic ordination.
* The generic [[HypocriticalHumor verbing]] of nouns, '''medaling''' to describe ''winning'' a medal, '''actioning''' for ''doing'' something, '''friending''' for ''becoming'' friends. This is an interesting case, as it is becoming increasingly acceptable to "verb" nouns in colloquial speech, and it isn't like these words have any other established uses that would make a distinction worthwhile to defend (being neologisms for the most part).[[note]]Particularly insane denizens of this very wiki would attribute this to the influence of Creator/JossWhedon; they may very well be right, but that's beside the point.[[/note]] As a result, it's difficult to solidly classify any of these verb-to-noun constructions as solecisms (except perhaps ''actioning'', which provides only a clumsy synonym for ''doing'' much as ''utilizing'' is most frequently used as a clumsy synonym for ''using''), but one would be very well-advised to avoid them in more formal writing.
* '''Jealousy''' typically refers to the negative thoughts and feelings of insecurity, fear, and anxiety over an anticipated loss of something that the person values, particularly in reference to a human connection. One can be a jealous boyfriend, but one cannot be jealous of ''someone else's'' boyfriend, unless [[HoYay there's already something between the two of you]]. This is often confused with '''Envy''', which is "an emotion that occurs when a person lacks another's (perceived) superior quality, achievement, or possession and either desires it or wishes that the other lacked it. Further compounding the confusion is the word '''Covet''', which includes all the characteristics of the definition of 'envy' but also indicates a willingness to take the object coveted for themselves. For instance, if a person has a television set that you want, envy might drive you to buy a bigger, better TV (as you desire the quality of owning a nice television). If you coveted it, however, you'd be more likely to steal their TV (as you desire the exact television set they own). And if you're jealous, you're worried that they're coveting ''your'' TV.
** This confusion has caused no small amount of confusion with one of the Christian commandments. The command is correctly translated as 'Do not covet', but 'Do not envy' and, worse yet, 'Do not be jealous' are common incorrect translations.
* '''Lose''' vs. '''Loose''': More of a spelling issue than a language one; people still ''say'' them correctly. However, (particularly online), the two are used almost interchangeably, though it is more common to add an "o" than to subtract one. For the record, "lose" (rhymes with "booze") is a verb, and, in its intransitive form, has several meanings including to suffer defeat, to suffer loss or to depreciate in effectiveness. "Loose" (rhymes with "goose") is an adjective, and the opposite of tight. You can lose a game, but not tighten it. Your shoelaces can be loose, but you can't win them. Okay, technically shoelaces ''could'' be a prize...
** Loose can also be used as a verb, to mean "release" or "unfasten", but that usage is kinda archaic -- you've probably never heard it outside of Literature/TheBible or archery (one looses an arrow from a bow). It ''still'' isn't the opposite of "win" or "find", ever.
** Not only a spelling issue, but very often a "spell-check" type of issue, where the word could be a typo but will never be caught by spell-check.
** A particularly interesting example of this is a Swedish book called ''The Looser Handbook'' which is about the art of leading a life of constant failure. It only stands to reason that the author would fail at naming the book, since failure is what the book is about.
* '''Casualties''' are the people ''wounded'' and ''permanently crippled'' (physically or psychologically), missing, captured, and dead sustained [[StrategyVersusTactics during a military operation]] or in any other given period. There is a term the dead, missing, captured, and crippled alone: '''Irrecoverable Casualties'''. Those who merely died (sometimes including those dead of wounds or in captivity) constitute '''Fatalities'''. Note however that the definition of wounded is pretty fluid - it can mean anything from "minor stab wound requiring hospitalisation to be on the safe side" to "crippling but temporary phobia of footsteps" to "three limbs blown off and permanent loss of hearing". In other words just anything short of actual death.
** To quote the other wiki, "In military usage, a casualty is a person in service killed in action, killed by disease, disabled by injuries, disabled by psychological trauma, captured, deserted, or missing, but not someone who sustains injuries which do not prevent them from fighting." So if one received a minor stab wound and got stitched up and sent back to the front one would not be a casualty.
** Casualty is also not the adjective form of casual, as Music/{{Jewel}} learned in an [[http://www.mtv.com/news/1430602/jewel-kurt-loder-square-off-on-poetic-license/ infamous]] TV interview (and she [[DeathGlare was not happy about it.]])
* '''Invalid''' with regard to arguments is a matter of not having the correct form. It has nothing to do with the truth value of the statement. ''See generally'' SoundValidTrue.
** "Fido has four legs. Dogs have four legs. Therefore Fido is a dog." is invalid. "Fido has four legs. All animals with four legs are cats. Therefore Fido is a cat" is valid.
* '''CGI''': In VideoGames, the term is often misused to describe '''pre-rendered cutscenes'''. '''All''' videogames (except ones done entirely with FullMotionVideo) use CGI, which means "computer-generated imagery". Even ''VideoGame/PacMan'' and ''VideoGame/DonkeyKong'' use CGI; their graphics were created by computer images. When a cutscene is debated on whether it shows real gameplay, there's no question whether it has CGI (unless it features live-action video). The question is whether the video was pre-rendered and recorded beforehand or if it features the actual game assets.
** In animation, CGI is used to mean "anything rendered in 3D software". 2D animation using computer rendering software (UsefulNotes/{{Adobe Flash}}/Animate, UsefulNotes/ToonBoom) are typically referred to by what program they were rendered in, despite being just as computer-generated as the 3D kind. Wiki/ThisVeryWiki's own AllCGICartoon page tends to list 3D works over computer-made 2D ones.
* '''MMO''' is commonly used to refer to an ''MMORPG'', an abbreviation for '''M'''assively '''M'''ultiplayer '''O'''nline '''R'''ole '''P'''laying '''G'''ame. While it makes sense to abbreviate the term, most people refer to an MMORPG as an "MMO", when "MMO" is merely a prefix, as any genre can be Massively Multiplayer and online. Most Massively Multiplayer Online Games happen to be {{RPG}}s because the formula had been experimented with the most, but if you refer to game as an "MMOG" or refer to ''VideoGame/{{Neocron}}'' or ''VideoGame/PlanetSide'' as an "MMOFPS" or ''Darkwind War On Wheels'' as an "MMOTBS", people will often look at you weirdly and not understand what you meant as other multiplayers, no matter ''how'' massive they are just call them "Multiplayer" or "Online".
* '''Otome Games''' are [[RomanceGame games with a female protagonist and male love interests]], with the main focus being the romance between the protagonist and male characters. Games for a female audience with a CastFullOfPrettyBoys, SelfInsert protagonist but no explicit romance with the protagonist are not otome games. ''VideoGame/ToukenRanbu'', ''VideoGame/{{A3}}'', ''VideoGame/TheIdolmasterSideM'', ''VideoGame/EnsembleStars'' and ''VideoGame/IDOLiSH7'' are sometimes labelled otome games, even though they technically aren't.
* A '''Protagonist''' is the principal character (or, more loosely, character''s'') of a work, typically the one from whose perspective it is narrated and usually ([[VillainProtagonist though not always]]) TheHero, or at least [[AntiHero the person we're meant to sympathise with]]. Strictly speaking, there can only be one protagonist. The second-most important character on the protagonist's side is the "{{deuteragonist}}", the third is the "tritagonist", and so forth. An '''Antagonist''' is a character who creates problems for the protagonist, and is thus typically [[{{Villains}} The Villain]] (although again, [[HeroAntagonist not always]]). It is '''''NOT''''' the other way round. Some people get this wrong, even though you'd think it obvious given that 'antagonist' obviously shares a root with 'antagonize'....
* '''[=MP3=]''' refers to either the MPEG standard popularly used to encode music or audio files, or a file using this standard. It is not the same as an '''[=MP3=] player''', which is either computer software or a physical media player which plays [=MP3s=], and it is not a catch-all for all kinds of digital audio.
** On a side note, [=MP3=] does not stand for MPEG-3 but for MPEG-1 Layer 3 (and MPEG-2 Part 3) which is a sound encoding mechanism for the MPEG-1 format. In order to avoid any further confusion, the MPEG (Moving Picture Expert Group) decided there would never be any MPEG-3 standard and thus they went from MPEG-2 to MPEG-4.
** This is made worse by Chinese manufacturers who simply bump the number after "MP" whenever they add a new feature, so we have [=MP3=] player, [=MP4=] player (their 'new feature' is video playback, but they're also unrelated to [=MPEG-4=] and don't support [=MPEG-4=] video at all), [=MP5=] player, [=MP6=] player...
* A '''riff''' is "a short, repeated phrase, frequently played over changing chords or harmonies or used as a background to a solo improvisation". The way "riff" is often used, especially by [[Series/MysteryScienceTheater3000 MST3K]], is as though the riff itself is an improvisation, and "riffing" is the act of coming up with something on the spot. It's actually the opposite: a riff is the same thing repeated over and over again, possibly with ''slight'' variation. The confusion likely comes about because riffs are used in jazz, and jazz is improvisational music; but improvisations are not made of riffs, they're made of longer, more complex melodic phrases. Improvisation is the spontaneous creation of a melody, and is not properly called "riffing". An example of "riffing" would be the guitar part in the verse of "You Really Got Me", "Come As You Are", or "Whole Lotta Love"; or in jazz, the repeated horn parts heard most famously in Count Basie arrangements: a short fragment that's repeated constantly and identically.
** as a note [no pun intended] when people refer to a "riff" or "riffing", what they are probably INTENDING to refer to is "scatting" - scat singing, specifically, although one can scat on any instrument; "scat" officially means "vocal improvisation with wordless vocables" (nonsense syllables generally, sometimes just "oooo" or "aaa", sometimes a single word used over and over, etc) but over the past decades has grown to mean ANY instrument improvising the melody, over the riff, in a jazz or jazz-based song or piece.
** On the other hand, Merriam-Webster dictionary describes riff as above (noting the possible etymologyis a shortening of the word 'refrain') but also gives another definitions, namely 'any variation or ''improvisation'''.
* Occasionally, a law-enforcement officer will refer to the scene of a brutal crime as being very "'''graphic'''". Well, duh, you're there and you're looking at it, one would expect it to be visual and realistic instead of merely implied. The idea of "graphic" violence in media isn't that it's {{Gorn}}, just that it's shown onscreen rather than implied.
** by the same token '''explicit''' doesn't mean rude or obscene (as people probably think due to those "explicit lyrics" labels) it means stated outright rather than just suggested.
* '''Rein''' vs. '''reign'''. "Reign" means to rule as royalty, "reins" are what one uses to guide a horse. Both involve leadership and sound exactly alike, and so are easily confused. A very common example is the phrase "free rein", which means letting loose of the reins and allowing a horse to wander as it pleases. This is often misused as "free reign", which doesn't even make sense: a King by definition has freedom to reign, it's what makes him a King. So to recap: "reign" refers to a ''state'' of having authority, while "free rein" or "being given the reins" refer to the ''actions'' of leadership in a situation. If there is a plural, it's almost always going to be "reins".
* '''Charisma''' refers to someone's speaking talents and ability to influence others through force of personality and diplomacy. While good looks help, someone is ''not'' charismatic because she looks good in a formal dress, or because he has blue eyes and a nice smile; similarly, just because someone is able to speak publicly and get their point across doesn't qualify them either, not unless people are cheering wildly for ''how'' the news is presented, rather than the facts themselves. For a historical example, UsefulNotes/{{Cleopatra}} was considered extremely charismatic, despite contemporary accounts of her being a very plain-looking woman.[[note]]Centuries of artists depicting her as a beautiful temptress have influenced the modern view of her.[[/note]]
* '''Calorie''' is a non-SI unit of energy. It is relatively small unit however, so caloric intake of foods is usually expressed in kilocalories, (1 kcal = 1000 calories). Thus an average recommended daily energy intake is not 2200 calories but 2200 kilocalories or 2,200,000 calories.
** A '''C'''alorie refers to a kilocalorie, while a '''c'''alorie refers to the base unit. This can get confusing when 'calorie' is at the beginning of a sentence, which without context, would be indistinguishable as to if it was between the normal unit or the large unit.
** Also, although it isn't an SI unit, it ''is'' a metric unit rather than Imperial or American customary.
* '''Stereophonic''' refers to an audio that has exactly two speakers, instead of one ('''mono''') or four ('''surround'''). It is slightly inaccurate to refer to a system with surround sound as a "stereo", but always inaccurate to refer to the output as being "stereo sound."
** Less commonly, it can be any sound the gives the illusion of being surrounded by a sound field. It's not useful stereo if the two speakers are stacked one on top of the other, or placed too close together as in a boombox.
* One's interest is '''piqued''', not ''peaked''. This mistake is understandable, since "peak" can be used as a verb to mean "maximize" or "climax"; though your English professor will still probably mark this as being wrong. [[VideoGame/FinalFantasyVII "Poque"]] [[Film/MontyPythonAndTheHolyGrail is right out.]]
** Likewise, getting a preview of something means getting a '''sneak peek'''. A "sneak peak" would be a [[https://twitter.com/StealthMountain stealth mountain]]. In fact, someone's interest may be piqued by a good peek.
* The '''[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immaculate_Conception Immaculate Conception]]''' refers to the conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary by ''her'' mother Anna, specifically the belief that "from the first moment of her existence [... Mary] was preserved by God from the Original Sin and filled with sanctifying grace that would normally come with baptism after birth." Jesus' conception and birth from Mary was the '''[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virgin_Birth Virgin Birth]]'''. (Whether Mary actually was immaculately conceived is a huge theological dispute between Catholics and modern Protestants, so nothing more will be said about that. But if a Protestant says he doesn't believe in the "Immaculate Conception", he is ''not'' necessarily saying that Mary wasn't a virgin.)
** And the Immaculate ''Reception'' is [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immaculate_Reception something else entirely]]...
* A '''song''' is called "song" because there's singing in it. If there is no singing in it, it is not a song. There is a proper word for a musical composition without singing. It's a '''piece'''. In the context of popular music, one might call it a "track" (which encompasses music that does have singing and music that doesn't).
** Musical definitions are strange animals because composers are always PlayingWith definitions. Mendelssohn quite famously wrote piano pieces called or "Lieder ohne Worte," or "Songs without words." Even in German, the Lied was associated with singing, and Mendelssohn was PlayingWith the idea [[OlderThanRadio in the 19th century]]. Also, a "piece" can include singing, but it is normally limited to one where the singing is not the primary purpose, like Beethoven's 9th symphony. However, there is a song in that movement (which we know as "Ode to Joy"). Composers ''love'' to MindScrew with convention.
*** All of which gets frustrating when trying to put this kind of music into a computer, having to classify movements or recitatives as 'songs', composers as 'bands', operas as 'albums' and anything written before about 1920 as 'Classical', a weird appellation to, say, Medieval music, to lump it in with Puccini and Handel (neither of whom are really 'classical' either.)
* A '''neophyte''' is someone who is new to something (a newbie); it literally means "new/young/newly-planted plant". A '''neophile''' is someone who likes things that are new.
* '''Novitiate''' is the state, condition, or period of being a '''novice''', not the person. William Buckley fouls this up in ''Tucker's Last Stand''.
* An '''epidemic''' refers to the frequency of a disease substantially exceeding what is expected in recent history.
* '''Sushi''' is a food consisting of cooked rice mixed with vinegar ("shari") and other ingredients. It can contain a large variety of ingredients ranging from vegetables, seafood (mostly uncooked, but some are cooked as well), sauces, etc. The shari makes it sushi. '''Onigiri''' or '''(o)musubi''' is usually rice (no vinegar), another ingredient, wrapped in seaweed.
** Similarly, '''Sashimi''' is taken to be the the word for raw seafood by itself, but it actually refers to the way it is prepared (thin slices), and [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_common_misconceptions#Food_and_cooking can apply to other types of meat or vegetables]].
* '''Ichor''' originally meant the blood of gods or angels. In later times, it has somehow come to also mean pus. Fiction writers, however, like to use it as a "fancy-sounding" word for pretty much any liquid.
* '''Your''' and '''you're'''. "Your" is a possessive pronoun used to describe something as belonging to the person being addressed, while "you're" is a contraction of "you are". If "you are" would fit instead, then "your" is not the correct word.
** Likewise, '''it's''', and '''its''' have similar misuse. "Its" is a possessive pronoun that's usually used to describe what belongs to the subject in the sentence. "It's" is the contraction of "it is". If "it is" can fit into the sentence, then "its" is not the correct word. Likewise, if there's a sign of the subject having possession in the sentence, then "it's" does not apply. (A good way to make sure it's being used correctly is to speak the phrase as if there's no contraction. For example, "It's red" = "It is red" is correct. "It's walls" = "It is walls" is incorrect, and should be "Its walls".)
* '''Implicate''' means to be responsible for something, or to assign responsibility to someone. '''Insinuate''' means to subtly hint at something unpleasant. Both are used for "imply", whether positive or negative. Imply actual means to ''strongly'' hint at something.
* '''Pilot''' does not simply mean "the first episode of a TV show". It should be used if, and ''only'' if, the episode is made by itself with the intention of shopping it around to various networks who will judge whether it works well enough to commission a whole series, as in a "pilot program". ''Film/PulpFiction'', which popularized the term, actually made this distinction, but along the way the word has become conflated with '''premiere'''. This usage is especially incorrect when referring to animated shows, which often get a whole season commissioned in advance due to animation lead time, and the pilot or pitch demo, often made cheaply and quickly, is simply redone.
** The exception, obviously, is when the pilot is made and ''then'' broadcast as the first episode.
* '''Ripoff''' is either a bad financial scam where you are conned into buying a fake product, or something where you are tricked into giving money without receiving anything in return. A lot of people use "ripoff" to mean the general act of copying or mimicry in general, and in the form of entertainment, a '''Ripoff''' is apparently "[[TheyCopiedItSoItSucks Something that's similar to a movie I saw before]]." The origin of this misuse had to do with [[TheMockbuster Mockbusters]] trying to trick people into buying their product mistaking it for the product they actually wanted.
* '''JustForFun/{{Egregious}}''' has been used so egregiously on Wiki/ThisVeryWiki that it has its own page.
* Similarly '''Your Mileage Will Vary''' is used as a way of referring to Your Mileage May Vary taken UpToEleven on especially controversial issues that reach a point where [[BrokenBase there is no middle ground]]. Your Mileage May Vary comes from car commercials that say consumers might get a different amount of mileage than is advertised, and on this wiki, means that viewers might not agree with the statement. Using "Your Mileage Will vary" implies unanimous disagreement rather than inevitable controversy.
%% Do not bluelink any of the Your Mileage X phrases.
* The word '''{{Trope}}''' does not come from TV Tropes, and like "subversion" its meaning in the real world is different than on this site. In reality "trope" does not mean "storytelling device" but "the use of a word to have a meaning different than the usual one."
** It does almost fit; trope titles often use words differently than the literal definition, because they're slang or jargon that already existed, or for brevity, or to make a pun.
* The word '''logical''' does not mean "reasonable" or "the result of a well-shaped argument". It means "defined according to the rules of logic", logic being a number of highly specific ways to describe and analyze the interaction between set premises.
* One that shows up every now and again is '''equivocal''' to mean "equivalent". An equivocal statement is one that is ambiguous and open to interpretation (conversely, an unequivocal statement is one in which the meaning is clear).
* '''Presently''' does not mean "happening now" or "ongoing". It means "soon".
* '''Ambivalence''' is not the same as ''ambiguity'' or just 'not bothered'. if you feel ambivalent about a decision, you are torn by equally strong feelings in two (or more) directions. A child deciding whether to live with her mother or father after a divorce might feel ambivalent.
* The term '''"stepchild"''' is sometimes mistakenly used with children who are ''adopted'', rather than for children whose [[ParentWithNewParamour parents have married someone besides their other parent]]. For example, Lindesfarne of ''Webcomic/KevinAndKell'' is Angelique's adopted daughter, but after her adoptive parents' divorce, she became Kell's stepdaughter when she married her adoptive father Kevin.
* Something that is '''anonymous''' has no name attached. If there is a name attached but it doesn't match the one on the originator's passport, such as an internet username, it's '''pseudonymous'''.
* '''Cherubim''' (singular '''cherub''') are the alien looking creatures appearing in the book of Ezekiel. The chubby little winged cupids are called '''putti''' (or '''putto''' in singular), and don't really have anything to do with biblical angels.
* In the entertainment industry, there are '''indie''' producers and developers (short for independent) that create and release their own works without relying on a 3rd party to assist in their project, such as major developers or publishers. However, people often get meaning of indie movies/games/etc. wrong and think it means the product was made by people who did not have a lot of money. This also leads people to believe that indie developers that make a ton of money off of their work or use a major publisher to get their product out to the public have "sold out" to major corporations. In short, as long as a group of developers have total control over their creations and don't have anyone outside of their group influencing their work, then the developers are indie, whether they are large or small, profitable or unprofitable.
** The Independent Spirit Awards had to actually redefine its criteria for nominations after ''Film/{{Fargo}}'' won Best Picture. While it was technically an independent film, its budget was $7M, and not in the spirit (pun recognized) of the awards, which was intended to give low budget films their own recognition.
* In the context of wrestling, an '''escape''' is where one frees themselves from a hold, a '''counter''' is where one turns a hold being applied to them into a hold of their own and a '''reversal''' is a specific counter that results in you applying the hold your opponent just had you in.
** The confusion was referenced in Wrestling/RingOfHonor when Wrestling/CMPunk argued he shouldn't have been cost a rope break when he used them to reverse an arm hold applied by Wrestling/AJStyles instead of using them to as a means of escape. Unfortunately Punk allowed Styles to escape while arguing, weakening his own point and requiring ROH [[ObviousRulePatch to take another look at the rules]].
** In TNA, Don West had to explain the significance of someone finding a counter to the Canadian destroyer used by Petey William, after the fans had likely seen the move blocked, escaped or otherwise negated dozens of time. Even then, the move itself may never have been countered before but attempts to apply it had.
* Someone born with reproductive organs that are intermediate between male and female is not transgender or a hermaphrodite, they are '''intersexed'''. A true '''hermaphrodite''' is an organism with functional male and female parts in the same body, that can reproduce as either: a condition which occurs naturally in earthworms or snails, but never in humans.
* '''"Excessive"''' does not mean "a lot" or "a great deal". It means "too much".
* One can only commit '''treason''' if they are working with a foreign power. If it's a completely internal case of trying to overthrow the government, it's '''sedition'''.
* '''Cojones''' is Spanish for balls. '''Cajones''' is Spanish for drawers.
** Although, saying ''cajones'' in English could be a [[BilingualBonus bilingual pun]].
* '''Port and starboard''' do not mean left and right, but specifically ''the ship's'' left and right -- that is, the left and the right of a person on the ship facing towards the bow. The fore and aft directions are similarly measured relative to the vessel, not the speaker.
** In cases where a smaller boat or plane is being carried on a larger ship, "left" and "right" are always used when referring to the smaller boat or plane to prevent confusion. So if a plane is parked on a carrier deck facing towards the back of the ship, the left side of the plane is towards the starboard side of the ship.
* '''Entitled''' means that someone is given a title, authority or ''rightful'' ownership of something. Some people however use it as if it meant the opposite, "someone is claiming to deserve something, although he doesn't". Even on Wiki/TVTropes - see EntitledBastard, EntitledToHaveYou. The usage here refers to an unearned ''subjective feeling'' of entitlement, hence the common expression "sense of entitlement" - the person in question ''feels'' they deserve something, even though they don't. The correct way to use "entitled" would be saying the person feels or acts like they are entitled to something, not that they are "being" entitled.
* '''Simplistic''' is not a synonym for "simple". It means "too simple" or "simple to a fault", and is inherently pejorative.
* A '''sprite''', for video game terms, is a 2D image in video games that is completely flat and lacks 3D angles. People who have little knowledge on video game definitions assume that all characters that one sees in a game are sprites, which is not completely true; people confused 3D '''models''' for sprites and a model is a 3D shape that can be viewed from any angle. Some games like ''VideoGame/PaperMario'' invoke a 2D style, but most of them use 3D character models that are flattened down so they look 2D.
* For video games, '''graphics''' is what a viewer sees on their display or monitor. Many people assume that "graphics" means what the video game looks like. In actuality, people usually mean the game's visual style when they describe a game's graphics.
* '''Open Beta''' and '''Closed Beta''' get heavily confused when people try to differentiate the two terms. A beta that is closed off to the public means that only people who get handpicked by developers via invites, a dedicated team formed to test the beta, and/or has a limited amount of slots available if the developers needs just a certain amount of people. An open beta means it's fully open to the public and anyone can take part without slots being limited. Some video games are available in its beta state and sometimes players can buy the game as such to test the game and keep the final version of the game once it is finished. Technically speaking, a "paid, open beta" is an oxymoron, since "beta test" is defined as a test of a computer product prior to wide commercial release. No matter what a company tries to tell you, once they're accepting money from the general public, they're selling a product, not conducting a beta test (although the line gets blurry in cases where the beta costs money, but is cheaper than the final release, such as ''VideoGame/{{Minecraft}}''). This is further confused by the fact that "beta" used to imply that the software was "incomplete" in some way; in the modern world of seamless online patches and updates, no software product is ever "complete" until the company stops issuing new patches and updates, often years after the product has come out of beta.
* Political ideologies in general suffer from a lot of confusion which can make discussions very hard. The confusion of what '''left''' and '''right''' actually mean, for example, or what is the relationship between '''conservatism''' and economic policies, or perhaps the most confusing word '''liberal''' which has different meanings in different countries which can, at worst, be the opposite of each other.
* '''[[UsefulNotes/HighFunctioningAutism Autistic]]''', at least on the Internet, gets used to mean "'retarded' only less so" more and more often in recent years - while less for perceived stupidity and more for social awkwardness (so you'll never find someone calling an inanimate object autistic even online), the general effect is the same. "Autistic" can also be used to refer to someone who has an exceptional focus on a particular activity, even if the person being described does not have an autism spectrum disorder at all. This is most likely due to the {{GIFT}}; anonymity means both that people feel freer to use "autistic" to mean "asshole" despite the UnfortunateImplications, and that people feel freer to use autism as an excuse for ''being'' an asshole (whether they're actually diagnosed or not), which only perpetuates the stereotype.
* '''AsymmetricMultiplayer''', as originally defined by Creator/{{Nintendo}} in reference to certain UsefulNotes/WiiU games, is a multiplayer mode in which the different players have totally different roles and capabilities, unlike most multiplayer games, where all the players are generally doing the same thing and playing the game the same way. This does ''not'' include games where players can be different characters (e.g., a magic user and a sword user) with slightly different abilities but carry out essentially the same goal in the same way. This instead refers to games where the roles, abilities and gameplay experience are drastically different. Misuse of the term became an issue with ''VideoGame/StarTrekTheVideoGame'' and several other games revealed and/or discussed in the period during/after [=E3=] 2012, when the development teams for the games claimed that their CoOpMultiplayer counted as Asymmetric Multiplayer (probably stemming from a desire to [[FollowTheLeader ride on the coattails of the initial Wii U hype]]).
* '''AIDS''' is often used to refer to the notorious sexually-transmitted disease that cripples the host's immune system. "AIDS" stands for '''a'''cquired '''i'''mmuno'''d'''eficiency '''s'''yndrome, and many people don't understand the "syndrome" part. You cannot ''catch'' AIDS; rather, you are reduced to it by being infected with the aforementioned STD, which by the way is called HIV ('''h'''uman '''i'''mmunodeficiency '''v'''irus), and having it beat the snot out of your immune cells. It is possible for someone to have HIV, but not AIDS, so long as their immune system is still intact. In addition, no one dies from AIDS - they die from ''complications'' related to the condition. (Simiarly, no one can die from alcholism, either. They can only die from ''complications'' due to it, such as cirrhosis of the liver.)
* '''Maltese cross''' is [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maltese_cross a eight-pointed cross]] which has the form of four "V"-shaped elements joined at the center, most famously used by UsefulNotes/TheKnightsHospitallers. Colloquially, however, the term "maltese cross" is sometimes applied to the ''cross pattée'', [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cross_patt%C3%A9e a cross which has arms narrower at the centre]], and broader at the perimeter, most often associated with the Prussian and German military usage.
* '''Scandinavia''': UsefulNotes/{{Finland}} and UsefulNotes/{{Iceland}} are not Scandinavian countries, though they are sometimes referred to as such. Scandinavia consists of UsefulNotes/{{Sweden}}, UsefulNotes/{{Norway}}, and UsefulNotes/{{Denmark}}. (They are, however, part of the Nordic region, as are the Scandinavian countries. There's also a distinction between Scandinavia--a political-cultural concept--and the Scandinavian Peninsula, a geographical feature which excludes Denmark but includes part of Finland.) Finns, for their part are neither Scandinavian nor Nordic in the ethnic sense; some anthropologists go so far as to describe them as Eurasian, given their common ancestry with certain Siberian (Asiatic Russian) peoples.
* '''Sex[=/=]Gender''': The distinction between sex and gender. The sexes (male and female) as the two divisions in which many organisms are placed, based upon their reproductive role and the genders (masculine and feminine) referring to ''social'' characteristics (such as behavioral norms) associated with males and females, respectively. The use of gender to mean the same thing as sex [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gender#Etymology_and_usage dates back to the 14th century]], whereas the use of gender to mean gender roles only dates to John Money's work in the 1950s. So it is not incorrect by any stretch for people to continue using the original meaning of the word (which in fact still precedes the gender roles [[http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/gender meaning in the dictionary]] ).
** The distinction between transgenderism and transsexuality does not necessarily have anything to do with genitals or whether or not someone has had sex reassignment surgery (SRS). "Transgender" is usually understood as an umbrella term for anyone whose sex and gender aren't totally congruent, or who strongly deviates from gender norms. "Transsexual" means someone who permanently transitions from one gender to another, usually through medical treatments like hormones and surgery as well as social and legal changes, but no individual step is necessary for being transsexual. SRS doesn't have much to do with it. Many transsexuals can't have SRS or choose not to. Furthermore, "transgender" is already an adjective. Saying "transgendered" is simply redundant.
* The words '''nemesis''' and '''archenemy''' are synonyms, as both words mean "one's greatest enemy". The "arch" modifier in "archenemy" signifies "greatest", while the word "nemesis" doesn't require a modifier because it already means "one's greatest enemy" by itself. "Arch-nemesis" is not only incorrect but [[DepartmentOfRedundancyDepartment redundant]], since it would mean "one's greatest greatest enemy".
* The term '''pay to win''' is used in many video games that entices the player to buy items or enhancements with real life money in order to have an easier time in beating the game or getting a step ahead of the competition. Many free to play games are designed to be frustrating to play normally and have heavy restrictions on what the player can do unless the person forks over money to gain and advantage. Pay to win is also applied to competitive games where a player can buy enhancements to defeat their opponents with little effort, thus only people with money to burn can beat everyone else that didn't pay. However, people often use pay to win on any video game with DLC that contains new weapons or other items, even if the game itself can be played just fine without the extra content, the DLC content themselves being on par with vanilla content, or if the game lacks any competitive aspect. The term in general carries negative connotations, with the implication that those that pay real life money have advantages that cannot be obtained by those that play for free. People have also used "pay to win" when it comes to buying cosmetic items in a game where said items do nothing to enhance the player's game other than simply changing how they look because some people believe obtaining all the items in the game is a way of "winning".
* The words '''atom''' and '''molecule''', and their derived terms ("molecular", etc.) are not synonymous. Molecules are structures formed from atoms. By strict usage, "molecule" only refers to structures held together by covalent bonds, so e.g. a block of metal is not made of molecules - its atoms are connected by metallic bonds.
** A molecule is also not the same as a mixture. In a molecule, atoms are chemically bonded together but in a mixture they are not. For example, air is (mostly) a ''mixture'' of nitrogen and oxygen, as it contains nitrogen and oxygen ''molecules''.
* In the Wiki/SCPFoundation notably, you will very often see the word '''amnesiac''' referring to substances that cause loss of memory. An amnesiac is actually a ''person'' suffering from amnesia. A substance causing amnesia would be an '''amnestic'''. However the word is so deeply rooted in SCP terminology that it's all but impossible to do anything about it. The Wiki only told newer authors that they prefer using "amnestic" instead of "amnesiac", but would forgive any uses of the latter.
* Challenging times can make it hard to make '''ends meet'''. No food item called '''ends meat''' (or '''end's meat''') has ever existed, outside of phonetic incomprehension or [[{{Feghoot}} stories that end with absolutely horrid puns]]. Imagine trying to tie a rope or cord around something with insufficient or barely sufficient length (or, conversely, with plentiful length, though it's usually only mentioned in the context of scarcity), and you'll understand the sensation the phrase is meant to convey.
* '''Niggardly''' is a perfectly innocent word meaning "stingy, miserly, not generous." It does not have nor has it ever had any connection to a certain [[NWordPrivileges infamous racial slur]]-- its origins date back to the 1300s by way of Old Norse, long before the African slave trade was a thing-- except that unfortunately it kind of ''sounds'' like that word. (Etymologically, it's related not to the N-word but to "niggle" as in nitpick, quibble about small details.) Sure enough, well-meaning but small-vocabularied people who succumb to PoliticalCorrectnessGoneMad have [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Controversies_about_the_word_%22niggardly%22 created many controversies about it]], to the point that it's probably wiser to avoid it altogether today.
* A '''regimen''' is a health-related routine, such as diet, exercise, and/or medicine. A '''regiment''' is a military unit (traditionally commanded by a colonel). A '''regime''' is a government or leadership (usually with negative, authoritarian connotations). These three words often end up shuffled into one another's places.
* '''Android''', '''cyborg''' and '''robot''' are not synonyms, as a quick glance at their respective etymologies should make clear. "Android" is derived from the Greek prefix ''"andro"'' ("man") and the suffix ''"oid"'' ("resembling"), and it means "An artificial creation built in the likeness of a human. "Cyborg" is a contraction of "cybernetic organism", and it means "A lifeform with a combination of organic and mechanical body parts". "Robot" is derived from the Russian ''"rabota"'' ("to work"), and it means "An autonomous machine built to perform a specific task". The term ''android'' technically refers to an artificial life form that resembles a male human. The female equivalent would be a ''gynoid''.
* Something's '''inception''' is its beginning. Courtesy of [[{{Film/Inception}} the eponymous movie]], this is widely misunderstood. Since a great deal of the movie revolves around dreams within dreams--and later, by MemeticMutation, anything within the same thing--a lot of people have, by association, gotten the idea it means the latter.[[note]] In the movie, "inception" refers to the '''ends''' of the protagonist's mission, not its '''means'''; they call it "inception" because they're trying to give their target a radical new idea, which will begin a new phase in his life.[[/note]]
* A '''desert''' is any place with low rainfall and vegetation, regardless of the climate. Thus, Antarctica is a desert.
* A '''Good Samaritan Law''' is not a law which compels someone to help a person in jeopardy. That is a '''Duty To Rescue''' law. A Good Samaritan law grants legal protection to anyone who attempts to help another person in the midst of a crisis. There have indeed been cases where someone offering aid was later sued by the person they attempted to help.
* '''Centurion''' is not an all-encompassing term for a soldier in Ancient Rome; it was an upper-level rank in the Roman military (roughly analogous to "Captain" or "Major") specifically designating the commander of a '''Century''' (a unit of around 100 soldiers, hence the name). A baseline Roman soldier (analogous to "Private") was a '''Legionary''' (not '''Legionnaire'''; that comes from the FrenchForeignLegion).
* For the term '''let alone''' as in "X is not Y, let alone Z", Y should be the ''less'' far-fetched idea. For example, "bronze is not as valuable as silver, let alone gold." Sometimes, the opposite gets used, that is, "bronze is not as valuable as gold, let alone silver."
** The same rule applies when two entities are specified, such as [[VideoGame/HalfLife "I never thought I'd see a resonance cascade, let alone create one"]]
* For United States citizens, '''Freedom of Speech''' means a person has the right to criticize and speak out against the government without needing to fear repercussions from said government. It does not mean "I cannot be silenced for saying anything I want to" since you can get in trouble for saying something that implies a threat to someone else (even if you claim to be joking), nor does it allow you to say something offensive on a privately owned web site whose owner(s) have the full right to ban you for breaking their rules.[[note]]To put it in a way that's relatable to Tropers in the U.S.: If one were to vandalize or make otherwise grossly-unacceptable edits to the TV Tropes Wiki, no part of the First Amendment disallows the wiki staff from banning the offending Troper.[[/note]]
** To suggest otherwise is like saying the right to Freedom Of Assembly [[InsaneTrollLogic means you can have a party at someone else's house without permission whenever you want]]
* '''Emigrate''' and '''Immigrate''' refer to the same concept, but the difference between the two words is that "emigrate" refers to moving ''out'' of a country while "immigrate" refers to moving ''into'' one. '''Export''' and '''Import''' are a similar source of confusion regarding objects rather than people. Think of it as like "exhale" and "inhale".
* '''Semantics''' is literally the study of meanings of words and phrases, and how they relate to the phonetic strings used to convey them. When you say about two different terms, ‘This is semantics,’ you are in fact saying they mean two different things rather than that the difference is negligible. Similarly, you could say that:
** the difference between ‘cat’ as an animal and ‘cat’ as a jazz player is semantic;
** the difference between ‘pray’ and ‘prey’ is semantic, orthographic (i.e. in writing), and syntactic (you can’t pray on someone, at least not in the same meaning);
** the difference between ‘kid’ and ‘child’ is phonological (they’re obviously pronounced differently) and orthographic, and while the difference is, for the most part, not semantic (i.e. both terms refer to a human between the ages of 2~3 and ~12, although the former could also mean ‘young goat’), it is also pragmatic (i.e. you wouldn’t use the former in formal conversation);
** The difference between Missouri (‘miz-ZURR-ree’) and Missouri (‘miz-ZURR-ruh’) is purely phonological/dialectical.
* The term '''reboot''' is sometimes used in reference to a new installment of a franchise that differs from the original in terms of art style or premise, when the term specifically applies to [[ContinuityReboot an adaptation that restarts continuity for the sake of telling a new interpretation of the franchise's characters and events]]. If the new series is still in continuity with the original incarnation, then it would be a '''revival''' (some people distinguish between the former and latter using the terms '''hard reboot''' and '''soft reboot''').
* '''Arab''' refers to people who speak Arabic. It is not a term for Muslims in general (There are Christian, Druze, and even Jewish Arabs, and most Muslims come from non Arab countries). Similar, Afghanis [[note]] who speak primarily Pashto and Dari, types of Persian. [[/note]]. Iranians [[note]] Who speak Persian [[/note]] or Pakistanis [[note]] Who have multiple languages, but primarily speak Urdu, a language related to Hindi[[/note]] are not Arabs, although all use a similar script to Arabic.
* '''Hindu''' refers to the [[UsefulNotes/{{Hinduism}} religion]], as well as an individual who practices it. '''Hindi''' refers to the language. Also, just because something is Indian doesn't mean it's Hindi or Hindu. There are multiple Indian religions and languages that share only a small if any similarity to Hindi. However, Hindu is also used as a synonym for someone from India.
* A '''Monkey''' is a type of primate, usually one with tails that live in trees. An '''Ape''' (which includes gibbons, orangutans, gorillas, chimpanzees, bonobos, and humans) is not considered a monkey, although they belong in the same suborder (Catarrhini) as Old World Monkeys. Apes don't have a tail, have larger brains than monkeys, and tend to be larger than most monkeys. '''Simian''' refers to both apes and monkeys. Lampshaded in ''Literature/{{Discworld}}'' where the Librarian, an Orangutan, is annoyed at being called a Monkey.
* In common use, '''rape''' and '''sexual assault''' are used interchangeably. '''Sexual assault''' is defined as any physical sexual contact perpetrated against a person without their consent or otherwise against their will. '''Rape''' is a specific form of sexual assault involving penetration.
* '''Semen''' is the liquid that comes out during male ejaculation. '''Sperm''' are specifically the male reproductive cells which are present in the semen of fertile males. It is indeed possible to ejaculate semen without sperm if he's infertile.
* '''Parasite''' is sometimes used, especially in fiction, to refer to something that drains life from its host, even to the point of death. Real parasites try not to kill their hosts; lethal "parasites" are actually called pathogens ([[ThePlague diseases]]) or [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parasitoid parasitoids]].
* '''Geneva Conventions''' are the international conventions binding their signatories to observe specific conduct toward refugees, captives and prisoners in the time of war. It has nothing to do with the agreement to abstain from the use of some types of weapons as this subject is covered by the '''Hague Conventions'''.
* '''Remake''' and '''remaster''' are used interchangeably in the video game field whenever a video game from the past gets rereleased with improved graphical fidelity. A '''remake''' is a video game that is rebuilt from the ground up with the intention of adding/changing levels, rewriting the story, and using new gameplay mechanics that couldn't have been done in the original game. A '''remaster''' is simply taking the same video game and giving it a visual upgrade (and possibly a new feature or two) while everything else remains the same.
* '''Samurai''' is not a synonym for a traditional Japanese warrior but it specifically means a warrior who is bound by feudal agreement with a lord. A vassal in other words. A general word for any person belonging to warrior caste is ''bushi''. A ''bushi'' serving no lord is called ''ronin''.
** Similarly, a knight is technically not a heavily-armed and armored (and possibly mounted) warrior in the medieval-European style - the term refers to an individual of that time period within the social class of knight, which was lower nobility and inevitably could fight in the aforementioned style. There actually is a term for a warrior capable of fighting with a lance in heavy armor upon a horse, independent of their social class: A man-at-arms. Interestingly, etymology seems to indicate that the term knight was originally used around this loosely before the social class arose and the term man-at-arms then came around for the difference.
* Television announcers in both the US and Canada routinely use the word '''common-law''' husband or wife to denote the person someone is living with. The act of cohabitation, no matter how long, ''never'' creates a legal relationship in the U.S., and only rarely in Canada.
* '''Vapid''': A word meaning "uninspired", "vacuous", or "bland", that has come to be used heavily by the online community for movies they don't like. Becomes hilarious (or infuriating) when the thing about the movie that turns them off is the exact opposite of being vapid. ie. it is inspired and deep, but goes in a direction the person doesn't care for.
* '''Exeunt''' is not a fancy synonym for '''exit'''. Etymologically, "exit" is the third-person singular present active indicative of the Latin verb ''exeō'', and "exeunt" its third-person plural present active indicative. Thus, in stage directions, "exit" is used for only one actor (e.g., Exit Hamlet), and "exeunt" for two or more (e.g., Exeunt Romeo and Juliet).
* A '''crescendo''' is NOT the loud climax of a piece of music or other sound -- the word you want is, well, '''climax.''' ''Crescendo'' (Italian: "I wax, I grow greater") refers to the ''process of getting louder'', an increase in volume over time, which ultimately may lead to a climax (or instead subside again in a '''decrescendo.''') "The noise rose to a crescendo" is flat-out wrong, in fact semi-redundant (rather like "His speed increased to an acceleration"), and will produce winces among the musically-trained.
* '''{{Muppet}}''', apart from use as an insult, is repeatedly used (even on Wiki/ThisVeryWiki!) to refer to advanced rubber puppets of the type seen in ''Film/TheDarkCrystal'' and ''Series/{{Farscape}}''. In reality, Creator/JimHenson himself said that those characters are not Muppets, but rather [[http://muppet.wikia.com/wiki/Muppets_vs_Creatures Creatures]]. ''Muppet'' refers specifically to the felt-type characters seen in ''Series/SesameStreet'', ''Series/TheMuppetShow'' and ''Series/FraggleRock'', because they are a {{Portmanteau}} of "marionette" and "puppet".[[note]]What about Big Bird? Or is that a costume?[[/note]] It's also a trademarked name, meaning that if Creator/{{Disney}} (the currect rights holder for the name) doesn't say something is a Muppet, it's not a Muppet. (*Cough*[[Franchise/StarWars Yoda]]*cough*)
* Contrary to what some believe, '''arbitrary''' does not mean the same thing as "random" or "ever-changing." It refers to a decision, definition, or policy which ''lacks a basis in prior precedent''. It is true that policies based largely on arbitration usually change rapidly and seemingly at random, but that is only a side effect. It is not the definition of the word.
* Being '''agnostic''' does not mean that a person is "undecided" about the existence of a god; it means that they believe that that both the existence or nonexistence of the divine is ''inherently'' unknowable. This is the reason for the word's Greek etymology: it comes from the prefix ''"a-"'' (meaning "lacking" or "without") and the root word ''"gnosis"'' (meaning "knowledge").[[note]] Technically, it should also be pronounced "AY-noss-tick" rather than "AGG-noss-tick", since the "g" is silent in the Greek word ''"gnosis"''. But that's another issue.[[/note]]
* "Please '''bare''' with me". No, I don't know you well enough. But if you like, I'll try and '''bear''' with you (in the metaphorical sense of following where you're going).
* '''[[VirusMisnomer Virus]]''' and '''bacteria'''[[note]] Also note that 'bacteria' is a plural, with the the singular form being 'bacterium'- but that's another issue. [[/note]] are often used interchangeably to mean 'pathogen' (i.e. a microorganism that causes disease), but are actually specific types of microorganism and are very different. Viruses are non-living, can only replicate inside host cells, are always pathogenic, and are far smaller than bacteria. In contrast, bacteria are alive, can reproduce by themselves, and are far larger than viruses. In addition, many of them are not pathogenic- your skin is literally covered with mostly harmless bacteria. Viruses and bacteria also cause different diseases, which is a fact many people ignore- for example, people worry about bacteria from people with flu, even though flu is a viral disease.
* '''Fluid''' is not a synonym of '''liquid''', as a fluid is anything that can flow. This includes liquids, gases and plasma.
* '''Sulphur''' is an element which, under standard conditions, is a yellow solid, which means it does not have a smell because in order for a substance to have a smell it has to be a gas. However, many people still compare smelly things to sulphur (for example, by saying that something which smells bad "smells like sulphur"). The misconception that sulphur has a smell may have arisen from confusion between sulphur, sulphur dioxide (which is formed when sulphur burns) and hydrogen sulphide (which decomposes to form elemental sulphur, meaning it's often found near sulphur), as the latter two chemicals are both odourants.
** And while we're on the subject, the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry (IUPAC), the body in charge of chemical nomenclature, spells it "sulfur". (This was a compromise between British and American English speakers, in exchange for the British English spelling of "aluminium".)
* A '''[[LoopholeAbuse loophole]]''' is an unintentional gap or grey area in the law usually caused by inadequate descriptions and definitions. A '''provision''' or an '''exemption''' [[note]]The later term usually refers to taxes while the former refers to everything else[[/note]] is a written in exception to the law and is very much intentional. Provisions and exemptions are often mistaken for loopholes, especially by people seeking to remove provisions. For example only a small minority of corporate tax "loopholes" are actually loopholes while the rest are very much intentional tax exemptions.
* A '''softlock''' is a particular kind of software freeze, in which the program still runs, but none of the user's input is functional. Beginning in 2017, some members of the ''Franchise/{{Pokemon}}'' fandom have been using the word to refer to situations where the player cannot progress farther in the game, which is better known as being "{{unwinnable}}", or just plain "getting stuck". The root of this confusion appears to be that around that time, the [=YouTuber=] WebVideo/{{Pikasprey}} Yellow uploaded a video titled "How to Escape Lorelei's Game-Ending Softlock", about one possible unwinnable scenario which completely takes control away from the player thanks to a design oversight, making it a true softlock. From this, his watchers generalized the word to ''all'' cases of UnwinnableByInsanity, even though none of the others qualify. Pikasprey himself has since begun a new video series titled "[=SoftlockPicking=]", about his Houdini-esque ways of escaping these "unwinnable" situations the viewers get him into, which unfortunately would appear to spread and perpetuate this incorrect usage.
* '''Lava''' and '''magma''', while related, are not one and the same. Lava is molten liquid rock that has been expelled from a volcano and is flowing on the surface whereas magma is the same substance that's inside the volcano and has not ejected to the surface. Due to lava being used to describe magma in most video games and films, lava is used as the catch all term for liquid rock no matter where it's situated.
* '''Refute''' means ''to provide evidence to prove falsehood''. If somebody insists they are refuting a claim demand they do so.
* A '''run-on sentence''' is not "a very long sentence". A run-on sentence is a grammatical error when two independent clauses either lack proper punctuation separating them, or a period indicating that they are two sentences.[[labelnote:e.g.]]"I went to the market Jane went home." is a run-on sentence. It can be corrected either by adding a comma and a coordinating conjunction ("I went to the market, and Jane went home."), a semicolon or similar punctuation ("I went to the market; Jane went home."), or by making it two sentences with a period ("I went to the market. Jane went home.").[[/labelnote]]. A three thousand word-long sentence can still be grammatical, and won't be a run-on sentence as long as it uses proper punctuation and coordinating conjunctions.
* '''Beta''' or '''beta male''' is often used to mean "man who isn't manly enough", however this is inconsistent with actual animal behavior. In a pack the betas serve more as the NumberTwo to the alpha, but still outrank the rest of the pack and may even [[KlingonPromotion kill their masters and take over]]. The most common example of the alpha/beta male dynamic, wolf packs, is also itself a DeadUnicornTrope. Wolf packs in the wild are simply families, and the alpha male and female are the parents. The researcher who first popularized that theory, L. David Mech, was observing wolves in zoos, where unrelated canines are grouped together and they take on more of a prison mentality. Mech eventually renounced the theory once he saw that wolves in the wild don't act that way.
* People often confuse '''Negative reinforcement''' with punishment. It actually means rewarding someone by taking ''away'' a bad thing, e.g. "Do what we say and we'll take your handcuffs off." In operant conditioning, the phrase "negative reinforcement" makes a pair with "positive reinforcement"; they both "reinforce", that is they both increase the likelihood that a behavior will be repeated. "Positive" and "negative" here do not carry the meaning of "good" and "bad", but rather the mathematical meaning of "adding" and "taking away". Therefore:
** Positive reinforcement: adding a stimulus to increase the likelihood that a behavior is repeated; ''"You cleaned your room! Here's some candy."''
** Negative reinforcement: removing a stimulus to increase the likelihood that a behavior is repeated; ''"You cleaned your room! I'll stop nagging you about it."''
** Positive punishment: adding a stimulus to decrease the likelihood that a behavior is repeated; ''"You left dirty clothes everywhere again! You're grounded."''
** Negative punishment: removing a stimulus to decrease the likelihood that a behavior is repeated; ''"You left dirty clothes everywhere again! You're not getting your allowance this week."''
* '''Terminal velocity''' is the speed at which a falling object doesn't accelerate any further no matter how long it falls, because drag and buoyancy are cancelling any further acceleration. A meteor, for example, does ''not'' reach terminal velocity at any point - it's already moving faster than that when it enters the atmosphere, and goes through it too quickly to slow down. The term also has nothing to do with the degree of lethality of the falling thing's impact, either to the item itself or to whatever it falls on.
* The term '''graphic novel''' is sometimes said to mean either "a comic book for adults" or "a comic book that's longer than single monthly issue". The actual definition is "A long-form work of graphic fiction that's published as a single volume rather than serialized". There are quite a few graphic novels written for children and young readers (''[[ComicBook/SmileandSisters Smile]]'' and ''ComicBook/AmericanBornChinese'' are two notable examples), and many long-form works of graphic fiction are originally published as multiple single issues before being collected and bound. Case in point: Creator/AlanMoore's ''ComicBook/{{Watchmen}}'' and Creator/NeilGaiman's ''ComicBook/TheSandman'' are often referred to as graphic novels, but they're actually not; ''Watchmen'' is a multi-part limited series that was originally published in single-issue installments before being collected as a single volume, while the ''Sandman'' series was originally an ongoing monthly comic book before it was published as a series of paperback collections.
* '''Unique''' means one of a kind. It does ''not'' mean unusual or special. Thus being "more unique" is like being "more pregnant" it just doesn't make sense. You ''could'' however say "almost unique" if there are only two of the thing in question.
* '''Infinitesimal''' means really small ''not'' really big. (think "infinitely small").
* Members of the far right often use '''Cultural Marxism''' (or '''Post-modern Neomarxism''') to mean "anything I don't like." While Cultural Marxism ''was'' a real denomination of Marxism taught at the Frankfurt School, the term in this far-right context characterizes the ideas and motivations of any number of different left-wing groups, many of whom are not aligned with each other or with the Frankfurt School, or similar in any way. Used in this way, the term has no meaning aside from being a piece of political invective. If it is understood to mean "the left," then it is imprecise and leads to the impression that the left are a unified Marxist front, which is ridiculous to anyone on the left, or anyone who has observed the left at any length: the left is quite as diverse and prone to infighting as the right, as it is defined as half of the left-right political spectrum. To sum up: neither of the words is particularly meaningful in that phrase as it is used by the far right.
* '''Atheism''' is lack of belief in a god or gods, while '''agnostic''' means being unsure whether there are any god(s). '''Nontheism''' usually refers to religions which don't have any gods, such as Buddhism.
* '''Prodigal''' is the opposite of "thrifty" or "frugal", meaning "wasteful", "frivolous", "Given to reckless or irresponsible spending" or "Living beyond one's means". But the most famous use of the word--by far--is in "The Parable of the Prodigal Son" from [[Literature/TheFourGospels the Gospel of Luke]], a story about an irresponsible young man who returns home to his parents after carelessly spending all of his money and winding up destitute. Because of this, it's often assumed to mean "Making a much-anticipated return after a long absence". But the Prodigal Son was "prodigal" because he spent all of his money, not because he was welcomed home by his parents afterwards.
* The idiom '''The exception proves the rule''' is often misused as a HandWave for any inconsistency in a person's argument, despite how this makes no sense [[FridgeLogic if you actually think about it]], e.g., If someone says "all birds are black" does the existence of doves prove they're right? Of course not. The real meaning of the saying is more akin to "the exception proves the rule applies by default" i.e if you see a sign at an intersection that says "no U-turn" you can infer that a U-turn is permitted whenever there ''isn't'' a sign forbidding it.
* '''Circa''' means "approximately" and is usually used to refer to dates. Therefore, you shouldn't use it when the exact date or other number is known: "[[AliceAndBob Alice was born circa 1987]]" is fine, "Alice was born circa May 5th, 1987" is not.
* A '''reprisal''' is an attack, particularly in warfare, carried out in retaliation for a previous attack. It is ''not'' the repetition of a musical number or a performance; that would be a '''reprise'''. Even Wiki/ThisVeryWiki made this mistake in the title of the trope RoleReprise, which was titled "Role Reprisal" for years.
* '''Real''' is an adjective, '''really''' is an adverb. While the former is often used in place of the latter (e.g., "She's a real nice girl"), this is considered colloquial at best and straight up wrong at worst, unless you meant she is a girl who is both nice and real as in not imaginary.
* By the same token: '''bad''' is an adjective and '''badly''' is an adverb. Thus, you ''probably'' mean you feel '''bad'''. To feel '''badly''' would mean your ability to feel is impaired.
* To '''earn''' money means to be given it in exchange for performing some work, service etc. To be given money for nothing is to simply '''get''' money.
* '''Brainchild''' refers to the concept or product created by a brain, not the owner of the brain doing the creating. For example, the World Wide Web is the brainchild of Tim Berners-Lee, not the other way round. The logical inverse would be something like '''brainparent''' but that's never caught on.
* '''Satire''' is not synonymous with "a joke", as people often misuse it to mean when saying "that was just satire", to mean "that was just a joke" (sometimes as a JustJokingJustification, though just as often out of ignorance). Satire has to be poking fun at a specific thing (be it a work of fiction or something in real life.) For example, the film ''Film/{{Spaceballs}}'' is a satire of ''Franchise/StarWars'', but just calling any comedy a satire is incorrect.
* To '''Care About''' someone is to have sympathy for them or concern for their well being. To '''Care For''' someone is either to literally take care of the person, or, idiomatically, to like that person or thing.
* '''Mansplaining''' is when a man condescendingly explains a subject to a woman, especially if it's a subject where she has expertise ("Whitesplaining," "Straightsplaining," "Cis-splaining," and others are related terms). Certain...sectors of social media have begun using that word ''any'' time a man disagrees with a woman online, regardless of his own expertise or any legit points he makes.
* '''People of Color''' refers to all racial minorities in countries where whites are the majority. It is not just a "nice" way to refer to black people.
* '''Deign''' isn't a "fancier" way of saying "dare". It means to do something you feel is beneath you, such as: "I didn't deign to respond to such a stupid comment."
* A '''Majority''' is over half, or 50 percent. A '''Supermajority''' is over two thirds, or about 66.6 percent. A '''Plurality''' is more than any other group/category etc, although less than 50 percent (e.g., if candidate A gets 40 percent of the votes, and the other three candidates get 20 percent each, candidate A gets the plurality of the votes).
* For some reason, it's become fashionable for people on the internet to use '''Classical Liberal''' to mean something like "conservative-lite". The correct meaning of "Classical Liberalism" is something more like what's now called '''Libertarianism.'''
* A train's '''Conductor''' is not its driver. That would be the '''Engineer.''' Conductors are the attendants who check tickets and assist passengers during the trip.
* '''Millenials''' are a generation of people born somewhere between the early 80's and the mid-90's. It does not mean "young person." If anything, the generation is approaching middle age.
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* '''Venomous''' and '''poisonous''' are not interchangeable, which is a common mistake in usage. ''Venomous'' means the subject has the ability to actively transmit poison. ''Poisonous'' means the subject transmits poison passively (ie. is eaten). Therefore, a poisonous frog means that it will poison those eating it, while a venomous snake means it will poison its victims by biting them and injecting toxins. As the mnemonic saying goes, "If it bites you and you die, it's venomous. If you bite it and you die, it's poisonous." [[note]]Similar issues happen in other languages -- for instance, in Spanish, ''venenoso'' (venomous) is very often used where ''ponzoñoso'' (poisonous) should be (although the opposite almost never happens), to the extent many assume both words are now synonyms, and that ''ponzoñoso'' is just an old word that is not used anymore.[[/note]] This means that, technically, if you are bitten by a snake or stung by a scorpion, the correct past tense is "I have been envenomed." This may be because most animal venoms are ''not'' harmful if swallowed...not that we'd recommend drinking it, since it can still enter the bloodstream through any cuts in the mouth.
* There is a famous (for a given value of "famous") poem by Lt. Col. Jeff Cooper, inventor of the "modern technique" of handgun combat:[softreturn]''A clip is not a magazine[softreturn]A mag is not a clip[softreturn]Neither is a grip a stock[softreturn]And "stock" does not mean "grip".[softreturn][softreturn]I do not mean to nitpick[softreturn]But improvement might be seen[softreturn]If we could bring ourselves to say[softreturn]Exactly what we mean.''
** A '''clip''' and a '''magazine''' are often used interchangeably, but military terminology is that a clip feeds a magazine (or the cylinder of a revolver) quickly; a magazine feeds into the weapon itself. A removable magazine is often referred to as a clip even by military sources, however.
*** This was highlighted early in 2014 when a California state senator delivered a press conference tirade where he kept using "30 calibre clip" and "30 magazine clip" to characterize the supposed firing speed of a gun.
** A '''stock''' is the part of a rifle, shotgun, or occasionally SMG or pistol that is braced against the shoulder; a '''grip''' is the part that is actually, well, [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin gripped]]—it's specifically the part of the gun that is held by the hand that pulls the trigger, and includes the trigger itself (though sometimes also used as a shortened form of "foregrip", the part of a long gun that is held by the off-hand to steady the weapon). The stock and grip are together part of the '''receiver''', the framework that holds the whole thing together (often called a '''frame''' on handguns).
*** To make things more confusing, in most classic rifles (i.e. non-automatic), a ''stock'' refers to the large wooden (or plastic) part all the metal parts (barrel, bolt and trigger assembly) are connected to. In this case, a part of stock behind the grip that is put against shooter's shoulder would be a 'butt'.
** A '''bullet''' is the metal slug fired from a gun. A '''cartridge''' or '''round''' is the unfired ammunition. A '''casing''' is the spent part of the cartridge ejected otherwise. Referring to unfired cartridges as bullets is a classic error. Similarly, '''shot''' is what's fired from a ''shotgun''. '''Shell''' can be both the unfired ammo and the spent casing.
*** To be extra confusing, old style cannon fired '''shot''' (solid projectiles) and '''shells''' (explosive projectiles). Explosive projectiles are still called shells.
** A '''barrel''' is the tube a bullet travels down when fired; before firing, the bullet sits (contained in a cartridge, see above) in a '''chamber'''. Revolvers have multiple chambers which rotate in a '''cylinder'''; other guns load their chambers (or "chamber rounds") from their magazines.
* For small arms, '''caliber''' means the width of the barrel at the narrowest point. "High caliber" is not, in fact, a way of saying "high power". E.g. A 7.62x39mm round fired from an AKM will not impart as much energy to a target as a 7.62x54mm round fired from a SVD Dragunov, nor will the 9x19mm Parabellum round impart as much energy as the 7.62x25mm Tokarev round.
** Another way to think of it is that a "high caliber bullet" will ''generally'' be fired from a bigger gun. However, caliber has nothing to do with strength ''by itself'' - if anything, the length of the cartridge (i.e. how much space there is in the casing for gunpowder behind the bullet) has more to do with the energy the bullet imparts on a target than the diameter of the bullet. If you're trying to say that a high caliber hand gun is more powerful than a low caliber rifle, chances are that you're ''wrong''. Unless you want to get into the specifics of grain count, rifling twist, bullet velocity and weight, you're better off assuming that handguns are less powerful than rifles.
*** To put it another way, "caliber" is absolutely not the same thing as [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stopping_power#Energy_transfer "stopping power"]]. A small-caliber bullet fired from a high-powered rifle is a lot more likely to kill you than a large-caliber bullet fired at a much slower speed -- the latter bulldozes its way through the entire region via [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydrostatic_shock hydrostatic shock]]; the former punctures its way through a narrow path. Kinetic energy is a function of the mass times the ''square'' of the speed.
** On the same subject, '''bore''' and '''caliber''' are not necessarily interchangeable. Traditionally for rifled weaponry, especially rifled artillery, "bore" denotes the number of turns in the number of calibers (i.e. how many times the width of the projectile down the barrel the projectile must travel to have one complete turn imparted on it by the rifling). So a rifled late Victorian artillery piece with one turn per 38 calibers is a 38 bore, but a smoothbore early Victorian cannon is a zero bore. To confuse matters further, in the UK the word "bore" is also used to mean the same as "gauge" in regards to shotguns: a measure of barrel diameter based upon the weight of a solid lead ball that will fit perfectly into the barrel, expressed as the denominator of a vulgar fraction of a pound if the numerator is one. Thus if the largest lead ball you can fit into the shotgun barrel weighs one twelfth of a pound, you have a 12-bore (or, in the US, 12-gauge) shotgun.
** To confuse matters, there are two separate meanings of the phrase "high-caliber," one of which means larger bullets, and the older of which means "fits the mold ideally." Therefore in other usage, higher caliber always means "better," but in guns it's just a straight technical term with no better/worse meaning.
** To confuse the situation even further, the term caliber is also used to indicate barrel length of artillery pieces, especially naval artillery. So when one refers to a 5"/ 38 caliber gun, one is referring to a gun with a barrel that is one caliber, or 5", internal diameter, and 38 calibers, or 190" long.
* '''Point-blank''' does not mean "at very close range". Point-blank refers to the maximum distance between a firearm and its target before one's aim needs to be adjusted for elevation. Of course, for field artillery or naval guns designed to launch shells in long parabolic arcs, that ''is'' quite a close range. For handguns or rifles, not so much.
* The word '''factoid''' is often used as if it meant "little fact" or "trivia," as in "here's a little factoid for you". It actually means "[[LittleKnownFacts something resembling a fact but with no evidence to support it]]"[[note]]"Factoids ... that is, facts which have no existence before appearing in a magazine or newspaper, creations which are not so much lies as a product to manipulate emotion in the Silent Majority." [N. Mailer, "Marilyn," 1973][[/note]], much like ''android'' is 'something that resembles a man'. Amusingly, this can often make the word more appropriate than the speaker's intention.
* '''[[RoyalBlood Royalty]]''' is not the same as '''[[BlueBlood nobility]]''' or '''gentry'''. Royalty is basically the nearest family of a ruler, while nobles are descendants of knights and landowners. There could be royal dukes and noble dukes. Gentry is somewhere between a subclass of nobility and a category of its own, as people in that class usually own land and are descended from well-established and well-connected families, but don't have hereditary titles or offices.
* '''Ironic''' doesn't (simply) mean "funny", "unexpected", "coincidental" or "cruel." See {{Irony}} for more on the subject, and IsntItIronic for more on the misuse.
** And on a similar note, '''cynicism''' isn't "sarcastic but more". Sarcasm is mocking, cynicism is jaded negativity.
*** And before '''cynicism''' got its current meaning, it was a Greek philosophy which taught that happiness is independence. From as much as possible - pleasures, law, other people...
* '''Impeach''' does not mean to remove someone from office. Impeachment is the process by which an individual is put on trial for unlawful activity. So Congress did not "''try'' to impeach" Bill Clinton, they did. He was not removed from office, though.
** In the legal context, it means to attack someone's credibility. At trial, both lawyers are trying to impeach the other's witnesses and it has nothing to do with elected office.
* '''Irregardless'''. While taken literally it could mean "not regardless", its usage is near-invariably as an erroneous synonym of "regardless." Linguists often refer to this fairly common phenomenon as "overnegation". In a case of ''actual'' irony, this is almost the exclusive purview of [[DelusionsOfEloquence people trying to sound more literate than they are, and achieving the exact opposite]]. In a case of ''further'' irony, you're vastly more likely to encounter this word in a style guide or as part of a joke than you are to ever hear anyone using it naïvely; we're calling out people who "don't know the language" by accusing them of using what was originally a non-word, even in a descriptivist sense. It is so common that the SAT has at least one question per writing section testing it. It is usually under the hardest questions, too. The Brothers Chaps lampooned this in their ''VideoGame/PeasantsQuest'' flash game by using the word "irredisregardless". The funny thing is, despite the word having no precedent, it's a triple negative, so it's technically correct.
* A '''Scientific Theory''' is [[GravityIsOnlyATheory not a guess, hypothesis, or conjecture.]] It's an established framework of one or more hypotheses with a significant body of evidence backing it. In other words, it's been "proven" to the extent it can be. If a model makes accurate predictions and is consistent with testing and/or observation it can eventually be called a theory, while the word hypothesis is reserved for an idea that you think might work but you haven't had the chance to rigorously test yet. As for why the word theory is used rather than, say, fact or law, this is simply a result of the general understanding that any theory may be incomplete or inaccurate. \\
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This doesn't mean we have any doubts about the validity of the theory itself, but that we may not know everything about it. Gravity is a good example, gravity is "only a theory". That is, our model of how gravity works may not be entirely correct; in fact we know it isn't, since our current theory does not incorporate quantum effects. That doesn't stop gravity from being real. Similarly evolution simply means change, and in the context of biology simply means change from one generation to the next in terms of genetic makeup. Our current theory of how species evolve through natural selection is a theory because the model may not be perfect, but the fact that organisms change from generation to generation is an observable fact. \\
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Incidentally, even in non-scientific usage the word '''theory''' did not always mean guess. If you look at how, say, Literature/SherlockHolmes would use the word theory, it would be a model explaining a crime, which is based on evidence, is testable, and has explanatory powers.
** It should be noted that this word is now subject to a misconception of the opposite sign, as a result of an overzealous response to the above mistake. The word "theory" does not imply that an idea is unproven, but neither does it imply that it is proven: it really doesn't say anything about the degree of confidence in it. For example, the theory of phlogiston is a thoroughly disproven scientific theory on combustion. It's still a theory, i.e. a system of ideas that aims to explain scientific phenomena on the basis of general principle - it's just that nobody believes in it any more.
** The core "essence" of a proper theory (and by extension hypothesis) is it has the property of ''falsifiability.'' This merely means that it's possible to construct a repeatable experiment to test ''if'' it's wrong. The actual outcome (proven correct or proven wrong) is irrelevant.
** As a further, a scientific '''law''' doesn't mean it's "more proven" than a theory. A law is (loosely) is something derived from a theory to cover a certain point. If your theory were "[[Series/{{Torchwood}} Jack Harkness]] is the sexiest creature in existence." then a one law might be "If you are in Jack Harkness' presence for more than 31.2 seconds, you ''will'' snog him." In more scientific the classic e=mc^2 is a law derived from the Theory of Relativity.
* The word '''Decimate''' is very frequently used a synonym of words like destroy, annihilate, or obliterate. Its actual definition is literally to destroy one tenth of something. [[note]]And being more pedantic, its a form of punishment used on Roman legions where legionaries draw straws and 1/10th are killed[[/note]]. The definition has loosened to mean, "kill a large percentage of" but it's still wrong to use it to mean "almost destroyed" or "completely destroyed" like some people do.
* The words '''racism''', '''prejudice''' and '''stereotype''' are often confused. Racism is defined as any policy or belief based in whole or in part on the pseudo-scientific theory that all humanity consists of biologically distinct races and that every member of each race has the distinct physical and/or behavioral characteristics of that race[[note]] Genetically, there are either tens of thousands of races or none, depending on whether you want to go for meaningful biological differences (none) or extremely minor ones (tens of thousands). The main problem with "racial" theory is that races aren't distinct, and not all the members of the supposed "races" have the characteristics they're supposed to have. [[/note]]. Prejudice means the belief that "[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prejudice a group of people [are] characterized by their race, social class, gender, ethnicity, sexual orientation, age, disability or religion]]." Stereotypes, on the other hand, are "generalizations of existing characteristics that reduce complexity" (also copied from Wiki/TheOtherWiki). So, the belief of the USA's 'Southern' slave-owners that anyone who was not an Anglo-Saxon European was by default of an inferior race was racism, the belief of Anglo-Saxon settlers that the USA's Amerindian peoples were savages was prejudice, and the belief that all Canadians constantly say "eh" is a stereotype. Stereotype is a ''neutral term''; often when people use the term in a pejorative manner, it is to attack a ''lazy'' stereotype -- that is, a blanket statement that assumes homogeny among an entire spectrum of demographic.
** Similarly, people often use '''discrimination''' to mean negative treatment based on prejudice. In fact, discrimination simply means ''any'' differential treatment, regardless of what such differentiation is based on or whether such treatment is positive or negative. Which is why we have an article for PositiveDiscrimination. Discrimination can and is perfectly rational and justifiable in many situations: for instance, the practice of hiring the more qualified candidate for a job is a form of discrimination. Another example would be to discriminate between foods one likes and doesn't like (i.e. ordering the strawberry shortcake over the apple pie because you do not like cinnamon)--this last sort of "discrimination" is why "discriminating" is a compliment in dealing with matters of taste (e.g. the ''discriminating'' wine-drinker can tell the ''Grand Cru'' Bordeaux from the [[ATankardOfMooseUrine plonk]], and is considered to have Good Taste because he "discriminates" in favour of the former over the latter). You will often see this used correctly in military contexts. If armed forces are said to be indiscriminate, they have crossed the MoralEventHorizon.
** Finns have become really, really bad at misusing "racism" ("rasismi") in the past ten years or so. People talk about "age racism" or "fat racism" or god forbid, even "sex racism" because they think "racism" just means "discrimination". Part of this stems from the English loanword "rasismi" replacing the old, 100% Finnish word "rotusyrjintä" (literally "race discrimination"). Nobody in their right mind would use a term like "ikärotusyrjintä" ("age race discrimination"), but "ikärasismi", "age racism" is ridiculously popular.
** '''Bigotry''' is often generalized into discrimination of any kind. In actuality, [[http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/bigotry bigotry]] is merely intolerance of beliefs other than one's own. Other factors, such as race, are not relevant to the designation.
* There appears to be a confusion about the words '''sexism''' and '''misogyny'''. Sexism is discrimination and stereotyping based on sex, and encompasses all forms of discrimination based on sex (indeed, even men who believe that women are inherently better than men, for example). '''Misogyny''' and '''misandry''' are hatred of women and men respectively. Some dictionaries have expanded this to include deep-seated prejudice against women or men respectively (so a womanizer who sees women only as sex objects would be a misogynist, despite his claims to love women).
* '''UsefulNotes/{{Feminism}}''' often gets misused for '''misandry'''. Feminism is the advocacy of women's rights on the grounds of political, social, and economic equality to men and nothing more. Unfortunately, due to a VocalMinority of feminists who tend to skew issues into an "us vs them" rhetoric, their advocacy for equality is often conflated with outright hatred for men.
* There is some confusion as to what a '''Justification''' is in the wiki's jargon, due to the everyday use of the term in Administrivia/JustifyingEdit. A JustifiedTrope ''does not'' require a Administrivia/JustifyingEdit. A trope is justified when the in-universe explanation for its use makes sense in context. A Administrivia/JustifyingEdit is just a fan of a work complaining that another editor [[FelonyMisdemeanor dared]] list that work under [[Administrivia/TropesAreTools a particular trope page]].
* '''Polygamy''' is "marriage of one person to more than one spouse" (to distinguish it from "group marriage"). It is not just a synonym for "polygyny", "marriage of a man to more than one wife". Most arguments brought up in response to "What's wrong with polygamy?" (e.g., "It oppresses women") are just irrelevant to "polyandry", "marriage of a woman to more than one husband". (And not just because "polyandrists do not exist", which is also factually incorrect.)
* A '''Battleship''' is a combat vessel that relies primarily on large caliber guns (11 inches or bigger) to do damage and is armored to withstand guns of equal power, if not greater power. It is not any ship meant to do battle, that would be a '''Warship'''. Nobody builds or uses battleships anymore[[note]]The last used were the American ''Iowa'' class[[/note]] (though several are preserved as museums) because missiles and aircraft carriers have rendered their construction uneconomical.
* While we're at it, a '''Cruise Ship''' and a '''Cruiser''' are very different types of ships. A cruiser is a medium-sized, long-range military vessel while a cruise ship is a passenger ship designed for pleasure cruises. Scifi writers screw this one up all the time [[SpaceIsAnOcean when naming spaceships,]] to the point that it's not unheard-of for one setting to use the terms both correctly and incorrectly.
* You can only ''truly'' '''plead the Fifth''' in a particularly bad court of HollywoodLaw. The correct phrase is to "TAKE the Fifth" (for those non-Americans unaffected by the EaglelandOsmosis: "The Fifth" is the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States, one clause of which protects against self-incrimination; better known as [[ReadingYourRights "you have the right to remain silent"]]). Pleading in a criminal prosecution[[note]]In a civil action, pleading is "the pleadings": the plaintiff's complaint (i.e. "the defendant did this, and this, and this, and that's such-and-such tort/breach of contract/other issue) and the defendant's answer to that complaint (which usually consists of responding to the complaint point-by-point by saying "Admitted" or "Denied" but can also be quite complicated--the least complicated being the common "This is a conclusion of law requiring no response, but to the extent it alleges any fact it is denied.").[[/note]] requires a '''plea''', most often "not guilty" or "guilty". (There's also ''nolo contendere'', "no contest": "I didn't do it, but I will not fight the charges," usually done to avoid civil liability on the grounds of [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Res_judicata res judicata/collateral estoppel]]--particularly when the criminal penalty is relatively light but the damages in a subsequent civil suit will be ''massive'' if the case goes against you.)
** While 'The Fifth' is not a plea, most courts will understand the statement "I plead the fifth" as a suspect explicitly invoking their Fifth Amendment right to avoid self-incrimination. According to the Supreme Court, while a suspect must explicitly invoke the right, "No ritualistic formula is necessary in order to invoke the privilege" ([[https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/349/155/ Quinn v. United States, 349 U. S. 155, 164 (1955)]]).
* Similarly (and technically), '''pleading insanity''' is shorthand used outside of court for pleading "not guilty by reason of mental disease or defect".
** Also worth noting is that one cannot be '''diagnosed''' as insane, because insanity is a legal concept, not a medical one. Even if a medical professional determines a person is mentally ill, a court must decide if that mental illness is legally relevant. In general, while having a mental illness or severe cognitive difficulty is an element of the court's decision, at the end of the day you are '''adjudicated''' insane, not diagnosed as such.[[note]]In the English-speaking countries, there are four standards for determining whether someone is legally insane. The oldest, called the ''M'Naghten'' rule after a case where the defendant believed the person he was shooting was Sir UsefulNotes/RobertPeel, articulates the rule that you (1) had a "mental disease or defect" such that (2) you either didn't understand what it was you were doing or didn't know that it was wrong. Some US states thought this too harsh, and changed the rule to be that (1) you had some kind of mental disease or defect and (2) it created an "irresistible impulse" to perform the criminal act. In TheSixties, some US states ''still'' thought this was too harsh, so they said that if (1) you had some kind of mental disease or defect and (2) that mental disease or defect "caused" you to commit the crime, you were insane. Finally, the authors of the Model Penal Code, an American attempt (mostly failed) at unifying the 50 states' criminal laws, thought that both the ''M'Naghten'' rule and the "irresistable impulse" rule made good points, sort of combined the two, stating that if (1) you had some kind of mental disease or defect such that (2) you could not (a) understand what you were doing OR (b) that it was wrong OR (c) you could not "conform [your] conduct to the law", the defense would be applicable.[[/note]] Similarly, on the civil side, you can also be adjudicated legally incompetent to do any number of things (to sign a contract, to commit a tort, to make a will, to serve as trustee of a trust); although the standard for that is a lot lower--"incompetence" can include moderate senility, for example--it is possible to have some kind of mental illness or cognitive difficulty and still be deemed legally competent to handle one's own affairs.
** Similarly, '''insanity''' means someone being mentally ill or being extremely illogical/foolish. Most people use the pop culture version taken from ''VideoGame/FarCry3'' where a character states that insanity is "doing the same thing over and over, expecting things to change". While someone who is mentally ill can exhibit such a behavior, it is not what insanity is all about.
* The phrase "'''compare and contrast'''" is redundant. '''Contrasting''' involves comparing—contrasting is comparing only the differences, while '''comparing''' in the broader sense may also note similarities. This error in rampant in this very wiki.
* '''Exponentially''' means "increasing at a rate which is also increasing", not merely "increasing" and certainly not "a lot". Mathematically speaking, "exponentially more" refers only to the difference between the rates of increase of two functions, and has a much more specific meaning than "this is growing faster than that"[[note]]The mathematical meaning of "exponentially more/less" is about the asymptotic complexity of a function equal to the difference between two functions. (More specifically, a function f(x) is said to be "exponentially greater" than another function g(x) if their difference (f(x) - g(x)) is a function that has the same asymptotic complexity as some function h(x) that grows exponentially with x. Another, probably more common definition is that their ratio (f(x)/g(x)) grows faster than any power of x. If one starts to be pedantic, the latter is called super-polynomial, and most people insist on using ratios (2^x doesn't really grow faster than 2* 2^x)) This means that it's incorrect to say that something is "exponentially more/less" than something else when the two things being compared are just constant quantities, rather than quantities that increase as functions of some variable (such as time).[[/note]] Values that stay the same or increase at steady rate are not, by definition, "exponentially" ''anything''. Most people who say this mean "orders of magnitude greater". An "order of magnitude" is (usually) ten times[[note]]Mathematically speaking, an order of magnitude is a factor of whatever the base value is. Saying that it is "usually ten times" reflects the generic standard that most mathematics is done in base ten. An order of magnitude in binary, for example, would be a factor of 2, while an order of magnitude in hexadecimal would be a factor of 16, ''et cetera''.[[/note]], so more than one would be 100 times, 1000 times, or more. That said, a quantity that is ten times larger than its starting value after one year, 100 times larger after two years, and 1000 times larger after three, can be said to be growing "exponentially" as the relation between value N and time t is one of N=10^t or N≈44.7e^t.
* A '''quantum''' is a discrete unit of something. Therefore, when Film/JamesBond finds his Film/QuantumOfSolace, he doesn't feel that much better[[note]]Which was how it was meant in [[Literature/ForYourEyesOnly the original story]]. The idea was that when the last quantum of solace is removed from a relationship a man might do anything[[/note]]. A quantum ''leap'' is a change directly from one state to another, without any defined intermediate states happening along the way. The distance leaped over does not need to be the smallest possible. [[http://www.irregularwebcomic.net/1554.html Some pedants have not quite grasped this]].
** To better describe, think of the word "quantity". When you have a quantity of something, i.e. a specific number of units of it, those units are ''quanta''. In physics, a quantum specifically means "the minimum amount of a physical entity involved in a physical interaction" (from Wiki/TheOtherWiki).
* '''Inflammable''' is not an antonym to '''flammable'''; it's a synonym. The antonym is '''non-flammable'''. (Granted, this is played for comedy more often than it's used seriously...)
** The confusion here is mostly due to the fact that inflammable (derived from "inflame") doesn't come from the typical [in-] negation, it comes from [en-], to give or receive. "Flammable" is actually the newer word, created because people knew that this exact mistake would be made. It makes sense once you consider that the archaic ''enflame'' is similar to enrage and enjoy.
** [[WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons "Inflammable means flammable? What a country!"]]
** [[VideoGame/MassEffect2 "Flammable! Or inflammable, forget which. Doesn't matter!"]]
** '''Creator/GeorgeCarlin''': "Flammable... inflammable... non-inflammable. Why are there three of them? Either it flams or it doesn't!"
** [[VideoGame/KingdomOfLoathing "It tries to set your face on fire, but you're inflammable."]] Wait, that means flammable. You're [[BuffySpeak "un-light-on-fire-able."]]
*** Of course, if someone ''did'' successfully light your face on fire, you'd suffer '''inflammation''', which is a physiological response to injury. So you'd be '''inflamed''' as well as inflammable.
* '''Mano a mano''' is a commonly used Spanish and Italian term that translate as "hand to hand," (which means the same thing as in English, but with a connotation of "evenly matched"). It '''does not''' means "man to man"[[note]]as two man on man kisses were described at the 2009 MTV Movie Awards[[/note]]. This is what is known in linguistics as a false friend. Sincerely saying that you want to settle things "mano a mano" before [[NeverBringAKnifeToAGunFight pulling out a gun is an example.]]
** Although, technically in some countries people shorten the word "hermano" (brother) to just "mano". So it could also be "brother to brother" ("hermano" or "mano" has been used as an identifier even if the person in question is not a sibling at all.)
** Even worse is when someone says "mano y mano" which is hand and hand, making no sense in relation to fighting, and even less sense when they think they are saying "man and man". [[HoYay Unless...]]
* The word '''whom''' is used by many as simply "who, but fancier." "Whom" is a ''direct or indirect object'', so if you ever see someone use it otherwise ("Whom are you?" for example), they're futzing it up. As a general rule, replace the usage of "whom" with "them" (and, correspondingly, "who" with "they") and see if it still makes sense.
** "Whom" is used to describe people something happens ''to'', and "who" describes people who ''do'' something. You might ask about a proposed business deal, "Who affects the deal?" and "Whom does the deal affect?"
* "Wherefore", as in Shakespeare's ''Theatre/RomeoAndJuliet'', does not mean "where", but "why"; "wherefore" is to "therefore" as "what" is to "that". Juliet was not wondering where Romeo was, but rather wondering why the man she loved had to be Romeo, one of her family's hated rivals. (Juliet's whole thing in the balcony scene is a meditation on the meaninglessness of labels.)
* People have been told not to say "Me and Joe went to the park", but "Joe and I ...". For too many, this has morphed to a general anxiety around the word "me", so they always use '''and I'''. This is a mistake. "He saw Joe and I" is wrong (it should be "Joe and ''me''").
** "I" is when you are the subject, and "me" is when you're an object. This does not change if you are accompanied by someone else.
** First person singular pronouns always go after anything else when multiple subjects or objects are involved, so "I and ..." is never correct. (This is courtesy, not grammar.)
** If you have trouble knowing whether or not to say "I" or "me", [[https://youtu.be/N4vf8N6GpdM?t=67 take out the other person/thing/whatever and see if the sentence still makes sense]]. ("Joe and I went to the park" changes to "I went to the park", not "Me went to the park")
** This is only the case in formal English, however. In discourse, almost all speakers will accept "Me and Joe went to the park" as an informal but grammatical variant. "Me and Joe" is somewhat more common than "Joe and me", an interesting inversion of the above "first person last" rule.
** Similarly, "He saw Joe and I" is used consistently by some speakers of e.g. Northern Californian English. This is probably hypercorrection in avoiding "me" entirely, as noted above, which has been adopted into the dialect.
** People who have been told that ''and I'' is not a panacea will often abuse the word '''myself'''. This is a mistake as well. Myself is ''reflexive'' -- when you're both the subject and the object. "I wet myself", "I touch myself" and "I cut myself" are all okay (grammatically, that is). "Please send the memo to Joe and myself" is wrong. You mean "... to Joe and me."
** Settling this and the above immediate point of grammatical confusion: In all cases where you list any series of individuals, ending with "and I/me", the way you settle the "I vs. me" is to eliminate everyone else from the list and isolate the "I/me". For instance, "Joseph, Victoria, and I went to the amusement park and rode the Thunderstrike," is correct because "I went to the amusement park..." would also be correct. Similarly, "Grandma Robinson regularly sent Joseph, Victoria, and me $5 checks on our birthdays," is also correct because "Grandma Robinson regularly sent me..." would also be correct.
** Possessives can get awkward as well, such as the cringeworthy "Joe and I's apartment." If you absolutely cannot get away with "Me and Joe's apartment," and the context isn't clear enough to just say "Our apartment," then the correct formal phrasing would be "Joe's and my apartment" for the same reasons listed above: "Joe's apartment" and "My apartment" are both correct by themselves.
* Ah, '''passive''' is another great example. Passive is a ''voice'', not a ''tense''. Similarly, '''indicative''' and '''subjunctive''' are ''moods'', not tenses.
** Also, people tend to confuse progressive aspect with passive voice. "I was kicking the ball" is not in the passive voice. "The ball was kicked by me" is.
*** A quick and easy way to identify passive voice- can you add "by [whatever]" after the verb/is it already there? Thus, you get "His brains were eaten (by [[EverythingsDeaderWithZombies zombies]])"- passive voice, "Zombies were eating his brains (by zombies)"- not passive voice.
*** Well, the examples in [[http://www.bartleby.com/141/strunk5.html#11 Strunk and White]] are a little painful, but not as painful as a [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E-Prime movement to discard passives and all other uses of "be"]].
* A '''vaccine''' is a component of a pathogen designed to induce immunity to it, not a miracle cure. Typically they are most effective before being exposed to the pathogen, though the rabies vaccine, which is typically given to humans after they are exposed to the rabies virus, is an exception. '''Vaccination''' and '''immunization''' are often, incorrectly, used interchangeably, but an immunization is simply anything that induces immunity, which includes vaccinations as well as antibody therapies that can cure a disease after exposure.
* '''Bemused''' has nothing to do with being "amused" -- in fact it means "utterly confused."
** Similarly, '''Nonplussed''' does not mean "aloof" or "unimpressed". It means "bewildered".
*** Or "unperturbed". Non-reacting due to confusion, or just non-reacting.
* '''Slander''' and '''libel''' tend to be used interchangeably. Libel is defamation in the form of ''written'' words, while slander is defamation in the form of ''spoken'' words. '''Defamation''' is a catch-all that covers both. With the advent of the Internet and lower barriers to publishing, the definitions are changing, but libel is generally public postings and slander is generally private words.
** The distinction (in the UK at least) comes from the permanence of the defamatory statement. If I said it to someone in a restaurant it's slander. If it happened to be inadvertently recorded and put in a movie soundtrack or written in an article, it's libel.
*** A.P. Herbert took this to the length of parody in "The Lawyer's Dream", where a bench of judges are arguing interminably about whether an audio recording is libel or slander?
** Mentioned in the first ''Film/SpiderMan1'' movie, as follows:
--->'''Peter Parker:''' Spider-Man wasn't trying to attack the city... he was trying to save it. That's slander.\\
'''J. Jonah Jameson:''' It is not. I resent that. [[ITakeOffenseToThatLastOne Slander is spoken. In print, it's libel.]]
** Also note for EaglelandOsmosis purposes that in all civil-law jurisdictions and many common-law ones (e.g. Virginia), slander and libel do not exist/have been merged and there is only "defamation" to cover injury arising from false statements, whether spoken or written. Also note that even in common-law jurisdictions that still respect the distinction, the only significant difference (in most jurisdictions) is in the proof needed for damages: with libel, all you need to show is "general" damages, i.e. put forward a good-faith estimate as to how much the damage to your reputation has cost you, but with slander, you need to prove "special" damages, i.e. need to point to at least one situation in which the injury to reputation had actually and directly harmed you (e.g. cost you a job) before you can collect anything (although if you can prove special damages, you can usually collect general damages as well).
* In {{Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game}}s, people often say, "Spell X has been '''casted'''" or "I have casted spell X". There is no word "casted". The word "cast" covers both present and past tenses. So both, "I will cast spell X on the monster" and "I have cast spell X on the monster" are the correct forms. The same conjugation is also used regardless of the specific thing or person being cast: Some sculptures are cast, actors are cast in movies.
* '''Puritanical''' means keeping "practicing or enforcing strict religious behavior." Its only tangentially related to anything sex related, and most certainly does not mean enforcing current laws about the age of consent (which in most countries is higher than the age specified in the dominant religion and derived from quite secular legislation). This does not stop more than a few pedophiles from calling such laws "puritanical."
* Another mistake frequently made in fantasy contexts is the conjugation of '''slay'''. As seen on acres of Disney World merchandise, "I slayed the dragon" is incorrect. "Slay" doesn't work like "play." Instead, it should be "I ''slew'' the dragon." Alternatively, "I ''have slain'' the dragon."
** {{Lampshaded}} in ''Series/BuffyTheVampireSlayer'', where Willow on one occasion had difficulty coming up with the right form. Giles, surprisingly, says either ''slew'' or ''slayed'' will do.
** You do not '''seen''' something. You ''saw'' it, or you ''have seen'' it, but you never '''seen''' it.
*** Most uses of the phrase "I seen it," especially those with enough emphasis to rule out a slurred "I've", are identifying the speaker as a hick.
* '''Inbreeding''' means [[KissingCousins breeding among]] [[BrotherSisterIncest closely related]] [[ParentalIncest individuals]]. Not breeding with members of another group or anything else. The confusion likely comes from the similar-sounding word "interbreeding." But ''in'' or ''intra'' refers to the inside and ''inter'' refers to the outside. [[note]]Other-word example: business between Los Angeles (in California) and Las Vegas (in Nevada) (e.g. an Angelino sells his 1964 Impala to someone in Vegas) is "interstate trade" or "interstate commerce". Business between Los Angeles and San Francisco (also in California) (same Angelino sells same car, but to someone in SF) is "intrastate trade" or "intrastate commerce".[[/note]] By the same token, '''interbreeding''' should not be used to mean marrying your sister.
* Similarly, a '''butler''' is the head of a large household of servants, dealing specifically with the wine cellars -- "butler" is, in fact, a corruption of "bottler". Because Jeeves is Bertie Wooster's only servant, his first job title would be "valet", although butlers may double as valets and vice versa.
** In one story, Jeeves' feelings are actually hurt when he is called on to buttle. That the normally unflappable "gentleman's gentleman" takes offense at something that seems trivial to us says that at one point it was a much more important distinction.
** Additionally, valet, when referring to a gentleman's servant, is always pronounced such that it rhymes with "pallet" or "mallet". Valet prounounced in the French style, such that it rhymes with "chalet", is an attendant who parks your car. In the United States, anyway. In the United Kingdom, they don't seem to make a distinction.
* While we're on the subject, '''claret'''--meaning a type of red Bordeaux wine and its associated colour--is pronounced to rhyme approximately with "merit". The word is a very old English borrowing, deriving from [[GermansLoveDavidHasselhoff medieval English nobles' love of a kind of dark rosé Bordeaux]] called ''clairet'', which the English eventually changed to "claret" as they began speaking English rather than French as a first language. They eventually began just calling any Bordeaux "claret," and when the preference of the English nobility (who [[UsefulNotes/NationalDrinks still love French wine, especially Bordeaux]]) shifted from a rosé to dark red, the name didn't change. Pronouncing it in the French manner is a hyperforeignism and frowned upon by the people who actually drink it. (You might be forgiven for your first offence if you're from a region or group that isn't familiar with the term--for instance, the same wine marketed as a "claret" in England will just be called a Bordeaux in America--but once you've been warned, you're on your own.)
* '''Interstellar''' means traveling between stars. Earth to Alpha Centauri is interstellar; Earth to Mars is interplanetary (and for heaven's sake not ''intergalactic''). ''Intrastellar'' travel would be travel within a star; ''transstellar'' would be across one; do not try either of these without serious heat shields or cooling tech unless you want to get fried to a crisp[[note]]You'll also get crushed; the sun masses c. 2 nonillion tons and averages half again as dense as water.[[/note]]. If you absolutely want to keep the ''stellar'' root for some reason, you might want to try ''circumstellar'' or ''parastellar'' on for size.
* To '''infer''' and to '''imply''' are different things. Person A may infer that Person B is stupid from the latter's misuse of words. Person A may then imply Person B's stupidity through witticism. Person B's inevitably incorrect response will be "Are you inferring that I'm stupid?" Person B is, in fact, inferring that Person A is implying that Person B is stupid, and they're right.
** The difference has been lampshaded by [[WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons Lisa Simpson]] and [[Series/LawAndOrderSpecialVictimsUnit John Munch]]: "You infer. I imply."
** As annoying as this can be for anyone with an interest in logic or literature, the use of infer to mean "suggest" is in fact ''very'' old; John Dryden is just the most famous writer to have used it that way. The difference between "infer" and "imply" is very useful, but it's actually wishful thinking to claim that the words have always meant different things.
** {{Lampshaded}} and PlayedWith in ''Series/TheDresdenFiles'' TV series:
-->'''Harry''': [[OurDragonsAreDifferent These drakes]], right, they can change shape? They're magical, immortal and all that. But you can change your appearance and you're magical and [stutters] you've been around a long, long time.
-->'''Ancient Mai''': Are you inferring something?
-->'''Harry''': Technically, I'm implying. You're inferring.
-->'''Mai''': Well, it's dangerous either way.
-->'''Harry''': You didn't answer my question.
-->'''Mai''': You didn't ask one. Which, at least, shows some common sense.
** {{Lampshaded}} in ''Series/TheThickOfIt'' Series Two, Episode Three:
-->'''Hugh''': Just tell me, truthfully, did you send that email?
-->'''Terri''': No I didn't... and [[IKnowYouKnowIKnow you know I didn't.]]
-->'''Hugh''': Sorry, are you inferring...?
-->'''Terri''': Implying.
-->'''Hugh''': You're implying that... it was me?
** One of Adam Warren's ''ComicBook/DirtyPair'' short stories has this as its main plot.
** This mistake is one of the [[MinorFlawMajorBreakup minor flaws]] that bother Music/WeirdAlYankovic so much in "Close But No Cigar".
* '''Disinterested''' is ''not'' a synonym for '''uninterested'''; it means, rather, that you are unbiased or have no vested interest.
** Though it wouldn't be unreasonable to be uninterested because you are disinterested.
** A good judge is disinterested; a tough audience is uninterested.
*** Ironically, the earliest recorded use of "disinterested" is in the sense that now belongs to "uninterested".
* A '''light-year''' is a measure of distance: the distance light travels in a year. Many writers have [[UnitConfusion made the mistake]] of using the term to describe a very long period of time. This is the one mistake ''guaranteed'' to infuriate pedants.
** In ''VideoGame/PokemonRedAndBlue'', the only trainer in the first Gym remarks, "You're light years away from beating Brock!" but then admits "Light years isn't time! It measures distance!" when beaten.
** Of course, often what a pedant interprets as literal but incorrect time could also be figurative and correct distance; a SufficientlyAdvancedAlien might well be light-years more advanced than us if you take it to be a metaphor using distance in place of quantity of technical and scientific knowledge.
*** In fact the construction "light-years ahead" is parallel to "miles ahead". Some pedants need to actually pay attention to the language they're using.
*** Literally, "to advance" is "to move forward", so if we define forward to be the direction of the alien planet, then it is most mechanically literal to interpret that as true, even if the aliens are using rocks. To interpret "advanced" as meaning the aliens have more sophisticated technology and comprehensive scientific knowledge is itself a figurative use of language.
** Of course, it's possible to get this both right [[http://www.answersingenesis.org/articles/kw/stars-far-away and wrong at the same time]].
* Similar to "light year", '''parsec''' is short for "parallax second", but is also a measure of distance, not time: 3.3 light years.[[note]]The distance to an object from the Sun if it has a one second yearly wobble in its appearant position in the sky due to being viewed from ''the Earth at different positions in space'' (different sides of the Sun). Even the closest star is a bit further away, meaning its parallax is smaller than one second.[[/note]] "Second" in this case refers to "seconds of arc", ''i.e.'', 1/3600 of a degree = 1/21,600th of a full circle. The ''[[Franchise/StarWars Millennium Falcon]]'' was able to shave ''distance'' off a smuggling run.[[note]]Or, as some fans like to believe, Han Solo was simply talking rubbish. (The original script actually contains stage directions to this effect, i.e. "Obi-Wan reacts with skepticism to Han Solo's attempt to impress them with obvious misinformation"; unfortunately, WordOfGod says it didn't quite come through on-screen, due to some poorly-timed film cuts between Alec Guinness and Harrison Ford.[[/note]]
* '''Conspicuous''' means "obvious," not "suspicious," no matter the way it sounds. Thus, if something was conspicuously absent, you are merely able to notice that it was absent; you do not necessarily have to raise an eyebrow at its absence.
** This may come from a character saying that they need to remain "inconspicuous" while in disguise or something similar. The character wants it to not be obvious they are in a disguise and consequently not be suspicious. Since they can say, "I want to be inconspicuous," or, "I don't want to be suspicious," interchangeably in such a situation, this may be why people equate them.
** By itself, conspicuous may not mean suspicious, but in that particular context it is implied the same as saying something is remarkably or questionably absent.
* '''Fascism''' is a loose political ideology that combines nationalism, militarism, anti-socialism and conservatism ([[EnemyMine insofar as Fascists and Conservatives can both agree that socialism and liberalism are bad]]). It's also associated with [[YouHaveOutlivedYourUsefulness anti-conservatism]] (because unlike conservatives they look to the future and not to the past for their ideal end-goal society), futurism, corporatism (i.e. Country-Corporation co-operation), military expansionism, and Social Darwinism. It's not a synonym for authoritarian, since one can be oppressive without being fascist. Most modern people and political parties that don't self-identify as "fascist" probably aren't fascists. Definite no-no's include communists, socialists, anarchists, feminists, environmentalists, liberals, libertarians, inter/anti-nationalists, pacifists, the USA's Republican and Democratic Parties, [[Creator/GeorgeOrwell Youth Hostels, Gandhi, women and dogs]]. To be more precise, even people showing antisemitic or xenophobic cannot be called "fascists" indiscriminately, as the original fascism introduced in Italy by Mussolini wasn't heavy on ethnic- or race- based xenophobia (fascists' aggression was usually directed towards their internal political enemies, chiefly the Catholic Trade Unions and Socialist Parties, while also strongly promoting Italian language and culture based nationalism). It was German National Socialism ("Nazism" or "Hitlerism") that introduced the ideas of racial superiority.
* '''Corporatism''' is the doctrine promoted by Mussolini that society should function as a body (Latin: ''corpus'') in which each of the various sectors of society (government, business, labor, etc.) are treated as "organs" within the body, interdependent and working toward the betterment of the whole. The term can include big business, but is broader than a simple collusion between business and government; "corporatism" has absolutely nothing to do with the English word "corporation."
** Relatedly, '''corporate personhood''' does not refer to letting companies vote or adopt children the way individual citizens can. It means a group of people ("a body") are treated as one person for administrative and certain legal purposes (particularly certain economic rights, including, most importantly, the right to enter into contracts and the right to sue and be sued). Perhaps ironically, "abolishing corporate personhood," if done without extremely fine precision, could ban labor unions, Indian tribes petitioning for reparations, and class-action lawsuits.
** And while we're at it, '''Corporation'''(public) and a '''Limited Liability Company'''(private) are two different things. Most people haven't even heard of the latter but their rights are the ones people often attribute "Corporate Personhood." To summarize, from a financial, and only financial, standpoint, a Limited Liability Company (LLC) is a person. This is because the whole reason [=LLCs=] even exist is so that a person can create a bufferzone between their business and their personal wealth. I.E. so no one can sue your local Mom and Pop coffee house for all their worth if their coffee ends up being too hot. Corporations do not have all of the same privileges that [=LLCs=]. For example a corporation can't discriminate on who it hires but an LLC ''can.'' On the other hand, [=LLC=] don't enjoy as many tax exemptions as corporations. From a legal perspective an LLC is person who enjoys the same, no more no less, privileges as an individual doing business.
* Strictly speaking, there is no single period in prehistory called '''[[OneMillionBC the Stone Age]]'''. The term originates from a listing of the three stages of a prehistoric society: Stone Age, Bronze Age, and Iron Age. In the most literal sense of the term, cowboys fought members of the Stone Age in the Wild Wild West; heck, there were still "Stone Age" people living in isolated parts of the world by the time ''WesternAnimation/TheFlintstones'' first went on air. The term is usually limited to Eurasian cultures, which complicates things.
** Strictly speaking, humanity as a whole had a single "Stone Age" (during which no sub-group had advanced beyond stone tools), after which the "Stone Age" becomes a term with more limited application, and terms such as "Bronze Age" began to apply as soon as one group use bronze for this purpose, even though they were the only ones. Likewise, the Stone Age would have begun with the first evidence of stone tools rather than the point at which stone tools become ubiquitous. Arguing otherwise would be akin to stating that we don't really live in the Space Age because most people alive right now have never ventured into space.
** Similarly, '''prehistoric''' does not necessarily mean ancient. "History" is "the study of what ancient people ''wrote'' about themselves," so for something to count as prehistoric, it merely has to predate the invention of writing (which was about 3500 BC). For this reason, there still exists a number of societies today which count as "prehistoric".
** Also, the Stone Age, Bronze Age, Iron Age were more a reference to the archaeology of Europe, the Middle East, and North Africa.
* '''Yea''' is an an archaic version of "yes" (sometimes still used in very formal context where one is asked to vote "yea" or "nay"). It is not an alternative spelling of "yeah", and is pronounced differently.
** And cartoonists often confuse it with "Yay!", which sounds the same but is a different word, an interjection expressing delight or enthusiasm. ("Yay/Yea, we won the game!")
** This is very probably simple coincidence due to onomatopoeia. The real instance of this trope would be those who misinterpret the older usage as being the newer usage.
* '''Object''' (the noun acted on by the verb) and '''subject''' (the noun [[BuffySpeak doing the verbing]]) are opposites.
* People use the word '''vagina''' to describe both a woman's vulva (external genitalia) and vagina (internal genitalia). Even the author of ''The Vagina Monologues''.
** Just to avoid making a false equivalency, "vulva" describes the entire external genitalia of the female, while "vagina" is one element of the internal genitalia (which also include the uterus, ovaries, etc).
*** Explained [[http://www2.ljworld.com/news/2003/may/04/v_is_for/ here]].
** Similarly, people seem to use '''Anus''', '''Rectum''' and '''Colon''' interchangeably, when [[ArtisticLicenseBiology they are very different parts of the digestive system with very different functions]]. Look 'em up!
* '''Consequences'''. It's commonly used to mean the negative results of an action; the opposite of a reward or benefit. Its actual definition is ''all'' results of an action, positive ''and'' negative.
* '''Infamous''' is frequently used to mean "very famous," which is far from correct. While it is not the opposite of fame (that would be obscurity), it actually means "having a very bad reputation", as in "the infamous UsefulNotes/JackTheRipper." Don't make the mistake that the Film/ThreeAmigos did when you're asked to meet someone infamous.
** Confusion may also arise from: 1) Deliberately-ambiguous sarcastic use and/or 2) the Jerry Springer effect, i.e. "I want my 15 minutes no matter what I have to do to get it".
** As described above, '''Infamous''' is not an antonym of ''famous''. Just wanted to clear it out: if something is ''infamous'', it actually ''has'' to have at least some (evil) fame.
** It is interesting, because original meaning of this word, now mostly forgotten, meant something different. Infamy was a form of punishment technically stripping the convicted of any legal protection, in other words, [[{{Outlaw}} outlawry]] (in the feudal world 'no fame' meant 'no one heard of him and no one will defend him'). Of course, the infamous had nothing left to lose, so they often were getting infamous in modern sense of this word.
* For another nice self-referencing example, compare the definition of '''{{trope}}''' in any reputable dictionary to the one used on this site. (For the sake of pedantry, assume the other wiki is not reputable.)
** Merriam-Webster agrees with us!
** So does the OED!
* '''Good''' vs '''Well'''. Good is an adjective. Well is an adverb. You look good, because good is describing you. You see well, because well is describing how you see. (You can look well, but in that cause 'well' is being used as measure of health, i.e. the opposite of 'You look ill'.)
** You can also correctly use 'look well' for 'look carefully', or 'look skillfully'. Similarly, the above could correctly describe a product that as part of its function interprets visual data. (A robot or something; if it's solely a camera, then its working is synonymous with its looking, and so it's still incorrect.)
** In ''Series/ThirtyRock'', Tracy Jordan even corrected the resident Harvard grad in the first episode: "No, Superman does good. You do well."
* Some people, including many English teachers, insist that the statement '''I feel bad''' is only correct if it is used to mean that the speaker's sense of touch is functioning improperly, and the proper way to express that one is suffering is to say "I feel badly." This is totally incorrect, and in fact, the reverse is true: in the first case, "bad" is a predicate adjective modifying "I" and linked to it by the linking verb "feel," whereas in the second case, "badly" is an adverb modifying the action verb "feel," and describes how one's sense of touch is functioning. Likewise, the statement "I feel good" is a completely correct response to the question "How are you?", since "good" is, again, a predicate adjective modifying "I"; pedants who insist that one say "I feel well" are incorrect, although that statement is also grammatically correct.
** As a rule, "feel" (in the sense of feeling a certain way), "look" (in the sense of looking a certain way, not looking ''at'' something), "sound", "smell", "taste" and all forms of "to be" ''do not take adverbs'', for the reasons given above.
** Like "no split infinitives," this is another example of a Latin rule being shoehorned into English. In Latin and Romance languages, "good" and "bad" are defining characteristics, akin to "saintly" and "evil" - to say that one is feeling evil today is a far cry from being tired. Instead, "I feel well" or "I feel unwell" (or a more specific feeling) are the typical answers in those languages. In English those words do dual duty as vague placeholders and as strong characteristics.
** This is possibly the best single example on the page that exemplifies the [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_language_processing natural language problem]], as well as why SesquipedalianLoquaciousness is sometimes quite justified. (i.e. "I feel bad." becoming "I feel less healthful." or "My epidermis is less sensate.") It's also how someone that WillNotTellALie can also be a ConsummateLiar through clever use of near synonyms, logical misdirection, etc.
* '''Literally''' is often used as a generic intensifier, a "smarter-sounding" substitute for "extremely" or similar. The irony is that the usage is most often figurative, when it ''actually'' means "not figuratively." Example of misuse: "It was literally a slaughter!" in reference to a sporting event, assuming said sport isn't a BloodSport. See LiteralMetaphor. Then there are the people who correct this by saying "You mean 'figuratively'," as in [[http://xkcd.com/725/ this]] ''Webcomic/{{xkcd}}''. That's also incorrect, as the desired effect was to speak hyperbolically, and using the word "figuratively" completely removes that meaning; what they really mean to say is an intensifier like "totally".[[note]]Incidentally, this isn't the first time a word has shifted from meaning "not figuratively" to being used as an intensifier. "Very" (from "verily," meaning "true") and "really" also have their roots in words meant to distinguish factual truth from exaggeration. Perhaps in time the original meaning of "literally" will have also become so diluted by being used for emphasis that we'll have to come up with another word to take its place.[[/note]]
* '''Peruse''' means "to read thoroughly", not "to skim."
** [[http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/peruse The dictionary.com entry has an interesting usage note concerning this]].
* '''Scan''' has been similarly diluted in common usage, perhaps because computers scan things so quickly.
** In language teaching, both ''scan'' and ''skim'' refer to quick-reading techniques: ''scanning'' is quickly reading through a text to find a particular piece of information, whereas ''skimming'' means quickly reading through a text to catch the general gist.
* '''Incredulous''' means "not believing," not "incredible." If someone sees something incredible, then they can be incredulous.
** It helps to think of it this way: the base of the two words is 'credible' (meaning 'can be believed') and the negation prefix 'in'. If something is 'incredible', it is not believable, or unbelievable (similar to 'fantastical'. If you are being 'incredulous', you are being the opposite of credulous (which means 'easily believing'), not treating something with credulity, or you don't believe it.
** Another mnemonic: In general ''people'' are incredulous while ''things'' are incredible.
** In ''Film/TheAccidentalTourist'', it's pointed out that '''lacking credence''' is the proper use of the word.
* The difference between "rob" and "steal": You '''rob''' a person when you '''steal''' their property.
** Technically, robbery is defined more narrowly than this: it's taking someone's goods by threat of violence. But yes, it's never correct to say "My wallet got robbed" or "He robbed my wallet", but "I was robbed of my wallet" is correct.
*** If someone solely stole the money without stealing the wallet itself, one could argue that the wallet was robbed of its money. This would also apply if the victim were a self-aware wallet.
** "Burglary" is a different kind of theft from "Robbery". If you leave your wallet at home, and when you get back, discover that it was ''stolen'', you've been ''burgled''. Or "burglarized" if you're in the United States.
*** Legally speaking, burglary doesn't have to involve stealing (larceny and theft cover those). Burglary is the entrance of a building with the intent to commit a crime therein. You don't even have to actually complete the act you entered the building to do. If Alice enters Bob's house with the intent to murder Bob (or steal from him, assault him, or write a bad check while sitting on his couch), she has committed burglary, whether or not she actually does the deed. In some areas, [[{{Thoughtcrime}} even if you change your mind about committing the crime once you're inside,]] you can still be on the hook for burglary. As a result, burglary is a favorite of prosecutors as it can be added as a charge to many different acts. The case law of what constitutes "building" and "entry" can get a little silly.
* The term "Assault and Battery" exists because the two represent different parts of the same act. '''Assault''' is a a threat which suggests that "immediate harmful contact" will occur; '''battery''' occurs upon contact. Swinging a bat at somebody is assault. Hitting somebody with a bat is battery. Consequently, the latter usually depends on the former, except when the threat is unknown until contact. Generally, the contact doesn't have to be violent; the rule is that any unwelcome ''touching'' is battery (although as a practical matter you have to meet a certain threshold in order to get the authorities to prosecute). An unwanted pie in the face or kiss on the cheek constitutes assault and battery; thus some statutes on sexual assault actually call it "sexual battery" on the theory that you're punishing the touching, not the threat.
** Different jurisdictions have different definitions. Example: what the MPC and the above call "Battery" is called "Assault" in Delaware, and what the above calls "Assault" is named "Menacing".
** Bear in mind that both assault and battery are not only crimes, they are also civil torts in most [[UsefulNotes/TheCommonLaw common-law]] jurisdictions. This means that you can be prosecuted by the state and sued for damages by the victim for one act. Battery suits often address things that the state just lets slip; in one case frequently used in law schools (''Garratt v. Dailey''), an old woman successfully sued a five-year-old boy for $11,000 (in 1952 money!) after she got a hip fracture when he moved a chair she was trying to sit in.
* "'''Affect'''" and "'''effect'''": In ''general'' terms, "effect" is usually a noun and "affect" is usually a verb. However, there are actually ''five'' words there, not two.
** af-FECT (v) - To have influence on. "The heavy rains affected the water level."
** af-FECT (v) - To pretend, often to pretend to have a degree of sophistication. "At the wine club, Bob affected a fake French accent to be a douche."
*** This is also the base word of "affectation," or a behavior adopted to evoke that air of sophistication. "Even though Bob is from America, he crosses his 7s as an affectation."
** AF-fect (n) - Usually only used in psychology circles, and it's basically a term for an emotional response.
** Effect (n) - A consequence or result of something. "The effect of all the heavy rain was flooding."
** Effect (v) - To create a change. "Due to the flooding, the city effected changes in flood channel construction."
** The things you carry on your person (in your purse or pockets) are your "personal ''effects''"
* Off the northwestern coast of Europe are the '''British Isles''', a collection of two large and many small islands, the largest of which is '''(Great) Britain''' and the second largest of which is '''Ireland'''. Together they contain two countries: the '''United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland''' and '''Ireland''' (called the "Republic of Ireland" to differentiate it from the island, of which it covers about five-sixths.) The United Kingdom is a country composed of four constituent countries: '''Scotland''', '''Wales''', '''Northern Ireland''' and '''England'''. '''Cornwall''' is a politically united but culturally distinct area within England. There also exists the '''Isle of Man''', the '''Bailiwick of Guernsey''', and the '''Bailiwick of Jersey''', which are not part of the United Kingdom, but which have its Queen as their sovereign and which the UK provides for the military defence thereof. It is confusing but please, for your own safety, NEVER use ''England'' to refer to anything besides the land south of the River Tweed and east of the Rivers Vyrnwy and Tamar (Cornwall may be a more debated case but the Cornish will like you for it).
*** [[http://i.imgur.com/cuq3P.png Relevant.]]
*** [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rNu8XDBSn10 Also relevant]].
** The term "British Isles" is also disputed by many Irish people, who object to the term "British", given its usual usage as "of or pertaining to Great Britain". The governments of the United Kingdom and Republic of Ireland both avoid using the term, as do most Irish people, but it is a common term in Great Britain, where it is seen as an entirely neutral, geographic term, akin to "Indian Subcontinent" or "North America".
*** Well the British Government uses it, just not in international documents. The neutral term often used is '''Islands of the North Atlantic (IONA)'''. (This does, mind, include the islands of Faeroe, which are really quite un-British, being ruled by Denmark and speaking their own North Germanic language and all...)
*** Not to be confused with the island of Iona off the west coast of Scotland.
*** At least in the travel industry, the "Indian Subcontinent" is now the "South Asian Subcontinent".
** Also, it's standard practice to refer the UK as "Britain", even though Northern Ireland is part of the former but not the latter.
** Also, a person from Scotland is "a Scot"; many people from Scotland are "Scots." You may describe their nationality and their institutions as "Scottish" (so it's perfectly to say "my friend is Scottish" in the same way that one would say "my friend is English"), but ''only'' in that sense.
*** 'Scottish' is an adjective qualifying someone or something from Scotland. 'Scot' is a noun. While it's preferable to refer to people from Scotland as "the Scots" rather than "the Scottish"[[note]]though historically, the Scots -- or the Scoti -- were from Scotia, which was in fact a Roman name for ''Ireland''[[/note]], it is not wrong to refer to someone as Scottish by way of an adjective. On that note, the adjective is indeed 'Scottish'. Don't use the adjective 'Scotch' outside of Scotch whisky, Scotch eggs or Scotch pies, at least not if you don't want to be [[https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/scotch#Verb scotched]] yourself.[[note]]However, at least as recently as Agatha Christie, "Scotch" and "Scotchman" were acceptable English idioms, no matter what the Scots themselves may have had to say about it.[[/note]]
*** And while we're at it, place-name adjectives like "Parisian" or "Viennese" do ''not'' simply mean "from Paris" or "from Vienna", but rather "typical or characteristic of the place in question". Thus, you can have a ''Viennese café'' in London (i.e. it embodies characteristics commonly associated with Vienna), but "Le Monde" is a "Paris newspaper" (i.e. a newspaper based in Paris).
** These rules similarly apply to people. Hugh Laurie was born in England, Ewan [=McGregor=] in Scotland, and Catherine Zeta Jones in Wales. All three are British[[note]]though both Welsh people and Scots generally prefer the more specific demonym[[/note]], but only Laurie is English. Pierce Brosnan is neither (he's Irish).
*** And just to make things more complicated--people from most of the British Isles wince at the expression [[IAmVeryBritish 'British accent']]. Usually because they know what foreigners mean by that, and resent the implication that's how they sound. 'English accent' is marginally better (not that people from much of England will take kindly to being told 'all British accents sound posh and educated to ''me''...', as they'll still feel that their existence is being denied and aren't always as pleased as you'd think to be told they sound 'classy', but it narrows the offence a little.)
** The '''Isle of Man''' is not part of England, Scotland or even the UK; it's a separate dependency of the British Crown. The '''Bailiwick of Jersey''' and the '''Bailiwick of Guernsey''' (known collectively as the Channel Islands) are the other two Crown Dependencies. ("Bailiwick" being an archaic term meaning the area under the jurisdiction of a bailiff -- a bailiff being a sheriff's appointee, so a bailiwick would have been a part of a shire). There are also 13 British overseas territories, and the Sovereign Base Areas of Akrotiri and Dhekelia (both on Cyprus).
** On that note, now you know where the idiomatic expression '''bailiwick''' got its meaning: it means an area specific to one's jurisdiction (department, profession, area of expertise): "not my bailiwick".
* '''Russia''' is a country (specifically, a federation of a number of states and republics) running from Finland to the Pacific Ocean, from Belarus to China, from Mongolia to the Arctic Ocean and immediately north of Kazakhstan. The '''Soviet Union''', or more formally, the '''Union of Soviet Socialist Republics''' is actually what it sounds like: a country, specifically a supranational federation of different republics with a federation government sitting in the capital of Moscow (at least in a constitutional and formal sense--like many large nations who used the same model, the actual distribution of authority is highly circumstantial and dependent on the period). They are not the same thing, but often times (particularly in, though not limited to, the West) it is convenient to make them interchangeable. Russia ''was'' one of the constituent republics, specifically, the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic, a founding republic of this federation state.
** This even confused foreign audiences at the time of the country's founding: "Soviet Russia" was founded in 1917 and 1918, with the collapse of the Petrograd-based Russian Provision Government (that came into power after the abdication of the Tsar) and the Petrograd Soviet moving the capital to Moscow, with the adding of "Soviet" to the name "Russian Republic." The "Soviet Union" was not founded until 1922, when said republic and five of its neighbors entered into a treat to become a supranational federation. Foreign observers were typically less familiar with the other states, and continued to use the name "Soviet Russia" commonly.
** This is particularly problematic when talking about geographic locations that were in the Soviet Union, but not in the largely-unchanged borders of Russia (for example, ''Series/{{Friends}}'' speaking of "the Russian City of Minsk" in regards to the capital of Belarus).
** Another common error is referring to pre-1992 Soviet organizations where a Russian counterpart did not exist, or was clearly not the subject: the ''Russian'' atomic bomb (when, obviously, nuclear weapons are controlled by the national government), the ''Russian'' Air Force (which might refer to the Russian contingent of aircraft in the republic-level Border Forces, but obviously is intended for the ''Soviet'' Air Force), the ''Russian'' Olympic athletes (referring to Russian athletes alone, but likely intended to reference the entire ''Soviet'' Olympic team). Mother ''Russia'' is a national personification predating the creation of the Soviet Union, the term used in literature or philosophical speech for the Soviet Union (where it most commonly appears in fiction) is Mother ''Homeland'', or the nonspecific ''Motherland''. Some other republics had their own national personifications in the same period (for example, Mother Armenia, whose statue was erected in 1950). Very few post-war monuments are, accordingly, of Mother Russia.
** In an inversion, most residents of the Soviet Union spoke Russian, as there were dozens of native Soviet languages and Russian was linguistically dominant. To say someone is speaking ''Soviet'' is nonspecific and oddly-worded, especially since when not a modifying adjective (in other words, alone) "Soviet" is a noun meaning "council."
* '''Immoral''' is knowing it's wrong and doing it anyway; '''amoral''' is, generally, not having a sense of right or wrong in the first place. Gravity and a large rock are amoral; my dropping a large rock on your head to kill you is immoral (unless, perhaps, I'm mentally disturbed in such a way that I'm incapable of making moral judgments). Furthermore, '''nonmoral''' deals with things that are not a question of morality, such as the choice between chocolate or vanilla ice cream. [[note]] Although it should be noted that [[FelonyMisdemeanor choosing vanilla over chocolate is a sign of pure, unmitigated evil.]] [[/note]]
* '''Non-zero-sum''' does not mean "win-win" or "opportunity to cooperate." It refers to some valuable resources (money, time, oil, wood, etc.) being permanently lost or gained during the event. A zero-sum game merely means that everything the participants begin with is redistributed. Non-zero-sum games can easily be lose-lose instead of win-win, and, while the Prisoner's Dilemma and a few other well-known non-zero-sum games are cooperative, others, such as the dollar auction, are normally non-cooperative.
** Whether something is win-win vs. lose-lose or cooperative vs non-cooperative is usually a function of the players' choices, not of the game itself. If the players in a dollar auction agree beforehand that only one person will bid, and that the profits will be shared equally, that is a cooperative/win-win strategy. Some games can be structured to always be lose-lose, but aren't as interesting to study.
*** If by "win" one means "end with more than one started" and by "lose" one means "end with less than one started", it is also ''not'' a requirement that someone ''must'' win and someone ''must'' lose in a zero-sum game; if everyone ends with ''exactly'' as much as each one respectively had at the start, it is still a zero-sum game.
** Also, usually game theorists do not use "zero sum game" but "constant sum game". That's partly for ease of mathematics behind it, but it also can mean that all players lose or win if compared to the status quo before the game. It is just that each win of one side is countered by a loss of equal amount on the other side (and let's not start about more-than-two-player games). Also in many to most games meta gaming (e.g. side payments outside of the game itself to counter asymmetric payouts in a win-win situation) is not considered, thus not every non-zero-sum means opportunity to collaborate.
* '''Stupid''' and '''ignorant''' are not interchangeable: a stupid person lacks intelligence, an ignorant person lacks knowledge. So, if someone crosses a street on a red light because they didn't know that red means "stop", they're ignorant. If they cross a street despite seeing a car coming at 50 mph and get hit, they're stupid.
** Lampshaded in the Simpsons episode "The Way We Was":
--> '''Homer:''' Wait a minute. That word you keep calling me?\\
'''Artie:''' Ignoramus?\\
'''Homer:''' Ignoramus! It means I'm stupid, doesn't it?\\
'''Artie:''' There is a difference between ignorance and stupidity.\\
'''Homer:''' Not to me there isn't, you... ignoramus!
** If someone misuses the words on this page, they're ignorant, but not necessarily stupid.
** "Ignorant" also does not mean "belligerent" or "impolite"
** Perhaps a better example of the difference between intelligence and knowledge: knowing what the Pythagorean theorem is and what it's used for takes knowledge; being able to work out the equation mentally requires intelligence.
** Once you've read the Pythagorean theorem, understanding what it means would require intelligence.
** If someone doesn't know that a tomato is a fruit, they're ignorant. If they know it's a fruit, so they put it in fruit salad (without knowing what they're doing),[[note]]You ''can'' create a tasty fruit salad with tomato in it, but it needs a special recipe and it exists in a neither-here-nor-there universe of being sweet and savory and neither at the same time.[[/note]] then they are stupid.
** Interestingly enough, '''idiot''' can be interchangeable with '''ignorant''' given its root in a Greek word for someone who does not take part in the affairs of his city, someone who ignores those affairs.
** You could also say that since no human is omniscient (as far as we know) everybody is ignorant about something. On the other hand, not everybody is stupid.
* On that note, '''stupid''' originally meant '''numbed''' or '''stunned''', hence the phrase "He was struck stupid." The sense lives on in the verb '''to stupefy'''.
* '''Omniscient''' means all knowing. It does not necessarily mean '''Divine''' or '''decides right from wrong.''' A lot of tropers seem to be misusing OmniscientMoralityLicense under the latter assumption.
* '''Née''' means "born". It does ''not'' mean "formerly known as" or "otherwise known as" or even "maiden name" except in the context that a woman's maiden name is generally her birth name. If a woman is born as Mary Smith, marries and changes her name to Mary Robinson, then divorces, remarries, and changes her name to Mary Jones, it would be correct to say "Mary Jones, née Smith"; it would ''not'' be correct to say "Mary Jones, née Robinson."
** Secondly, "née" is feminine. If a man changes his name, it's '''né''' (e.g. "Malcolm X, né Little").
** For transsexuals, as a general rule of thumb, you use the gender-specific words of the gender they identify as, rather than their genotype, if you are trying to be polite to them. So for example if you know a [=FtM=], it is "He" "Him" "né" etc.
* Similarly, French-derived adjectives should retain their French masculine-feminine endings. A woman with flaxen hair is '''blonde''', but a man is '''blond'''. More obscurely, and only in English, a man with dark hair is not a '''brunette''' but a '''brunet'''. It would all be pronounced the same in English, though, where articles don't have gender.
** In French, "brunette" carries the literal meaning of "little brown-/black-haired girl." A woman who is dark-haired is "brune", and a dark-haired man is "brun". The nouns, "une brune" and "un brun" can also be used, especially with adjectives ("une jolie[[note]]pretty[[/note]] brune"/"un beau[[note]]handsome[[/note]] brun"). "Blondinette" (blond-haired girl) is an endearment. There is no male equivalent for "brunette".
** Also, when one is engaged to be married, the proper word depends on the person's gender: a man is a '''fiancé''', whereas a woman is a '''fiancée'''. As with other French-derived terms, they may be pronounced exactly the same, but their gender matters.
** Another place where people often drop the gender declension in English is for words like aviator. Saying "female aviator" is incorrect, the term is "aviatrix."[[note]]Though it's perhaps better, if the pilot's genitalia aren't relevant, to stick with "pilot".[[/note]] Same with "male dominatrix." It's just "dominator."
* People keep using '''pragmatic''' to describe someone who appears to be thinking quite ideally, or something along the lines of that. This is used frequently to describe politicians during political campaigns. The word means "of or pertaining to a practical point of view or practical considerations." In a related sense, '''pragmatism''' is a "character or conduct that emphasizes practicality." So depending on the case, one may be correct or not.
* If you're '''waiting on''' someone, then you're performing the job of a waiter or servant. If you're looking at your watch wondering where the hell they are, you're waiting ''for'' them.
** [[SeparatedByACommonLanguage Dialect difference]]. Like how people from parts of the eastern US--especially New York City--say "on line for tickets" instead of "in line for tickets". Slight differences between preposition use are a common dialect variation, especially in Germanic languages (anyone who took high-school German probably read that word "preposition" and began to weep softly, like a ShellShockedVeteran).
*** Trust me, we Germans aren't happy with English prepositions either.
* A '''narcotic''' is any sedative defined as drug with morphine-like effects (to quote Wiki/TheOtherWiki). Most people use it as an umbrella term to include all illicit drugs.
** The term was corrupted as soon as the ''stimulant'' cocaine was classified as a narcotic in US federal law (the original Harrison Narcotics Act was written to deal with opium trafficking), so for legal purposes it is - despite being a stimulant.
* '''Argumentum ad hominem''' is (to quote Wiki/TheOtherWiki) [[LogicalFallacies "an argument which links the validity of a premise to a characteristic or belief of the person advocating the premise."]] It's not just a fancy word for a personal attack. "You suck, therefore your argument is false" is ''ad hominem''. "You suck" on its own isn't, neither is "your argument is false, therefore you suck,"[[note]]which, thanks to how implication works, means that the person could still suck even if their argument is true[[/note]] nor is "Your argument is false and you suck." It's certainly rude, but not fallacious.
** In many cases, the "therefore your argument is false" part is left implied. The intent is still to discredit the advocate rather than (probably more difficult) rebuttal of the premise; that the link is not explicitly stated doesn't necessarily mean it isn't ad hominem - if the attack is trying to bring down the premise, it is. If the person being attacked is not advocating anything, though (or if anything they might be advocating has nothing to do with the attack), it isn't ad hominem - just a personal attack.
* '''Semitic''' doesn't necessarily mean Jewish. It means of Akkadian, Arabic, Aramaic, Ethiopic, Hebrew, and/or Phoenician ancestry.[[note]]By the process of history, most Phoenicians, Akkadians, and Aramaeans have been mixed so much with Arabs -- to the point that nearly all of them have Arabic as a first language and many if not most of them consider themselves ethnically Arab -- that they're hardly worth mentioning today.[[/note]] On the other hand, the terms '''anti-Semitic''', '''anti-Semitism''', and '''anti-Semite''' typically only refer to hatred of Jews; these words were coined in 19th century Europe, during the era of "scientific racism" which claimed that all apparent religious and cultural conflicts of Jews and (Christian) Europeans were actually born of conflict between Semitic and "Aryan" races,[[note]]See also Woodrow Wilson's brilliant idea that Serbs, Croats, and Bosniaks should have one country because they're all the same race and thus won't have any conflict. In fairness to him, many Serbs, Croats, and Bosniaks actually had the same idea at the time; they figured their commonality of language (their languages are completely mutually intelligible and were at the time argued to be dialects of one language) was more important than their religious differences.[[/note]] and the terminology has stuck ever since.
** Contrast with the lesser-known word '''anti-Judaism''', which refers specifically to opposition to the Jewish religion, and not to Jews as a nation, race, tribe, or ethnicity. Then there is '''anti-Zionism''', which specifically refers to opposition to the ''political'' nation-state of Israel and[=/=]or Jewish Nationalism in general (some of the most vocal anti-Zionists are Haredi ''Jews'', [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sikrikim some of whom]] have committed violence in the name of their position).
*** Both anti-Judaism and anti-Zionism can, of course, be covers for anti-Semitism. Even without deliberate dishonesty, the three tend to shade into each other, especially given how tightly interwoven Jewish religion and nationalism are to the rest of Jewish identity (it's similarly difficult to distinguish opposition to Hinduism from opposition to Indian nationalism or hatred of Indians).
* '''Populist''' has done a complete turnaround of meaning since the 1890s. Political scientist David Nolan once used it as roughly a synonym for ''socialist''. Actually, while the Populist (or People's) Party of the 1890s that thrived in much of the western and southern United States was more anti-"big business" than anti-business generally, it did call for some reforms that are usually thought of as socialistic (such as the nationalization of particularly lucrative industries). Nowadays, the word has been shorn of almost all economic connotations. To be a ''populist'' is to bear resentment against society's elites, who need not necessarily be "the rich." Class is still a factor to some extent, but differing educational levels and the contentious nature of American popular culture also enter into the equation.
** The broadest definition of populism is opposition to the elite, whatever "elite" may mean at the moment. As such, it's perfectly correct to use it for the political movements of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, marked for their socialist tendancies and dismantling of corporate giants, as it is to use it for the current anti-intellectualist bent in the American social and political landscape.
*** Populist is not about opposition to the elite but about favouring and aiming efforts at the greater populace. To be a populist is to promote oneself to be liked by the majority, the non-elite, if they happen to like the elite it would be populist not to go against the elite...
*** To complicate matters further, ''populist'' may also refer to politicians who aim their efforts on any majority, thus changing sides and agendas to maximize their support, not to represent any group in particulat. It is more or less political equivalent to 'opportunist'.
* '''Objective''' (as in the opposite of '''Subjective'''), especially when used with the word '''review''' (as in a ''critical review''). There is no such thing as an '''objective review'''. A review, by definition, is subjective. A ''consensus'' may be derived from many reviews, but there will never be a definitive, objective review. An actually objective review would look something like this [[http://www.destructoid.com/100-objective-review-final-fantasy-xiii-179178.phtml review of Final Fantasy XIII]] by [[WebVideo/{{Jimquisition}} Jim Sterling]].
** The word one should use when speaking about review that is as unbiased as possible and takes into account multiple point of views is 'intersubjective'.
* The use of a somewhat archaic word has clouded its meaning, but nibbling on hors d'oeuvres serves to '''whet''' one's appetite, not ''wet'' it. ''Whet'' means "to sharpen," as seen in the term ''whetstone'', a stone used for sharpening knives--if something is sharpening your appetite, it's leaving you hungry for more, not dampening (or ''wetting'') your enthusiasm. So, "whetting your appetite for destruction" would mean starting small as a prelude to becoming more destructive, not sating the urge altogether.
* There are so many examples of psychological and psychiatric terms that are misused that it almost warrants its own page. To start with:
* '''Psychotic''': It does not mean [[InsaneEqualsViolent "going around and killing people for no reason"]]; someone who does that is just homicidal. Psychosis is a loss of touch with reality, characterized by disorganised thinking, delusions, and sometimes (but not always) auditory, visual, and tactile hallucinations. While people with psychosis can be homicidal, it is extremely rare (violence by psychotics is more usually related to paranoid or other delusions).
* '''[[TheSociopath Psychopath / Sociopath]]''': They are usually not murderers; in fact, many successful [[CorruptCorporateExecutive CEOs]], [[AmoralAttorney lawyers]], and [[SleazyPolitician politicians]] are psychopaths or sociopaths. Psychopathy and sociopathy both mean lack of a conscience, a limited emotional range, and difficulty in forming significant relationships. They also often lack impulse control. Both psychopaths and sociopaths can be classed as having antisocial personality disorder, though not all people with the disorder are psychopaths or sociopaths. Psychopathy and sociopathy are typically held to be synonyms under the umbrella of antisocial personality disorder (which is the term the DSM-IV uses that includes psychopaths and sociopaths), and when a distinction is made it has nothing to do with the origins of the disorder, since the origins are not definitely known. The typical distinction is that sociopaths have a more normal temperament and are better able to adapt to societal norms. While statistically speaking murderers are likely to be psychopaths or sociopaths, psychopaths and sociopaths are not very likely to be murderers.
** In the pilot of ''Series/{{Sherlock}}'', Holmes objects to being called a psychopath, preferring to be recognized as a "highly functional sociopath."
*** "High-functioning sociopath." "Highly functional" is a very common misquote; the actual line follows the same pattern as high-functioning autism or high-functioning alcoholism, etc., denoting a person who might have some disorder but is more capable than is common among those who have that disorder. It is not clear what Sherlock actually meant by that statement, since sociopaths follow a "normal" (as in, not distinct from the wider population) distribution curve. All subsequent evidence points to Sherlock just being a (high-functioning) autistic person in denial.
* '''Antisocial''': Sometimes used to mean someone who dislikes or fears socializing. In the psychological sense, it doesn't mean that at all. Antisocial attitudes or behaviors are against society, from extreme acts like murder to more minor transgressions like simply being a manipulative, self-centered {{Jerkass}}. Someone who fears interacting with other people should be said to be '''asocial''' or suffering from social phobia, not "antisocial" tendencies. As a matter of fact, ''social phobia'' is an outdated term, and is usually now called "social anxiety disorder." In other words, people who are antisocial are ''hostile'' -- not merely indifferent -- towards society.
** "Antisocial" is also used to denote "rebellious" individuals actively fighting (not necessarily by violence, also by dissent or passive-aggressive behavior) any authority and are incapable of operating under external influence.
** An increasingly more popular and accurate term for the above disorder is ''agoraphobia'', from the ancient Greek term for "fear of the marketplace." But to be honest, I've always understood that ''agoraphobia'' is fear of the ''entire'' outside world, not just the "social" parts of it. Thus, an agoraphobe would be just as afraid of being lost in a forest or a desert as they were of crowds.
*** It makes more sense once you know that 'agora' in this case is what the Romans called the 'forum', rather than your run-of-the-mill farmers' market.
** ''Agoraphobia'' is more specifically a fear of being unable to ''escape'' from whatever situation you're in (sometimes amended to include 'without severe embarrassment'), rather than the situation itself. In the above examples, the phobic response would be due to the fear of never escaping the forest, or being lost in the desert forever. Being in a busy place (e.g. a football crowd) could count if you couldn't leave your set without making a huge scene.
** What "agoraphobia" misses is the ''social'' part of "social anxiety disorder". Sartre's "Hell is other people" hits a nerve - and as unjustified as that hit may be, it's still felt.
** Perhaps more appropriate word would be "asocial", and it is sometimes used, though it implies lack of interest in social interaction while not fear of it.
*** This is exactly the term used in psychological parlance to describe people avoiding social situations due to social phobias, egomania, extreme introversion or any other factor.
** Agoraphobia is a disorder more focused on the area and getting to safety (without embarrassing yourself) if needed and usually has to do with panic attacks or some of the symptoms of them. A fear focused on actual people or socializing is called social phobia or social anxiety disorder (and is much more severe than shyness so should not be used lightly despite its commonness -- the most common mental disorder in adults other than substance abuse or depression, which is saying something). The best replacement for "antisocial" is "avoidant" -- avoidant personality disorder is associated with extreme social phobia. "Asocial", as pointed out above, is different. Most shy/socially anxious/avoidant people would love to be social if they weren't anxious about it. There are people who simply do not like to be around other people without being either avoidant or antisocial; these are asocial. "Asocial", however, may look like a typo in writing "antisocial" to a reader.
** On a related note, '''introversion''' is not being antisocial; being introverted is simply ''preferring'' solitary activities to social activities.
* '''Manic-depression''' is more properly known as '''bipolar disorder''', and ''does not'' mean "severe depression" or "wild mood swings;" the highs and lows last for days or weeks at a time. Neither one is a catch-all for "crazy ex." (See '''borderline''', '''histrionic''', and '''narcissistic''' disorders for what most people think of as "crazy ex syndrome.")
** [[Franchise/TheHitchhikersGuideToTheGalaxy Marvin the Paranoid Android]] is a ''manically'' depressed robot, ''not'' a manic-depressive robot, which is true - he's enthusiastically depressed.
** Also, bipolar is an ''adjective'', not a noun. It's either "my friend is bipolar" or "my friend has bipolar disorder," ''not'' "my friend has bipolar."
** And it doesn't have anything to do with {{tsundere}}s, no matter what certain fansubs say.
* On the subject of '''borderline''', saying someone is borderline does not mean they're on the cusp of having a personality disorder; it means they ''do'' have one. ''Borderline'' is a name for a very specific pattern of behaviour involving emotional instability, poor self-image, impulsiveness, and [[BlackAndWhiteInsanity black-and-white thinking]] (what psychologists call "splitting"), as well as a fear of abandonment. The name is only used because of historical reasons which are too complex to get into here, and the existence of the disorder has been questioned, with some seeing it as a variant of post-traumatic stress disorder (specifically, one that the profession slaps on female PTSD sufferers, as the overwhelming majority of borderline personality disorder diagnoses are of women).
* '''Depression''' is yet another psychological term (seeing a trend here?) that's casually thrown around but has a different meaning in a medical or therapeutic context. Depression is not just sadness, but much more persistent and disabling, and includes many other mood changes and physical symptoms like: anhedonia (loss of the ability to feel pleasure), changes in sleep and eating habits (either much less or much more than usual), and a lack of energy and motivation.
* '''OCD''' is [[SuperOCD often thought of]] as the concept of a NeatFreak taken to the extreme. That's because the most visible sign of it is the rituals that people who have OCD do (counting, checking, hand-washing, climbing stairs and so on). The reason it's called ''obsessive''-compulsive disorder is because people with it have certain obsessive thoughts that are highly distressing and which they cannot get rid of (things like fears of their entire family dying, or their house burning down, or accidentally harming a baby). The compulsions they have are a coping mechanism of sorts - performing these rituals helps the obsessions go away, but only temporarily. To describe someone as "kind of OCD (adj.)" because they like order and cleanliness is not even close to reality.
* '''Chronic''' does not mean "severe". It means "recurring/habitual" and/or "happening for a long time;" it comes from a Greek root meaning "time" (same as "chronological" or "chronicle"), so you should think "over time." Contrast '''acute''', which means "rapid onset". Too many people associate "acute" with "small" due to its meaning in geometry (they should be associating it with "sharp" for the same reason).
** Also an illness being acute does not necessarily mean that it is serious, it only means that full set of symptoms display themselves quickly (a papercut is acute). So calling a disease Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) is not tautological.
* '''Paranoia''' and '''paranoid''' are a particularly egregious case. '''Paranoia''' is a full-blown psychosis, not just thinking people are out to get you. However, someone who really was diagnosed with paranoia would be '''paranoiac''' (literally '''out of his mind'''), not '''paranoid''', which denotes a neurotic '''paranoid state'''.
** This is lampshaded in the movie version of ''Film/TheCaineMutiny'', where Maryk admits that until Keefer talked to him, "I didn't even know the difference between paranoid and paranoia."
* '''Schizophrenia''' does not involve multiple personalities. Multiple personalities are a form of dissociation known as Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID). It is an extremely rare diagnosis, so rare that its existence is very hotly debated. In addition, one of the major prerequisites is that the separate personalities are [[http://www.nami.org/Content/ContentGroups/Helpline1/Dissociative_Identity_Disorder_(formerly_Multiple_Personality_Disorder).htm usually]] not aware of each other--something that is often overlooked in both real life and the media, as the protagonist in ''Series/UnitedStatesOfTara'' was quick to point out.
** Especially confusing for those who like their Greek roots, because 'Schizophrenia' literally means "split mind".
*** The full etymology for schizophrenia is ''skhizein'' (σχίζειν, "to split") and ''phrēn'', phren- (φρήν, φρεν-; "mind, intelligence") not the same thing as personality.
** If we wanted to do right by the etymologists we should switch from Schneider's 'schizophrenia' name for schizophrenia back to Emil Kraepelin's 'dementia praecox'.
*** ''Dementia praecox'' wouldn't work though because it means "precocious madness", so a degenerative disease of young people. However, schizophrenia isn't degenerative like dementia is, and it's treatable, whereas Alzheimer's and other forms of dementia aren't really and treatments for them are mostly palliative. Also, schizophrenia does most often manifest for the first time in young adulthood (late teens to early twenties) but it can develop at any age, including in the elderly.
** The confusion is likely from some schizophrenics having auditory/visual hallucinations and sometimes speaking back to them, giving the [[IncrediblyLamePun illusion]] to some people that another "personality" is speaking to the schizophrenic.
*** If psychology texts are reliable, the confusion is the above misinterpretation of "intelligence" as "personality", plus failure to understand that "divided" in this instance means something closer to "shattered" than it does to "split".
** The "split" portion of the word actually refers to a divergence of the mind from reality, not that it's split internally.
** The word '''schizoid''', which is a personality disorder, does use this root to mean "cut off (from other people)". But this is a very different thing than schizophrenia.
** If a person has '''anorexia''', then she is '''an anorectic''' or she is '''anorexic'''. She is not an anorexic, nor is she anorectic. "Anorectic" is a noun; "anorexic" is an adjective.
*** In strict medical terms, '''anorexia''' refers generally to loss of appetite as a symptom, the psychiatric disorder involving distorted body image and fear of weight gain is '''anorexia nervosa'''.
* The words '''psychologist''' and '''psychiatrist''' are often confused. A psychologist is someone who has an advanced degree in psychology (normally a doctorate or at least a master's) and does psychotherapy and psychological testing. They can diagnose people, but can't prescribe medication (except in a few jurisdictions) or order medical imaging. A psychiatrist, on the other hand, is a medical doctor who specializes in psychological disorders and they can do these things because of their broader scope of practice. Psychologists study nothing but psychology in their training; psychiatrists have to learn about other branches of medicine first before specializing in it.
* '''Quean''' does not mean, as [[{{Literature/Redwall}} Brian Jacques]] claimed in interviews about ''The Sable Quean'', "wicked woman". Nor, as some readers might assume, does it mean "queen". It means "prostitute" or "promiscuous woman". Then again, this is probably actually a case of GettingCrapPastTheRadar.
* To be '''bereft''' of something does not just mean to be without something. It means to be without something ''that you previously had''.
* '''Peasant''' is not a general term for a poor person. A peasant is a tenant farmer, a free laborer who rents a farm and works it himself. The hierarchy is: slave (who is owned property that can be bought and sold), serf (has some rights, but is required to work his lord's land and give the lord a portion of the harvest), sharecropper (a free man who works on someone else's land and pays the landowner a portion of the crop) peasant, crofter (a farmer who owns his own house, but still rents land to farm), yeoman (owns enough land to support a family), gentleman (owns enough farmland to support himself by renting it out). Admittedly, a lot of this depends on time period and the distinctions can be blurred; for instance, consider someone who rents a piece of land and works it himself but has agreed to pay the rent by sending the landlord crops equivalent in market value to the rent (e.g. "the rent is $600/year; in lieu of cash, tenant may send crops with market value of $600"); is this person a sharecropper or a peasant?[[note]]If he agreed to send a fixed portion or amount of the crops (e.g. 1/3 of all corn harvested, or 100 bushels of wheat"), he would be a sharecropper. If he sold the crops and paid the rent in cash with the proceeds, he would doubtless be a peasant. Since the market value of crops changes, and there may be practical considerations keeping the tenant from using cash (for instance: there aren't many coins in the area to go around, so the economy mostly runs on barter), the distinction is hard to make.[[/note]] To no small degree this depends on whether he's in medieval England (where he would probably be called a peasant) or the post-Civil War American South (where he would probably be called a sharecropper). Poor farmers can loosely be called "the peasantry," but that's about it.
** Note that TranslationConvention can introduce confusion in dealing with non-English-speaking societies. Everything after "peasant" is often called the same thing in many other languages (because "doesn't work for someone else" is a decisive characteristic). Many other European languages also often use their cognates for "peasant" in senses closer to English's "crofter" and "yeoman" (a French peasant could be a full-blown landowner, for example, or a "métayer", a sharecropper).
* A '''Chaingun''' is a single-barrel weapon with an electrically driven bolt operated with a chain. It is not a '''rotary gun'''. This comes from ''VideoGame/{{Doom}}'' misusing the term; usually, the reasoning for the mistake is that the latter is fed with a "chain" (ie a ''belt'') of ammunition, or that the barrel group is driven by a chain.
** More accurately still, a "Chain Gun" is the specific model of weapon used on many US and NATO aircraft. Any autoloading (generally fully automatic) weapon larger than a machinegun is called an "autocannon" regardless of mechanism. A multi-barrelled weapon in this class that rotates is called a "Rotary Autocannon." A single-barreled weapon that uses a rotating loading mechanism is a "Revolver Autocannon". The most accurate name for ''Doom'''s "chaingun" would be "Rotary Submachine Gun", as it uses pistol ammunition.
* "'''Decapitated''' head" is paradoxical: to decapitate someone is to behead him. Cutting a head off of itself is...well...[[YouKeepUsingThatWord inconceivable]]. A ''body'' can be decapitated; a better adjective for a head on its own is '''severed'''. (''Disembodied'' usually means 'intangible'.)
--> "Newsanchor overheard in ''Film/{{Highlander}}'': "It also left a man's decapitated body, lying on the floor next to his own severed head."
* Related: "decapacitate" is a rarely-used word that means to reduce someone or something's capacity for action, essentially a milder version of "incapacitate." It doesn't necessarily have anything to do with the head; in fact, decapitating someone is far more likely to incapacitate them (by killing them) than decapacitate them.
* '''Differential''' is both a noun and an adjective, but in the noun form, it is a mechanical device used for combining torque from different inputs, ''not'' a synonym for '''difference'''. This is a favorite of television sports announcers ("There's a three-point differential in the game!").
** A differential is also used in mathematics to refer to infinitesimals in calculus and differential geometry i.e. dx, dy etc or to the Jacobian matrix of partial derivatives.
* A '''demigod''' is not a lesser "category" of deity. "Demi" means "half", i.e. "half god". A demigod has both mortal and divine parentage. For example, Hercules (son of Zeus, a god, and Alcmene, a human) ''is'' a demigod, whereas a dryad (a forest spirit) is ''not''.
** Note, however, that the term was invented by 19th century classicists; the Greek word for "of mixed divine and mortal parentage" was "hero" (which originally ''never'' applied to pureblood mortals—and also had intrinsically cultic connotations, since all the mythic heroes were considered appropriate for worship, especially Heracles).
* Something being '''random''' means that it has no clear predictability or arrangement. It doesn't mean "kooky" or "off the wall", and neither sporks nor waffles nor [[DoomyDoomsOfDoom doom]] are "random" (see also: the 4chan meme "Katy").
* '''{{Prequel}}''' doesn't mean "a previous installment in a series". It means "a sequel to an existing work that takes place earlier in the timeline of its [[TheVerse 'Verse]]".
* The suffix '''mancer''' does not mean "magician". A [something]mancer is a very specific type of magician who uses [something] to predict the future. (A "necromancer" used bones and entrails to divine.) A better suffix, -urge, means "worker", as in "one who creates or works with". A thaumaturge (worker of wonders) is a magician, but a dramaturge (playwright) isn't, and neither is a metallurgist nor a demiurge.
* The Internet usage of '''{{Troll}}''' does not mean "someone who has a different opinion from mine", "someone who has an unpopular opinion", or "someone who does something for attention". A troll is someone who does/says things for the sole purpose of trying to piss people off. Someone can legitimately have an unpopular opinion, but he's not a troll unless he states it just to be annoying.
** A well known real-life troll is Fred Phelps, who travels around the country saying the most upsetting things he can to emotional audiences (mainly at funerals), in the hopes that someone will cross the legal line so he and his family (all lawyers) can sue them.
** The term comes not from the mythical creature, but from a ''trawling'', the method of fishing involving moving through the water while waving the bait behind you. An internet troll is fishing for reactions, waving their 'opinion' as bait.
*** Its earliest use, in the early 90's, usually referred to 'fishing out' new users and lurkers (often in a good-natured attempt to encourage them to write) by presenting an argument that had been already thoroughly discussed by regulars.
** In even narrower sense, trolls do not even have to have an unpopular opinions. They cause also can cause stir by simply initiating a [[FlameWar discussion that is bound to cause an argument]] but they may do so without taking sides themselves. (However, [[HanlonsRazor be careful with accusations in this case; they may simply have]] triggered an event by accident.)
*** Not to mention the ChewbaccaDefense.
** Lately the term has been used as a synonym for "bully" or "harasser" in that it constitutes behavior used to belittle or demean a target. It's also often confused with the term "flaming" which is any sort of negativity towards a specific user. While the initial trolling might involve any of those, the end goal of the troll is to ''incite'' flames rather than just insult somebody.
* A '''[[UsefulNotes/FurryFandom furry]]''' is not the same thing as a zoophile. A zoophile gets off on real animals, while furries like fictional anthropomorphic characters, most of whom would be intelligent enough to consent if they were real.
** Also, many if not most furries are not interested in the sexual aspect of the fandom at all, they simply like drawing/dressing up as/writing about anthropomorphic animals.
** The confusion about the definition of the term is not helped by the fact that it is often used interchangeably to refer to both fans of anthropomorphic animal characters and the characters themselves. The especially pedantic may insist on referring to the former as "furry fans" and reserving the term "furry" for the latter, but even that may be confused by the practice of taking on a "fursona," at which point a person is both a furry fan and a self-identified (though not literal) furry (i.e. anthropomorphic animal).
* '''I.e.''' ("id est," "that is") and '''e.g.''' ("exempli gratia," "for example") are not interchangeable. I.e may be used to expand upon a point or to exhaustively list every possibility, while e.g. merely gives possible answers but leaves the list open.
-->"There are many varieties of pasta, e.g., spaghetti, macaroni, and gnocchi."
-->"Pasta should be made ''al dente,'' i.e., firm and chewy, not overcooked."
** A useful mnemonic is to remember i.e. as "in essence" and e.g. as "example given."
** On a similar note, '''etc.''' ("et cetera," "and other things"), should never end a list introduced with "e.g." or "i.e." (or the plain English "for example" and "such as"). Etc. and e.g. are redundant, and it makes no sense to abbreviate i.e.
* A '''[[ImAHumanitarian cannibal]]''' eats members of its own species. Something that is non-human, but eats humans, is an '''anthropophage'''. "Anthropophage" is a pretty pedantic word, but come on; use "man-eater" or something. Technically a human [[ImAHumanitarian who eats other humans]] would be a cannibal ''and'' an anthropophage, but "cannibal" seems superordinate in this case. The word "cannibal" derives from the Carib people (after whom the Caribbean Sea is named) who were once believed to chew and spit out the flesh of a defeated enemy.
** This was actually mentioned in ''Film/DawnOfTheDead1978'', where it was said that the undead were not cannibals, because they were no longer human.
** This is also pointed out in ''VideoGame/DragonAgeOrigins'' by Alistair when he remarks that it's not cannibalism if ''Dog'' is eating fallen foes.
** However, in fantasy/sci-fi settings, the definition is sometimes extended to any [[YouKeepUsingThatWord/VeryPedantic sapient]] creature [[SapientEatSapient eating another]] (Elves eating humans, or even lizardfolk, would be considered cannibals in such a setting).
* The phrase "'''more highly evolved'''" means nothing: [[GoalOrientedEvolution evolution doesn't work like a ladder that animals climb to the top]]. No biologist has thought of it that way since Darwin. You could say that a species that hasn't changed for a few million years is "unevolved" but that would be a rather simplistic way of looking at it. After all evolution is still working on the species, because they aren't changing, evolution is "selecting" for no change. Evolution is always working on a species, unless they reach a very specific and almost impossible set of conditions.
** The word ''evolution'' can mean a lot of different things, from the scientific "natural selection", and "development of life from single-celled organisms to current situation", the same but including emergence of life from non-life, and the less scientific "change over time", "change for the better" or simply "huge change", as used in advertising.
*** Evolution may also refer to specific terms of conditions. If we speak about, say, the operating systems that are meant to be user-friendly and efficient then we can say that better-developed systems are 'more evolved'. In the case of natural selection such judgment makes little sense because that would have required an objective knowledge of the meaning of life which is, as all things objective, beyond the grasp of human mind.
*** And if we were to put this in the "very-Pedantic" entry, "evolution" originally meant to ''unroll something''. The word has been documented since the 17th century and might be even older. The word "evolution" is a prime example of a dead metaphor, where a metaphor becomes an actual term no longer considered metaphorical (e.g. electric current). The word was used a metaphor for the unrolling of time/fate and over the ages, its, well, evolved so that not only has the metaphorical meaning lost its metaphorical use, the original meaning has been completely forgotten.
** Similarly, terms such as ''devolution'', ''de-evolution'', ''reverse evolution'', etc. carry no meaning in biology (although "devolution" carries a separate meaning in politics), since complex forms of life can become less complex and physical traits that were once advantageous can disappear (or remain as vestigial traits) over generations when confronted by a new environment. That doesn't stop the writers of science fiction from occasionally using this term when a member of one species "returns" to an ancestral form, nor does it stop [[{{Music/Devo}} some people]] from adopting the term to mean "reverse progress."
** Also: By the millions of years their species have been around with few significant changes, two of the least highly evolved creatures are alligators and sharks. Evolution doesn't have any direction, but once it stumbles on a winning combination, it is ''really good at sticking with it''. Some prominent biologists have used sharks as examples that sapience and intelligence are not evolutionary imperatives, and that they are in fact entirely up to chance.
* '''Castration''' is specifically the removal of ''testicles''. The correct term for the removal of the penis (or the male genitalia as a whole) is '''emasculation'''. Though it might be argued that the correct term for either one is [[ShareTheMalePain ouch]].
** The surgical removal of the penis is called a ''penectomy'', while ''orchidectomy'' is the term for the surgical removal of the testicles. (And now you get the joke in ''Series/MadMen'' about Bert Cooper's "unnecessary orchidectomy.")
** One can be castrated without the testicles being removed (still less the whole scrotum- very dangerous without modern techniques, it has a heavy blood supply)- the only significant part is the ''testes'', the glands within them. These can be permanently decommissioned by drugs or, in the case of the Italian castrati singers of the 14th to 19th centuries, by being deliberately ruptured by being squeezed by one who knows where to apply pressure. (They can also be ruptured by accident, though you'd have to be very unlucky to lose both this way.)
* A '''totem''' is not a personal spirit guide, even if it ''is'' an animal. A totem animal protects an entire ''group'' of people, such as a family, clan, or tribe.
* '''Asexual''' is applied in general to [[{{Asexuality}} anyone who doesn't have sex for any reason]], but, as a proper sexual orientation, there are several more nuanced shades of meaning. ''Asexual'' in the strict sense means that a person does not feel physical attraction to others. A person who wants to have sex but has physiological or psychological reasons preventing them from having sex is not asexual. Similarly, someone who identifies as asexual does not see themselves as suffering from a medical disorder like lack of sex drive.
** An asexual can and often does experience attraction but it's more of the platonic/aesthetic type. There are as many different types of asexuals as sexuals, but it should really be pointed out that it has nothing to do with desiring relationships. There are many sexuals who do not desire relationships, for example, Creator/CharlieSheen's character on ''Series/TwoAndAHalfMen''.
** Being asexual does not necessarily mean that the person doesn't want relationships-- an ''aromantic'' person is uninterested in relationships. One can be asexual but romantic (enjoys friendship, love, kissing or hugging, but is uninterested in sexual activity) or sexual but aromantic (interested in sex but not in relationships).
** ''Autosexual'' can refer to a person who enjoys masturbation, but not sex (with another person). Autosexuals are not considered asexual.
*** Technically, as an orientation, an autosexual is someone who is in love with themself. Otherwise, autosexuality or autoerotica is a behavior, not a sexual orientation. Otherwise, sexuals who masturbate would also be called autosexuals.
** Finally, asexual can also refer to "not having a sex" (as opposed to a sex ''drive''), most commonly in the term "asexual reproduction". However, context is usually sufficient to distinguish the terms - it depends on whether you're discussing humans, or non-human species.
* Relatedly, '''abstinence''' is a willing choice not to engage in some activity--such as, for example, ''sexual abstinence'' (which might range from "doing everything but intercourse" to much stricter levels of abstinence, like refraining from masturbation and from sexual contact with others). '''Celibacy''' originally meant simply "being unmarried", but now generally means being unmarried ''and'' sexually abstinent. '''Chastity''' means obeying the appropriate moral rules for sexual behavior, which does ''not'' necessarily imply sexual abstinence: in traditional Christian teaching, for example, a chaste husband and wife would be sexually active with each other (but with nobody else), but a chaste, unmarried person would be sexually abstinent.
* '''Comprise''' and '''compose''' are (roughly) reciprocal, not synonyms. An archipelago ''is composed of'' many islands, and ''comprises'' those islands; it is not ''comprised of'' the islands -- if anything, the islands are comprised of the archipelago (though this use of ''of'' is very archaic; ''comprised by'' might be better--although not by much, since ''comprised by'' is hardly a common expression either).
* '''Erstwhile''' is not laudatory; it means 'former'.
* In chemistry, '''[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volatility_%28chemistry%29 Volatile]]''' does ''not'' mean "explosive" or "flammable"[[note]]and certainly not that it [[FanFic/QuarterLifeHalfwayToDestruction does not have a half-life but quarter life so you must observe with haste]][[/note]], it means how likely the substance is to vaporise. Vapours of a given flammable substance likely ''will'' be even more flammable than say the liquid form, but that's just coincidental. The correct words to describe something which is likely to go boom or ''otherwise react spontaneously'' is either ''unstable'' (for when it is energetically likely) or ''labile'' (when it is kinetically likely); in particular, gasoline and oils are volatile but not particularly unstable, compared to compounds like acetylene.
** In regular English, the other meaning ("quick to anger" or "prone to violence") is perfectly correct, however.
* '''Holland''' is a region in '''The Netherlands'''. It comprises most of the coastal region and the best-known cities from The Netherlands lie in Holland, namely [[FreestateAmsterdam Amsterdam]], Rotterdam and The Hague. Holland is not a valid name for the country, nor is it the name of a province anymore. The region that was once Holland now has the imaginative names North Holland and South Holland. This is akin to referring to the UK as "England".
** It should be noted that in several languages the official name of Netherlands is derived from the name of the Holland province (e.g. 'Holandia' in Polish or 'Holland' in Danish and Estonian). It is used however to denote only the European part of the Kingdom of The Netherlands that incorporates also Aruba and former Dutch Antilles).
** Of course, it doesn't help avoid confusion when the ''pars pro toto'' shorthand "Holland" is used in the name of the national football team and by local fans who shout "Holland!" and "Hup Holland Hup!" at matches (so the word "Holland" is prominently implied to denote the whole country to the rest of the world's spectators), and "Holland" is currently used by the Netherlands Board of Tourism and Conventions to refer to the entire country in literature for prospective visitors. The main tourist website is Holland.com which contains a brief description of why Netherlands is technically correct but why it's nonetheless preferred to use Holland to attract visitors. The Dutch may actually be less pedantic on this point than many English speakers.
* A '''rabbi''' is a person sufficiently versed in Jewish law to have obtained this designation from a religious authority, not unlike an academic degree (you are still entitled to be addressed as Doctor even if you "don't do anything" with your Ph. D.). A rabbi:
** is ''not'' the Jewish equivalent of a priest (there still exists a hereditary priestly class within the Tribe of Levi, called Kohanim, although their duties have been significantly reduced since the destruction of the Temple in 70 CE);
** is ''not'' a person who certifies kosher food (this is a ''mashgiaḥ'', which literally means "inspector", and it is certainly not done through "blessing" food as [[ArtisticLicenseReligion Hollywood seems to think]]);
** is ''not'' a person who does circumcisions (this is a ''mohel'', who is generally a licensed physician these days),
** is ''not'' a person who leads prayers in the synagogue (this is a ''ḥazan'' or cantor, or often just a lay member of the congregation); and
** is not exclusively the spiritual leader of a synagogue (rabbis who do this are usually called "pulpit rabbis", but there are thousands of individuals with rabbinic ordination who do not work for synagogue congregations, including those who simply study full-time).
** Now to be fair, there is overlap among these categories -- some kohanim become rabbis, some rabbis work as mashgiḥim, etc., but the fact of being a rabbi does not mean that one is/does any of them. Also, any bearded man wearing black is not a rabbi -- this is standard appearance for all ultra-Orthodox Jews whether or not they have rabbinic ordination.
* The generic [[HypocriticalHumor verbing]] of nouns, '''medaling''' to describe ''winning'' a medal, '''actioning''' for ''doing'' something, '''friending''' for ''becoming'' friends. This is an interesting case, as it is becoming increasingly acceptable to "verb" nouns in colloquial speech, and it isn't like these words have any other established uses that would make a distinction worthwhile to defend (being neologisms for the most part).[[note]]Particularly insane denizens of this very wiki would attribute this to the influence of Creator/JossWhedon; they may very well be right, but that's beside the point.[[/note]] As a result, it's difficult to solidly classify any of these verb-to-noun constructions as solecisms (except perhaps ''actioning'', which provides only a clumsy synonym for ''doing'' much as ''utilizing'' is most frequently used as a clumsy synonym for ''using''), but one would be very well-advised to avoid them in more formal writing.
* '''Jealousy''' typically refers to the negative thoughts and feelings of insecurity, fear, and anxiety over an anticipated loss of something that the person values, particularly in reference to a human connection. One can be a jealous boyfriend, but one cannot be jealous of ''someone else's'' boyfriend, unless [[HoYay there's already something between the two of you]]. This is often confused with '''Envy''', which is "an emotion that occurs when a person lacks another's (perceived) superior quality, achievement, or possession and either desires it or wishes that the other lacked it. Further compounding the confusion is the word '''Covet''', which includes all the characteristics of the definition of 'envy' but also indicates a willingness to take the object coveted for themselves. For instance, if a person has a television set that you want, envy might drive you to buy a bigger, better TV (as you desire the quality of owning a nice television). If you coveted it, however, you'd be more likely to steal their TV (as you desire the exact television set they own). And if you're jealous, you're worried that they're coveting ''your'' TV.
** This confusion has caused no small amount of confusion with one of the Christian commandments. The command is correctly translated as 'Do not covet', but 'Do not envy' and, worse yet, 'Do not be jealous' are common incorrect translations.
* '''Lose''' vs. '''Loose''': More of a spelling issue than a language one; people still ''say'' them correctly. However, (particularly online), the two are used almost interchangeably, though it is more common to add an "o" than to subtract one. For the record, "lose" (rhymes with "booze") is a verb, and, in its intransitive form, has several meanings including to suffer defeat, to suffer loss or to depreciate in effectiveness. "Loose" (rhymes with "goose") is an adjective, and the opposite of tight. You can lose a game, but not tighten it. Your shoelaces can be loose, but you can't win them. Okay, technically shoelaces ''could'' be a prize...
** Loose can also be used as a verb, to mean "release" or "unfasten", but that usage is kinda archaic -- you've probably never heard it outside of Literature/TheBible or archery (one looses an arrow from a bow). It ''still'' isn't the opposite of "win" or "find", ever.
** Not only a spelling issue, but very often a "spell-check" type of issue, where the word could be a typo but will never be caught by spell-check.
** A particularly interesting example of this is a Swedish book called ''The Looser Handbook'' which is about the art of leading a life of constant failure. It only stands to reason that the author would fail at naming the book, since failure is what the book is about.
* '''Casualties''' are the people ''wounded'' and ''permanently crippled'' (physically or psychologically), missing, captured, and dead sustained [[StrategyVersusTactics during a military operation]] or in any other given period. There is a term the dead, missing, captured, and crippled alone: '''Irrecoverable Casualties'''. Those who merely died (sometimes including those dead of wounds or in captivity) constitute '''Fatalities'''. Note however that the definition of wounded is pretty fluid - it can mean anything from "minor stab wound requiring hospitalisation to be on the safe side" to "crippling but temporary phobia of footsteps" to "three limbs blown off and permanent loss of hearing". In other words just anything short of actual death.
** To quote the other wiki, "In military usage, a casualty is a person in service killed in action, killed by disease, disabled by injuries, disabled by psychological trauma, captured, deserted, or missing, but not someone who sustains injuries which do not prevent them from fighting." So if one received a minor stab wound and got stitched up and sent back to the front one would not be a casualty.
** Casualty is also not the adjective form of casual, as Music/{{Jewel}} learned in an [[http://www.mtv.com/news/1430602/jewel-kurt-loder-square-off-on-poetic-license/ infamous]] TV interview (and she [[DeathGlare was not happy about it.]])
* '''Invalid''' with regard to arguments is a matter of not having the correct form. It has nothing to do with the truth value of the statement. ''See generally'' SoundValidTrue.
** "Fido has four legs. Dogs have four legs. Therefore Fido is a dog." is invalid. "Fido has four legs. All animals with four legs are cats. Therefore Fido is a cat" is valid.
* '''CGI''': In VideoGames, the term is often misused to describe '''pre-rendered cutscenes'''. '''All''' videogames (except ones done entirely with FullMotionVideo) use CGI, which means "computer-generated imagery". Even ''VideoGame/PacMan'' and ''VideoGame/DonkeyKong'' use CGI; their graphics were created by computer images. When a cutscene is debated on whether it shows real gameplay, there's no question whether it has CGI (unless it features live-action video). The question is whether the video was pre-rendered and recorded beforehand or if it features the actual game assets.
** In animation, CGI is used to mean "anything rendered in 3D software". 2D animation using computer rendering software (UsefulNotes/{{Adobe Flash}}/Animate, UsefulNotes/ToonBoom) are typically referred to by what program they were rendered in, despite being just as computer-generated as the 3D kind. Wiki/ThisVeryWiki's own AllCGICartoon page tends to list 3D works over computer-made 2D ones.
* '''MMO''' is commonly used to refer to an ''MMORPG'', an abbreviation for '''M'''assively '''M'''ultiplayer '''O'''nline '''R'''ole '''P'''laying '''G'''ame. While it makes sense to abbreviate the term, most people refer to an MMORPG as an "MMO", when "MMO" is merely a prefix, as any genre can be Massively Multiplayer and online. Most Massively Multiplayer Online Games happen to be {{RPG}}s because the formula had been experimented with the most, but if you refer to game as an "MMOG" or refer to ''VideoGame/{{Neocron}}'' or ''VideoGame/PlanetSide'' as an "MMOFPS" or ''Darkwind War On Wheels'' as an "MMOTBS", people will often look at you weirdly and not understand what you meant as other multiplayers, no matter ''how'' massive they are just call them "Multiplayer" or "Online".
* '''Otome Games''' are [[RomanceGame games with a female protagonist and male love interests]], with the main focus being the romance between the protagonist and male characters. Games for a female audience with a CastFullOfPrettyBoys, SelfInsert protagonist but no explicit romance with the protagonist are not otome games. ''VideoGame/ToukenRanbu'', ''VideoGame/{{A3}}'', ''VideoGame/TheIdolmasterSideM'', ''VideoGame/EnsembleStars'' and ''VideoGame/IDOLiSH7'' are sometimes labelled otome games, even though they technically aren't.
* A '''Protagonist''' is the principal character (or, more loosely, character''s'') of a work, typically the one from whose perspective it is narrated and usually ([[VillainProtagonist though not always]]) TheHero, or at least [[AntiHero the person we're meant to sympathise with]]. Strictly speaking, there can only be one protagonist. The second-most important character on the protagonist's side is the "{{deuteragonist}}", the third is the "tritagonist", and so forth. An '''Antagonist''' is a character who creates problems for the protagonist, and is thus typically [[{{Villains}} The Villain]] (although again, [[HeroAntagonist not always]]). It is '''''NOT''''' the other way round. Some people get this wrong, even though you'd think it obvious given that 'antagonist' obviously shares a root with 'antagonize'....
* '''[=MP3=]''' refers to either the MPEG standard popularly used to encode music or audio files, or a file using this standard. It is not the same as an '''[=MP3=] player''', which is either computer software or a physical media player which plays [=MP3s=], and it is not a catch-all for all kinds of digital audio.
** On a side note, [=MP3=] does not stand for MPEG-3 but for MPEG-1 Layer 3 (and MPEG-2 Part 3) which is a sound encoding mechanism for the MPEG-1 format. In order to avoid any further confusion, the MPEG (Moving Picture Expert Group) decided there would never be any MPEG-3 standard and thus they went from MPEG-2 to MPEG-4.
** This is made worse by Chinese manufacturers who simply bump the number after "MP" whenever they add a new feature, so we have [=MP3=] player, [=MP4=] player (their 'new feature' is video playback, but they're also unrelated to [=MPEG-4=] and don't support [=MPEG-4=] video at all), [=MP5=] player, [=MP6=] player...
* A '''riff''' is "a short, repeated phrase, frequently played over changing chords or harmonies or used as a background to a solo improvisation". The way "riff" is often used, especially by [[Series/MysteryScienceTheater3000 MST3K]], is as though the riff itself is an improvisation, and "riffing" is the act of coming up with something on the spot. It's actually the opposite: a riff is the same thing repeated over and over again, possibly with ''slight'' variation. The confusion likely comes about because riffs are used in jazz, and jazz is improvisational music; but improvisations are not made of riffs, they're made of longer, more complex melodic phrases. Improvisation is the spontaneous creation of a melody, and is not properly called "riffing". An example of "riffing" would be the guitar part in the verse of "You Really Got Me", "Come As You Are", or "Whole Lotta Love"; or in jazz, the repeated horn parts heard most famously in Count Basie arrangements: a short fragment that's repeated constantly and identically.
** as a note [no pun intended] when people refer to a "riff" or "riffing", what they are probably INTENDING to refer to is "scatting" - scat singing, specifically, although one can scat on any instrument; "scat" officially means "vocal improvisation with wordless vocables" (nonsense syllables generally, sometimes just "oooo" or "aaa", sometimes a single word used over and over, etc) but over the past decades has grown to mean ANY instrument improvising the melody, over the riff, in a jazz or jazz-based song or piece.
** On the other hand, Merriam-Webster dictionary describes riff as above (noting the possible etymologyis a shortening of the word 'refrain') but also gives another definitions, namely 'any variation or ''improvisation'''.
* Occasionally, a law-enforcement officer will refer to the scene of a brutal crime as being very "'''graphic'''". Well, duh, you're there and you're looking at it, one would expect it to be visual and realistic instead of merely implied. The idea of "graphic" violence in media isn't that it's {{Gorn}}, just that it's shown onscreen rather than implied.
** by the same token '''explicit''' doesn't mean rude or obscene (as people probably think due to those "explicit lyrics" labels) it means stated outright rather than just suggested.
* '''Rein''' vs. '''reign'''. "Reign" means to rule as royalty, "reins" are what one uses to guide a horse. Both involve leadership and sound exactly alike, and so are easily confused. A very common example is the phrase "free rein", which means letting loose of the reins and allowing a horse to wander as it pleases. This is often misused as "free reign", which doesn't even make sense: a King by definition has freedom to reign, it's what makes him a King. So to recap: "reign" refers to a ''state'' of having authority, while "free rein" or "being given the reins" refer to the ''actions'' of leadership in a situation. If there is a plural, it's almost always going to be "reins".
* '''Charisma''' refers to someone's speaking talents and ability to influence others through force of personality and diplomacy. While good looks help, someone is ''not'' charismatic because she looks good in a formal dress, or because he has blue eyes and a nice smile; similarly, just because someone is able to speak publicly and get their point across doesn't qualify them either, not unless people are cheering wildly for ''how'' the news is presented, rather than the facts themselves. For a historical example, UsefulNotes/{{Cleopatra}} was considered extremely charismatic, despite contemporary accounts of her being a very plain-looking woman.[[note]]Centuries of artists depicting her as a beautiful temptress have influenced the modern view of her.[[/note]]
* '''Calorie''' is a non-SI unit of energy. It is relatively small unit however, so caloric intake of foods is usually expressed in kilocalories, (1 kcal = 1000 calories). Thus an average recommended daily energy intake is not 2200 calories but 2200 kilocalories or 2,200,000 calories.
** A '''C'''alorie refers to a kilocalorie, while a '''c'''alorie refers to the base unit. This can get confusing when 'calorie' is at the beginning of a sentence, which without context, would be indistinguishable as to if it was between the normal unit or the large unit.
** Also, although it isn't an SI unit, it ''is'' a metric unit rather than Imperial or American customary.
* '''Stereophonic''' refers to an audio that has exactly two speakers, instead of one ('''mono''') or four ('''surround'''). It is slightly inaccurate to refer to a system with surround sound as a "stereo", but always inaccurate to refer to the output as being "stereo sound."
** Less commonly, it can be any sound the gives the illusion of being surrounded by a sound field. It's not useful stereo if the two speakers are stacked one on top of the other, or placed too close together as in a boombox.
* One's interest is '''piqued''', not ''peaked''. This mistake is understandable, since "peak" can be used as a verb to mean "maximize" or "climax"; though your English professor will still probably mark this as being wrong. [[VideoGame/FinalFantasyVII "Poque"]] [[Film/MontyPythonAndTheHolyGrail is right out.]]
** Likewise, getting a preview of something means getting a '''sneak peek'''. A "sneak peak" would be a [[https://twitter.com/StealthMountain stealth mountain]]. In fact, someone's interest may be piqued by a good peek.
* The '''[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immaculate_Conception Immaculate Conception]]''' refers to the conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary by ''her'' mother Anna, specifically the belief that "from the first moment of her existence [... Mary] was preserved by God from the Original Sin and filled with sanctifying grace that would normally come with baptism after birth." Jesus' conception and birth from Mary was the '''[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virgin_Birth Virgin Birth]]'''. (Whether Mary actually was immaculately conceived is a huge theological dispute between Catholics and modern Protestants, so nothing more will be said about that. But if a Protestant says he doesn't believe in the "Immaculate Conception", he is ''not'' necessarily saying that Mary wasn't a virgin.)
** And the Immaculate ''Reception'' is [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immaculate_Reception something else entirely]]...
* A '''song''' is called "song" because there's singing in it. If there is no singing in it, it is not a song. There is a proper word for a musical composition without singing. It's a '''piece'''. In the context of popular music, one might call it a "track" (which encompasses music that does have singing and music that doesn't).
** Musical definitions are strange animals because composers are always PlayingWith definitions. Mendelssohn quite famously wrote piano pieces called or "Lieder ohne Worte," or "Songs without words." Even in German, the Lied was associated with singing, and Mendelssohn was PlayingWith the idea [[OlderThanRadio in the 19th century]]. Also, a "piece" can include singing, but it is normally limited to one where the singing is not the primary purpose, like Beethoven's 9th symphony. However, there is a song in that movement (which we know as "Ode to Joy"). Composers ''love'' to MindScrew with convention.
*** All of which gets frustrating when trying to put this kind of music into a computer, having to classify movements or recitatives as 'songs', composers as 'bands', operas as 'albums' and anything written before about 1920 as 'Classical', a weird appellation to, say, Medieval music, to lump it in with Puccini and Handel (neither of whom are really 'classical' either.)
* A '''neophyte''' is someone who is new to something (a newbie); it literally means "new/young/newly-planted plant". A '''neophile''' is someone who likes things that are new.
* '''Novitiate''' is the state, condition, or period of being a '''novice''', not the person. William Buckley fouls this up in ''Tucker's Last Stand''.
* An '''epidemic''' refers to the frequency of a disease substantially exceeding what is expected in recent history.
* '''Sushi''' is a food consisting of cooked rice mixed with vinegar ("shari") and other ingredients. It can contain a large variety of ingredients ranging from vegetables, seafood (mostly uncooked, but some are cooked as well), sauces, etc. The shari makes it sushi. '''Onigiri''' or '''(o)musubi''' is usually rice (no vinegar), another ingredient, wrapped in seaweed.
** Similarly, '''Sashimi''' is taken to be the the word for raw seafood by itself, but it actually refers to the way it is prepared (thin slices), and [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_common_misconceptions#Food_and_cooking can apply to other types of meat or vegetables]].
* '''Ichor''' originally meant the blood of gods or angels. In later times, it has somehow come to also mean pus. Fiction writers, however, like to use it as a "fancy-sounding" word for pretty much any liquid.
* '''Your''' and '''you're'''. "Your" is a possessive pronoun used to describe something as belonging to the person being addressed, while "you're" is a contraction of "you are". If "you are" would fit instead, then "your" is not the correct word.
** Likewise, '''it's''', and '''its''' have similar misuse. "Its" is a possessive pronoun that's usually used to describe what belongs to the subject in the sentence. "It's" is the contraction of "it is". If "it is" can fit into the sentence, then "its" is not the correct word. Likewise, if there's a sign of the subject having possession in the sentence, then "it's" does not apply. (A good way to make sure it's being used correctly is to speak the phrase as if there's no contraction. For example, "It's red" = "It is red" is correct. "It's walls" = "It is walls" is incorrect, and should be "Its walls".)
* '''Implicate''' means to be responsible for something, or to assign responsibility to someone. '''Insinuate''' means to subtly hint at something unpleasant. Both are used for "imply", whether positive or negative. Imply actual means to ''strongly'' hint at something.
* '''Pilot''' does not simply mean "the first episode of a TV show". It should be used if, and ''only'' if, the episode is made by itself with the intention of shopping it around to various networks who will judge whether it works well enough to commission a whole series, as in a "pilot program". ''Film/PulpFiction'', which popularized the term, actually made this distinction, but along the way the word has become conflated with '''premiere'''. This usage is especially incorrect when referring to animated shows, which often get a whole season commissioned in advance due to animation lead time, and the pilot or pitch demo, often made cheaply and quickly, is simply redone.
** The exception, obviously, is when the pilot is made and ''then'' broadcast as the first episode.
* '''Ripoff''' is either a bad financial scam where you are conned into buying a fake product, or something where you are tricked into giving money without receiving anything in return. A lot of people use "ripoff" to mean the general act of copying or mimicry in general, and in the form of entertainment, a '''Ripoff''' is apparently "[[TheyCopiedItSoItSucks Something that's similar to a movie I saw before]]." The origin of this misuse had to do with [[TheMockbuster Mockbusters]] trying to trick people into buying their product mistaking it for the product they actually wanted.
* '''JustForFun/{{Egregious}}''' has been used so egregiously on Wiki/ThisVeryWiki that it has its own page.
* Similarly '''Your Mileage Will Vary''' is used as a way of referring to Your Mileage May Vary taken UpToEleven on especially controversial issues that reach a point where [[BrokenBase there is no middle ground]]. Your Mileage May Vary comes from car commercials that say consumers might get a different amount of mileage than is advertised, and on this wiki, means that viewers might not agree with the statement. Using "Your Mileage Will vary" implies unanimous disagreement rather than inevitable controversy.
%% Do not bluelink any of the Your Mileage X phrases.
* The word '''{{Trope}}''' does not come from TV Tropes, and like "subversion" its meaning in the real world is different than on this site. In reality "trope" does not mean "storytelling device" but "the use of a word to have a meaning different than the usual one."
** It does almost fit; trope titles often use words differently than the literal definition, because they're slang or jargon that already existed, or for brevity, or to make a pun.
* The word '''logical''' does not mean "reasonable" or "the result of a well-shaped argument". It means "defined according to the rules of logic", logic being a number of highly specific ways to describe and analyze the interaction between set premises.
* One that shows up every now and again is '''equivocal''' to mean "equivalent". An equivocal statement is one that is ambiguous and open to interpretation (conversely, an unequivocal statement is one in which the meaning is clear).
* '''Presently''' does not mean "happening now" or "ongoing". It means "soon".
* '''Ambivalence''' is not the same as ''ambiguity'' or just 'not bothered'. if you feel ambivalent about a decision, you are torn by equally strong feelings in two (or more) directions. A child deciding whether to live with her mother or father after a divorce might feel ambivalent.
* The term '''"stepchild"''' is sometimes mistakenly used with children who are ''adopted'', rather than for children whose [[ParentWithNewParamour parents have married someone besides their other parent]]. For example, Lindesfarne of ''Webcomic/KevinAndKell'' is Angelique's adopted daughter, but after her adoptive parents' divorce, she became Kell's stepdaughter when she married her adoptive father Kevin.
* Something that is '''anonymous''' has no name attached. If there is a name attached but it doesn't match the one on the originator's passport, such as an internet username, it's '''pseudonymous'''.
* '''Cherubim''' (singular '''cherub''') are the alien looking creatures appearing in the book of Ezekiel. The chubby little winged cupids are called '''putti''' (or '''putto''' in singular), and don't really have anything to do with biblical angels.
* In the entertainment industry, there are '''indie''' producers and developers (short for independent) that create and release their own works without relying on a 3rd party to assist in their project, such as major developers or publishers. However, people often get meaning of indie movies/games/etc. wrong and think it means the product was made by people who did not have a lot of money. This also leads people to believe that indie developers that make a ton of money off of their work or use a major publisher to get their product out to the public have "sold out" to major corporations. In short, as long as a group of developers have total control over their creations and don't have anyone outside of their group influencing their work, then the developers are indie, whether they are large or small, profitable or unprofitable.
** The Independent Spirit Awards had to actually redefine its criteria for nominations after ''Film/{{Fargo}}'' won Best Picture. While it was technically an independent film, its budget was $7M, and not in the spirit (pun recognized) of the awards, which was intended to give low budget films their own recognition.
* In the context of wrestling, an '''escape''' is where one frees themselves from a hold, a '''counter''' is where one turns a hold being applied to them into a hold of their own and a '''reversal''' is a specific counter that results in you applying the hold your opponent just had you in.
** The confusion was referenced in Wrestling/RingOfHonor when Wrestling/CMPunk argued he shouldn't have been cost a rope break when he used them to reverse an arm hold applied by Wrestling/AJStyles instead of using them to as a means of escape. Unfortunately Punk allowed Styles to escape while arguing, weakening his own point and requiring ROH [[ObviousRulePatch to take another look at the rules]].
** In TNA, Don West had to explain the significance of someone finding a counter to the Canadian destroyer used by Petey William, after the fans had likely seen the move blocked, escaped or otherwise negated dozens of time. Even then, the move itself may never have been countered before but attempts to apply it had.
* Someone born with reproductive organs that are intermediate between male and female is not transgender or a hermaphrodite, they are '''intersexed'''. A true '''hermaphrodite''' is an organism with functional male and female parts in the same body, that can reproduce as either: a condition which occurs naturally in earthworms or snails, but never in humans.
* '''"Excessive"''' does not mean "a lot" or "a great deal". It means "too much".
* One can only commit '''treason''' if they are working with a foreign power. If it's a completely internal case of trying to overthrow the government, it's '''sedition'''.
* '''Cojones''' is Spanish for balls. '''Cajones''' is Spanish for drawers.
** Although, saying ''cajones'' in English could be a [[BilingualBonus bilingual pun]].
* '''Port and starboard''' do not mean left and right, but specifically ''the ship's'' left and right -- that is, the left and the right of a person on the ship facing towards the bow. The fore and aft directions are similarly measured relative to the vessel, not the speaker.
** In cases where a smaller boat or plane is being carried on a larger ship, "left" and "right" are always used when referring to the smaller boat or plane to prevent confusion. So if a plane is parked on a carrier deck facing towards the back of the ship, the left side of the plane is towards the starboard side of the ship.
* '''Entitled''' means that someone is given a title, authority or ''rightful'' ownership of something. Some people however use it as if it meant the opposite, "someone is claiming to deserve something, although he doesn't". Even on Wiki/TVTropes - see EntitledBastard, EntitledToHaveYou. The usage here refers to an unearned ''subjective feeling'' of entitlement, hence the common expression "sense of entitlement" - the person in question ''feels'' they deserve something, even though they don't. The correct way to use "entitled" would be saying the person feels or acts like they are entitled to something, not that they are "being" entitled.
* '''Simplistic''' is not a synonym for "simple". It means "too simple" or "simple to a fault", and is inherently pejorative.
* A '''sprite''', for video game terms, is a 2D image in video games that is completely flat and lacks 3D angles. People who have little knowledge on video game definitions assume that all characters that one sees in a game are sprites, which is not completely true; people confused 3D '''models''' for sprites and a model is a 3D shape that can be viewed from any angle. Some games like ''VideoGame/PaperMario'' invoke a 2D style, but most of them use 3D character models that are flattened down so they look 2D.
* For video games, '''graphics''' is what a viewer sees on their display or monitor. Many people assume that "graphics" means what the video game looks like. In actuality, people usually mean the game's visual style when they describe a game's graphics.
* '''Open Beta''' and '''Closed Beta''' get heavily confused when people try to differentiate the two terms. A beta that is closed off to the public means that only people who get handpicked by developers via invites, a dedicated team formed to test the beta, and/or has a limited amount of slots available if the developers needs just a certain amount of people. An open beta means it's fully open to the public and anyone can take part without slots being limited. Some video games are available in its beta state and sometimes players can buy the game as such to test the game and keep the final version of the game once it is finished. Technically speaking, a "paid, open beta" is an oxymoron, since "beta test" is defined as a test of a computer product prior to wide commercial release. No matter what a company tries to tell you, once they're accepting money from the general public, they're selling a product, not conducting a beta test (although the line gets blurry in cases where the beta costs money, but is cheaper than the final release, such as ''VideoGame/{{Minecraft}}''). This is further confused by the fact that "beta" used to imply that the software was "incomplete" in some way; in the modern world of seamless online patches and updates, no software product is ever "complete" until the company stops issuing new patches and updates, often years after the product has come out of beta.
* Political ideologies in general suffer from a lot of confusion which can make discussions very hard. The confusion of what '''left''' and '''right''' actually mean, for example, or what is the relationship between '''conservatism''' and economic policies, or perhaps the most confusing word '''liberal''' which has different meanings in different countries which can, at worst, be the opposite of each other.
* '''[[UsefulNotes/HighFunctioningAutism Autistic]]''', at least on the Internet, gets used to mean "'retarded' only less so" more and more often in recent years - while less for perceived stupidity and more for social awkwardness (so you'll never find someone calling an inanimate object autistic even online), the general effect is the same. "Autistic" can also be used to refer to someone who has an exceptional focus on a particular activity, even if the person being described does not have an autism spectrum disorder at all. This is most likely due to the {{GIFT}}; anonymity means both that people feel freer to use "autistic" to mean "asshole" despite the UnfortunateImplications, and that people feel freer to use autism as an excuse for ''being'' an asshole (whether they're actually diagnosed or not), which only perpetuates the stereotype.
* '''AsymmetricMultiplayer''', as originally defined by Creator/{{Nintendo}} in reference to certain UsefulNotes/WiiU games, is a multiplayer mode in which the different players have totally different roles and capabilities, unlike most multiplayer games, where all the players are generally doing the same thing and playing the game the same way. This does ''not'' include games where players can be different characters (e.g., a magic user and a sword user) with slightly different abilities but carry out essentially the same goal in the same way. This instead refers to games where the roles, abilities and gameplay experience are drastically different. Misuse of the term became an issue with ''VideoGame/StarTrekTheVideoGame'' and several other games revealed and/or discussed in the period during/after [=E3=] 2012, when the development teams for the games claimed that their CoOpMultiplayer counted as Asymmetric Multiplayer (probably stemming from a desire to [[FollowTheLeader ride on the coattails of the initial Wii U hype]]).
* '''AIDS''' is often used to refer to the notorious sexually-transmitted disease that cripples the host's immune system. "AIDS" stands for '''a'''cquired '''i'''mmuno'''d'''eficiency '''s'''yndrome, and many people don't understand the "syndrome" part. You cannot ''catch'' AIDS; rather, you are reduced to it by being infected with the aforementioned STD, which by the way is called HIV ('''h'''uman '''i'''mmunodeficiency '''v'''irus), and having it beat the snot out of your immune cells. It is possible for someone to have HIV, but not AIDS, so long as their immune system is still intact. In addition, no one dies from AIDS - they die from ''complications'' related to the condition. (Simiarly, no one can die from alcholism, either. They can only die from ''complications'' due to it, such as cirrhosis of the liver.)
* '''Maltese cross''' is [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maltese_cross a eight-pointed cross]] which has the form of four "V"-shaped elements joined at the center, most famously used by UsefulNotes/TheKnightsHospitallers. Colloquially, however, the term "maltese cross" is sometimes applied to the ''cross pattée'', [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cross_patt%C3%A9e a cross which has arms narrower at the centre]], and broader at the perimeter, most often associated with the Prussian and German military usage.
* '''Scandinavia''': UsefulNotes/{{Finland}} and UsefulNotes/{{Iceland}} are not Scandinavian countries, though they are sometimes referred to as such. Scandinavia consists of UsefulNotes/{{Sweden}}, UsefulNotes/{{Norway}}, and UsefulNotes/{{Denmark}}. (They are, however, part of the Nordic region, as are the Scandinavian countries. There's also a distinction between Scandinavia--a political-cultural concept--and the Scandinavian Peninsula, a geographical feature which excludes Denmark but includes part of Finland.) Finns, for their part are neither Scandinavian nor Nordic in the ethnic sense; some anthropologists go so far as to describe them as Eurasian, given their common ancestry with certain Siberian (Asiatic Russian) peoples.
* '''Sex[=/=]Gender''': The distinction between sex and gender. The sexes (male and female) as the two divisions in which many organisms are placed, based upon their reproductive role and the genders (masculine and feminine) referring to ''social'' characteristics (such as behavioral norms) associated with males and females, respectively. The use of gender to mean the same thing as sex [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gender#Etymology_and_usage dates back to the 14th century]], whereas the use of gender to mean gender roles only dates to John Money's work in the 1950s. So it is not incorrect by any stretch for people to continue using the original meaning of the word (which in fact still precedes the gender roles [[http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/gender meaning in the dictionary]] ).
** The distinction between transgenderism and transsexuality does not necessarily have anything to do with genitals or whether or not someone has had sex reassignment surgery (SRS). "Transgender" is usually understood as an umbrella term for anyone whose sex and gender aren't totally congruent, or who strongly deviates from gender norms. "Transsexual" means someone who permanently transitions from one gender to another, usually through medical treatments like hormones and surgery as well as social and legal changes, but no individual step is necessary for being transsexual. SRS doesn't have much to do with it. Many transsexuals can't have SRS or choose not to. Furthermore, "transgender" is already an adjective. Saying "transgendered" is simply redundant.
* The words '''nemesis''' and '''archenemy''' are synonyms, as both words mean "one's greatest enemy". The "arch" modifier in "archenemy" signifies "greatest", while the word "nemesis" doesn't require a modifier because it already means "one's greatest enemy" by itself. "Arch-nemesis" is not only incorrect but [[DepartmentOfRedundancyDepartment redundant]], since it would mean "one's greatest greatest enemy".
* The term '''pay to win''' is used in many video games that entices the player to buy items or enhancements with real life money in order to have an easier time in beating the game or getting a step ahead of the competition. Many free to play games are designed to be frustrating to play normally and have heavy restrictions on what the player can do unless the person forks over money to gain and advantage. Pay to win is also applied to competitive games where a player can buy enhancements to defeat their opponents with little effort, thus only people with money to burn can beat everyone else that didn't pay. However, people often use pay to win on any video game with DLC that contains new weapons or other items, even if the game itself can be played just fine without the extra content, the DLC content themselves being on par with vanilla content, or if the game lacks any competitive aspect. The term in general carries negative connotations, with the implication that those that pay real life money have advantages that cannot be obtained by those that play for free. People have also used "pay to win" when it comes to buying cosmetic items in a game where said items do nothing to enhance the player's game other than simply changing how they look because some people believe obtaining all the items in the game is a way of "winning".
* The words '''atom''' and '''molecule''', and their derived terms ("molecular", etc.) are not synonymous. Molecules are structures formed from atoms. By strict usage, "molecule" only refers to structures held together by covalent bonds, so e.g. a block of metal is not made of molecules - its atoms are connected by metallic bonds.
** A molecule is also not the same as a mixture. In a molecule, atoms are chemically bonded together but in a mixture they are not. For example, air is (mostly) a ''mixture'' of nitrogen and oxygen, as it contains nitrogen and oxygen ''molecules''.
* In the Wiki/SCPFoundation notably, you will very often see the word '''amnesiac''' referring to substances that cause loss of memory. An amnesiac is actually a ''person'' suffering from amnesia. A substance causing amnesia would be an '''amnestic'''. However the word is so deeply rooted in SCP terminology that it's all but impossible to do anything about it. The Wiki only told newer authors that they prefer using "amnestic" instead of "amnesiac", but would forgive any uses of the latter.
* Challenging times can make it hard to make '''ends meet'''. No food item called '''ends meat''' (or '''end's meat''') has ever existed, outside of phonetic incomprehension or [[{{Feghoot}} stories that end with absolutely horrid puns]]. Imagine trying to tie a rope or cord around something with insufficient or barely sufficient length (or, conversely, with plentiful length, though it's usually only mentioned in the context of scarcity), and you'll understand the sensation the phrase is meant to convey.
* '''Niggardly''' is a perfectly innocent word meaning "stingy, miserly, not generous." It does not have nor has it ever had any connection to a certain [[NWordPrivileges infamous racial slur]]-- its origins date back to the 1300s by way of Old Norse, long before the African slave trade was a thing-- except that unfortunately it kind of ''sounds'' like that word. (Etymologically, it's related not to the N-word but to "niggle" as in nitpick, quibble about small details.) Sure enough, well-meaning but small-vocabularied people who succumb to PoliticalCorrectnessGoneMad have [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Controversies_about_the_word_%22niggardly%22 created many controversies about it]], to the point that it's probably wiser to avoid it altogether today.
* A '''regimen''' is a health-related routine, such as diet, exercise, and/or medicine. A '''regiment''' is a military unit (traditionally commanded by a colonel). A '''regime''' is a government or leadership (usually with negative, authoritarian connotations). These three words often end up shuffled into one another's places.
* '''Android''', '''cyborg''' and '''robot''' are not synonyms, as a quick glance at their respective etymologies should make clear. "Android" is derived from the Greek prefix ''"andro"'' ("man") and the suffix ''"oid"'' ("resembling"), and it means "An artificial creation built in the likeness of a human. "Cyborg" is a contraction of "cybernetic organism", and it means "A lifeform with a combination of organic and mechanical body parts". "Robot" is derived from the Russian ''"rabota"'' ("to work"), and it means "An autonomous machine built to perform a specific task". The term ''android'' technically refers to an artificial life form that resembles a male human. The female equivalent would be a ''gynoid''.
* Something's '''inception''' is its beginning. Courtesy of [[{{Film/Inception}} the eponymous movie]], this is widely misunderstood. Since a great deal of the movie revolves around dreams within dreams--and later, by MemeticMutation, anything within the same thing--a lot of people have, by association, gotten the idea it means the latter.[[note]] In the movie, "inception" refers to the '''ends''' of the protagonist's mission, not its '''means'''; they call it "inception" because they're trying to give their target a radical new idea, which will begin a new phase in his life.[[/note]]
* A '''desert''' is any place with low rainfall and vegetation, regardless of the climate. Thus, Antarctica is a desert.
* A '''Good Samaritan Law''' is not a law which compels someone to help a person in jeopardy. That is a '''Duty To Rescue''' law. A Good Samaritan law grants legal protection to anyone who attempts to help another person in the midst of a crisis. There have indeed been cases where someone offering aid was later sued by the person they attempted to help.
* '''Centurion''' is not an all-encompassing term for a soldier in Ancient Rome; it was an upper-level rank in the Roman military (roughly analogous to "Captain" or "Major") specifically designating the commander of a '''Century''' (a unit of around 100 soldiers, hence the name). A baseline Roman soldier (analogous to "Private") was a '''Legionary''' (not '''Legionnaire'''; that comes from the FrenchForeignLegion).
* For the term '''let alone''' as in "X is not Y, let alone Z", Y should be the ''less'' far-fetched idea. For example, "bronze is not as valuable as silver, let alone gold." Sometimes, the opposite gets used, that is, "bronze is not as valuable as gold, let alone silver."
** The same rule applies when two entities are specified, such as [[VideoGame/HalfLife "I never thought I'd see a resonance cascade, let alone create one"]]
* For United States citizens, '''Freedom of Speech''' means a person has the right to criticize and speak out against the government without needing to fear repercussions from said government. It does not mean "I cannot be silenced for saying anything I want to" since you can get in trouble for saying something that implies a threat to someone else (even if you claim to be joking), nor does it allow you to say something offensive on a privately owned web site whose owner(s) have the full right to ban you for breaking their rules.[[note]]To put it in a way that's relatable to Tropers in the U.S.: If one were to vandalize or make otherwise grossly-unacceptable edits to the TV Tropes Wiki, no part of the First Amendment disallows the wiki staff from banning the offending Troper.[[/note]]
** To suggest otherwise is like saying the right to Freedom Of Assembly [[InsaneTrollLogic means you can have a party at someone else's house without permission whenever you want]]
* '''Emigrate''' and '''Immigrate''' refer to the same concept, but the difference between the two words is that "emigrate" refers to moving ''out'' of a country while "immigrate" refers to moving ''into'' one. '''Export''' and '''Import''' are a similar source of confusion regarding objects rather than people. Think of it as like "exhale" and "inhale".
* '''Semantics''' is literally the study of meanings of words and phrases, and how they relate to the phonetic strings used to convey them. When you say about two different terms, ‘This is semantics,’ you are in fact saying they mean two different things rather than that the difference is negligible. Similarly, you could say that:
** the difference between ‘cat’ as an animal and ‘cat’ as a jazz player is semantic;
** the difference between ‘pray’ and ‘prey’ is semantic, orthographic (i.e. in writing), and syntactic (you can’t pray on someone, at least not in the same meaning);
** the difference between ‘kid’ and ‘child’ is phonological (they’re obviously pronounced differently) and orthographic, and while the difference is, for the most part, not semantic (i.e. both terms refer to a human between the ages of 2~3 and ~12, although the former could also mean ‘young goat’), it is also pragmatic (i.e. you wouldn’t use the former in formal conversation);
** The difference between Missouri (‘miz-ZURR-ree’) and Missouri (‘miz-ZURR-ruh’) is purely phonological/dialectical.
* The term '''reboot''' is sometimes used in reference to a new installment of a franchise that differs from the original in terms of art style or premise, when the term specifically applies to [[ContinuityReboot an adaptation that restarts continuity for the sake of telling a new interpretation of the franchise's characters and events]]. If the new series is still in continuity with the original incarnation, then it would be a '''revival''' (some people distinguish between the former and latter using the terms '''hard reboot''' and '''soft reboot''').
* '''Arab''' refers to people who speak Arabic. It is not a term for Muslims in general (There are Christian, Druze, and even Jewish Arabs, and most Muslims come from non Arab countries). Similar, Afghanis [[note]] who speak primarily Pashto and Dari, types of Persian. [[/note]]. Iranians [[note]] Who speak Persian [[/note]] or Pakistanis [[note]] Who have multiple languages, but primarily speak Urdu, a language related to Hindi[[/note]] are not Arabs, although all use a similar script to Arabic.
* '''Hindu''' refers to the [[UsefulNotes/{{Hinduism}} religion]], as well as an individual who practices it. '''Hindi''' refers to the language. Also, just because something is Indian doesn't mean it's Hindi or Hindu. There are multiple Indian religions and languages that share only a small if any similarity to Hindi. However, Hindu is also used as a synonym for someone from India.
* A '''Monkey''' is a type of primate, usually one with tails that live in trees. An '''Ape''' (which includes gibbons, orangutans, gorillas, chimpanzees, bonobos, and humans) is not considered a monkey, although they belong in the same suborder (Catarrhini) as Old World Monkeys. Apes don't have a tail, have larger brains than monkeys, and tend to be larger than most monkeys. '''Simian''' refers to both apes and monkeys. Lampshaded in ''Literature/{{Discworld}}'' where the Librarian, an Orangutan, is annoyed at being called a Monkey.
* In common use, '''rape''' and '''sexual assault''' are used interchangeably. '''Sexual assault''' is defined as any physical sexual contact perpetrated against a person without their consent or otherwise against their will. '''Rape''' is a specific form of sexual assault involving penetration.
* '''Semen''' is the liquid that comes out during male ejaculation. '''Sperm''' are specifically the male reproductive cells which are present in the semen of fertile males. It is indeed possible to ejaculate semen without sperm if he's infertile.
* '''Parasite''' is sometimes used, especially in fiction, to refer to something that drains life from its host, even to the point of death. Real parasites try not to kill their hosts; lethal "parasites" are actually called pathogens ([[ThePlague diseases]]) or [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parasitoid parasitoids]].
* '''Geneva Conventions''' are the international conventions binding their signatories to observe specific conduct toward refugees, captives and prisoners in the time of war. It has nothing to do with the agreement to abstain from the use of some types of weapons as this subject is covered by the '''Hague Conventions'''.
* '''Remake''' and '''remaster''' are used interchangeably in the video game field whenever a video game from the past gets rereleased with improved graphical fidelity. A '''remake''' is a video game that is rebuilt from the ground up with the intention of adding/changing levels, rewriting the story, and using new gameplay mechanics that couldn't have been done in the original game. A '''remaster''' is simply taking the same video game and giving it a visual upgrade (and possibly a new feature or two) while everything else remains the same.
* '''Samurai''' is not a synonym for a traditional Japanese warrior but it specifically means a warrior who is bound by feudal agreement with a lord. A vassal in other words. A general word for any person belonging to warrior caste is ''bushi''. A ''bushi'' serving no lord is called ''ronin''.
** Similarly, a knight is technically not a heavily-armed and armored (and possibly mounted) warrior in the medieval-European style - the term refers to an individual of that time period within the social class of knight, which was lower nobility and inevitably could fight in the aforementioned style. There actually is a term for a warrior capable of fighting with a lance in heavy armor upon a horse, independent of their social class: A man-at-arms. Interestingly, etymology seems to indicate that the term knight was originally used around this loosely before the social class arose and the term man-at-arms then came around for the difference.
* Television announcers in both the US and Canada routinely use the word '''common-law''' husband or wife to denote the person someone is living with. The act of cohabitation, no matter how long, ''never'' creates a legal relationship in the U.S., and only rarely in Canada.
* '''Vapid''': A word meaning "uninspired", "vacuous", or "bland", that has come to be used heavily by the online community for movies they don't like. Becomes hilarious (or infuriating) when the thing about the movie that turns them off is the exact opposite of being vapid. ie. it is inspired and deep, but goes in a direction the person doesn't care for.
* '''Exeunt''' is not a fancy synonym for '''exit'''. Etymologically, "exit" is the third-person singular present active indicative of the Latin verb ''exeō'', and "exeunt" its third-person plural present active indicative. Thus, in stage directions, "exit" is used for only one actor (e.g., Exit Hamlet), and "exeunt" for two or more (e.g., Exeunt Romeo and Juliet).
* A '''crescendo''' is NOT the loud climax of a piece of music or other sound -- the word you want is, well, '''climax.''' ''Crescendo'' (Italian: "I wax, I grow greater") refers to the ''process of getting louder'', an increase in volume over time, which ultimately may lead to a climax (or instead subside again in a '''decrescendo.''') "The noise rose to a crescendo" is flat-out wrong, in fact semi-redundant (rather like "His speed increased to an acceleration"), and will produce winces among the musically-trained.
* '''{{Muppet}}''', apart from use as an insult, is repeatedly used (even on Wiki/ThisVeryWiki!) to refer to advanced rubber puppets of the type seen in ''Film/TheDarkCrystal'' and ''Series/{{Farscape}}''. In reality, Creator/JimHenson himself said that those characters are not Muppets, but rather [[http://muppet.wikia.com/wiki/Muppets_vs_Creatures Creatures]]. ''Muppet'' refers specifically to the felt-type characters seen in ''Series/SesameStreet'', ''Series/TheMuppetShow'' and ''Series/FraggleRock'', because they are a {{Portmanteau}} of "marionette" and "puppet".[[note]]What about Big Bird? Or is that a costume?[[/note]] It's also a trademarked name, meaning that if Creator/{{Disney}} (the currect rights holder for the name) doesn't say something is a Muppet, it's not a Muppet. (*Cough*[[Franchise/StarWars Yoda]]*cough*)
* Contrary to what some believe, '''arbitrary''' does not mean the same thing as "random" or "ever-changing." It refers to a decision, definition, or policy which ''lacks a basis in prior precedent''. It is true that policies based largely on arbitration usually change rapidly and seemingly at random, but that is only a side effect. It is not the definition of the word.
* Being '''agnostic''' does not mean that a person is "undecided" about the existence of a god; it means that they believe that that both the existence or nonexistence of the divine is ''inherently'' unknowable. This is the reason for the word's Greek etymology: it comes from the prefix ''"a-"'' (meaning "lacking" or "without") and the root word ''"gnosis"'' (meaning "knowledge").[[note]] Technically, it should also be pronounced "AY-noss-tick" rather than "AGG-noss-tick", since the "g" is silent in the Greek word ''"gnosis"''. But that's another issue.[[/note]]
* "Please '''bare''' with me". No, I don't know you well enough. But if you like, I'll try and '''bear''' with you (in the metaphorical sense of following where you're going).
* '''[[VirusMisnomer Virus]]''' and '''bacteria'''[[note]] Also note that 'bacteria' is a plural, with the the singular form being 'bacterium'- but that's another issue. [[/note]] are often used interchangeably to mean 'pathogen' (i.e. a microorganism that causes disease), but are actually specific types of microorganism and are very different. Viruses are non-living, can only replicate inside host cells, are always pathogenic, and are far smaller than bacteria. In contrast, bacteria are alive, can reproduce by themselves, and are far larger than viruses. In addition, many of them are not pathogenic- your skin is literally covered with mostly harmless bacteria. Viruses and bacteria also cause different diseases, which is a fact many people ignore- for example, people worry about bacteria from people with flu, even though flu is a viral disease.
* '''Fluid''' is not a synonym of '''liquid''', as a fluid is anything that can flow. This includes liquids, gases and plasma.
* '''Sulphur''' is an element which, under standard conditions, is a yellow solid, which means it does not have a smell because in order for a substance to have a smell it has to be a gas. However, many people still compare smelly things to sulphur (for example, by saying that something which smells bad "smells like sulphur"). The misconception that sulphur has a smell may have arisen from confusion between sulphur, sulphur dioxide (which is formed when sulphur burns) and hydrogen sulphide (which decomposes to form elemental sulphur, meaning it's often found near sulphur), as the latter two chemicals are both odourants.
** And while we're on the subject, the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry (IUPAC), the body in charge of chemical nomenclature, spells it "sulfur". (This was a compromise between British and American English speakers, in exchange for the British English spelling of "aluminium".)
* A '''[[LoopholeAbuse loophole]]''' is an unintentional gap or grey area in the law usually caused by inadequate descriptions and definitions. A '''provision''' or an '''exemption''' [[note]]The later term usually refers to taxes while the former refers to everything else[[/note]] is a written in exception to the law and is very much intentional. Provisions and exemptions are often mistaken for loopholes, especially by people seeking to remove provisions. For example only a small minority of corporate tax "loopholes" are actually loopholes while the rest are very much intentional tax exemptions.
* A '''softlock''' is a particular kind of software freeze, in which the program still runs, but none of the user's input is functional. Beginning in 2017, some members of the ''Franchise/{{Pokemon}}'' fandom have been using the word to refer to situations where the player cannot progress farther in the game, which is better known as being "{{unwinnable}}", or just plain "getting stuck". The root of this confusion appears to be that around that time, the [=YouTuber=] WebVideo/{{Pikasprey}} Yellow uploaded a video titled "How to Escape Lorelei's Game-Ending Softlock", about one possible unwinnable scenario which completely takes control away from the player thanks to a design oversight, making it a true softlock. From this, his watchers generalized the word to ''all'' cases of UnwinnableByInsanity, even though none of the others qualify. Pikasprey himself has since begun a new video series titled "[=SoftlockPicking=]", about his Houdini-esque ways of escaping these "unwinnable" situations the viewers get him into, which unfortunately would appear to spread and perpetuate this incorrect usage.
* '''Lava''' and '''magma''', while related, are not one and the same. Lava is molten liquid rock that has been expelled from a volcano and is flowing on the surface whereas magma is the same substance that's inside the volcano and has not ejected to the surface. Due to lava being used to describe magma in most video games and films, lava is used as the catch all term for liquid rock no matter where it's situated.
* '''Refute''' means ''to provide evidence to prove falsehood''. If somebody insists they are refuting a claim demand they do so.
* A '''run-on sentence''' is not "a very long sentence". A run-on sentence is a grammatical error when two independent clauses either lack proper punctuation separating them, or a period indicating that they are two sentences.[[labelnote:e.g.]]"I went to the market Jane went home." is a run-on sentence. It can be corrected either by adding a comma and a coordinating conjunction ("I went to the market, and Jane went home."), a semicolon or similar punctuation ("I went to the market; Jane went home."), or by making it two sentences with a period ("I went to the market. Jane went home.").[[/labelnote]]. A three thousand word-long sentence can still be grammatical, and won't be a run-on sentence as long as it uses proper punctuation and coordinating conjunctions.
* '''Beta''' or '''beta male''' is often used to mean "man who isn't manly enough", however this is inconsistent with actual animal behavior. In a pack the betas serve more as the NumberTwo to the alpha, but still outrank the rest of the pack and may even [[KlingonPromotion kill their masters and take over]]. The most common example of the alpha/beta male dynamic, wolf packs, is also itself a DeadUnicornTrope. Wolf packs in the wild are simply families, and the alpha male and female are the parents. The researcher who first popularized that theory, L. David Mech, was observing wolves in zoos, where unrelated canines are grouped together and they take on more of a prison mentality. Mech eventually renounced the theory once he saw that wolves in the wild don't act that way.
* People often confuse '''Negative reinforcement''' with punishment. It actually means rewarding someone by taking ''away'' a bad thing, e.g. "Do what we say and we'll take your handcuffs off." In operant conditioning, the phrase "negative reinforcement" makes a pair with "positive reinforcement"; they both "reinforce", that is they both increase the likelihood that a behavior will be repeated. "Positive" and "negative" here do not carry the meaning of "good" and "bad", but rather the mathematical meaning of "adding" and "taking away". Therefore:
** Positive reinforcement: adding a stimulus to increase the likelihood that a behavior is repeated; ''"You cleaned your room! Here's some candy."''
** Negative reinforcement: removing a stimulus to increase the likelihood that a behavior is repeated; ''"You cleaned your room! I'll stop nagging you about it."''
** Positive punishment: adding a stimulus to decrease the likelihood that a behavior is repeated; ''"You left dirty clothes everywhere again! You're grounded."''
** Negative punishment: removing a stimulus to decrease the likelihood that a behavior is repeated; ''"You left dirty clothes everywhere again! You're not getting your allowance this week."''
* '''Terminal velocity''' is the speed at which a falling object doesn't accelerate any further no matter how long it falls, because drag and buoyancy are cancelling any further acceleration. A meteor, for example, does ''not'' reach terminal velocity at any point - it's already moving faster than that when it enters the atmosphere, and goes through it too quickly to slow down. The term also has nothing to do with the degree of lethality of the falling thing's impact, either to the item itself or to whatever it falls on.
* The term '''graphic novel''' is sometimes said to mean either "a comic book for adults" or "a comic book that's longer than single monthly issue". The actual definition is "A long-form work of graphic fiction that's published as a single volume rather than serialized". There are quite a few graphic novels written for children and young readers (''[[ComicBook/SmileandSisters Smile]]'' and ''ComicBook/AmericanBornChinese'' are two notable examples), and many long-form works of graphic fiction are originally published as multiple single issues before being collected and bound. Case in point: Creator/AlanMoore's ''ComicBook/{{Watchmen}}'' and Creator/NeilGaiman's ''ComicBook/TheSandman'' are often referred to as graphic novels, but they're actually not; ''Watchmen'' is a multi-part limited series that was originally published in single-issue installments before being collected as a single volume, while the ''Sandman'' series was originally an ongoing monthly comic book before it was published as a series of paperback collections.
* '''Unique''' means one of a kind. It does ''not'' mean unusual or special. Thus being "more unique" is like being "more pregnant" it just doesn't make sense. You ''could'' however say "almost unique" if there are only two of the thing in question.
* '''Infinitesimal''' means really small ''not'' really big. (think "infinitely small").
* Members of the far right often use '''Cultural Marxism''' (or '''Post-modern Neomarxism''') to mean "anything I don't like." While Cultural Marxism ''was'' a real denomination of Marxism taught at the Frankfurt School, the term in this far-right context characterizes the ideas and motivations of any number of different left-wing groups, many of whom are not aligned with each other or with the Frankfurt School, or similar in any way. Used in this way, the term has no meaning aside from being a piece of political invective. If it is understood to mean "the left," then it is imprecise and leads to the impression that the left are a unified Marxist front, which is ridiculous to anyone on the left, or anyone who has observed the left at any length: the left is quite as diverse and prone to infighting as the right, as it is defined as half of the left-right political spectrum. To sum up: neither of the words is particularly meaningful in that phrase as it is used by the far right.
* '''Atheism''' is lack of belief in a god or gods, while '''agnostic''' means being unsure whether there are any god(s). '''Nontheism''' usually refers to religions which don't have any gods, such as Buddhism.
* '''Prodigal''' is the opposite of "thrifty" or "frugal", meaning "wasteful", "frivolous", "Given to reckless or irresponsible spending" or "Living beyond one's means". But the most famous use of the word--by far--is in "The Parable of the Prodigal Son" from [[Literature/TheFourGospels the Gospel of Luke]], a story about an irresponsible young man who returns home to his parents after carelessly spending all of his money and winding up destitute. Because of this, it's often assumed to mean "Making a much-anticipated return after a long absence". But the Prodigal Son was "prodigal" because he spent all of his money, not because he was welcomed home by his parents afterwards.
* The idiom '''The exception proves the rule''' is often misused as a HandWave for any inconsistency in a person's argument, despite how this makes no sense [[FridgeLogic if you actually think about it]], e.g., If someone says "all birds are black" does the existence of doves prove they're right? Of course not. The real meaning of the saying is more akin to "the exception proves the rule applies by default" i.e if you see a sign at an intersection that says "no U-turn" you can infer that a U-turn is permitted whenever there ''isn't'' a sign forbidding it.
* '''Circa''' means "approximately" and is usually used to refer to dates. Therefore, you shouldn't use it when the exact date or other number is known: "[[AliceAndBob Alice was born circa 1987]]" is fine, "Alice was born circa May 5th, 1987" is not.
* A '''reprisal''' is an attack, particularly in warfare, carried out in retaliation for a previous attack. It is ''not'' the repetition of a musical number or a performance; that would be a '''reprise'''. Even Wiki/ThisVeryWiki made this mistake in the title of the trope RoleReprise, which was titled "Role Reprisal" for years.
* '''Real''' is an adjective, '''really''' is an adverb. While the former is often used in place of the latter (e.g., "She's a real nice girl"), this is considered colloquial at best and straight up wrong at worst, unless you meant she is a girl who is both nice and real as in not imaginary.
* By the same token: '''bad''' is an adjective and '''badly''' is an adverb. Thus, you ''probably'' mean you feel '''bad'''. To feel '''badly''' would mean your ability to feel is impaired.
* To '''earn''' money means to be given it in exchange for performing some work, service etc. To be given money for nothing is to simply '''get''' money.
* '''Brainchild''' refers to the concept or product created by a brain, not the owner of the brain doing the creating. For example, the World Wide Web is the brainchild of Tim Berners-Lee, not the other way round. The logical inverse would be something like '''brainparent''' but that's never caught on.
* '''Satire''' is not synonymous with "a joke", as people often misuse it to mean when saying "that was just satire", to mean "that was just a joke" (sometimes as a JustJokingJustification, though just as often out of ignorance). Satire has to be poking fun at a specific thing (be it a work of fiction or something in real life.) For example, the film ''Film/{{Spaceballs}}'' is a satire of ''Franchise/StarWars'', but just calling any comedy a satire is incorrect.
* To '''Care About''' someone is to have sympathy for them or concern for their well being. To '''Care For''' someone is either to literally take care of the person, or, idiomatically, to like that person or thing.
* '''Mansplaining''' is when a man condescendingly explains a subject to a woman, especially if it's a subject where she has expertise ("Whitesplaining," "Straightsplaining," "Cis-splaining," and others are related terms). Certain...sectors of social media have begun using that word ''any'' time a man disagrees with a woman online, regardless of his own expertise or any legit points he makes.
* '''People of Color''' refers to all racial minorities in countries where whites are the majority. It is not just a "nice" way to refer to black people.
* '''Deign''' isn't a "fancier" way of saying "dare". It means to do something you feel is beneath you, such as: "I didn't deign to respond to such a stupid comment."
* A '''Majority''' is over half, or 50 percent. A '''Supermajority''' is over two thirds, or about 66.6 percent. A '''Plurality''' is more than any other group/category etc, although less than 50 percent (e.g., if candidate A gets 40 percent of the votes, and the other three candidates get 20 percent each, candidate A gets the plurality of the votes).
* For some reason, it's become fashionable for people on the internet to use '''Classical Liberal''' to mean something like "conservative-lite". The correct meaning of "Classical Liberalism" is something more like what's now called '''Libertarianism.'''
* A train's '''Conductor''' is not its driver. That would be the '''Engineer.''' Conductors are the attendants who check tickets and assist passengers during the trip.
* '''Millenials''' are a generation of people born somewhere between the early 80's and the mid-90's. It does not mean "young person." If anything, the generation is approaching middle age.
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* '''Venomous''' and '''poisonous''' are not interchangeable, which is a common mistake in usage. ''Venomous'' means the subject has the ability to actively transmit poison. ''Poisonous'' means the subject transmits poison passively (ie. is eaten). Therefore, a poisonous frog means that it will poison those eating it, while a venomous snake means it will poison its victims by biting them and injecting toxins. As the mnemonic saying goes, "If it bites you and you die, it's venomous. If you bite it and you die, it's poisonous." [[note]]Similar issues happen in other languages -- for instance, in Spanish, ''venenoso'' (venomous) is very often used where ''ponzoñoso'' (poisonous) should be (although the opposite almost never happens), to the extent many assume both words are now synonyms, and that ''ponzoñoso'' is just an old word that is not used anymore.[[/note]] This means that, technically, if you are bitten by a snake or stung by a scorpion, the correct past tense is "I have been envenomed." This may be because most animal venoms are ''not'' harmful if swallowed...not that we'd recommend drinking it, since it can still enter the bloodstream through any cuts in the mouth.
* There is a famous (for a given value of "famous") poem by Lt. Col. Jeff Cooper, inventor of the "modern technique" of handgun combat:[softreturn]''A clip is not a magazine[softreturn]A mag is not a clip[softreturn]Neither is a grip a stock[softreturn]And "stock" does not mean "grip".[softreturn][softreturn]I do not mean to nitpick[softreturn]But improvement might be seen[softreturn]If we could bring ourselves to say[softreturn]Exactly what we mean.''
** A '''clip''' and a '''magazine''' are often used interchangeably, but military terminology is that a clip feeds a magazine (or the cylinder of a revolver) quickly; a magazine feeds into the weapon itself. A removable magazine is often referred to as a clip even by military sources, however.
*** This was highlighted early in 2014 when a California state senator delivered a press conference tirade where he kept using "30 calibre clip" and "30 magazine clip" to characterize the supposed firing speed of a gun.
** A '''stock''' is the part of a rifle, shotgun, or occasionally SMG or pistol that is braced against the shoulder; a '''grip''' is the part that is actually, well, [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin gripped]]—it's specifically the part of the gun that is held by the hand that pulls the trigger, and includes the trigger itself (though sometimes also used as a shortened form of "foregrip", the part of a long gun that is held by the off-hand to steady the weapon). The stock and grip are together part of the '''receiver''', the framework that holds the whole thing together (often called a '''frame''' on handguns).
*** To make things more confusing, in most classic rifles (i.e. non-automatic), a ''stock'' refers to the large wooden (or plastic) part all the metal parts (barrel, bolt and trigger assembly) are connected to. In this case, a part of stock behind the grip that is put against shooter's shoulder would be a 'butt'.
** A '''bullet''' is the metal slug fired from a gun. A '''cartridge''' or '''round''' is the unfired ammunition. A '''casing''' is the spent part of the cartridge ejected otherwise. Referring to unfired cartridges as bullets is a classic error. Similarly, '''shot''' is what's fired from a ''shotgun''. '''Shell''' can be both the unfired ammo and the spent casing.
*** To be extra confusing, old style cannon fired '''shot''' (solid projectiles) and '''shells''' (explosive projectiles). Explosive projectiles are still called shells.
** A '''barrel''' is the tube a bullet travels down when fired; before firing, the bullet sits (contained in a cartridge, see above) in a '''chamber'''. Revolvers have multiple chambers which rotate in a '''cylinder'''; other guns load their chambers (or "chamber rounds") from their magazines.
* For small arms, '''caliber''' means the width of the barrel at the narrowest point. "High caliber" is not, in fact, a way of saying "high power". E.g. A 7.62x39mm round fired from an AKM will not impart as much energy to a target as a 7.62x54mm round fired from a SVD Dragunov, nor will the 9x19mm Parabellum round impart as much energy as the 7.62x25mm Tokarev round.
** Another way to think of it is that a "high caliber bullet" will ''generally'' be fired from a bigger gun. However, caliber has nothing to do with strength ''by itself'' - if anything, the length of the cartridge (i.e. how much space there is in the casing for gunpowder behind the bullet) has more to do with the energy the bullet imparts on a target than the diameter of the bullet. If you're trying to say that a high caliber hand gun is more powerful than a low caliber rifle, chances are that you're ''wrong''. Unless you want to get into the specifics of grain count, rifling twist, bullet velocity and weight, you're better off assuming that handguns are less powerful than rifles.
*** To put it another way, "caliber" is absolutely not the same thing as [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stopping_power#Energy_transfer "stopping power"]]. A small-caliber bullet fired from a high-powered rifle is a lot more likely to kill you than a large-caliber bullet fired at a much slower speed -- the latter bulldozes its way through the entire region via [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydrostatic_shock hydrostatic shock]]; the former punctures its way through a narrow path. Kinetic energy is a function of the mass times the ''square'' of the speed.
** On the same subject, '''bore''' and '''caliber''' are not necessarily interchangeable. Traditionally for rifled weaponry, especially rifled artillery, "bore" denotes the number of turns in the number of calibers (i.e. how many times the width of the projectile down the barrel the projectile must travel to have one complete turn imparted on it by the rifling). So a rifled late Victorian artillery piece with one turn per 38 calibers is a 38 bore, but a smoothbore early Victorian cannon is a zero bore. To confuse matters further, in the UK the word "bore" is also used to mean the same as "gauge" in regards to shotguns: a measure of barrel diameter based upon the weight of a solid lead ball that will fit perfectly into the barrel, expressed as the denominator of a vulgar fraction of a pound if the numerator is one. Thus if the largest lead ball you can fit into the shotgun barrel weighs one twelfth of a pound, you have a 12-bore (or, in the US, 12-gauge) shotgun.
** To confuse matters, there are two separate meanings of the phrase "high-caliber," one of which means larger bullets, and the older of which means "fits the mold ideally." Therefore in other usage, higher caliber always means "better," but in guns it's just a straight technical term with no better/worse meaning.
** To confuse the situation even further, the term caliber is also used to indicate barrel length of artillery pieces, especially naval artillery. So when one refers to a 5"/ 38 caliber gun, one is referring to a gun with a barrel that is one caliber, or 5", internal diameter, and 38 calibers, or 190" long.
* '''Point-blank''' does not mean "at very close range". Point-blank refers to the maximum distance between a firearm and its target before one's aim needs to be adjusted for elevation. Of course, for field artillery or naval guns designed to launch shells in long parabolic arcs, that ''is'' quite a close range. For handguns or rifles, not so much.
* The word '''factoid''' is often used as if it meant "little fact" or "trivia," as in "here's a little factoid for you". It actually means "[[LittleKnownFacts something resembling a fact but with no evidence to support it]]"[[note]]"Factoids ... that is, facts which have no existence before appearing in a magazine or newspaper, creations which are not so much lies as a product to manipulate emotion in the Silent Majority." [N. Mailer, "Marilyn," 1973][[/note]], much like ''android'' is 'something that resembles a man'. Amusingly, this can often make the word more appropriate than the speaker's intention.
* '''[[RoyalBlood Royalty]]''' is not the same as '''[[BlueBlood nobility]]''' or '''gentry'''. Royalty is basically the nearest family of a ruler, while nobles are descendants of knights and landowners. There could be royal dukes and noble dukes. Gentry is somewhere between a subclass of nobility and a category of its own, as people in that class usually own land and are descended from well-established and well-connected families, but don't have hereditary titles or offices.
* '''Ironic''' doesn't (simply) mean "funny", "unexpected", "coincidental" or "cruel." See {{Irony}} for more on the subject, and IsntItIronic for more on the misuse.
** And on a similar note, '''cynicism''' isn't "sarcastic but more". Sarcasm is mocking, cynicism is jaded negativity.
*** And before '''cynicism''' got its current meaning, it was a Greek philosophy which taught that happiness is independence. From as much as possible - pleasures, law, other people...
* '''Impeach''' does not mean to remove someone from office. Impeachment is the process by which an individual is put on trial for unlawful activity. So Congress did not "''try'' to impeach" Bill Clinton, they did. He was not removed from office, though.
** In the legal context, it means to attack someone's credibility. At trial, both lawyers are trying to impeach the other's witnesses and it has nothing to do with elected office.
* '''Irregardless'''. While taken literally it could mean "not regardless", its usage is near-invariably as an erroneous synonym of "regardless." Linguists often refer to this fairly common phenomenon as "overnegation". In a case of ''actual'' irony, this is almost the exclusive purview of [[DelusionsOfEloquence people trying to sound more literate than they are, and achieving the exact opposite]]. In a case of ''further'' irony, you're vastly more likely to encounter this word in a style guide or as part of a joke than you are to ever hear anyone using it naïvely; we're calling out people who "don't know the language" by accusing them of using what was originally a non-word, even in a descriptivist sense. It is so common that the SAT has at least one question per writing section testing it. It is usually under the hardest questions, too. The Brothers Chaps lampooned this in their ''VideoGame/PeasantsQuest'' flash game by using the word "irredisregardless". The funny thing is, despite the word having no precedent, it's a triple negative, so it's technically correct.
* A '''Scientific Theory''' is [[GravityIsOnlyATheory not a guess, hypothesis, or conjecture.]] It's an established framework of one or more hypotheses with a significant body of evidence backing it. In other words, it's been "proven" to the extent it can be. If a model makes accurate predictions and is consistent with testing and/or observation it can eventually be called a theory, while the word hypothesis is reserved for an idea that you think might work but you haven't had the chance to rigorously test yet. As for why the word theory is used rather than, say, fact or law, this is simply a result of the general understanding that any theory may be incomplete or inaccurate. \\
\\
This doesn't mean we have any doubts about the validity of the theory itself, but that we may not know everything about it. Gravity is a good example, gravity is "only a theory". That is, our model of how gravity works may not be entirely correct; in fact we know it isn't, since our current theory does not incorporate quantum effects. That doesn't stop gravity from being real. Similarly evolution simply means change, and in the context of biology simply means change from one generation to the next in terms of genetic makeup. Our current theory of how species evolve through natural selection is a theory because the model may not be perfect, but the fact that organisms change from generation to generation is an observable fact. \\
\\
Incidentally, even in non-scientific usage the word '''theory''' did not always mean guess. If you look at how, say, Literature/SherlockHolmes would use the word theory, it would be a model explaining a crime, which is based on evidence, is testable, and has explanatory powers.
** It should be noted that this word is now subject to a misconception of the opposite sign, as a result of an overzealous response to the above mistake. The word "theory" does not imply that an idea is unproven, but neither does it imply that it is proven: it really doesn't say anything about the degree of confidence in it. For example, the theory of phlogiston is a thoroughly disproven scientific theory on combustion. It's still a theory, i.e. a system of ideas that aims to explain scientific phenomena on the basis of general principle - it's just that nobody believes in it any more.
** The core "essence" of a proper theory (and by extension hypothesis) is it has the property of ''falsifiability.'' This merely means that it's possible to construct a repeatable experiment to test ''if'' it's wrong. The actual outcome (proven correct or proven wrong) is irrelevant.
** As a further, a scientific '''law''' doesn't mean it's "more proven" than a theory. A law is (loosely) is something derived from a theory to cover a certain point. If your theory were "[[Series/{{Torchwood}} Jack Harkness]] is the sexiest creature in existence." then a one law might be "If you are in Jack Harkness' presence for more than 31.2 seconds, you ''will'' snog him." In more scientific the classic e=mc^2 is a law derived from the Theory of Relativity.
* The word '''Decimate''' is very frequently used a synonym of words like destroy, annihilate, or obliterate. Its actual definition is literally to destroy one tenth of something. [[note]]And being more pedantic, its a form of punishment used on Roman legions where legionaries draw straws and 1/10th are killed[[/note]]. The definition has loosened to mean, "kill a large percentage of" but it's still wrong to use it to mean "almost destroyed" or "completely destroyed" like some people do.
* The words '''racism''', '''prejudice''' and '''stereotype''' are often confused. Racism is defined as any policy or belief based in whole or in part on the pseudo-scientific theory that all humanity consists of biologically distinct races and that every member of each race has the distinct physical and/or behavioral characteristics of that race[[note]] Genetically, there are either tens of thousands of races or none, depending on whether you want to go for meaningful biological differences (none) or extremely minor ones (tens of thousands). The main problem with "racial" theory is that races aren't distinct, and not all the members of the supposed "races" have the characteristics they're supposed to have. [[/note]]. Prejudice means the belief that "[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prejudice a group of people [are] characterized by their race, social class, gender, ethnicity, sexual orientation, age, disability or religion]]." Stereotypes, on the other hand, are "generalizations of existing characteristics that reduce complexity" (also copied from Wiki/TheOtherWiki). So, the belief of the USA's 'Southern' slave-owners that anyone who was not an Anglo-Saxon European was by default of an inferior race was racism, the belief of Anglo-Saxon settlers that the USA's Amerindian peoples were savages was prejudice, and the belief that all Canadians constantly say "eh" is a stereotype. Stereotype is a ''neutral term''; often when people use the term in a pejorative manner, it is to attack a ''lazy'' stereotype -- that is, a blanket statement that assumes homogeny among an entire spectrum of demographic.
** Similarly, people often use '''discrimination''' to mean negative treatment based on prejudice. In fact, discrimination simply means ''any'' differential treatment, regardless of what such differentiation is based on or whether such treatment is positive or negative. Which is why we have an article for PositiveDiscrimination. Discrimination can and is perfectly rational and justifiable in many situations: for instance, the practice of hiring the more qualified candidate for a job is a form of discrimination. Another example would be to discriminate between foods one likes and doesn't like (i.e. ordering the strawberry shortcake over the apple pie because you do not like cinnamon)--this last sort of "discrimination" is why "discriminating" is a compliment in dealing with matters of taste (e.g. the ''discriminating'' wine-drinker can tell the ''Grand Cru'' Bordeaux from the [[ATankardOfMooseUrine plonk]], and is considered to have Good Taste because he "discriminates" in favour of the former over the latter). You will often see this used correctly in military contexts. If armed forces are said to be indiscriminate, they have crossed the MoralEventHorizon.
** Finns have become really, really bad at misusing "racism" ("rasismi") in the past ten years or so. People talk about "age racism" or "fat racism" or god forbid, even "sex racism" because they think "racism" just means "discrimination". Part of this stems from the English loanword "rasismi" replacing the old, 100% Finnish word "rotusyrjintä" (literally "race discrimination"). Nobody in their right mind would use a term like "ikärotusyrjintä" ("age race discrimination"), but "ikärasismi", "age racism" is ridiculously popular.
** '''Bigotry''' is often generalized into discrimination of any kind. In actuality, [[http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/bigotry bigotry]] is merely intolerance of beliefs other than one's own. Other factors, such as race, are not relevant to the designation.
* There appears to be a confusion about the words '''sexism''' and '''misogyny'''. Sexism is discrimination and stereotyping based on sex, and encompasses all forms of discrimination based on sex (indeed, even men who believe that women are inherently better than men, for example). '''Misogyny''' and '''misandry''' are hatred of women and men respectively. Some dictionaries have expanded this to include deep-seated prejudice against women or men respectively (so a womanizer who sees women only as sex objects would be a misogynist, despite his claims to love women).
* '''UsefulNotes/{{Feminism}}''' often gets misused for '''misandry'''. Feminism is the advocacy of women's rights on the grounds of political, social, and economic equality to men and nothing more. Unfortunately, due to a VocalMinority of feminists who tend to skew issues into an "us vs them" rhetoric, their advocacy for equality is often conflated with outright hatred for men.
* There is some confusion as to what a '''Justification''' is in the wiki's jargon, due to the everyday use of the term in Administrivia/JustifyingEdit. A JustifiedTrope ''does not'' require a Administrivia/JustifyingEdit. A trope is justified when the in-universe explanation for its use makes sense in context. A Administrivia/JustifyingEdit is just a fan of a work complaining that another editor [[FelonyMisdemeanor dared]] list that work under [[Administrivia/TropesAreTools a particular trope page]].
* '''Polygamy''' is "marriage of one person to more than one spouse" (to distinguish it from "group marriage"). It is not just a synonym for "polygyny", "marriage of a man to more than one wife". Most arguments brought up in response to "What's wrong with polygamy?" (e.g., "It oppresses women") are just irrelevant to "polyandry", "marriage of a woman to more than one husband". (And not just because "polyandrists do not exist", which is also factually incorrect.)
* A '''Battleship''' is a combat vessel that relies primarily on large caliber guns (11 inches or bigger) to do damage and is armored to withstand guns of equal power, if not greater power. It is not any ship meant to do battle, that would be a '''Warship'''. Nobody builds or uses battleships anymore[[note]]The last used were the American ''Iowa'' class[[/note]] (though several are preserved as museums) because missiles and aircraft carriers have rendered their construction uneconomical.
* While we're at it, a '''Cruise Ship''' and a '''Cruiser''' are very different types of ships. A cruiser is a medium-sized, long-range military vessel while a cruise ship is a passenger ship designed for pleasure cruises. Scifi writers screw this one up all the time [[SpaceIsAnOcean when naming spaceships,]] to the point that it's not unheard-of for one setting to use the terms both correctly and incorrectly.
* You can only ''truly'' '''plead the Fifth''' in a particularly bad court of HollywoodLaw. The correct phrase is to "TAKE the Fifth" (for those non-Americans unaffected by the EaglelandOsmosis: "The Fifth" is the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States, one clause of which protects against self-incrimination; better known as [[ReadingYourRights "you have the right to remain silent"]]). Pleading in a criminal prosecution[[note]]In a civil action, pleading is "the pleadings": the plaintiff's complaint (i.e. "the defendant did this, and this, and this, and that's such-and-such tort/breach of contract/other issue) and the defendant's answer to that complaint (which usually consists of responding to the complaint point-by-point by saying "Admitted" or "Denied" but can also be quite complicated--the least complicated being the common "This is a conclusion of law requiring no response, but to the extent it alleges any fact it is denied.").[[/note]] requires a '''plea''', most often "not guilty" or "guilty". (There's also ''nolo contendere'', "no contest": "I didn't do it, but I will not fight the charges," usually done to avoid civil liability on the grounds of [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Res_judicata res judicata/collateral estoppel]]--particularly when the criminal penalty is relatively light but the damages in a subsequent civil suit will be ''massive'' if the case goes against you.)
** While 'The Fifth' is not a plea, most courts will understand the statement "I plead the fifth" as a suspect explicitly invoking their Fifth Amendment right to avoid self-incrimination. According to the Supreme Court, while a suspect must explicitly invoke the right, "No ritualistic formula is necessary in order to invoke the privilege" ([[https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/349/155/ Quinn v. United States, 349 U. S. 155, 164 (1955)]]).
* Similarly (and technically), '''pleading insanity''' is shorthand used outside of court for pleading "not guilty by reason of mental disease or defect".
** Also worth noting is that one cannot be '''diagnosed''' as insane, because insanity is a legal concept, not a medical one. Even if a medical professional determines a person is mentally ill, a court must decide if that mental illness is legally relevant. In general, while having a mental illness or severe cognitive difficulty is an element of the court's decision, at the end of the day you are '''adjudicated''' insane, not diagnosed as such.[[note]]In the English-speaking countries, there are four standards for determining whether someone is legally insane. The oldest, called the ''M'Naghten'' rule after a case where the defendant believed the person he was shooting was Sir UsefulNotes/RobertPeel, articulates the rule that you (1) had a "mental disease or defect" such that (2) you either didn't understand what it was you were doing or didn't know that it was wrong. Some US states thought this too harsh, and changed the rule to be that (1) you had some kind of mental disease or defect and (2) it created an "irresistible impulse" to perform the criminal act. In TheSixties, some US states ''still'' thought this was too harsh, so they said that if (1) you had some kind of mental disease or defect and (2) that mental disease or defect "caused" you to commit the crime, you were insane. Finally, the authors of the Model Penal Code, an American attempt (mostly failed) at unifying the 50 states' criminal laws, thought that both the ''M'Naghten'' rule and the "irresistable impulse" rule made good points, sort of combined the two, stating that if (1) you had some kind of mental disease or defect such that (2) you could not (a) understand what you were doing OR (b) that it was wrong OR (c) you could not "conform [your] conduct to the law", the defense would be applicable.[[/note]] Similarly, on the civil side, you can also be adjudicated legally incompetent to do any number of things (to sign a contract, to commit a tort, to make a will, to serve as trustee of a trust); although the standard for that is a lot lower--"incompetence" can include moderate senility, for example--it is possible to have some kind of mental illness or cognitive difficulty and still be deemed legally competent to handle one's own affairs.
** Similarly, '''insanity''' means someone being mentally ill or being extremely illogical/foolish. Most people use the pop culture version taken from ''VideoGame/FarCry3'' where a character states that insanity is "doing the same thing over and over, expecting things to change". While someone who is mentally ill can exhibit such a behavior, it is not what insanity is all about.
* The phrase "'''compare and contrast'''" is redundant. '''Contrasting''' involves comparing—contrasting is comparing only the differences, while '''comparing''' in the broader sense may also note similarities. This error in rampant in this very wiki.
* '''Exponentially''' means "increasing at a rate which is also increasing", not merely "increasing" and certainly not "a lot". Mathematically speaking, "exponentially more" refers only to the difference between the rates of increase of two functions, and has a much more specific meaning than "this is growing faster than that"[[note]]The mathematical meaning of "exponentially more/less" is about the asymptotic complexity of a function equal to the difference between two functions. (More specifically, a function f(x) is said to be "exponentially greater" than another function g(x) if their difference (f(x) - g(x)) is a function that has the same asymptotic complexity as some function h(x) that grows exponentially with x. Another, probably more common definition is that their ratio (f(x)/g(x)) grows faster than any power of x. If one starts to be pedantic, the latter is called super-polynomial, and most people insist on using ratios (2^x doesn't really grow faster than 2* 2^x)) This means that it's incorrect to say that something is "exponentially more/less" than something else when the two things being compared are just constant quantities, rather than quantities that increase as functions of some variable (such as time).[[/note]] Values that stay the same or increase at steady rate are not, by definition, "exponentially" ''anything''. Most people who say this mean "orders of magnitude greater". An "order of magnitude" is (usually) ten times[[note]]Mathematically speaking, an order of magnitude is a factor of whatever the base value is. Saying that it is "usually ten times" reflects the generic standard that most mathematics is done in base ten. An order of magnitude in binary, for example, would be a factor of 2, while an order of magnitude in hexadecimal would be a factor of 16, ''et cetera''.[[/note]], so more than one would be 100 times, 1000 times, or more. That said, a quantity that is ten times larger than its starting value after one year, 100 times larger after two years, and 1000 times larger after three, can be said to be growing "exponentially" as the relation between value N and time t is one of N=10^t or N≈44.7e^t.
* A '''quantum''' is a discrete unit of something. Therefore, when Film/JamesBond finds his Film/QuantumOfSolace, he doesn't feel that much better[[note]]Which was how it was meant in [[Literature/ForYourEyesOnly the original story]]. The idea was that when the last quantum of solace is removed from a relationship a man might do anything[[/note]]. A quantum ''leap'' is a change directly from one state to another, without any defined intermediate states happening along the way. The distance leaped over does not need to be the smallest possible. [[http://www.irregularwebcomic.net/1554.html Some pedants have not quite grasped this]].
** To better describe, think of the word "quantity". When you have a quantity of something, i.e. a specific number of units of it, those units are ''quanta''. In physics, a quantum specifically means "the minimum amount of a physical entity involved in a physical interaction" (from Wiki/TheOtherWiki).
* '''Inflammable''' is not an antonym to '''flammable'''; it's a synonym. The antonym is '''non-flammable'''. (Granted, this is played for comedy more often than it's used seriously...)
** The confusion here is mostly due to the fact that inflammable (derived from "inflame") doesn't come from the typical [in-] negation, it comes from [en-], to give or receive. "Flammable" is actually the newer word, created because people knew that this exact mistake would be made. It makes sense once you consider that the archaic ''enflame'' is similar to enrage and enjoy.
** [[WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons "Inflammable means flammable? What a country!"]]
** [[VideoGame/MassEffect2 "Flammable! Or inflammable, forget which. Doesn't matter!"]]
** '''Creator/GeorgeCarlin''': "Flammable... inflammable... non-inflammable. Why are there three of them? Either it flams or it doesn't!"
** [[VideoGame/KingdomOfLoathing "It tries to set your face on fire, but you're inflammable."]] Wait, that means flammable. You're [[BuffySpeak "un-light-on-fire-able."]]
*** Of course, if someone ''did'' successfully light your face on fire, you'd suffer '''inflammation''', which is a physiological response to injury. So you'd be '''inflamed''' as well as inflammable.
* '''Mano a mano''' is a commonly used Spanish and Italian term that translate as "hand to hand," (which means the same thing as in English, but with a connotation of "evenly matched"). It '''does not''' means "man to man"[[note]]as two man on man kisses were described at the 2009 MTV Movie Awards[[/note]]. This is what is known in linguistics as a false friend. Sincerely saying that you want to settle things "mano a mano" before [[NeverBringAKnifeToAGunFight pulling out a gun is an example.]]
** Although, technically in some countries people shorten the word "hermano" (brother) to just "mano". So it could also be "brother to brother" ("hermano" or "mano" has been used as an identifier even if the person in question is not a sibling at all.)
** Even worse is when someone says "mano y mano" which is hand and hand, making no sense in relation to fighting, and even less sense when they think they are saying "man and man". [[HoYay Unless...]]
* The word '''whom''' is used by many as simply "who, but fancier." "Whom" is a ''direct or indirect object'', so if you ever see someone use it otherwise ("Whom are you?" for example), they're futzing it up. As a general rule, replace the usage of "whom" with "them" (and, correspondingly, "who" with "they") and see if it still makes sense.
** "Whom" is used to describe people something happens ''to'', and "who" describes people who ''do'' something. You might ask about a proposed business deal, "Who affects the deal?" and "Whom does the deal affect?"
* "Wherefore", as in Shakespeare's ''Theatre/RomeoAndJuliet'', does not mean "where", but "why"; "wherefore" is to "therefore" as "what" is to "that". Juliet was not wondering where Romeo was, but rather wondering why the man she loved had to be Romeo, one of her family's hated rivals. (Juliet's whole thing in the balcony scene is a meditation on the meaninglessness of labels.)
* People have been told not to say "Me and Joe went to the park", but "Joe and I ...". For too many, this has morphed to a general anxiety around the word "me", so they always use '''and I'''. This is a mistake. "He saw Joe and I" is wrong (it should be "Joe and ''me''").
** "I" is when you are the subject, and "me" is when you're an object. This does not change if you are accompanied by someone else.
** First person singular pronouns always go after anything else when multiple subjects or objects are involved, so "I and ..." is never correct. (This is courtesy, not grammar.)
** If you have trouble knowing whether or not to say "I" or "me", [[https://youtu.be/N4vf8N6GpdM?t=67 take out the other person/thing/whatever and see if the sentence still makes sense]]. ("Joe and I went to the park" changes to "I went to the park", not "Me went to the park")
** This is only the case in formal English, however. In discourse, almost all speakers will accept "Me and Joe went to the park" as an informal but grammatical variant. "Me and Joe" is somewhat more common than "Joe and me", an interesting inversion of the above "first person last" rule.
** Similarly, "He saw Joe and I" is used consistently by some speakers of e.g. Northern Californian English. This is probably hypercorrection in avoiding "me" entirely, as noted above, which has been adopted into the dialect.
** People who have been told that ''and I'' is not a panacea will often abuse the word '''myself'''. This is a mistake as well. Myself is ''reflexive'' -- when you're both the subject and the object. "I wet myself", "I touch myself" and "I cut myself" are all okay (grammatically, that is). "Please send the memo to Joe and myself" is wrong. You mean "... to Joe and me."
** Settling this and the above immediate point of grammatical confusion: In all cases where you list any series of individuals, ending with "and I/me", the way you settle the "I vs. me" is to eliminate everyone else from the list and isolate the "I/me". For instance, "Joseph, Victoria, and I went to the amusement park and rode the Thunderstrike," is correct because "I went to the amusement park..." would also be correct. Similarly, "Grandma Robinson regularly sent Joseph, Victoria, and me $5 checks on our birthdays," is also correct because "Grandma Robinson regularly sent me..." would also be correct.
** Possessives can get awkward as well, such as the cringeworthy "Joe and I's apartment." If you absolutely cannot get away with "Me and Joe's apartment," and the context isn't clear enough to just say "Our apartment," then the correct formal phrasing would be "Joe's and my apartment" for the same reasons listed above: "Joe's apartment" and "My apartment" are both correct by themselves.
* Ah, '''passive''' is another great example. Passive is a ''voice'', not a ''tense''. Similarly, '''indicative''' and '''subjunctive''' are ''moods'', not tenses.
** Also, people tend to confuse progressive aspect with passive voice. "I was kicking the ball" is not in the passive voice. "The ball was kicked by me" is.
*** A quick and easy way to identify passive voice- can you add "by [whatever]" after the verb/is it already there? Thus, you get "His brains were eaten (by [[EverythingsDeaderWithZombies zombies]])"- passive voice, "Zombies were eating his brains (by zombies)"- not passive voice.
*** Well, the examples in [[http://www.bartleby.com/141/strunk5.html#11 Strunk and White]] are a little painful, but not as painful as a [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E-Prime movement to discard passives and all other uses of "be"]].
* A '''vaccine''' is a component of a pathogen designed to induce immunity to it, not a miracle cure. Typically they are most effective before being exposed to the pathogen, though the rabies vaccine, which is typically given to humans after they are exposed to the rabies virus, is an exception. '''Vaccination''' and '''immunization''' are often, incorrectly, used interchangeably, but an immunization is simply anything that induces immunity, which includes vaccinations as well as antibody therapies that can cure a disease after exposure.
* '''Bemused''' has nothing to do with being "amused" -- in fact it means "utterly confused."
** Similarly, '''Nonplussed''' does not mean "aloof" or "unimpressed". It means "bewildered".
*** Or "unperturbed". Non-reacting due to confusion, or just non-reacting.
* '''Slander''' and '''libel''' tend to be used interchangeably. Libel is defamation in the form of ''written'' words, while slander is defamation in the form of ''spoken'' words. '''Defamation''' is a catch-all that covers both. With the advent of the Internet and lower barriers to publishing, the definitions are changing, but libel is generally public postings and slander is generally private words.
** The distinction (in the UK at least) comes from the permanence of the defamatory statement. If I said it to someone in a restaurant it's slander. If it happened to be inadvertently recorded and put in a movie soundtrack or written in an article, it's libel.
*** A.P. Herbert took this to the length of parody in "The Lawyer's Dream", where a bench of judges are arguing interminably about whether an audio recording is libel or slander?
** Mentioned in the first ''Film/SpiderMan1'' movie, as follows:
--->'''Peter Parker:''' Spider-Man wasn't trying to attack the city... he was trying to save it. That's slander.\\
'''J. Jonah Jameson:''' It is not. I resent that. [[ITakeOffenseToThatLastOne Slander is spoken. In print, it's libel.]]
** Also note for EaglelandOsmosis purposes that in all civil-law jurisdictions and many common-law ones (e.g. Virginia), slander and libel do not exist/have been merged and there is only "defamation" to cover injury arising from false statements, whether spoken or written. Also note that even in common-law jurisdictions that still respect the distinction, the only significant difference (in most jurisdictions) is in the proof needed for damages: with libel, all you need to show is "general" damages, i.e. put forward a good-faith estimate as to how much the damage to your reputation has cost you, but with slander, you need to prove "special" damages, i.e. need to point to at least one situation in which the injury to reputation had actually and directly harmed you (e.g. cost you a job) before you can collect anything (although if you can prove special damages, you can usually collect general damages as well).
* In {{Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game}}s, people often say, "Spell X has been '''casted'''" or "I have casted spell X". There is no word "casted". The word "cast" covers both present and past tenses. So both, "I will cast spell X on the monster" and "I have cast spell X on the monster" are the correct forms. The same conjugation is also used regardless of the specific thing or person being cast: Some sculptures are cast, actors are cast in movies.
* '''Puritanical''' means keeping "practicing or enforcing strict religious behavior." Its only tangentially related to anything sex related, and most certainly does not mean enforcing current laws about the age of consent (which in most countries is higher than the age specified in the dominant religion and derived from quite secular legislation). This does not stop more than a few pedophiles from calling such laws "puritanical."
* Another mistake frequently made in fantasy contexts is the conjugation of '''slay'''. As seen on acres of Disney World merchandise, "I slayed the dragon" is incorrect. "Slay" doesn't work like "play." Instead, it should be "I ''slew'' the dragon." Alternatively, "I ''have slain'' the dragon."
** {{Lampshaded}} in ''Series/BuffyTheVampireSlayer'', where Willow on one occasion had difficulty coming up with the right form. Giles, surprisingly, says either ''slew'' or ''slayed'' will do.
** You do not '''seen''' something. You ''saw'' it, or you ''have seen'' it, but you never '''seen''' it.
*** Most uses of the phrase "I seen it," especially those with enough emphasis to rule out a slurred "I've", are identifying the speaker as a hick.
* '''Inbreeding''' means [[KissingCousins breeding among]] [[BrotherSisterIncest closely related]] [[ParentalIncest individuals]]. Not breeding with members of another group or anything else. The confusion likely comes from the similar-sounding word "interbreeding." But ''in'' or ''intra'' refers to the inside and ''inter'' refers to the outside. [[note]]Other-word example: business between Los Angeles (in California) and Las Vegas (in Nevada) (e.g. an Angelino sells his 1964 Impala to someone in Vegas) is "interstate trade" or "interstate commerce". Business between Los Angeles and San Francisco (also in California) (same Angelino sells same car, but to someone in SF) is "intrastate trade" or "intrastate commerce".[[/note]] By the same token, '''interbreeding''' should not be used to mean marrying your sister.
* Similarly, a '''butler''' is the head of a large household of servants, dealing specifically with the wine cellars -- "butler" is, in fact, a corruption of "bottler". Because Jeeves is Bertie Wooster's only servant, his first job title would be "valet", although butlers may double as valets and vice versa.
** In one story, Jeeves' feelings are actually hurt when he is called on to buttle. That the normally unflappable "gentleman's gentleman" takes offense at something that seems trivial to us says that at one point it was a much more important distinction.
** Additionally, valet, when referring to a gentleman's servant, is always pronounced such that it rhymes with "pallet" or "mallet". Valet prounounced in the French style, such that it rhymes with "chalet", is an attendant who parks your car. In the United States, anyway. In the United Kingdom, they don't seem to make a distinction.
* While we're on the subject, '''claret'''--meaning a type of red Bordeaux wine and its associated colour--is pronounced to rhyme approximately with "merit". The word is a very old English borrowing, deriving from [[GermansLoveDavidHasselhoff medieval English nobles' love of a kind of dark rosé Bordeaux]] called ''clairet'', which the English eventually changed to "claret" as they began speaking English rather than French as a first language. They eventually began just calling any Bordeaux "claret," and when the preference of the English nobility (who [[UsefulNotes/NationalDrinks still love French wine, especially Bordeaux]]) shifted from a rosé to dark red, the name didn't change. Pronouncing it in the French manner is a hyperforeignism and frowned upon by the people who actually drink it. (You might be forgiven for your first offence if you're from a region or group that isn't familiar with the term--for instance, the same wine marketed as a "claret" in England will just be called a Bordeaux in America--but once you've been warned, you're on your own.)
* '''Interstellar''' means traveling between stars. Earth to Alpha Centauri is interstellar; Earth to Mars is interplanetary (and for heaven's sake not ''intergalactic''). ''Intrastellar'' travel would be travel within a star; ''transstellar'' would be across one; do not try either of these without serious heat shields or cooling tech unless you want to get fried to a crisp[[note]]You'll also get crushed; the sun masses c. 2 nonillion tons and averages half again as dense as water.[[/note]]. If you absolutely want to keep the ''stellar'' root for some reason, you might want to try ''circumstellar'' or ''parastellar'' on for size.
* To '''infer''' and to '''imply''' are different things. Person A may infer that Person B is stupid from the latter's misuse of words. Person A may then imply Person B's stupidity through witticism. Person B's inevitably incorrect response will be "Are you inferring that I'm stupid?" Person B is, in fact, inferring that Person A is implying that Person B is stupid, and they're right.
** The difference has been lampshaded by [[WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons Lisa Simpson]] and [[Series/LawAndOrderSpecialVictimsUnit John Munch]]: "You infer. I imply."
** As annoying as this can be for anyone with an interest in logic or literature, the use of infer to mean "suggest" is in fact ''very'' old; John Dryden is just the most famous writer to have used it that way. The difference between "infer" and "imply" is very useful, but it's actually wishful thinking to claim that the words have always meant different things.
** {{Lampshaded}} and PlayedWith in ''Series/TheDresdenFiles'' TV series:
-->'''Harry''': [[OurDragonsAreDifferent These drakes]], right, they can change shape? They're magical, immortal and all that. But you can change your appearance and you're magical and [stutters] you've been around a long, long time.
-->'''Ancient Mai''': Are you inferring something?
-->'''Harry''': Technically, I'm implying. You're inferring.
-->'''Mai''': Well, it's dangerous either way.
-->'''Harry''': You didn't answer my question.
-->'''Mai''': You didn't ask one. Which, at least, shows some common sense.
** {{Lampshaded}} in ''Series/TheThickOfIt'' Series Two, Episode Three:
-->'''Hugh''': Just tell me, truthfully, did you send that email?
-->'''Terri''': No I didn't... and [[IKnowYouKnowIKnow you know I didn't.]]
-->'''Hugh''': Sorry, are you inferring...?
-->'''Terri''': Implying.
-->'''Hugh''': You're implying that... it was me?
** One of Adam Warren's ''ComicBook/DirtyPair'' short stories has this as its main plot.
** This mistake is one of the [[MinorFlawMajorBreakup minor flaws]] that bother Music/WeirdAlYankovic so much in "Close But No Cigar".
* '''Disinterested''' is ''not'' a synonym for '''uninterested'''; it means, rather, that you are unbiased or have no vested interest.
** Though it wouldn't be unreasonable to be uninterested because you are disinterested.
** A good judge is disinterested; a tough audience is uninterested.
*** Ironically, the earliest recorded use of "disinterested" is in the sense that now belongs to "uninterested".
* A '''light-year''' is a measure of distance: the distance light travels in a year. Many writers have [[UnitConfusion made the mistake]] of using the term to describe a very long period of time. This is the one mistake ''guaranteed'' to infuriate pedants.
** In ''VideoGame/PokemonRedAndBlue'', the only trainer in the first Gym remarks, "You're light years away from beating Brock!" but then admits "Light years isn't time! It measures distance!" when beaten.
** Of course, often what a pedant interprets as literal but incorrect time could also be figurative and correct distance; a SufficientlyAdvancedAlien might well be light-years more advanced than us if you take it to be a metaphor using distance in place of quantity of technical and scientific knowledge.
*** In fact the construction "light-years ahead" is parallel to "miles ahead". Some pedants need to actually pay attention to the language they're using.
*** Literally, "to advance" is "to move forward", so if we define forward to be the direction of the alien planet, then it is most mechanically literal to interpret that as true, even if the aliens are using rocks. To interpret "advanced" as meaning the aliens have more sophisticated technology and comprehensive scientific knowledge is itself a figurative use of language.
** Of course, it's possible to get this both right [[http://www.answersingenesis.org/articles/kw/stars-far-away and wrong at the same time]].
* Similar to "light year", '''parsec''' is short for "parallax second", but is also a measure of distance, not time: 3.3 light years.[[note]]The distance to an object from the Sun if it has a one second yearly wobble in its appearant position in the sky due to being viewed from ''the Earth at different positions in space'' (different sides of the Sun). Even the closest star is a bit further away, meaning its parallax is smaller than one second.[[/note]] "Second" in this case refers to "seconds of arc", ''i.e.'', 1/3600 of a degree = 1/21,600th of a full circle. The ''[[Franchise/StarWars Millennium Falcon]]'' was able to shave ''distance'' off a smuggling run.[[note]]Or, as some fans like to believe, Han Solo was simply talking rubbish. (The original script actually contains stage directions to this effect, i.e. "Obi-Wan reacts with skepticism to Han Solo's attempt to impress them with obvious misinformation"; unfortunately, WordOfGod says it didn't quite come through on-screen, due to some poorly-timed film cuts between Alec Guinness and Harrison Ford.[[/note]]
* '''Conspicuous''' means "obvious," not "suspicious," no matter the way it sounds. Thus, if something was conspicuously absent, you are merely able to notice that it was absent; you do not necessarily have to raise an eyebrow at its absence.
** This may come from a character saying that they need to remain "inconspicuous" while in disguise or something similar. The character wants it to not be obvious they are in a disguise and consequently not be suspicious. Since they can say, "I want to be inconspicuous," or, "I don't want to be suspicious," interchangeably in such a situation, this may be why people equate them.
** By itself, conspicuous may not mean suspicious, but in that particular context it is implied the same as saying something is remarkably or questionably absent.
* '''Fascism''' is a loose political ideology that combines nationalism, militarism, anti-socialism and conservatism ([[EnemyMine insofar as Fascists and Conservatives can both agree that socialism and liberalism are bad]]). It's also associated with [[YouHaveOutlivedYourUsefulness anti-conservatism]] (because unlike conservatives they look to the future and not to the past for their ideal end-goal society), futurism, corporatism (i.e. Country-Corporation co-operation), military expansionism, and Social Darwinism. It's not a synonym for authoritarian, since one can be oppressive without being fascist. Most modern people and political parties that don't self-identify as "fascist" probably aren't fascists. Definite no-no's include communists, socialists, anarchists, feminists, environmentalists, liberals, libertarians, inter/anti-nationalists, pacifists, the USA's Republican and Democratic Parties, [[Creator/GeorgeOrwell Youth Hostels, Gandhi, women and dogs]]. To be more precise, even people showing antisemitic or xenophobic cannot be called "fascists" indiscriminately, as the original fascism introduced in Italy by Mussolini wasn't heavy on ethnic- or race- based xenophobia (fascists' aggression was usually directed towards their internal political enemies, chiefly the Catholic Trade Unions and Socialist Parties, while also strongly promoting Italian language and culture based nationalism). It was German National Socialism ("Nazism" or "Hitlerism") that introduced the ideas of racial superiority.
* '''Corporatism''' is the doctrine promoted by Mussolini that society should function as a body (Latin: ''corpus'') in which each of the various sectors of society (government, business, labor, etc.) are treated as "organs" within the body, interdependent and working toward the betterment of the whole. The term can include big business, but is broader than a simple collusion between business and government; "corporatism" has absolutely nothing to do with the English word "corporation."
** Relatedly, '''corporate personhood''' does not refer to letting companies vote or adopt children the way individual citizens can. It means a group of people ("a body") are treated as one person for administrative and certain legal purposes (particularly certain economic rights, including, most importantly, the right to enter into contracts and the right to sue and be sued). Perhaps ironically, "abolishing corporate personhood," if done without extremely fine precision, could ban labor unions, Indian tribes petitioning for reparations, and class-action lawsuits.
** And while we're at it, '''Corporation'''(public) and a '''Limited Liability Company'''(private) are two different things. Most people haven't even heard of the latter but their rights are the ones people often attribute "Corporate Personhood." To summarize, from a financial, and only financial, standpoint, a Limited Liability Company (LLC) is a person. This is because the whole reason [=LLCs=] even exist is so that a person can create a bufferzone between their business and their personal wealth. I.E. so no one can sue your local Mom and Pop coffee house for all their worth if their coffee ends up being too hot. Corporations do not have all of the same privileges that [=LLCs=]. For example a corporation can't discriminate on who it hires but an LLC ''can.'' On the other hand, [=LLC=] don't enjoy as many tax exemptions as corporations. From a legal perspective an LLC is person who enjoys the same, no more no less, privileges as an individual doing business.
* Strictly speaking, there is no single period in prehistory called '''[[OneMillionBC the Stone Age]]'''. The term originates from a listing of the three stages of a prehistoric society: Stone Age, Bronze Age, and Iron Age. In the most literal sense of the term, cowboys fought members of the Stone Age in the Wild Wild West; heck, there were still "Stone Age" people living in isolated parts of the world by the time ''WesternAnimation/TheFlintstones'' first went on air. The term is usually limited to Eurasian cultures, which complicates things.
** Strictly speaking, humanity as a whole had a single "Stone Age" (during which no sub-group had advanced beyond stone tools), after which the "Stone Age" becomes a term with more limited application, and terms such as "Bronze Age" began to apply as soon as one group use bronze for this purpose, even though they were the only ones. Likewise, the Stone Age would have begun with the first evidence of stone tools rather than the point at which stone tools become ubiquitous. Arguing otherwise would be akin to stating that we don't really live in the Space Age because most people alive right now have never ventured into space.
** Similarly, '''prehistoric''' does not necessarily mean ancient. "History" is "the study of what ancient people ''wrote'' about themselves," so for something to count as prehistoric, it merely has to predate the invention of writing (which was about 3500 BC). For this reason, there still exists a number of societies today which count as "prehistoric".
** Also, the Stone Age, Bronze Age, Iron Age were more a reference to the archaeology of Europe, the Middle East, and North Africa.
* '''Yea''' is an an archaic version of "yes" (sometimes still used in very formal context where one is asked to vote "yea" or "nay"). It is not an alternative spelling of "yeah", and is pronounced differently.
** And cartoonists often confuse it with "Yay!", which sounds the same but is a different word, an interjection expressing delight or enthusiasm. ("Yay/Yea, we won the game!")
** This is very probably simple coincidence due to onomatopoeia. The real instance of this trope would be those who misinterpret the older usage as being the newer usage.
* '''Object''' (the noun acted on by the verb) and '''subject''' (the noun [[BuffySpeak doing the verbing]]) are opposites.
* People use the word '''vagina''' to describe both a woman's vulva (external genitalia) and vagina (internal genitalia). Even the author of ''The Vagina Monologues''.
** Just to avoid making a false equivalency, "vulva" describes the entire external genitalia of the female, while "vagina" is one element of the internal genitalia (which also include the uterus, ovaries, etc).
*** Explained [[http://www2.ljworld.com/news/2003/may/04/v_is_for/ here]].
** Similarly, people seem to use '''Anus''', '''Rectum''' and '''Colon''' interchangeably, when [[ArtisticLicenseBiology they are very different parts of the digestive system with very different functions]]. Look 'em up!
* '''Consequences'''. It's commonly used to mean the negative results of an action; the opposite of a reward or benefit. Its actual definition is ''all'' results of an action, positive ''and'' negative.
* '''Infamous''' is frequently used to mean "very famous," which is far from correct. While it is not the opposite of fame (that would be obscurity), it actually means "having a very bad reputation", as in "the infamous UsefulNotes/JackTheRipper." Don't make the mistake that the Film/ThreeAmigos did when you're asked to meet someone infamous.
** Confusion may also arise from: 1) Deliberately-ambiguous sarcastic use and/or 2) the Jerry Springer effect, i.e. "I want my 15 minutes no matter what I have to do to get it".
** As described above, '''Infamous''' is not an antonym of ''famous''. Just wanted to clear it out: if something is ''infamous'', it actually ''has'' to have at least some (evil) fame.
** It is interesting, because original meaning of this word, now mostly forgotten, meant something different. Infamy was a form of punishment technically stripping the convicted of any legal protection, in other words, [[{{Outlaw}} outlawry]] (in the feudal world 'no fame' meant 'no one heard of him and no one will defend him'). Of course, the infamous had nothing left to lose, so they often were getting infamous in modern sense of this word.
* For another nice self-referencing example, compare the definition of '''{{trope}}''' in any reputable dictionary to the one used on this site. (For the sake of pedantry, assume the other wiki is not reputable.)
** Merriam-Webster agrees with us!
** So does the OED!
* '''Good''' vs '''Well'''. Good is an adjective. Well is an adverb. You look good, because good is describing you. You see well, because well is describing how you see. (You can look well, but in that cause 'well' is being used as measure of health, i.e. the opposite of 'You look ill'.)
** You can also correctly use 'look well' for 'look carefully', or 'look skillfully'. Similarly, the above could correctly describe a product that as part of its function interprets visual data. (A robot or something; if it's solely a camera, then its working is synonymous with its looking, and so it's still incorrect.)
** In ''Series/ThirtyRock'', Tracy Jordan even corrected the resident Harvard grad in the first episode: "No, Superman does good. You do well."
* Some people, including many English teachers, insist that the statement '''I feel bad''' is only correct if it is used to mean that the speaker's sense of touch is functioning improperly, and the proper way to express that one is suffering is to say "I feel badly." This is totally incorrect, and in fact, the reverse is true: in the first case, "bad" is a predicate adjective modifying "I" and linked to it by the linking verb "feel," whereas in the second case, "badly" is an adverb modifying the action verb "feel," and describes how one's sense of touch is functioning. Likewise, the statement "I feel good" is a completely correct response to the question "How are you?", since "good" is, again, a predicate adjective modifying "I"; pedants who insist that one say "I feel well" are incorrect, although that statement is also grammatically correct.
** As a rule, "feel" (in the sense of feeling a certain way), "look" (in the sense of looking a certain way, not looking ''at'' something), "sound", "smell", "taste" and all forms of "to be" ''do not take adverbs'', for the reasons given above.
** Like "no split infinitives," this is another example of a Latin rule being shoehorned into English. In Latin and Romance languages, "good" and "bad" are defining characteristics, akin to "saintly" and "evil" - to say that one is feeling evil today is a far cry from being tired. Instead, "I feel well" or "I feel unwell" (or a more specific feeling) are the typical answers in those languages. In English those words do dual duty as vague placeholders and as strong characteristics.
** This is possibly the best single example on the page that exemplifies the [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_language_processing natural language problem]], as well as why SesquipedalianLoquaciousness is sometimes quite justified. (i.e. "I feel bad." becoming "I feel less healthful." or "My epidermis is less sensate.") It's also how someone that WillNotTellALie can also be a ConsummateLiar through clever use of near synonyms, logical misdirection, etc.
* '''Literally''' is often used as a generic intensifier, a "smarter-sounding" substitute for "extremely" or similar. The irony is that the usage is most often figurative, when it ''actually'' means "not figuratively." Example of misuse: "It was literally a slaughter!" in reference to a sporting event, assuming said sport isn't a BloodSport. See LiteralMetaphor. Then there are the people who correct this by saying "You mean 'figuratively'," as in [[http://xkcd.com/725/ this]] ''Webcomic/{{xkcd}}''. That's also incorrect, as the desired effect was to speak hyperbolically, and using the word "figuratively" completely removes that meaning; what they really mean to say is an intensifier like "totally".[[note]]Incidentally, this isn't the first time a word has shifted from meaning "not figuratively" to being used as an intensifier. "Very" (from "verily," meaning "true") and "really" also have their roots in words meant to distinguish factual truth from exaggeration. Perhaps in time the original meaning of "literally" will have also become so diluted by being used for emphasis that we'll have to come up with another word to take its place.[[/note]]
* '''Peruse''' means "to read thoroughly", not "to skim."
** [[http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/peruse The dictionary.com entry has an interesting usage note concerning this]].
* '''Scan''' has been similarly diluted in common usage, perhaps because computers scan things so quickly.
** In language teaching, both ''scan'' and ''skim'' refer to quick-reading techniques: ''scanning'' is quickly reading through a text to find a particular piece of information, whereas ''skimming'' means quickly reading through a text to catch the general gist.
* '''Incredulous''' means "not believing," not "incredible." If someone sees something incredible, then they can be incredulous.
** It helps to think of it this way: the base of the two words is 'credible' (meaning 'can be believed') and the negation prefix 'in'. If something is 'incredible', it is not believable, or unbelievable (similar to 'fantastical'. If you are being 'incredulous', you are being the opposite of credulous (which means 'easily believing'), not treating something with credulity, or you don't believe it.
** Another mnemonic: In general ''people'' are incredulous while ''things'' are incredible.
** In ''Film/TheAccidentalTourist'', it's pointed out that '''lacking credence''' is the proper use of the word.
* The difference between "rob" and "steal": You '''rob''' a person when you '''steal''' their property.
** Technically, robbery is defined more narrowly than this: it's taking someone's goods by threat of violence. But yes, it's never correct to say "My wallet got robbed" or "He robbed my wallet", but "I was robbed of my wallet" is correct.
*** If someone solely stole the money without stealing the wallet itself, one could argue that the wallet was robbed of its money. This would also apply if the victim were a self-aware wallet.
** "Burglary" is a different kind of theft from "Robbery". If you leave your wallet at home, and when you get back, discover that it was ''stolen'', you've been ''burgled''. Or "burglarized" if you're in the United States.
*** Legally speaking, burglary doesn't have to involve stealing (larceny and theft cover those). Burglary is the entrance of a building with the intent to commit a crime therein. You don't even have to actually complete the act you entered the building to do. If Alice enters Bob's house with the intent to murder Bob (or steal from him, assault him, or write a bad check while sitting on his couch), she has committed burglary, whether or not she actually does the deed. In some areas, [[{{Thoughtcrime}} even if you change your mind about committing the crime once you're inside,]] you can still be on the hook for burglary. As a result, burglary is a favorite of prosecutors as it can be added as a charge to many different acts. The case law of what constitutes "building" and "entry" can get a little silly.
* The term "Assault and Battery" exists because the two represent different parts of the same act. '''Assault''' is a a threat which suggests that "immediate harmful contact" will occur; '''battery''' occurs upon contact. Swinging a bat at somebody is assault. Hitting somebody with a bat is battery. Consequently, the latter usually depends on the former, except when the threat is unknown until contact. Generally, the contact doesn't have to be violent; the rule is that any unwelcome ''touching'' is battery (although as a practical matter you have to meet a certain threshold in order to get the authorities to prosecute). An unwanted pie in the face or kiss on the cheek constitutes assault and battery; thus some statutes on sexual assault actually call it "sexual battery" on the theory that you're punishing the touching, not the threat.
** Different jurisdictions have different definitions. Example: what the MPC and the above call "Battery" is called "Assault" in Delaware, and what the above calls "Assault" is named "Menacing".
** Bear in mind that both assault and battery are not only crimes, they are also civil torts in most [[UsefulNotes/TheCommonLaw common-law]] jurisdictions. This means that you can be prosecuted by the state and sued for damages by the victim for one act. Battery suits often address things that the state just lets slip; in one case frequently used in law schools (''Garratt v. Dailey''), an old woman successfully sued a five-year-old boy for $11,000 (in 1952 money!) after she got a hip fracture when he moved a chair she was trying to sit in.
* "'''Affect'''" and "'''effect'''": In ''general'' terms, "effect" is usually a noun and "affect" is usually a verb. However, there are actually ''five'' words there, not two.
** af-FECT (v) - To have influence on. "The heavy rains affected the water level."
** af-FECT (v) - To pretend, often to pretend to have a degree of sophistication. "At the wine club, Bob affected a fake French accent to be a douche."
*** This is also the base word of "affectation," or a behavior adopted to evoke that air of sophistication. "Even though Bob is from America, he crosses his 7s as an affectation."
** AF-fect (n) - Usually only used in psychology circles, and it's basically a term for an emotional response.
** Effect (n) - A consequence or result of something. "The effect of all the heavy rain was flooding."
** Effect (v) - To create a change. "Due to the flooding, the city effected changes in flood channel construction."
** The things you carry on your person (in your purse or pockets) are your "personal ''effects''"
* Off the northwestern coast of Europe are the '''British Isles''', a collection of two large and many small islands, the largest of which is '''(Great) Britain''' and the second largest of which is '''Ireland'''. Together they contain two countries: the '''United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland''' and '''Ireland''' (called the "Republic of Ireland" to differentiate it from the island, of which it covers about five-sixths.) The United Kingdom is a country composed of four constituent countries: '''Scotland''', '''Wales''', '''Northern Ireland''' and '''England'''. '''Cornwall''' is a politically united but culturally distinct area within England. There also exists the '''Isle of Man''', the '''Bailiwick of Guernsey''', and the '''Bailiwick of Jersey''', which are not part of the United Kingdom, but which have its Queen as their sovereign and which the UK provides for the military defence thereof. It is confusing but please, for your own safety, NEVER use ''England'' to refer to anything besides the land south of the River Tweed and east of the Rivers Vyrnwy and Tamar (Cornwall may be a more debated case but the Cornish will like you for it).
*** [[http://i.imgur.com/cuq3P.png Relevant.]]
*** [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rNu8XDBSn10 Also relevant]].
** The term "British Isles" is also disputed by many Irish people, who object to the term "British", given its usual usage as "of or pertaining to Great Britain". The governments of the United Kingdom and Republic of Ireland both avoid using the term, as do most Irish people, but it is a common term in Great Britain, where it is seen as an entirely neutral, geographic term, akin to "Indian Subcontinent" or "North America".
*** Well the British Government uses it, just not in international documents. The neutral term often used is '''Islands of the North Atlantic (IONA)'''. (This does, mind, include the islands of Faeroe, which are really quite un-British, being ruled by Denmark and speaking their own North Germanic language and all...)
*** Not to be confused with the island of Iona off the west coast of Scotland.
*** At least in the travel industry, the "Indian Subcontinent" is now the "South Asian Subcontinent".
** Also, it's standard practice to refer the UK as "Britain", even though Northern Ireland is part of the former but not the latter.
** Also, a person from Scotland is "a Scot"; many people from Scotland are "Scots." You may describe their nationality and their institutions as "Scottish" (so it's perfectly to say "my friend is Scottish" in the same way that one would say "my friend is English"), but ''only'' in that sense.
*** 'Scottish' is an adjective qualifying someone or something from Scotland. 'Scot' is a noun. While it's preferable to refer to people from Scotland as "the Scots" rather than "the Scottish"[[note]]though historically, the Scots -- or the Scoti -- were from Scotia, which was in fact a Roman name for ''Ireland''[[/note]], it is not wrong to refer to someone as Scottish by way of an adjective. On that note, the adjective is indeed 'Scottish'. Don't use the adjective 'Scotch' outside of Scotch whisky, Scotch eggs or Scotch pies, at least not if you don't want to be [[https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/scotch#Verb scotched]] yourself.[[note]]However, at least as recently as Agatha Christie, "Scotch" and "Scotchman" were acceptable English idioms, no matter what the Scots themselves may have had to say about it.[[/note]]
*** And while we're at it, place-name adjectives like "Parisian" or "Viennese" do ''not'' simply mean "from Paris" or "from Vienna", but rather "typical or characteristic of the place in question". Thus, you can have a ''Viennese café'' in London (i.e. it embodies characteristics commonly associated with Vienna), but "Le Monde" is a "Paris newspaper" (i.e. a newspaper based in Paris).
** These rules similarly apply to people. Hugh Laurie was born in England, Ewan [=McGregor=] in Scotland, and Catherine Zeta Jones in Wales. All three are British[[note]]though both Welsh people and Scots generally prefer the more specific demonym[[/note]], but only Laurie is English. Pierce Brosnan is neither (he's Irish).
*** And just to make things more complicated--people from most of the British Isles wince at the expression [[IAmVeryBritish 'British accent']]. Usually because they know what foreigners mean by that, and resent the implication that's how they sound. 'English accent' is marginally better (not that people from much of England will take kindly to being told 'all British accents sound posh and educated to ''me''...', as they'll still feel that their existence is being denied and aren't always as pleased as you'd think to be told they sound 'classy', but it narrows the offence a little.)
** The '''Isle of Man''' is not part of England, Scotland or even the UK; it's a separate dependency of the British Crown. The '''Bailiwick of Jersey''' and the '''Bailiwick of Guernsey''' (known collectively as the Channel Islands) are the other two Crown Dependencies. ("Bailiwick" being an archaic term meaning the area under the jurisdiction of a bailiff -- a bailiff being a sheriff's appointee, so a bailiwick would have been a part of a shire). There are also 13 British overseas territories, and the Sovereign Base Areas of Akrotiri and Dhekelia (both on Cyprus).
** On that note, now you know where the idiomatic expression '''bailiwick''' got its meaning: it means an area specific to one's jurisdiction (department, profession, area of expertise): "not my bailiwick".
* '''Russia''' is a country (specifically, a federation of a number of states and republics) running from Finland to the Pacific Ocean, from Belarus to China, from Mongolia to the Arctic Ocean and immediately north of Kazakhstan. The '''Soviet Union''', or more formally, the '''Union of Soviet Socialist Republics''' is actually what it sounds like: a country, specifically a supranational federation of different republics with a federation government sitting in the capital of Moscow (at least in a constitutional and formal sense--like many large nations who used the same model, the actual distribution of authority is highly circumstantial and dependent on the period). They are not the same thing, but often times (particularly in, though not limited to, the West) it is convenient to make them interchangeable. Russia ''was'' one of the constituent republics, specifically, the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic, a founding republic of this federation state.
** This even confused foreign audiences at the time of the country's founding: "Soviet Russia" was founded in 1917 and 1918, with the collapse of the Petrograd-based Russian Provision Government (that came into power after the abdication of the Tsar) and the Petrograd Soviet moving the capital to Moscow, with the adding of "Soviet" to the name "Russian Republic." The "Soviet Union" was not founded until 1922, when said republic and five of its neighbors entered into a treat to become a supranational federation. Foreign observers were typically less familiar with the other states, and continued to use the name "Soviet Russia" commonly.
** This is particularly problematic when talking about geographic locations that were in the Soviet Union, but not in the largely-unchanged borders of Russia (for example, ''Series/{{Friends}}'' speaking of "the Russian City of Minsk" in regards to the capital of Belarus).
** Another common error is referring to pre-1992 Soviet organizations where a Russian counterpart did not exist, or was clearly not the subject: the ''Russian'' atomic bomb (when, obviously, nuclear weapons are controlled by the national government), the ''Russian'' Air Force (which might refer to the Russian contingent of aircraft in the republic-level Border Forces, but obviously is intended for the ''Soviet'' Air Force), the ''Russian'' Olympic athletes (referring to Russian athletes alone, but likely intended to reference the entire ''Soviet'' Olympic team). Mother ''Russia'' is a national personification predating the creation of the Soviet Union, the term used in literature or philosophical speech for the Soviet Union (where it most commonly appears in fiction) is Mother ''Homeland'', or the nonspecific ''Motherland''. Some other republics had their own national personifications in the same period (for example, Mother Armenia, whose statue was erected in 1950). Very few post-war monuments are, accordingly, of Mother Russia.
** In an inversion, most residents of the Soviet Union spoke Russian, as there were dozens of native Soviet languages and Russian was linguistically dominant. To say someone is speaking ''Soviet'' is nonspecific and oddly-worded, especially since when not a modifying adjective (in other words, alone) "Soviet" is a noun meaning "council."
* '''Immoral''' is knowing it's wrong and doing it anyway; '''amoral''' is, generally, not having a sense of right or wrong in the first place. Gravity and a large rock are amoral; my dropping a large rock on your head to kill you is immoral (unless, perhaps, I'm mentally disturbed in such a way that I'm incapable of making moral judgments). Furthermore, '''nonmoral''' deals with things that are not a question of morality, such as the choice between chocolate or vanilla ice cream. [[note]] Although it should be noted that [[FelonyMisdemeanor choosing vanilla over chocolate is a sign of pure, unmitigated evil.]] [[/note]]
* '''Non-zero-sum''' does not mean "win-win" or "opportunity to cooperate." It refers to some valuable resources (money, time, oil, wood, etc.) being permanently lost or gained during the event. A zero-sum game merely means that everything the participants begin with is redistributed. Non-zero-sum games can easily be lose-lose instead of win-win, and, while the Prisoner's Dilemma and a few other well-known non-zero-sum games are cooperative, others, such as the dollar auction, are normally non-cooperative.
** Whether something is win-win vs. lose-lose or cooperative vs non-cooperative is usually a function of the players' choices, not of the game itself. If the players in a dollar auction agree beforehand that only one person will bid, and that the profits will be shared equally, that is a cooperative/win-win strategy. Some games can be structured to always be lose-lose, but aren't as interesting to study.
*** If by "win" one means "end with more than one started" and by "lose" one means "end with less than one started", it is also ''not'' a requirement that someone ''must'' win and someone ''must'' lose in a zero-sum game; if everyone ends with ''exactly'' as much as each one respectively had at the start, it is still a zero-sum game.
** Also, usually game theorists do not use "zero sum game" but "constant sum game". That's partly for ease of mathematics behind it, but it also can mean that all players lose or win if compared to the status quo before the game. It is just that each win of one side is countered by a loss of equal amount on the other side (and let's not start about more-than-two-player games). Also in many to most games meta gaming (e.g. side payments outside of the game itself to counter asymmetric payouts in a win-win situation) is not considered, thus not every non-zero-sum means opportunity to collaborate.
* '''Stupid''' and '''ignorant''' are not interchangeable: a stupid person lacks intelligence, an ignorant person lacks knowledge. So, if someone crosses a street on a red light because they didn't know that red means "stop", they're ignorant. If they cross a street despite seeing a car coming at 50 mph and get hit, they're stupid.
** Lampshaded in the Simpsons episode "The Way We Was":
--> '''Homer:''' Wait a minute. That word you keep calling me?\\
'''Artie:''' Ignoramus?\\
'''Homer:''' Ignoramus! It means I'm stupid, doesn't it?\\
'''Artie:''' There is a difference between ignorance and stupidity.\\
'''Homer:''' Not to me there isn't, you... ignoramus!
** If someone misuses the words on this page, they're ignorant, but not necessarily stupid.
** "Ignorant" also does not mean "belligerent" or "impolite"
** Perhaps a better example of the difference between intelligence and knowledge: knowing what the Pythagorean theorem is and what it's used for takes knowledge; being able to work out the equation mentally requires intelligence.
** Once you've read the Pythagorean theorem, understanding what it means would require intelligence.
** If someone doesn't know that a tomato is a fruit, they're ignorant. If they know it's a fruit, so they put it in fruit salad (without knowing what they're doing),[[note]]You ''can'' create a tasty fruit salad with tomato in it, but it needs a special recipe and it exists in a neither-here-nor-there universe of being sweet and savory and neither at the same time.[[/note]] then they are stupid.
** Interestingly enough, '''idiot''' can be interchangeable with '''ignorant''' given its root in a Greek word for someone who does not take part in the affairs of his city, someone who ignores those affairs.
** You could also say that since no human is omniscient (as far as we know) everybody is ignorant about something. On the other hand, not everybody is stupid.
* On that note, '''stupid''' originally meant '''numbed''' or '''stunned''', hence the phrase "He was struck stupid." The sense lives on in the verb '''to stupefy'''.
* '''Omniscient''' means all knowing. It does not necessarily mean '''Divine''' or '''decides right from wrong.''' A lot of tropers seem to be misusing OmniscientMoralityLicense under the latter assumption.
* '''Née''' means "born". It does ''not'' mean "formerly known as" or "otherwise known as" or even "maiden name" except in the context that a woman's maiden name is generally her birth name. If a woman is born as Mary Smith, marries and changes her name to Mary Robinson, then divorces, remarries, and changes her name to Mary Jones, it would be correct to say "Mary Jones, née Smith"; it would ''not'' be correct to say "Mary Jones, née Robinson."
** Secondly, "née" is feminine. If a man changes his name, it's '''né''' (e.g. "Malcolm X, né Little").
** For transsexuals, as a general rule of thumb, you use the gender-specific words of the gender they identify as, rather than their genotype, if you are trying to be polite to them. So for example if you know a [=FtM=], it is "He" "Him" "né" etc.
* Similarly, French-derived adjectives should retain their French masculine-feminine endings. A woman with flaxen hair is '''blonde''', but a man is '''blond'''. More obscurely, and only in English, a man with dark hair is not a '''brunette''' but a '''brunet'''. It would all be pronounced the same in English, though, where articles don't have gender.
** In French, "brunette" carries the literal meaning of "little brown-/black-haired girl." A woman who is dark-haired is "brune", and a dark-haired man is "brun". The nouns, "une brune" and "un brun" can also be used, especially with adjectives ("une jolie[[note]]pretty[[/note]] brune"/"un beau[[note]]handsome[[/note]] brun"). "Blondinette" (blond-haired girl) is an endearment. There is no male equivalent for "brunette".
** Also, when one is engaged to be married, the proper word depends on the person's gender: a man is a '''fiancé''', whereas a woman is a '''fiancée'''. As with other French-derived terms, they may be pronounced exactly the same, but their gender matters.
** Another place where people often drop the gender declension in English is for words like aviator. Saying "female aviator" is incorrect, the term is "aviatrix."[[note]]Though it's perhaps better, if the pilot's genitalia aren't relevant, to stick with "pilot".[[/note]] Same with "male dominatrix." It's just "dominator."
* People keep using '''pragmatic''' to describe someone who appears to be thinking quite ideally, or something along the lines of that. This is used frequently to describe politicians during political campaigns. The word means "of or pertaining to a practical point of view or practical considerations." In a related sense, '''pragmatism''' is a "character or conduct that emphasizes practicality." So depending on the case, one may be correct or not.
* If you're '''waiting on''' someone, then you're performing the job of a waiter or servant. If you're looking at your watch wondering where the hell they are, you're waiting ''for'' them.
** [[SeparatedByACommonLanguage Dialect difference]]. Like how people from parts of the eastern US--especially New York City--say "on line for tickets" instead of "in line for tickets". Slight differences between preposition use are a common dialect variation, especially in Germanic languages (anyone who took high-school German probably read that word "preposition" and began to weep softly, like a ShellShockedVeteran).
*** Trust me, we Germans aren't happy with English prepositions either.
* A '''narcotic''' is any sedative defined as drug with morphine-like effects (to quote Wiki/TheOtherWiki). Most people use it as an umbrella term to include all illicit drugs.
** The term was corrupted as soon as the ''stimulant'' cocaine was classified as a narcotic in US federal law (the original Harrison Narcotics Act was written to deal with opium trafficking), so for legal purposes it is - despite being a stimulant.
* '''Argumentum ad hominem''' is (to quote Wiki/TheOtherWiki) [[LogicalFallacies "an argument which links the validity of a premise to a characteristic or belief of the person advocating the premise."]] It's not just a fancy word for a personal attack. "You suck, therefore your argument is false" is ''ad hominem''. "You suck" on its own isn't, neither is "your argument is false, therefore you suck,"[[note]]which, thanks to how implication works, means that the person could still suck even if their argument is true[[/note]] nor is "Your argument is false and you suck." It's certainly rude, but not fallacious.
** In many cases, the "therefore your argument is false" part is left implied. The intent is still to discredit the advocate rather than (probably more difficult) rebuttal of the premise; that the link is not explicitly stated doesn't necessarily mean it isn't ad hominem - if the attack is trying to bring down the premise, it is. If the person being attacked is not advocating anything, though (or if anything they might be advocating has nothing to do with the attack), it isn't ad hominem - just a personal attack.
* '''Semitic''' doesn't necessarily mean Jewish. It means of Akkadian, Arabic, Aramaic, Ethiopic, Hebrew, and/or Phoenician ancestry.[[note]]By the process of history, most Phoenicians, Akkadians, and Aramaeans have been mixed so much with Arabs -- to the point that nearly all of them have Arabic as a first language and many if not most of them consider themselves ethnically Arab -- that they're hardly worth mentioning today.[[/note]] On the other hand, the terms '''anti-Semitic''', '''anti-Semitism''', and '''anti-Semite''' typically only refer to hatred of Jews; these words were coined in 19th century Europe, during the era of "scientific racism" which claimed that all apparent religious and cultural conflicts of Jews and (Christian) Europeans were actually born of conflict between Semitic and "Aryan" races,[[note]]See also Woodrow Wilson's brilliant idea that Serbs, Croats, and Bosniaks should have one country because they're all the same race and thus won't have any conflict. In fairness to him, many Serbs, Croats, and Bosniaks actually had the same idea at the time; they figured their commonality of language (their languages are completely mutually intelligible and were at the time argued to be dialects of one language) was more important than their religious differences.[[/note]] and the terminology has stuck ever since.
** Contrast with the lesser-known word '''anti-Judaism''', which refers specifically to opposition to the Jewish religion, and not to Jews as a nation, race, tribe, or ethnicity. Then there is '''anti-Zionism''', which specifically refers to opposition to the ''political'' nation-state of Israel and[=/=]or Jewish Nationalism in general (some of the most vocal anti-Zionists are Haredi ''Jews'', [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sikrikim some of whom]] have committed violence in the name of their position).
*** Both anti-Judaism and anti-Zionism can, of course, be covers for anti-Semitism. Even without deliberate dishonesty, the three tend to shade into each other, especially given how tightly interwoven Jewish religion and nationalism are to the rest of Jewish identity (it's similarly difficult to distinguish opposition to Hinduism from opposition to Indian nationalism or hatred of Indians).
* '''Populist''' has done a complete turnaround of meaning since the 1890s. Political scientist David Nolan once used it as roughly a synonym for ''socialist''. Actually, while the Populist (or People's) Party of the 1890s that thrived in much of the western and southern United States was more anti-"big business" than anti-business generally, it did call for some reforms that are usually thought of as socialistic (such as the nationalization of particularly lucrative industries). Nowadays, the word has been shorn of almost all economic connotations. To be a ''populist'' is to bear resentment against society's elites, who need not necessarily be "the rich." Class is still a factor to some extent, but differing educational levels and the contentious nature of American popular culture also enter into the equation.
** The broadest definition of populism is opposition to the elite, whatever "elite" may mean at the moment. As such, it's perfectly correct to use it for the political movements of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, marked for their socialist tendancies and dismantling of corporate giants, as it is to use it for the current anti-intellectualist bent in the American social and political landscape.
*** Populist is not about opposition to the elite but about favouring and aiming efforts at the greater populace. To be a populist is to promote oneself to be liked by the majority, the non-elite, if they happen to like the elite it would be populist not to go against the elite...
*** To complicate matters further, ''populist'' may also refer to politicians who aim their efforts on any majority, thus changing sides and agendas to maximize their support, not to represent any group in particulat. It is more or less political equivalent to 'opportunist'.
* '''Objective''' (as in the opposite of '''Subjective'''), especially when used with the word '''review''' (as in a ''critical review''). There is no such thing as an '''objective review'''. A review, by definition, is subjective. A ''consensus'' may be derived from many reviews, but there will never be a definitive, objective review. An actually objective review would look something like this [[http://www.destructoid.com/100-objective-review-final-fantasy-xiii-179178.phtml review of Final Fantasy XIII]] by [[WebVideo/{{Jimquisition}} Jim Sterling]].
** The word one should use when speaking about review that is as unbiased as possible and takes into account multiple point of views is 'intersubjective'.
* The use of a somewhat archaic word has clouded its meaning, but nibbling on hors d'oeuvres serves to '''whet''' one's appetite, not ''wet'' it. ''Whet'' means "to sharpen," as seen in the term ''whetstone'', a stone used for sharpening knives--if something is sharpening your appetite, it's leaving you hungry for more, not dampening (or ''wetting'') your enthusiasm. So, "whetting your appetite for destruction" would mean starting small as a prelude to becoming more destructive, not sating the urge altogether.
* There are so many examples of psychological and psychiatric terms that are misused that it almost warrants its own page. To start with:
* '''Psychotic''': It does not mean [[InsaneEqualsViolent "going around and killing people for no reason"]]; someone who does that is just homicidal. Psychosis is a loss of touch with reality, characterized by disorganised thinking, delusions, and sometimes (but not always) auditory, visual, and tactile hallucinations. While people with psychosis can be homicidal, it is extremely rare (violence by psychotics is more usually related to paranoid or other delusions).
* '''[[TheSociopath Psychopath / Sociopath]]''': They are usually not murderers; in fact, many successful [[CorruptCorporateExecutive CEOs]], [[AmoralAttorney lawyers]], and [[SleazyPolitician politicians]] are psychopaths or sociopaths. Psychopathy and sociopathy both mean lack of a conscience, a limited emotional range, and difficulty in forming significant relationships. They also often lack impulse control. Both psychopaths and sociopaths can be classed as having antisocial personality disorder, though not all people with the disorder are psychopaths or sociopaths. Psychopathy and sociopathy are typically held to be synonyms under the umbrella of antisocial personality disorder (which is the term the DSM-IV uses that includes psychopaths and sociopaths), and when a distinction is made it has nothing to do with the origins of the disorder, since the origins are not definitely known. The typical distinction is that sociopaths have a more normal temperament and are better able to adapt to societal norms. While statistically speaking murderers are likely to be psychopaths or sociopaths, psychopaths and sociopaths are not very likely to be murderers.
** In the pilot of ''Series/{{Sherlock}}'', Holmes objects to being called a psychopath, preferring to be recognized as a "highly functional sociopath."
*** "High-functioning sociopath." "Highly functional" is a very common misquote; the actual line follows the same pattern as high-functioning autism or high-functioning alcoholism, etc., denoting a person who might have some disorder but is more capable than is common among those who have that disorder. It is not clear what Sherlock actually meant by that statement, since sociopaths follow a "normal" (as in, not distinct from the wider population) distribution curve. All subsequent evidence points to Sherlock just being a (high-functioning) autistic person in denial.
* '''Antisocial''': Sometimes used to mean someone who dislikes or fears socializing. In the psychological sense, it doesn't mean that at all. Antisocial attitudes or behaviors are against society, from extreme acts like murder to more minor transgressions like simply being a manipulative, self-centered {{Jerkass}}. Someone who fears interacting with other people should be said to be '''asocial''' or suffering from social phobia, not "antisocial" tendencies. As a matter of fact, ''social phobia'' is an outdated term, and is usually now called "social anxiety disorder." In other words, people who are antisocial are ''hostile'' -- not merely indifferent -- towards society.
** "Antisocial" is also used to denote "rebellious" individuals actively fighting (not necessarily by violence, also by dissent or passive-aggressive behavior) any authority and are incapable of operating under external influence.
** An increasingly more popular and accurate term for the above disorder is ''agoraphobia'', from the ancient Greek term for "fear of the marketplace." But to be honest, I've always understood that ''agoraphobia'' is fear of the ''entire'' outside world, not just the "social" parts of it. Thus, an agoraphobe would be just as afraid of being lost in a forest or a desert as they were of crowds.
*** It makes more sense once you know that 'agora' in this case is what the Romans called the 'forum', rather than your run-of-the-mill farmers' market.
** ''Agoraphobia'' is more specifically a fear of being unable to ''escape'' from whatever situation you're in (sometimes amended to include 'without severe embarrassment'), rather than the situation itself. In the above examples, the phobic response would be due to the fear of never escaping the forest, or being lost in the desert forever. Being in a busy place (e.g. a football crowd) could count if you couldn't leave your set without making a huge scene.
** What "agoraphobia" misses is the ''social'' part of "social anxiety disorder". Sartre's "Hell is other people" hits a nerve - and as unjustified as that hit may be, it's still felt.
** Perhaps more appropriate word would be "asocial", and it is sometimes used, though it implies lack of interest in social interaction while not fear of it.
*** This is exactly the term used in psychological parlance to describe people avoiding social situations due to social phobias, egomania, extreme introversion or any other factor.
** Agoraphobia is a disorder more focused on the area and getting to safety (without embarrassing yourself) if needed and usually has to do with panic attacks or some of the symptoms of them. A fear focused on actual people or socializing is called social phobia or social anxiety disorder (and is much more severe than shyness so should not be used lightly despite its commonness -- the most common mental disorder in adults other than substance abuse or depression, which is saying something). The best replacement for "antisocial" is "avoidant" -- avoidant personality disorder is associated with extreme social phobia. "Asocial", as pointed out above, is different. Most shy/socially anxious/avoidant people would love to be social if they weren't anxious about it. There are people who simply do not like to be around other people without being either avoidant or antisocial; these are asocial. "Asocial", however, may look like a typo in writing "antisocial" to a reader.
** On a related note, '''introversion''' is not being antisocial; being introverted is simply ''preferring'' solitary activities to social activities.
* '''Manic-depression''' is more properly known as '''bipolar disorder''', and ''does not'' mean "severe depression" or "wild mood swings;" the highs and lows last for days or weeks at a time. Neither one is a catch-all for "crazy ex." (See '''borderline''', '''histrionic''', and '''narcissistic''' disorders for what most people think of as "crazy ex syndrome.")
** [[Franchise/TheHitchhikersGuideToTheGalaxy Marvin the Paranoid Android]] is a ''manically'' depressed robot, ''not'' a manic-depressive robot, which is true - he's enthusiastically depressed.
** Also, bipolar is an ''adjective'', not a noun. It's either "my friend is bipolar" or "my friend has bipolar disorder," ''not'' "my friend has bipolar."
** And it doesn't have anything to do with {{tsundere}}s, no matter what certain fansubs say.
* On the subject of '''borderline''', saying someone is borderline does not mean they're on the cusp of having a personality disorder; it means they ''do'' have one. ''Borderline'' is a name for a very specific pattern of behaviour involving emotional instability, poor self-image, impulsiveness, and [[BlackAndWhiteInsanity black-and-white thinking]] (what psychologists call "splitting"), as well as a fear of abandonment. The name is only used because of historical reasons which are too complex to get into here, and the existence of the disorder has been questioned, with some seeing it as a variant of post-traumatic stress disorder (specifically, one that the profession slaps on female PTSD sufferers, as the overwhelming majority of borderline personality disorder diagnoses are of women).
* '''Depression''' is yet another psychological term (seeing a trend here?) that's casually thrown around but has a different meaning in a medical or therapeutic context. Depression is not just sadness, but much more persistent and disabling, and includes many other mood changes and physical symptoms like: anhedonia (loss of the ability to feel pleasure), changes in sleep and eating habits (either much less or much more than usual), and a lack of energy and motivation.
* '''OCD''' is [[SuperOCD often thought of]] as the concept of a NeatFreak taken to the extreme. That's because the most visible sign of it is the rituals that people who have OCD do (counting, checking, hand-washing, climbing stairs and so on). The reason it's called ''obsessive''-compulsive disorder is because people with it have certain obsessive thoughts that are highly distressing and which they cannot get rid of (things like fears of their entire family dying, or their house burning down, or accidentally harming a baby). The compulsions they have are a coping mechanism of sorts - performing these rituals helps the obsessions go away, but only temporarily. To describe someone as "kind of OCD (adj.)" because they like order and cleanliness is not even close to reality.
* '''Chronic''' does not mean "severe". It means "recurring/habitual" and/or "happening for a long time;" it comes from a Greek root meaning "time" (same as "chronological" or "chronicle"), so you should think "over time." Contrast '''acute''', which means "rapid onset". Too many people associate "acute" with "small" due to its meaning in geometry (they should be associating it with "sharp" for the same reason).
** Also an illness being acute does not necessarily mean that it is serious, it only means that full set of symptoms display themselves quickly (a papercut is acute). So calling a disease Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) is not tautological.
* '''Paranoia''' and '''paranoid''' are a particularly egregious case. '''Paranoia''' is a full-blown psychosis, not just thinking people are out to get you. However, someone who really was diagnosed with paranoia would be '''paranoiac''' (literally '''out of his mind'''), not '''paranoid''', which denotes a neurotic '''paranoid state'''.
** This is lampshaded in the movie version of ''Film/TheCaineMutiny'', where Maryk admits that until Keefer talked to him, "I didn't even know the difference between paranoid and paranoia."
* '''Schizophrenia''' does not involve multiple personalities. Multiple personalities are a form of dissociation known as Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID). It is an extremely rare diagnosis, so rare that its existence is very hotly debated. In addition, one of the major prerequisites is that the separate personalities are [[http://www.nami.org/Content/ContentGroups/Helpline1/Dissociative_Identity_Disorder_(formerly_Multiple_Personality_Disorder).htm usually]] not aware of each other--something that is often overlooked in both real life and the media, as the protagonist in ''Series/UnitedStatesOfTara'' was quick to point out.
** Especially confusing for those who like their Greek roots, because 'Schizophrenia' literally means "split mind".
*** The full etymology for schizophrenia is ''skhizein'' (σχίζειν, "to split") and ''phrēn'', phren- (φρήν, φρεν-; "mind, intelligence") not the same thing as personality.
** If we wanted to do right by the etymologists we should switch from Schneider's 'schizophrenia' name for schizophrenia back to Emil Kraepelin's 'dementia praecox'.
*** ''Dementia praecox'' wouldn't work though because it means "precocious madness", so a degenerative disease of young people. However, schizophrenia isn't degenerative like dementia is, and it's treatable, whereas Alzheimer's and other forms of dementia aren't really and treatments for them are mostly palliative. Also, schizophrenia does most often manifest for the first time in young adulthood (late teens to early twenties) but it can develop at any age, including in the elderly.
** The confusion is likely from some schizophrenics having auditory/visual hallucinations and sometimes speaking back to them, giving the [[IncrediblyLamePun illusion]] to some people that another "personality" is speaking to the schizophrenic.
*** If psychology texts are reliable, the confusion is the above misinterpretation of "intelligence" as "personality", plus failure to understand that "divided" in this instance means something closer to "shattered" than it does to "split".
** The "split" portion of the word actually refers to a divergence of the mind from reality, not that it's split internally.
** The word '''schizoid''', which is a personality disorder, does use this root to mean "cut off (from other people)". But this is a very different thing than schizophrenia.
** If a person has '''anorexia''', then she is '''an anorectic''' or she is '''anorexic'''. She is not an anorexic, nor is she anorectic. "Anorectic" is a noun; "anorexic" is an adjective.
*** In strict medical terms, '''anorexia''' refers generally to loss of appetite as a symptom, the psychiatric disorder involving distorted body image and fear of weight gain is '''anorexia nervosa'''.
* The words '''psychologist''' and '''psychiatrist''' are often confused. A psychologist is someone who has an advanced degree in psychology (normally a doctorate or at least a master's) and does psychotherapy and psychological testing. They can diagnose people, but can't prescribe medication (except in a few jurisdictions) or order medical imaging. A psychiatrist, on the other hand, is a medical doctor who specializes in psychological disorders and they can do these things because of their broader scope of practice. Psychologists study nothing but psychology in their training; psychiatrists have to learn about other branches of medicine first before specializing in it.
* '''Quean''' does not mean, as [[{{Literature/Redwall}} Brian Jacques]] claimed in interviews about ''The Sable Quean'', "wicked woman". Nor, as some readers might assume, does it mean "queen". It means "prostitute" or "promiscuous woman". Then again, this is probably actually a case of GettingCrapPastTheRadar.
* To be '''bereft''' of something does not just mean to be without something. It means to be without something ''that you previously had''.
* '''Peasant''' is not a general term for a poor person. A peasant is a tenant farmer, a free laborer who rents a farm and works it himself. The hierarchy is: slave (who is owned property that can be bought and sold), serf (has some rights, but is required to work his lord's land and give the lord a portion of the harvest), sharecropper (a free man who works on someone else's land and pays the landowner a portion of the crop) peasant, crofter (a farmer who owns his own house, but still rents land to farm), yeoman (owns enough land to support a family), gentleman (owns enough farmland to support himself by renting it out). Admittedly, a lot of this depends on time period and the distinctions can be blurred; for instance, consider someone who rents a piece of land and works it himself but has agreed to pay the rent by sending the landlord crops equivalent in market value to the rent (e.g. "the rent is $600/year; in lieu of cash, tenant may send crops with market value of $600"); is this person a sharecropper or a peasant?[[note]]If he agreed to send a fixed portion or amount of the crops (e.g. 1/3 of all corn harvested, or 100 bushels of wheat"), he would be a sharecropper. If he sold the crops and paid the rent in cash with the proceeds, he would doubtless be a peasant. Since the market value of crops changes, and there may be practical considerations keeping the tenant from using cash (for instance: there aren't many coins in the area to go around, so the economy mostly runs on barter), the distinction is hard to make.[[/note]] To no small degree this depends on whether he's in medieval England (where he would probably be called a peasant) or the post-Civil War American South (where he would probably be called a sharecropper). Poor farmers can loosely be called "the peasantry," but that's about it.
** Note that TranslationConvention can introduce confusion in dealing with non-English-speaking societies. Everything after "peasant" is often called the same thing in many other languages (because "doesn't work for someone else" is a decisive characteristic). Many other European languages also often use their cognates for "peasant" in senses closer to English's "crofter" and "yeoman" (a French peasant could be a full-blown landowner, for example, or a "métayer", a sharecropper).
* A '''Chaingun''' is a single-barrel weapon with an electrically driven bolt operated with a chain. It is not a '''rotary gun'''. This comes from ''VideoGame/{{Doom}}'' misusing the term; usually, the reasoning for the mistake is that the latter is fed with a "chain" (ie a ''belt'') of ammunition, or that the barrel group is driven by a chain.
** More accurately still, a "Chain Gun" is the specific model of weapon used on many US and NATO aircraft. Any autoloading (generally fully automatic) weapon larger than a machinegun is called an "autocannon" regardless of mechanism. A multi-barrelled weapon in this class that rotates is called a "Rotary Autocannon." A single-barreled weapon that uses a rotating loading mechanism is a "Revolver Autocannon". The most accurate name for ''Doom'''s "chaingun" would be "Rotary Submachine Gun", as it uses pistol ammunition.
* "'''Decapitated''' head" is paradoxical: to decapitate someone is to behead him. Cutting a head off of itself is...well...[[YouKeepUsingThatWord inconceivable]]. A ''body'' can be decapitated; a better adjective for a head on its own is '''severed'''. (''Disembodied'' usually means 'intangible'.)
--> "Newsanchor overheard in ''Film/{{Highlander}}'': "It also left a man's decapitated body, lying on the floor next to his own severed head."
* Related: "decapacitate" is a rarely-used word that means to reduce someone or something's capacity for action, essentially a milder version of "incapacitate." It doesn't necessarily have anything to do with the head; in fact, decapitating someone is far more likely to incapacitate them (by killing them) than decapacitate them.
* '''Differential''' is both a noun and an adjective, but in the noun form, it is a mechanical device used for combining torque from different inputs, ''not'' a synonym for '''difference'''. This is a favorite of television sports announcers ("There's a three-point differential in the game!").
** A differential is also used in mathematics to refer to infinitesimals in calculus and differential geometry i.e. dx, dy etc or to the Jacobian matrix of partial derivatives.
* A '''demigod''' is not a lesser "category" of deity. "Demi" means "half", i.e. "half god". A demigod has both mortal and divine parentage. For example, Hercules (son of Zeus, a god, and Alcmene, a human) ''is'' a demigod, whereas a dryad (a forest spirit) is ''not''.
** Note, however, that the term was invented by 19th century classicists; the Greek word for "of mixed divine and mortal parentage" was "hero" (which originally ''never'' applied to pureblood mortals—and also had intrinsically cultic connotations, since all the mythic heroes were considered appropriate for worship, especially Heracles).
* Something being '''random''' means that it has no clear predictability or arrangement. It doesn't mean "kooky" or "off the wall", and neither sporks nor waffles nor [[DoomyDoomsOfDoom doom]] are "random" (see also: the 4chan meme "Katy").
* '''{{Prequel}}''' doesn't mean "a previous installment in a series". It means "a sequel to an existing work that takes place earlier in the timeline of its [[TheVerse 'Verse]]".
* The suffix '''mancer''' does not mean "magician". A [something]mancer is a very specific type of magician who uses [something] to predict the future. (A "necromancer" used bones and entrails to divine.) A better suffix, -urge, means "worker", as in "one who creates or works with". A thaumaturge (worker of wonders) is a magician, but a dramaturge (playwright) isn't, and neither is a metallurgist nor a demiurge.
* The Internet usage of '''{{Troll}}''' does not mean "someone who has a different opinion from mine", "someone who has an unpopular opinion", or "someone who does something for attention". A troll is someone who does/says things for the sole purpose of trying to piss people off. Someone can legitimately have an unpopular opinion, but he's not a troll unless he states it just to be annoying.
** A well known real-life troll is Fred Phelps, who travels around the country saying the most upsetting things he can to emotional audiences (mainly at funerals), in the hopes that someone will cross the legal line so he and his family (all lawyers) can sue them.
** The term comes not from the mythical creature, but from a ''trawling'', the method of fishing involving moving through the water while waving the bait behind you. An internet troll is fishing for reactions, waving their 'opinion' as bait.
*** Its earliest use, in the early 90's, usually referred to 'fishing out' new users and lurkers (often in a good-natured attempt to encourage them to write) by presenting an argument that had been already thoroughly discussed by regulars.
** In even narrower sense, trolls do not even have to have an unpopular opinions. They cause also can cause stir by simply initiating a [[FlameWar discussion that is bound to cause an argument]] but they may do so without taking sides themselves. (However, [[HanlonsRazor be careful with accusations in this case; they may simply have]] triggered an event by accident.)
*** Not to mention the ChewbaccaDefense.
** Lately the term has been used as a synonym for "bully" or "harasser" in that it constitutes behavior used to belittle or demean a target. It's also often confused with the term "flaming" which is any sort of negativity towards a specific user. While the initial trolling might involve any of those, the end goal of the troll is to ''incite'' flames rather than just insult somebody.
* A '''[[UsefulNotes/FurryFandom furry]]''' is not the same thing as a zoophile. A zoophile gets off on real animals, while furries like fictional anthropomorphic characters, most of whom would be intelligent enough to consent if they were real.
** Also, many if not most furries are not interested in the sexual aspect of the fandom at all, they simply like drawing/dressing up as/writing about anthropomorphic animals.
** The confusion about the definition of the term is not helped by the fact that it is often used interchangeably to refer to both fans of anthropomorphic animal characters and the characters themselves. The especially pedantic may insist on referring to the former as "furry fans" and reserving the term "furry" for the latter, but even that may be confused by the practice of taking on a "fursona," at which point a person is both a furry fan and a self-identified (though not literal) furry (i.e. anthropomorphic animal).
* '''I.e.''' ("id est," "that is") and '''e.g.''' ("exempli gratia," "for example") are not interchangeable. I.e may be used to expand upon a point or to exhaustively list every possibility, while e.g. merely gives possible answers but leaves the list open.
-->"There are many varieties of pasta, e.g., spaghetti, macaroni, and gnocchi."
-->"Pasta should be made ''al dente,'' i.e., firm and chewy, not overcooked."
** A useful mnemonic is to remember i.e. as "in essence" and e.g. as "example given."
** On a similar note, '''etc.''' ("et cetera," "and other things"), should never end a list introduced with "e.g." or "i.e." (or the plain English "for example" and "such as"). Etc. and e.g. are redundant, and it makes no sense to abbreviate i.e.
* A '''[[ImAHumanitarian cannibal]]''' eats members of its own species. Something that is non-human, but eats humans, is an '''anthropophage'''. "Anthropophage" is a pretty pedantic word, but come on; use "man-eater" or something. Technically a human [[ImAHumanitarian who eats other humans]] would be a cannibal ''and'' an anthropophage, but "cannibal" seems superordinate in this case. The word "cannibal" derives from the Carib people (after whom the Caribbean Sea is named) who were once believed to chew and spit out the flesh of a defeated enemy.
** This was actually mentioned in ''Film/DawnOfTheDead1978'', where it was said that the undead were not cannibals, because they were no longer human.
** This is also pointed out in ''VideoGame/DragonAgeOrigins'' by Alistair when he remarks that it's not cannibalism if ''Dog'' is eating fallen foes.
** However, in fantasy/sci-fi settings, the definition is sometimes extended to any [[YouKeepUsingThatWord/VeryPedantic sapient]] creature [[SapientEatSapient eating another]] (Elves eating humans, or even lizardfolk, would be considered cannibals in such a setting).
* The phrase "'''more highly evolved'''" means nothing: [[GoalOrientedEvolution evolution doesn't work like a ladder that animals climb to the top]]. No biologist has thought of it that way since Darwin. You could say that a species that hasn't changed for a few million years is "unevolved" but that would be a rather simplistic way of looking at it. After all evolution is still working on the species, because they aren't changing, evolution is "selecting" for no change. Evolution is always working on a species, unless they reach a very specific and almost impossible set of conditions.
** The word ''evolution'' can mean a lot of different things, from the scientific "natural selection", and "development of life from single-celled organisms to current situation", the same but including emergence of life from non-life, and the less scientific "change over time", "change for the better" or simply "huge change", as used in advertising.
*** Evolution may also refer to specific terms of conditions. If we speak about, say, the operating systems that are meant to be user-friendly and efficient then we can say that better-developed systems are 'more evolved'. In the case of natural selection such judgment makes little sense because that would have required an objective knowledge of the meaning of life which is, as all things objective, beyond the grasp of human mind.
*** And if we were to put this in the "very-Pedantic" entry, "evolution" originally meant to ''unroll something''. The word has been documented since the 17th century and might be even older. The word "evolution" is a prime example of a dead metaphor, where a metaphor becomes an actual term no longer considered metaphorical (e.g. electric current). The word was used a metaphor for the unrolling of time/fate and over the ages, its, well, evolved so that not only has the metaphorical meaning lost its metaphorical use, the original meaning has been completely forgotten.
** Similarly, terms such as ''devolution'', ''de-evolution'', ''reverse evolution'', etc. carry no meaning in biology (although "devolution" carries a separate meaning in politics), since complex forms of life can become less complex and physical traits that were once advantageous can disappear (or remain as vestigial traits) over generations when confronted by a new environment. That doesn't stop the writers of science fiction from occasionally using this term when a member of one species "returns" to an ancestral form, nor does it stop [[{{Music/Devo}} some people]] from adopting the term to mean "reverse progress."
** Also: By the millions of years their species have been around with few significant changes, two of the least highly evolved creatures are alligators and sharks. Evolution doesn't have any direction, but once it stumbles on a winning combination, it is ''really good at sticking with it''. Some prominent biologists have used sharks as examples that sapience and intelligence are not evolutionary imperatives, and that they are in fact entirely up to chance.
* '''Castration''' is specifically the removal of ''testicles''. The correct term for the removal of the penis (or the male genitalia as a whole) is '''emasculation'''. Though it might be argued that the correct term for either one is [[ShareTheMalePain ouch]].
** The surgical removal of the penis is called a ''penectomy'', while ''orchidectomy'' is the term for the surgical removal of the testicles. (And now you get the joke in ''Series/MadMen'' about Bert Cooper's "unnecessary orchidectomy.")
** One can be castrated without the testicles being removed (still less the whole scrotum- very dangerous without modern techniques, it has a heavy blood supply)- the only significant part is the ''testes'', the glands within them. These can be permanently decommissioned by drugs or, in the case of the Italian castrati singers of the 14th to 19th centuries, by being deliberately ruptured by being squeezed by one who knows where to apply pressure. (They can also be ruptured by accident, though you'd have to be very unlucky to lose both this way.)
* A '''totem''' is not a personal spirit guide, even if it ''is'' an animal. A totem animal protects an entire ''group'' of people, such as a family, clan, or tribe.
* '''Asexual''' is applied in general to [[{{Asexuality}} anyone who doesn't have sex for any reason]], but, as a proper sexual orientation, there are several more nuanced shades of meaning. ''Asexual'' in the strict sense means that a person does not feel physical attraction to others. A person who wants to have sex but has physiological or psychological reasons preventing them from having sex is not asexual. Similarly, someone who identifies as asexual does not see themselves as suffering from a medical disorder like lack of sex drive.
** An asexual can and often does experience attraction but it's more of the platonic/aesthetic type. There are as many different types of asexuals as sexuals, but it should really be pointed out that it has nothing to do with desiring relationships. There are many sexuals who do not desire relationships, for example, Creator/CharlieSheen's character on ''Series/TwoAndAHalfMen''.
** Being asexual does not necessarily mean that the person doesn't want relationships-- an ''aromantic'' person is uninterested in relationships. One can be asexual but romantic (enjoys friendship, love, kissing or hugging, but is uninterested in sexual activity) or sexual but aromantic (interested in sex but not in relationships).
** ''Autosexual'' can refer to a person who enjoys masturbation, but not sex (with another person). Autosexuals are not considered asexual.
*** Technically, as an orientation, an autosexual is someone who is in love with themself. Otherwise, autosexuality or autoerotica is a behavior, not a sexual orientation. Otherwise, sexuals who masturbate would also be called autosexuals.
** Finally, asexual can also refer to "not having a sex" (as opposed to a sex ''drive''), most commonly in the term "asexual reproduction". However, context is usually sufficient to distinguish the terms - it depends on whether you're discussing humans, or non-human species.
* Relatedly, '''abstinence''' is a willing choice not to engage in some activity--such as, for example, ''sexual abstinence'' (which might range from "doing everything but intercourse" to much stricter levels of abstinence, like refraining from masturbation and from sexual contact with others). '''Celibacy''' originally meant simply "being unmarried", but now generally means being unmarried ''and'' sexually abstinent. '''Chastity''' means obeying the appropriate moral rules for sexual behavior, which does ''not'' necessarily imply sexual abstinence: in traditional Christian teaching, for example, a chaste husband and wife would be sexually active with each other (but with nobody else), but a chaste, unmarried person would be sexually abstinent.
* '''Comprise''' and '''compose''' are (roughly) reciprocal, not synonyms. An archipelago ''is composed of'' many islands, and ''comprises'' those islands; it is not ''comprised of'' the islands -- if anything, the islands are comprised of the archipelago (though this use of ''of'' is very archaic; ''comprised by'' might be better--although not by much, since ''comprised by'' is hardly a common expression either).
* '''Erstwhile''' is not laudatory; it means 'former'.
* In chemistry, '''[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volatility_%28chemistry%29 Volatile]]''' does ''not'' mean "explosive" or "flammable"[[note]]and certainly not that it [[FanFic/QuarterLifeHalfwayToDestruction does not have a half-life but quarter life so you must observe with haste]][[/note]], it means how likely the substance is to vaporise. Vapours of a given flammable substance likely ''will'' be even more flammable than say the liquid form, but that's just coincidental. The correct words to describe something which is likely to go boom or ''otherwise react spontaneously'' is either ''unstable'' (for when it is energetically likely) or ''labile'' (when it is kinetically likely); in particular, gasoline and oils are volatile but not particularly unstable, compared to compounds like acetylene.
** In regular English, the other meaning ("quick to anger" or "prone to violence") is perfectly correct, however.
* '''Holland''' is a region in '''The Netherlands'''. It comprises most of the coastal region and the best-known cities from The Netherlands lie in Holland, namely [[FreestateAmsterdam Amsterdam]], Rotterdam and The Hague. Holland is not a valid name for the country, nor is it the name of a province anymore. The region that was once Holland now has the imaginative names North Holland and South Holland. This is akin to referring to the UK as "England".
** It should be noted that in several languages the official name of Netherlands is derived from the name of the Holland province (e.g. 'Holandia' in Polish or 'Holland' in Danish and Estonian). It is used however to denote only the European part of the Kingdom of The Netherlands that incorporates also Aruba and former Dutch Antilles).
** Of course, it doesn't help avoid confusion when the ''pars pro toto'' shorthand "Holland" is used in the name of the national football team and by local fans who shout "Holland!" and "Hup Holland Hup!" at matches (so the word "Holland" is prominently implied to denote the whole country to the rest of the world's spectators), and "Holland" is currently used by the Netherlands Board of Tourism and Conventions to refer to the entire country in literature for prospective visitors. The main tourist website is Holland.com which contains a brief description of why Netherlands is technically correct but why it's nonetheless preferred to use Holland to attract visitors. The Dutch may actually be less pedantic on this point than many English speakers.
* A '''rabbi''' is a person sufficiently versed in Jewish law to have obtained this designation from a religious authority, not unlike an academic degree (you are still entitled to be addressed as Doctor even if you "don't do anything" with your Ph. D.). A rabbi:
** is ''not'' the Jewish equivalent of a priest (there still exists a hereditary priestly class within the Tribe of Levi, called Kohanim, although their duties have been significantly reduced since the destruction of the Temple in 70 CE);
** is ''not'' a person who certifies kosher food (this is a ''mashgiaḥ'', which literally means "inspector", and it is certainly not done through "blessing" food as [[ArtisticLicenseReligion Hollywood seems to think]]);
** is ''not'' a person who does circumcisions (this is a ''mohel'', who is generally a licensed physician these days),
** is ''not'' a person who leads prayers in the synagogue (this is a ''ḥazan'' or cantor, or often just a lay member of the congregation); and
** is not exclusively the spiritual leader of a synagogue (rabbis who do this are usually called "pulpit rabbis", but there are thousands of individuals with rabbinic ordination who do not work for synagogue congregations, including those who simply study full-time).
** Now to be fair, there is overlap among these categories -- some kohanim become rabbis, some rabbis work as mashgiḥim, etc., but the fact of being a rabbi does not mean that one is/does any of them. Also, any bearded man wearing black is not a rabbi -- this is standard appearance for all ultra-Orthodox Jews whether or not they have rabbinic ordination.
* The generic [[HypocriticalHumor verbing]] of nouns, '''medaling''' to describe ''winning'' a medal, '''actioning''' for ''doing'' something, '''friending''' for ''becoming'' friends. This is an interesting case, as it is becoming increasingly acceptable to "verb" nouns in colloquial speech, and it isn't like these words have any other established uses that would make a distinction worthwhile to defend (being neologisms for the most part).[[note]]Particularly insane denizens of this very wiki would attribute this to the influence of Creator/JossWhedon; they may very well be right, but that's beside the point.[[/note]] As a result, it's difficult to solidly classify any of these verb-to-noun constructions as solecisms (except perhaps ''actioning'', which provides only a clumsy synonym for ''doing'' much as ''utilizing'' is most frequently used as a clumsy synonym for ''using''), but one would be very well-advised to avoid them in more formal writing.
* '''Jealousy''' typically refers to the negative thoughts and feelings of insecurity, fear, and anxiety over an anticipated loss of something that the person values, particularly in reference to a human connection. One can be a jealous boyfriend, but one cannot be jealous of ''someone else's'' boyfriend, unless [[HoYay there's already something between the two of you]]. This is often confused with '''Envy''', which is "an emotion that occurs when a person lacks another's (perceived) superior quality, achievement, or possession and either desires it or wishes that the other lacked it. Further compounding the confusion is the word '''Covet''', which includes all the characteristics of the definition of 'envy' but also indicates a willingness to take the object coveted for themselves. For instance, if a person has a television set that you want, envy might drive you to buy a bigger, better TV (as you desire the quality of owning a nice television). If you coveted it, however, you'd be more likely to steal their TV (as you desire the exact television set they own). And if you're jealous, you're worried that they're coveting ''your'' TV.
** This confusion has caused no small amount of confusion with one of the Christian commandments. The command is correctly translated as 'Do not covet', but 'Do not envy' and, worse yet, 'Do not be jealous' are common incorrect translations.
* '''Lose''' vs. '''Loose''': More of a spelling issue than a language one; people still ''say'' them correctly. However, (particularly online), the two are used almost interchangeably, though it is more common to add an "o" than to subtract one. For the record, "lose" (rhymes with "booze") is a verb, and, in its intransitive form, has several meanings including to suffer defeat, to suffer loss or to depreciate in effectiveness. "Loose" (rhymes with "goose") is an adjective, and the opposite of tight. You can lose a game, but not tighten it. Your shoelaces can be loose, but you can't win them. Okay, technically shoelaces ''could'' be a prize...
** Loose can also be used as a verb, to mean "release" or "unfasten", but that usage is kinda archaic -- you've probably never heard it outside of Literature/TheBible or archery (one looses an arrow from a bow). It ''still'' isn't the opposite of "win" or "find", ever.
** Not only a spelling issue, but very often a "spell-check" type of issue, where the word could be a typo but will never be caught by spell-check.
** A particularly interesting example of this is a Swedish book called ''The Looser Handbook'' which is about the art of leading a life of constant failure. It only stands to reason that the author would fail at naming the book, since failure is what the book is about.
* '''Casualties''' are the people ''wounded'' and ''permanently crippled'' (physically or psychologically), missing, captured, and dead sustained [[StrategyVersusTactics during a military operation]] or in any other given period. There is a term the dead, missing, captured, and crippled alone: '''Irrecoverable Casualties'''. Those who merely died (sometimes including those dead of wounds or in captivity) constitute '''Fatalities'''. Note however that the definition of wounded is pretty fluid - it can mean anything from "minor stab wound requiring hospitalisation to be on the safe side" to "crippling but temporary phobia of footsteps" to "three limbs blown off and permanent loss of hearing". In other words just anything short of actual death.
** To quote the other wiki, "In military usage, a casualty is a person in service killed in action, killed by disease, disabled by injuries, disabled by psychological trauma, captured, deserted, or missing, but not someone who sustains injuries which do not prevent them from fighting." So if one received a minor stab wound and got stitched up and sent back to the front one would not be a casualty.
** Casualty is also not the adjective form of casual, as Music/{{Jewel}} learned in an [[http://www.mtv.com/news/1430602/jewel-kurt-loder-square-off-on-poetic-license/ infamous]] TV interview (and she [[DeathGlare was not happy about it.]])
* '''Invalid''' with regard to arguments is a matter of not having the correct form. It has nothing to do with the truth value of the statement. ''See generally'' SoundValidTrue.
** "Fido has four legs. Dogs have four legs. Therefore Fido is a dog." is invalid. "Fido has four legs. All animals with four legs are cats. Therefore Fido is a cat" is valid.
* '''CGI''': In VideoGames, the term is often misused to describe '''pre-rendered cutscenes'''. '''All''' videogames (except ones done entirely with FullMotionVideo) use CGI, which means "computer-generated imagery". Even ''VideoGame/PacMan'' and ''VideoGame/DonkeyKong'' use CGI; their graphics were created by computer images. When a cutscene is debated on whether it shows real gameplay, there's no question whether it has CGI (unless it features live-action video). The question is whether the video was pre-rendered and recorded beforehand or if it features the actual game assets.
** In animation, CGI is used to mean "anything rendered in 3D software". 2D animation using computer rendering software (UsefulNotes/{{Adobe Flash}}/Animate, UsefulNotes/ToonBoom) are typically referred to by what program they were rendered in, despite being just as computer-generated as the 3D kind. Wiki/ThisVeryWiki's own AllCGICartoon page tends to list 3D works over computer-made 2D ones.
* '''MMO''' is commonly used to refer to an ''MMORPG'', an abbreviation for '''M'''assively '''M'''ultiplayer '''O'''nline '''R'''ole '''P'''laying '''G'''ame. While it makes sense to abbreviate the term, most people refer to an MMORPG as an "MMO", when "MMO" is merely a prefix, as any genre can be Massively Multiplayer and online. Most Massively Multiplayer Online Games happen to be {{RPG}}s because the formula had been experimented with the most, but if you refer to game as an "MMOG" or refer to ''VideoGame/{{Neocron}}'' or ''VideoGame/PlanetSide'' as an "MMOFPS" or ''Darkwind War On Wheels'' as an "MMOTBS", people will often look at you weirdly and not understand what you meant as other multiplayers, no matter ''how'' massive they are just call them "Multiplayer" or "Online".
* '''Otome Games''' are [[RomanceGame games with a female protagonist and male love interests]], with the main focus being the romance between the protagonist and male characters. Games for a female audience with a CastFullOfPrettyBoys, SelfInsert protagonist but no explicit romance with the protagonist are not otome games. ''VideoGame/ToukenRanbu'', ''VideoGame/{{A3}}'', ''VideoGame/TheIdolmasterSideM'', ''VideoGame/EnsembleStars'' and ''VideoGame/IDOLiSH7'' are sometimes labelled otome games, even though they technically aren't.
* A '''Protagonist''' is the principal character (or, more loosely, character''s'') of a work, typically the one from whose perspective it is narrated and usually ([[VillainProtagonist though not always]]) TheHero, or at least [[AntiHero the person we're meant to sympathise with]]. Strictly speaking, there can only be one protagonist. The second-most important character on the protagonist's side is the "{{deuteragonist}}", the third is the "tritagonist", and so forth. An '''Antagonist''' is a character who creates problems for the protagonist, and is thus typically [[{{Villains}} The Villain]] (although again, [[HeroAntagonist not always]]). It is '''''NOT''''' the other way round. Some people get this wrong, even though you'd think it obvious given that 'antagonist' obviously shares a root with 'antagonize'....
* '''[=MP3=]''' refers to either the MPEG standard popularly used to encode music or audio files, or a file using this standard. It is not the same as an '''[=MP3=] player''', which is either computer software or a physical media player which plays [=MP3s=], and it is not a catch-all for all kinds of digital audio.
** On a side note, [=MP3=] does not stand for MPEG-3 but for MPEG-1 Layer 3 (and MPEG-2 Part 3) which is a sound encoding mechanism for the MPEG-1 format. In order to avoid any further confusion, the MPEG (Moving Picture Expert Group) decided there would never be any MPEG-3 standard and thus they went from MPEG-2 to MPEG-4.
** This is made worse by Chinese manufacturers who simply bump the number after "MP" whenever they add a new feature, so we have [=MP3=] player, [=MP4=] player (their 'new feature' is video playback, but they're also unrelated to [=MPEG-4=] and don't support [=MPEG-4=] video at all), [=MP5=] player, [=MP6=] player...
* A '''riff''' is "a short, repeated phrase, frequently played over changing chords or harmonies or used as a background to a solo improvisation". The way "riff" is often used, especially by [[Series/MysteryScienceTheater3000 MST3K]], is as though the riff itself is an improvisation, and "riffing" is the act of coming up with something on the spot. It's actually the opposite: a riff is the same thing repeated over and over again, possibly with ''slight'' variation. The confusion likely comes about because riffs are used in jazz, and jazz is improvisational music; but improvisations are not made of riffs, they're made of longer, more complex melodic phrases. Improvisation is the spontaneous creation of a melody, and is not properly called "riffing". An example of "riffing" would be the guitar part in the verse of "You Really Got Me", "Come As You Are", or "Whole Lotta Love"; or in jazz, the repeated horn parts heard most famously in Count Basie arrangements: a short fragment that's repeated constantly and identically.
** as a note [no pun intended] when people refer to a "riff" or "riffing", what they are probably INTENDING to refer to is "scatting" - scat singing, specifically, although one can scat on any instrument; "scat" officially means "vocal improvisation with wordless vocables" (nonsense syllables generally, sometimes just "oooo" or "aaa", sometimes a single word used over and over, etc) but over the past decades has grown to mean ANY instrument improvising the melody, over the riff, in a jazz or jazz-based song or piece.
** On the other hand, Merriam-Webster dictionary describes riff as above (noting the possible etymologyis a shortening of the word 'refrain') but also gives another definitions, namely 'any variation or ''improvisation'''.
* Occasionally, a law-enforcement officer will refer to the scene of a brutal crime as being very "'''graphic'''". Well, duh, you're there and you're looking at it, one would expect it to be visual and realistic instead of merely implied. The idea of "graphic" violence in media isn't that it's {{Gorn}}, just that it's shown onscreen rather than implied.
** by the same token '''explicit''' doesn't mean rude or obscene (as people probably think due to those "explicit lyrics" labels) it means stated outright rather than just suggested.
* '''Rein''' vs. '''reign'''. "Reign" means to rule as royalty, "reins" are what one uses to guide a horse. Both involve leadership and sound exactly alike, and so are easily confused. A very common example is the phrase "free rein", which means letting loose of the reins and allowing a horse to wander as it pleases. This is often misused as "free reign", which doesn't even make sense: a King by definition has freedom to reign, it's what makes him a King. So to recap: "reign" refers to a ''state'' of having authority, while "free rein" or "being given the reins" refer to the ''actions'' of leadership in a situation. If there is a plural, it's almost always going to be "reins".
* '''Charisma''' refers to someone's speaking talents and ability to influence others through force of personality and diplomacy. While good looks help, someone is ''not'' charismatic because she looks good in a formal dress, or because he has blue eyes and a nice smile; similarly, just because someone is able to speak publicly and get their point across doesn't qualify them either, not unless people are cheering wildly for ''how'' the news is presented, rather than the facts themselves. For a historical example, UsefulNotes/{{Cleopatra}} was considered extremely charismatic, despite contemporary accounts of her being a very plain-looking woman.[[note]]Centuries of artists depicting her as a beautiful temptress have influenced the modern view of her.[[/note]]
* '''Calorie''' is a non-SI unit of energy. It is relatively small unit however, so caloric intake of foods is usually expressed in kilocalories, (1 kcal = 1000 calories). Thus an average recommended daily energy intake is not 2200 calories but 2200 kilocalories or 2,200,000 calories.
** A '''C'''alorie refers to a kilocalorie, while a '''c'''alorie refers to the base unit. This can get confusing when 'calorie' is at the beginning of a sentence, which without context, would be indistinguishable as to if it was between the normal unit or the large unit.
** Also, although it isn't an SI unit, it ''is'' a metric unit rather than Imperial or American customary.
* '''Stereophonic''' refers to an audio that has exactly two speakers, instead of one ('''mono''') or four ('''surround'''). It is slightly inaccurate to refer to a system with surround sound as a "stereo", but always inaccurate to refer to the output as being "stereo sound."
** Less commonly, it can be any sound the gives the illusion of being surrounded by a sound field. It's not useful stereo if the two speakers are stacked one on top of the other, or placed too close together as in a boombox.
* One's interest is '''piqued''', not ''peaked''. This mistake is understandable, since "peak" can be used as a verb to mean "maximize" or "climax"; though your English professor will still probably mark this as being wrong. [[VideoGame/FinalFantasyVII "Poque"]] [[Film/MontyPythonAndTheHolyGrail is right out.]]
** Likewise, getting a preview of something means getting a '''sneak peek'''. A "sneak peak" would be a [[https://twitter.com/StealthMountain stealth mountain]]. In fact, someone's interest may be piqued by a good peek.
* The '''[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immaculate_Conception Immaculate Conception]]''' refers to the conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary by ''her'' mother Anna, specifically the belief that "from the first moment of her existence [... Mary] was preserved by God from the Original Sin and filled with sanctifying grace that would normally come with baptism after birth." Jesus' conception and birth from Mary was the '''[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virgin_Birth Virgin Birth]]'''. (Whether Mary actually was immaculately conceived is a huge theological dispute between Catholics and modern Protestants, so nothing more will be said about that. But if a Protestant says he doesn't believe in the "Immaculate Conception", he is ''not'' necessarily saying that Mary wasn't a virgin.)
** And the Immaculate ''Reception'' is [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immaculate_Reception something else entirely]]...
* A '''song''' is called "song" because there's singing in it. If there is no singing in it, it is not a song. There is a proper word for a musical composition without singing. It's a '''piece'''. In the context of popular music, one might call it a "track" (which encompasses music that does have singing and music that doesn't).
** Musical definitions are strange animals because composers are always PlayingWith definitions. Mendelssohn quite famously wrote piano pieces called or "Lieder ohne Worte," or "Songs without words." Even in German, the Lied was associated with singing, and Mendelssohn was PlayingWith the idea [[OlderThanRadio in the 19th century]]. Also, a "piece" can include singing, but it is normally limited to one where the singing is not the primary purpose, like Beethoven's 9th symphony. However, there is a song in that movement (which we know as "Ode to Joy"). Composers ''love'' to MindScrew with convention.
*** All of which gets frustrating when trying to put this kind of music into a computer, having to classify movements or recitatives as 'songs', composers as 'bands', operas as 'albums' and anything written before about 1920 as 'Classical', a weird appellation to, say, Medieval music, to lump it in with Puccini and Handel (neither of whom are really 'classical' either.)
* A '''neophyte''' is someone who is new to something (a newbie); it literally means "new/young/newly-planted plant". A '''neophile''' is someone who likes things that are new.
* '''Novitiate''' is the state, condition, or period of being a '''novice''', not the person. William Buckley fouls this up in ''Tucker's Last Stand''.
* An '''epidemic''' refers to the frequency of a disease substantially exceeding what is expected in recent history.
* '''Sushi''' is a food consisting of cooked rice mixed with vinegar ("shari") and other ingredients. It can contain a large variety of ingredients ranging from vegetables, seafood (mostly uncooked, but some are cooked as well), sauces, etc. The shari makes it sushi. '''Onigiri''' or '''(o)musubi''' is usually rice (no vinegar), another ingredient, wrapped in seaweed.
** Similarly, '''Sashimi''' is taken to be the the word for raw seafood by itself, but it actually refers to the way it is prepared (thin slices), and [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_common_misconceptions#Food_and_cooking can apply to other types of meat or vegetables]].
* '''Ichor''' originally meant the blood of gods or angels. In later times, it has somehow come to also mean pus. Fiction writers, however, like to use it as a "fancy-sounding" word for pretty much any liquid.
* '''Your''' and '''you're'''. "Your" is a possessive pronoun used to describe something as belonging to the person being addressed, while "you're" is a contraction of "you are". If "you are" would fit instead, then "your" is not the correct word.
** Likewise, '''it's''', and '''its''' have similar misuse. "Its" is a possessive pronoun that's usually used to describe what belongs to the subject in the sentence. "It's" is the contraction of "it is". If "it is" can fit into the sentence, then "its" is not the correct word. Likewise, if there's a sign of the subject having possession in the sentence, then "it's" does not apply. (A good way to make sure it's being used correctly is to speak the phrase as if there's no contraction. For example, "It's red" = "It is red" is correct. "It's walls" = "It is walls" is incorrect, and should be "Its walls".)
* '''Implicate''' means to be responsible for something, or to assign responsibility to someone. '''Insinuate''' means to subtly hint at something unpleasant. Both are used for "imply", whether positive or negative. Imply actual means to ''strongly'' hint at something.
* '''Pilot''' does not simply mean "the first episode of a TV show". It should be used if, and ''only'' if, the episode is made by itself with the intention of shopping it around to various networks who will judge whether it works well enough to commission a whole series, as in a "pilot program". ''Film/PulpFiction'', which popularized the term, actually made this distinction, but along the way the word has become conflated with '''premiere'''. This usage is especially incorrect when referring to animated shows, which often get a whole season commissioned in advance due to animation lead time, and the pilot or pitch demo, often made cheaply and quickly, is simply redone.
** The exception, obviously, is when the pilot is made and ''then'' broadcast as the first episode.
* '''Ripoff''' is either a bad financial scam where you are conned into buying a fake product, or something where you are tricked into giving money without receiving anything in return. A lot of people use "ripoff" to mean the general act of copying or mimicry in general, and in the form of entertainment, a '''Ripoff''' is apparently "[[TheyCopiedItSoItSucks Something that's similar to a movie I saw before]]." The origin of this misuse had to do with [[TheMockbuster Mockbusters]] trying to trick people into buying their product mistaking it for the product they actually wanted.
* '''JustForFun/{{Egregious}}''' has been used so egregiously on Wiki/ThisVeryWiki that it has its own page.
* Similarly '''Your Mileage Will Vary''' is used as a way of referring to Your Mileage May Vary taken UpToEleven on especially controversial issues that reach a point where [[BrokenBase there is no middle ground]]. Your Mileage May Vary comes from car commercials that say consumers might get a different amount of mileage than is advertised, and on this wiki, means that viewers might not agree with the statement. Using "Your Mileage Will vary" implies unanimous disagreement rather than inevitable controversy.
%% Do not bluelink any of the Your Mileage X phrases.
* The word '''{{Trope}}''' does not come from TV Tropes, and like "subversion" its meaning in the real world is different than on this site. In reality "trope" does not mean "storytelling device" but "the use of a word to have a meaning different than the usual one."
** It does almost fit; trope titles often use words differently than the literal definition, because they're slang or jargon that already existed, or for brevity, or to make a pun.
* The word '''logical''' does not mean "reasonable" or "the result of a well-shaped argument". It means "defined according to the rules of logic", logic being a number of highly specific ways to describe and analyze the interaction between set premises.
* One that shows up every now and again is '''equivocal''' to mean "equivalent". An equivocal statement is one that is ambiguous and open to interpretation (conversely, an unequivocal statement is one in which the meaning is clear).
* '''Presently''' does not mean "happening now" or "ongoing". It means "soon".
* '''Ambivalence''' is not the same as ''ambiguity'' or just 'not bothered'. if you feel ambivalent about a decision, you are torn by equally strong feelings in two (or more) directions. A child deciding whether to live with her mother or father after a divorce might feel ambivalent.
* The term '''"stepchild"''' is sometimes mistakenly used with children who are ''adopted'', rather than for children whose [[ParentWithNewParamour parents have married someone besides their other parent]]. For example, Lindesfarne of ''Webcomic/KevinAndKell'' is Angelique's adopted daughter, but after her adoptive parents' divorce, she became Kell's stepdaughter when she married her adoptive father Kevin.
* Something that is '''anonymous''' has no name attached. If there is a name attached but it doesn't match the one on the originator's passport, such as an internet username, it's '''pseudonymous'''.
* '''Cherubim''' (singular '''cherub''') are the alien looking creatures appearing in the book of Ezekiel. The chubby little winged cupids are called '''putti''' (or '''putto''' in singular), and don't really have anything to do with biblical angels.
* In the entertainment industry, there are '''indie''' producers and developers (short for independent) that create and release their own works without relying on a 3rd party to assist in their project, such as major developers or publishers. However, people often get meaning of indie movies/games/etc. wrong and think it means the product was made by people who did not have a lot of money. This also leads people to believe that indie developers that make a ton of money off of their work or use a major publisher to get their product out to the public have "sold out" to major corporations. In short, as long as a group of developers have total control over their creations and don't have anyone outside of their group influencing their work, then the developers are indie, whether they are large or small, profitable or unprofitable.
** The Independent Spirit Awards had to actually redefine its criteria for nominations after ''Film/{{Fargo}}'' won Best Picture. While it was technically an independent film, its budget was $7M, and not in the spirit (pun recognized) of the awards, which was intended to give low budget films their own recognition.
* In the context of wrestling, an '''escape''' is where one frees themselves from a hold, a '''counter''' is where one turns a hold being applied to them into a hold of their own and a '''reversal''' is a specific counter that results in you applying the hold your opponent just had you in.
** The confusion was referenced in Wrestling/RingOfHonor when Wrestling/CMPunk argued he shouldn't have been cost a rope break when he used them to reverse an arm hold applied by Wrestling/AJStyles instead of using them to as a means of escape. Unfortunately Punk allowed Styles to escape while arguing, weakening his own point and requiring ROH [[ObviousRulePatch to take another look at the rules]].
** In TNA, Don West had to explain the significance of someone finding a counter to the Canadian destroyer used by Petey William, after the fans had likely seen the move blocked, escaped or otherwise negated dozens of time. Even then, the move itself may never have been countered before but attempts to apply it had.
* Someone born with reproductive organs that are intermediate between male and female is not transgender or a hermaphrodite, they are '''intersexed'''. A true '''hermaphrodite''' is an organism with functional male and female parts in the same body, that can reproduce as either: a condition which occurs naturally in earthworms or snails, but never in humans.
* '''"Excessive"''' does not mean "a lot" or "a great deal". It means "too much".
* One can only commit '''treason''' if they are working with a foreign power. If it's a completely internal case of trying to overthrow the government, it's '''sedition'''.
* '''Cojones''' is Spanish for balls. '''Cajones''' is Spanish for drawers.
** Although, saying ''cajones'' in English could be a [[BilingualBonus bilingual pun]].
* '''Port and starboard''' do not mean left and right, but specifically ''the ship's'' left and right -- that is, the left and the right of a person on the ship facing towards the bow. The fore and aft directions are similarly measured relative to the vessel, not the speaker.
** In cases where a smaller boat or plane is being carried on a larger ship, "left" and "right" are always used when referring to the smaller boat or plane to prevent confusion. So if a plane is parked on a carrier deck facing towards the back of the ship, the left side of the plane is towards the starboard side of the ship.
* '''Entitled''' means that someone is given a title, authority or ''rightful'' ownership of something. Some people however use it as if it meant the opposite, "someone is claiming to deserve something, although he doesn't". Even on Wiki/TVTropes - see EntitledBastard, EntitledToHaveYou. The usage here refers to an unearned ''subjective feeling'' of entitlement, hence the common expression "sense of entitlement" - the person in question ''feels'' they deserve something, even though they don't. The correct way to use "entitled" would be saying the person feels or acts like they are entitled to something, not that they are "being" entitled.
* '''Simplistic''' is not a synonym for "simple". It means "too simple" or "simple to a fault", and is inherently pejorative.
* A '''sprite''', for video game terms, is a 2D image in video games that is completely flat and lacks 3D angles. People who have little knowledge on video game definitions assume that all characters that one sees in a game are sprites, which is not completely true; people confused 3D '''models''' for sprites and a model is a 3D shape that can be viewed from any angle. Some games like ''VideoGame/PaperMario'' invoke a 2D style, but most of them use 3D character models that are flattened down so they look 2D.
* For video games, '''graphics''' is what a viewer sees on their display or monitor. Many people assume that "graphics" means what the video game looks like. In actuality, people usually mean the game's visual style when they describe a game's graphics.
* '''Open Beta''' and '''Closed Beta''' get heavily confused when people try to differentiate the two terms. A beta that is closed off to the public means that only people who get handpicked by developers via invites, a dedicated team formed to test the beta, and/or has a limited amount of slots available if the developers needs just a certain amount of people. An open beta means it's fully open to the public and anyone can take part without slots being limited. Some video games are available in its beta state and sometimes players can buy the game as such to test the game and keep the final version of the game once it is finished. Technically speaking, a "paid, open beta" is an oxymoron, since "beta test" is defined as a test of a computer product prior to wide commercial release. No matter what a company tries to tell you, once they're accepting money from the general public, they're selling a product, not conducting a beta test (although the line gets blurry in cases where the beta costs money, but is cheaper than the final release, such as ''VideoGame/{{Minecraft}}''). This is further confused by the fact that "beta" used to imply that the software was "incomplete" in some way; in the modern world of seamless online patches and updates, no software product is ever "complete" until the company stops issuing new patches and updates, often years after the product has come out of beta.
* Political ideologies in general suffer from a lot of confusion which can make discussions very hard. The confusion of what '''left''' and '''right''' actually mean, for example, or what is the relationship between '''conservatism''' and economic policies, or perhaps the most confusing word '''liberal''' which has different meanings in different countries which can, at worst, be the opposite of each other.
* '''[[UsefulNotes/HighFunctioningAutism Autistic]]''', at least on the Internet, gets used to mean "'retarded' only less so" more and more often in recent years - while less for perceived stupidity and more for social awkwardness (so you'll never find someone calling an inanimate object autistic even online), the general effect is the same. "Autistic" can also be used to refer to someone who has an exceptional focus on a particular activity, even if the person being described does not have an autism spectrum disorder at all. This is most likely due to the {{GIFT}}; anonymity means both that people feel freer to use "autistic" to mean "asshole" despite the UnfortunateImplications, and that people feel freer to use autism as an excuse for ''being'' an asshole (whether they're actually diagnosed or not), which only perpetuates the stereotype.
* '''AsymmetricMultiplayer''', as originally defined by Creator/{{Nintendo}} in reference to certain UsefulNotes/WiiU games, is a multiplayer mode in which the different players have totally different roles and capabilities, unlike most multiplayer games, where all the players are generally doing the same thing and playing the game the same way. This does ''not'' include games where players can be different characters (e.g., a magic user and a sword user) with slightly different abilities but carry out essentially the same goal in the same way. This instead refers to games where the roles, abilities and gameplay experience are drastically different. Misuse of the term became an issue with ''VideoGame/StarTrekTheVideoGame'' and several other games revealed and/or discussed in the period during/after [=E3=] 2012, when the development teams for the games claimed that their CoOpMultiplayer counted as Asymmetric Multiplayer (probably stemming from a desire to [[FollowTheLeader ride on the coattails of the initial Wii U hype]]).
* '''AIDS''' is often used to refer to the notorious sexually-transmitted disease that cripples the host's immune system. "AIDS" stands for '''a'''cquired '''i'''mmuno'''d'''eficiency '''s'''yndrome, and many people don't understand the "syndrome" part. You cannot ''catch'' AIDS; rather, you are reduced to it by being infected with the aforementioned STD, which by the way is called HIV ('''h'''uman '''i'''mmunodeficiency '''v'''irus), and having it beat the snot out of your immune cells. It is possible for someone to have HIV, but not AIDS, so long as their immune system is still intact. In addition, no one dies from AIDS - they die from ''complications'' related to the condition. (Simiarly, no one can die from alcholism, either. They can only die from ''complications'' due to it, such as cirrhosis of the liver.)
* '''Maltese cross''' is [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maltese_cross a eight-pointed cross]] which has the form of four "V"-shaped elements joined at the center, most famously used by UsefulNotes/TheKnightsHospitallers. Colloquially, however, the term "maltese cross" is sometimes applied to the ''cross pattée'', [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cross_patt%C3%A9e a cross which has arms narrower at the centre]], and broader at the perimeter, most often associated with the Prussian and German military usage.
* '''Scandinavia''': UsefulNotes/{{Finland}} and UsefulNotes/{{Iceland}} are not Scandinavian countries, though they are sometimes referred to as such. Scandinavia consists of UsefulNotes/{{Sweden}}, UsefulNotes/{{Norway}}, and UsefulNotes/{{Denmark}}. (They are, however, part of the Nordic region, as are the Scandinavian countries. There's also a distinction between Scandinavia--a political-cultural concept--and the Scandinavian Peninsula, a geographical feature which excludes Denmark but includes part of Finland.) Finns, for their part are neither Scandinavian nor Nordic in the ethnic sense; some anthropologists go so far as to describe them as Eurasian, given their common ancestry with certain Siberian (Asiatic Russian) peoples.
* '''Sex[=/=]Gender''': The distinction between sex and gender. The sexes (male and female) as the two divisions in which many organisms are placed, based upon their reproductive role and the genders (masculine and feminine) referring to ''social'' characteristics (such as behavioral norms) associated with males and females, respectively. The use of gender to mean the same thing as sex [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gender#Etymology_and_usage dates back to the 14th century]], whereas the use of gender to mean gender roles only dates to John Money's work in the 1950s. So it is not incorrect by any stretch for people to continue using the original meaning of the word (which in fact still precedes the gender roles [[http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/gender meaning in the dictionary]] ).
** The distinction between transgenderism and transsexuality does not necessarily have anything to do with genitals or whether or not someone has had sex reassignment surgery (SRS). "Transgender" is usually understood as an umbrella term for anyone whose sex and gender aren't totally congruent, or who strongly deviates from gender norms. "Transsexual" means someone who permanently transitions from one gender to another, usually through medical treatments like hormones and surgery as well as social and legal changes, but no individual step is necessary for being transsexual. SRS doesn't have much to do with it. Many transsexuals can't have SRS or choose not to. Furthermore, "transgender" is already an adjective. Saying "transgendered" is simply redundant.
* The words '''nemesis''' and '''archenemy''' are synonyms, as both words mean "one's greatest enemy". The "arch" modifier in "archenemy" signifies "greatest", while the word "nemesis" doesn't require a modifier because it already means "one's greatest enemy" by itself. "Arch-nemesis" is not only incorrect but [[DepartmentOfRedundancyDepartment redundant]], since it would mean "one's greatest greatest enemy".
* The term '''pay to win''' is used in many video games that entices the player to buy items or enhancements with real life money in order to have an easier time in beating the game or getting a step ahead of the competition. Many free to play games are designed to be frustrating to play normally and have heavy restrictions on what the player can do unless the person forks over money to gain and advantage. Pay to win is also applied to competitive games where a player can buy enhancements to defeat their opponents with little effort, thus only people with money to burn can beat everyone else that didn't pay. However, people often use pay to win on any video game with DLC that contains new weapons or other items, even if the game itself can be played just fine without the extra content, the DLC content themselves being on par with vanilla content, or if the game lacks any competitive aspect. The term in general carries negative connotations, with the implication that those that pay real life money have advantages that cannot be obtained by those that play for free. People have also used "pay to win" when it comes to buying cosmetic items in a game where said items do nothing to enhance the player's game other than simply changing how they look because some people believe obtaining all the items in the game is a way of "winning".
* The words '''atom''' and '''molecule''', and their derived terms ("molecular", etc.) are not synonymous. Molecules are structures formed from atoms. By strict usage, "molecule" only refers to structures held together by covalent bonds, so e.g. a block of metal is not made of molecules - its atoms are connected by metallic bonds.
** A molecule is also not the same as a mixture. In a molecule, atoms are chemically bonded together but in a mixture they are not. For example, air is (mostly) a ''mixture'' of nitrogen and oxygen, as it contains nitrogen and oxygen ''molecules''.
* In the Wiki/SCPFoundation notably, you will very often see the word '''amnesiac''' referring to substances that cause loss of memory. An amnesiac is actually a ''person'' suffering from amnesia. A substance causing amnesia would be an '''amnestic'''. However the word is so deeply rooted in SCP terminology that it's all but impossible to do anything about it. The Wiki only told newer authors that they prefer using "amnestic" instead of "amnesiac", but would forgive any uses of the latter.
* Challenging times can make it hard to make '''ends meet'''. No food item called '''ends meat''' (or '''end's meat''') has ever existed, outside of phonetic incomprehension or [[{{Feghoot}} stories that end with absolutely horrid puns]]. Imagine trying to tie a rope or cord around something with insufficient or barely sufficient length (or, conversely, with plentiful length, though it's usually only mentioned in the context of scarcity), and you'll understand the sensation the phrase is meant to convey.
* '''Niggardly''' is a perfectly innocent word meaning "stingy, miserly, not generous." It does not have nor has it ever had any connection to a certain [[NWordPrivileges infamous racial slur]]-- its origins date back to the 1300s by way of Old Norse, long before the African slave trade was a thing-- except that unfortunately it kind of ''sounds'' like that word. (Etymologically, it's related not to the N-word but to "niggle" as in nitpick, quibble about small details.) Sure enough, well-meaning but small-vocabularied people who succumb to PoliticalCorrectnessGoneMad have [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Controversies_about_the_word_%22niggardly%22 created many controversies about it]], to the point that it's probably wiser to avoid it altogether today.
* A '''regimen''' is a health-related routine, such as diet, exercise, and/or medicine. A '''regiment''' is a military unit (traditionally commanded by a colonel). A '''regime''' is a government or leadership (usually with negative, authoritarian connotations). These three words often end up shuffled into one another's places.
* '''Android''', '''cyborg''' and '''robot''' are not synonyms, as a quick glance at their respective etymologies should make clear. "Android" is derived from the Greek prefix ''"andro"'' ("man") and the suffix ''"oid"'' ("resembling"), and it means "An artificial creation built in the likeness of a human. "Cyborg" is a contraction of "cybernetic organism", and it means "A lifeform with a combination of organic and mechanical body parts". "Robot" is derived from the Russian ''"rabota"'' ("to work"), and it means "An autonomous machine built to perform a specific task". The term ''android'' technically refers to an artificial life form that resembles a male human. The female equivalent would be a ''gynoid''.
* Something's '''inception''' is its beginning. Courtesy of [[{{Film/Inception}} the eponymous movie]], this is widely misunderstood. Since a great deal of the movie revolves around dreams within dreams--and later, by MemeticMutation, anything within the same thing--a lot of people have, by association, gotten the idea it means the latter.[[note]] In the movie, "inception" refers to the '''ends''' of the protagonist's mission, not its '''means'''; they call it "inception" because they're trying to give their target a radical new idea, which will begin a new phase in his life.[[/note]]
* A '''desert''' is any place with low rainfall and vegetation, regardless of the climate. Thus, Antarctica is a desert.
* A '''Good Samaritan Law''' is not a law which compels someone to help a person in jeopardy. That is a '''Duty To Rescue''' law. A Good Samaritan law grants legal protection to anyone who attempts to help another person in the midst of a crisis. There have indeed been cases where someone offering aid was later sued by the person they attempted to help.
* '''Centurion''' is not an all-encompassing term for a soldier in Ancient Rome; it was an upper-level rank in the Roman military (roughly analogous to "Captain" or "Major") specifically designating the commander of a '''Century''' (a unit of around 100 soldiers, hence the name). A baseline Roman soldier (analogous to "Private") was a '''Legionary''' (not '''Legionnaire'''; that comes from the FrenchForeignLegion).
* For the term '''let alone''' as in "X is not Y, let alone Z", Y should be the ''less'' far-fetched idea. For example, "bronze is not as valuable as silver, let alone gold." Sometimes, the opposite gets used, that is, "bronze is not as valuable as gold, let alone silver."
** The same rule applies when two entities are specified, such as [[VideoGame/HalfLife "I never thought I'd see a resonance cascade, let alone create one"]]
* For United States citizens, '''Freedom of Speech''' means a person has the right to criticize and speak out against the government without needing to fear repercussions from said government. It does not mean "I cannot be silenced for saying anything I want to" since you can get in trouble for saying something that implies a threat to someone else (even if you claim to be joking), nor does it allow you to say something offensive on a privately owned web site whose owner(s) have the full right to ban you for breaking their rules.[[note]]To put it in a way that's relatable to Tropers in the U.S.: If one were to vandalize or make otherwise grossly-unacceptable edits to the TV Tropes Wiki, no part of the First Amendment disallows the wiki staff from banning the offending Troper.[[/note]]
** To suggest otherwise is like saying the right to Freedom Of Assembly [[InsaneTrollLogic means you can have a party at someone else's house without permission whenever you want]]
* '''Emigrate''' and '''Immigrate''' refer to the same concept, but the difference between the two words is that "emigrate" refers to moving ''out'' of a country while "immigrate" refers to moving ''into'' one. '''Export''' and '''Import''' are a similar source of confusion regarding objects rather than people. Think of it as like "exhale" and "inhale".
* '''Semantics''' is literally the study of meanings of words and phrases, and how they relate to the phonetic strings used to convey them. When you say about two different terms, ‘This is semantics,’ you are in fact saying they mean two different things rather than that the difference is negligible. Similarly, you could say that:
** the difference between ‘cat’ as an animal and ‘cat’ as a jazz player is semantic;
** the difference between ‘pray’ and ‘prey’ is semantic, orthographic (i.e. in writing), and syntactic (you can’t pray on someone, at least not in the same meaning);
** the difference between ‘kid’ and ‘child’ is phonological (they’re obviously pronounced differently) and orthographic, and while the difference is, for the most part, not semantic (i.e. both terms refer to a human between the ages of 2~3 and ~12, although the former could also mean ‘young goat’), it is also pragmatic (i.e. you wouldn’t use the former in formal conversation);
** The difference between Missouri (‘miz-ZURR-ree’) and Missouri (‘miz-ZURR-ruh’) is purely phonological/dialectical.
* The term '''reboot''' is sometimes used in reference to a new installment of a franchise that differs from the original in terms of art style or premise, when the term specifically applies to [[ContinuityReboot an adaptation that restarts continuity for the sake of telling a new interpretation of the franchise's characters and events]]. If the new series is still in continuity with the original incarnation, then it would be a '''revival''' (some people distinguish between the former and latter using the terms '''hard reboot''' and '''soft reboot''').
* '''Arab''' refers to people who speak Arabic. It is not a term for Muslims in general (There are Christian, Druze, and even Jewish Arabs, and most Muslims come from non Arab countries). Similar, Afghanis [[note]] who speak primarily Pashto and Dari, types of Persian. [[/note]]. Iranians [[note]] Who speak Persian [[/note]] or Pakistanis [[note]] Who have multiple languages, but primarily speak Urdu, a language related to Hindi[[/note]] are not Arabs, although all use a similar script to Arabic.
* '''Hindu''' refers to the [[UsefulNotes/{{Hinduism}} religion]], as well as an individual who practices it. '''Hindi''' refers to the language. Also, just because something is Indian doesn't mean it's Hindi or Hindu. There are multiple Indian religions and languages that share only a small if any similarity to Hindi. However, Hindu is also used as a synonym for someone from India.
* A '''Monkey''' is a type of primate, usually one with tails that live in trees. An '''Ape''' (which includes gibbons, orangutans, gorillas, chimpanzees, bonobos, and humans) is not considered a monkey, although they belong in the same suborder (Catarrhini) as Old World Monkeys. Apes don't have a tail, have larger brains than monkeys, and tend to be larger than most monkeys. '''Simian''' refers to both apes and monkeys. Lampshaded in ''Literature/{{Discworld}}'' where the Librarian, an Orangutan, is annoyed at being called a Monkey.
* In common use, '''rape''' and '''sexual assault''' are used interchangeably. '''Sexual assault''' is defined as any physical sexual contact perpetrated against a person without their consent or otherwise against their will. '''Rape''' is a specific form of sexual assault involving penetration.
* '''Semen''' is the liquid that comes out during male ejaculation. '''Sperm''' are specifically the male reproductive cells which are present in the semen of fertile males. It is indeed possible to ejaculate semen without sperm if he's infertile.
* '''Parasite''' is sometimes used, especially in fiction, to refer to something that drains life from its host, even to the point of death. Real parasites try not to kill their hosts; lethal "parasites" are actually called pathogens ([[ThePlague diseases]]) or [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parasitoid parasitoids]].
* '''Geneva Conventions''' are the international conventions binding their signatories to observe specific conduct toward refugees, captives and prisoners in the time of war. It has nothing to do with the agreement to abstain from the use of some types of weapons as this subject is covered by the '''Hague Conventions'''.
* '''Remake''' and '''remaster''' are used interchangeably in the video game field whenever a video game from the past gets rereleased with improved graphical fidelity. A '''remake''' is a video game that is rebuilt from the ground up with the intention of adding/changing levels, rewriting the story, and using new gameplay mechanics that couldn't have been done in the original game. A '''remaster''' is simply taking the same video game and giving it a visual upgrade (and possibly a new feature or two) while everything else remains the same.
* '''Samurai''' is not a synonym for a traditional Japanese warrior but it specifically means a warrior who is bound by feudal agreement with a lord. A vassal in other words. A general word for any person belonging to warrior caste is ''bushi''. A ''bushi'' serving no lord is called ''ronin''.
** Similarly, a knight is technically not a heavily-armed and armored (and possibly mounted) warrior in the medieval-European style - the term refers to an individual of that time period within the social class of knight, which was lower nobility and inevitably could fight in the aforementioned style. There actually is a term for a warrior capable of fighting with a lance in heavy armor upon a horse, independent of their social class: A man-at-arms. Interestingly, etymology seems to indicate that the term knight was originally used around this loosely before the social class arose and the term man-at-arms then came around for the difference.
* Television announcers in both the US and Canada routinely use the word '''common-law''' husband or wife to denote the person someone is living with. The act of cohabitation, no matter how long, ''never'' creates a legal relationship in the U.S., and only rarely in Canada.
* '''Vapid''': A word meaning "uninspired", "vacuous", or "bland", that has come to be used heavily by the online community for movies they don't like. Becomes hilarious (or infuriating) when the thing about the movie that turns them off is the exact opposite of being vapid. ie. it is inspired and deep, but goes in a direction the person doesn't care for.
* '''Exeunt''' is not a fancy synonym for '''exit'''. Etymologically, "exit" is the third-person singular present active indicative of the Latin verb ''exeō'', and "exeunt" its third-person plural present active indicative. Thus, in stage directions, "exit" is used for only one actor (e.g., Exit Hamlet), and "exeunt" for two or more (e.g., Exeunt Romeo and Juliet).
* A '''crescendo''' is NOT the loud climax of a piece of music or other sound -- the word you want is, well, '''climax.''' ''Crescendo'' (Italian: "I wax, I grow greater") refers to the ''process of getting louder'', an increase in volume over time, which ultimately may lead to a climax (or instead subside again in a '''decrescendo.''') "The noise rose to a crescendo" is flat-out wrong, in fact semi-redundant (rather like "His speed increased to an acceleration"), and will produce winces among the musically-trained.
* '''{{Muppet}}''', apart from use as an insult, is repeatedly used (even on Wiki/ThisVeryWiki!) to refer to advanced rubber puppets of the type seen in ''Film/TheDarkCrystal'' and ''Series/{{Farscape}}''. In reality, Creator/JimHenson himself said that those characters are not Muppets, but rather [[http://muppet.wikia.com/wiki/Muppets_vs_Creatures Creatures]]. ''Muppet'' refers specifically to the felt-type characters seen in ''Series/SesameStreet'', ''Series/TheMuppetShow'' and ''Series/FraggleRock'', because they are a {{Portmanteau}} of "marionette" and "puppet".[[note]]What about Big Bird? Or is that a costume?[[/note]] It's also a trademarked name, meaning that if Creator/{{Disney}} (the currect rights holder for the name) doesn't say something is a Muppet, it's not a Muppet. (*Cough*[[Franchise/StarWars Yoda]]*cough*)
* Contrary to what some believe, '''arbitrary''' does not mean the same thing as "random" or "ever-changing." It refers to a decision, definition, or policy which ''lacks a basis in prior precedent''. It is true that policies based largely on arbitration usually change rapidly and seemingly at random, but that is only a side effect. It is not the definition of the word.
* Being '''agnostic''' does not mean that a person is "undecided" about the existence of a god; it means that they believe that that both the existence or nonexistence of the divine is ''inherently'' unknowable. This is the reason for the word's Greek etymology: it comes from the prefix ''"a-"'' (meaning "lacking" or "without") and the root word ''"gnosis"'' (meaning "knowledge").[[note]] Technically, it should also be pronounced "AY-noss-tick" rather than "AGG-noss-tick", since the "g" is silent in the Greek word ''"gnosis"''. But that's another issue.[[/note]]
* "Please '''bare''' with me". No, I don't know you well enough. But if you like, I'll try and '''bear''' with you (in the metaphorical sense of following where you're going).
* '''[[VirusMisnomer Virus]]''' and '''bacteria'''[[note]] Also note that 'bacteria' is a plural, with the the singular form being 'bacterium'- but that's another issue. [[/note]] are often used interchangeably to mean 'pathogen' (i.e. a microorganism that causes disease), but are actually specific types of microorganism and are very different. Viruses are non-living, can only replicate inside host cells, are always pathogenic, and are far smaller than bacteria. In contrast, bacteria are alive, can reproduce by themselves, and are far larger than viruses. In addition, many of them are not pathogenic- your skin is literally covered with mostly harmless bacteria. Viruses and bacteria also cause different diseases, which is a fact many people ignore- for example, people worry about bacteria from people with flu, even though flu is a viral disease.
* '''Fluid''' is not a synonym of '''liquid''', as a fluid is anything that can flow. This includes liquids, gases and plasma.
* '''Sulphur''' is an element which, under standard conditions, is a yellow solid, which means it does not have a smell because in order for a substance to have a smell it has to be a gas. However, many people still compare smelly things to sulphur (for example, by saying that something which smells bad "smells like sulphur"). The misconception that sulphur has a smell may have arisen from confusion between sulphur, sulphur dioxide (which is formed when sulphur burns) and hydrogen sulphide (which decomposes to form elemental sulphur, meaning it's often found near sulphur), as the latter two chemicals are both odourants.
** And while we're on the subject, the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry (IUPAC), the body in charge of chemical nomenclature, spells it "sulfur". (This was a compromise between British and American English speakers, in exchange for the British English spelling of "aluminium".)
* A '''[[LoopholeAbuse loophole]]''' is an unintentional gap or grey area in the law usually caused by inadequate descriptions and definitions. A '''provision''' or an '''exemption''' [[note]]The later term usually refers to taxes while the former refers to everything else[[/note]] is a written in exception to the law and is very much intentional. Provisions and exemptions are often mistaken for loopholes, especially by people seeking to remove provisions. For example only a small minority of corporate tax "loopholes" are actually loopholes while the rest are very much intentional tax exemptions.
* A '''softlock''' is a particular kind of software freeze, in which the program still runs, but none of the user's input is functional. Beginning in 2017, some members of the ''Franchise/{{Pokemon}}'' fandom have been using the word to refer to situations where the player cannot progress farther in the game, which is better known as being "{{unwinnable}}", or just plain "getting stuck". The root of this confusion appears to be that around that time, the [=YouTuber=] WebVideo/{{Pikasprey}} Yellow uploaded a video titled "How to Escape Lorelei's Game-Ending Softlock", about one possible unwinnable scenario which completely takes control away from the player thanks to a design oversight, making it a true softlock. From this, his watchers generalized the word to ''all'' cases of UnwinnableByInsanity, even though none of the others qualify. Pikasprey himself has since begun a new video series titled "[=SoftlockPicking=]", about his Houdini-esque ways of escaping these "unwinnable" situations the viewers get him into, which unfortunately would appear to spread and perpetuate this incorrect usage.
* '''Lava''' and '''magma''', while related, are not one and the same. Lava is molten liquid rock that has been expelled from a volcano and is flowing on the surface whereas magma is the same substance that's inside the volcano and has not ejected to the surface. Due to lava being used to describe magma in most video games and films, lava is used as the catch all term for liquid rock no matter where it's situated.
* '''Refute''' means ''to provide evidence to prove falsehood''. If somebody insists they are refuting a claim demand they do so.
* A '''run-on sentence''' is not "a very long sentence". A run-on sentence is a grammatical error when two independent clauses either lack proper punctuation separating them, or a period indicating that they are two sentences.[[labelnote:e.g.]]"I went to the market Jane went home." is a run-on sentence. It can be corrected either by adding a comma and a coordinating conjunction ("I went to the market, and Jane went home."), a semicolon or similar punctuation ("I went to the market; Jane went home."), or by making it two sentences with a period ("I went to the market. Jane went home.").[[/labelnote]]. A three thousand word-long sentence can still be grammatical, and won't be a run-on sentence as long as it uses proper punctuation and coordinating conjunctions.
* '''Beta''' or '''beta male''' is often used to mean "man who isn't manly enough", however this is inconsistent with actual animal behavior. In a pack the betas serve more as the NumberTwo to the alpha, but still outrank the rest of the pack and may even [[KlingonPromotion kill their masters and take over]]. The most common example of the alpha/beta male dynamic, wolf packs, is also itself a DeadUnicornTrope. Wolf packs in the wild are simply families, and the alpha male and female are the parents. The researcher who first popularized that theory, L. David Mech, was observing wolves in zoos, where unrelated canines are grouped together and they take on more of a prison mentality. Mech eventually renounced the theory once he saw that wolves in the wild don't act that way.
* People often confuse '''Negative reinforcement''' with punishment. It actually means rewarding someone by taking ''away'' a bad thing, e.g. "Do what we say and we'll take your handcuffs off." In operant conditioning, the phrase "negative reinforcement" makes a pair with "positive reinforcement"; they both "reinforce", that is they both increase the likelihood that a behavior will be repeated. "Positive" and "negative" here do not carry the meaning of "good" and "bad", but rather the mathematical meaning of "adding" and "taking away". Therefore:
** Positive reinforcement: adding a stimulus to increase the likelihood that a behavior is repeated; ''"You cleaned your room! Here's some candy."''
** Negative reinforcement: removing a stimulus to increase the likelihood that a behavior is repeated; ''"You cleaned your room! I'll stop nagging you about it."''
** Positive punishment: adding a stimulus to decrease the likelihood that a behavior is repeated; ''"You left dirty clothes everywhere again! You're grounded."''
** Negative punishment: removing a stimulus to decrease the likelihood that a behavior is repeated; ''"You left dirty clothes everywhere again! You're not getting your allowance this week."''
* '''Terminal velocity''' is the speed at which a falling object doesn't accelerate any further no matter how long it falls, because drag and buoyancy are cancelling any further acceleration. A meteor, for example, does ''not'' reach terminal velocity at any point - it's already moving faster than that when it enters the atmosphere, and goes through it too quickly to slow down. The term also has nothing to do with the degree of lethality of the falling thing's impact, either to the item itself or to whatever it falls on.
* The term '''graphic novel''' is sometimes said to mean either "a comic book for adults" or "a comic book that's longer than single monthly issue". The actual definition is "A long-form work of graphic fiction that's published as a single volume rather than serialized". There are quite a few graphic novels written for children and young readers (''[[ComicBook/SmileandSisters Smile]]'' and ''ComicBook/AmericanBornChinese'' are two notable examples), and many long-form works of graphic fiction are originally published as multiple single issues before being collected and bound. Case in point: Creator/AlanMoore's ''ComicBook/{{Watchmen}}'' and Creator/NeilGaiman's ''ComicBook/TheSandman'' are often referred to as graphic novels, but they're actually not; ''Watchmen'' is a multi-part limited series that was originally published in single-issue installments before being collected as a single volume, while the ''Sandman'' series was originally an ongoing monthly comic book before it was published as a series of paperback collections.
* '''Unique''' means one of a kind. It does ''not'' mean unusual or special. Thus being "more unique" is like being "more pregnant" it just doesn't make sense. You ''could'' however say "almost unique" if there are only two of the thing in question.
* '''Infinitesimal''' means really small ''not'' really big. (think "infinitely small").
* Members of the far right often use '''Cultural Marxism''' (or '''Post-modern Neomarxism''') to mean "anything I don't like." While Cultural Marxism ''was'' a real denomination of Marxism taught at the Frankfurt School, the term in this far-right context characterizes the ideas and motivations of any number of different left-wing groups, many of whom are not aligned with each other or with the Frankfurt School, or similar in any way. Used in this way, the term has no meaning aside from being a piece of political invective. If it is understood to mean "the left," then it is imprecise and leads to the impression that the left are a unified Marxist front, which is ridiculous to anyone on the left, or anyone who has observed the left at any length: the left is quite as diverse and prone to infighting as the right, as it is defined as half of the left-right political spectrum. To sum up: neither of the words is particularly meaningful in that phrase as it is used by the far right.
* '''Atheism''' is lack of belief in a god or gods, while '''agnostic''' means being unsure whether there are any god(s). '''Nontheism''' usually refers to religions which don't have any gods, such as Buddhism.
* '''Prodigal''' is the opposite of "thrifty" or "frugal", meaning "wasteful", "frivolous", "Given to reckless or irresponsible spending" or "Living beyond one's means". But the most famous use of the word--by far--is in "The Parable of the Prodigal Son" from [[Literature/TheFourGospels the Gospel of Luke]], a story about an irresponsible young man who returns home to his parents after carelessly spending all of his money and winding up destitute. Because of this, it's often assumed to mean "Making a much-anticipated return after a long absence". But the Prodigal Son was "prodigal" because he spent all of his money, not because he was welcomed home by his parents afterwards.
* The idiom '''The exception proves the rule''' is often misused as a HandWave for any inconsistency in a person's argument, despite how this makes no sense [[FridgeLogic if you actually think about it]], e.g., If someone says "all birds are black" does the existence of doves prove they're right? Of course not. The real meaning of the saying is more akin to "the exception proves the rule applies by default" i.e if you see a sign at an intersection that says "no U-turn" you can infer that a U-turn is permitted whenever there ''isn't'' a sign forbidding it.
* '''Circa''' means "approximately" and is usually used to refer to dates. Therefore, you shouldn't use it when the exact date or other number is known: "[[AliceAndBob Alice was born circa 1987]]" is fine, "Alice was born circa May 5th, 1987" is not.
* A '''reprisal''' is an attack, particularly in warfare, carried out in retaliation for a previous attack. It is ''not'' the repetition of a musical number or a performance; that would be a '''reprise'''. Even Wiki/ThisVeryWiki made this mistake in the title of the trope RoleReprise, which was titled "Role Reprisal" for years.
* '''Real''' is an adjective, '''really''' is an adverb. While the former is often used in place of the latter (e.g., "She's a real nice girl"), this is considered colloquial at best and straight up wrong at worst, unless you meant she is a girl who is both nice and real as in not imaginary.
* By the same token: '''bad''' is an adjective and '''badly''' is an adverb. Thus, you ''probably'' mean you feel '''bad'''. To feel '''badly''' would mean your ability to feel is impaired.
* To '''earn''' money means to be given it in exchange for performing some work, service etc. To be given money for nothing is to simply '''get''' money.
* '''Brainchild''' refers to the concept or product created by a brain, not the owner of the brain doing the creating. For example, the World Wide Web is the brainchild of Tim Berners-Lee, not the other way round. The logical inverse would be something like '''brainparent''' but that's never caught on.
* '''Satire''' is not synonymous with "a joke", as people often misuse it to mean when saying "that was just satire", to mean "that was just a joke" (sometimes as a JustJokingJustification, though just as often out of ignorance). Satire has to be poking fun at a specific thing (be it a work of fiction or something in real life.) For example, the film ''Film/{{Spaceballs}}'' is a satire of ''Franchise/StarWars'', but just calling any comedy a satire is incorrect.
* To '''Care About''' someone is to have sympathy for them or concern for their well being. To '''Care For''' someone is either to literally take care of the person, or, idiomatically, to like that person or thing.
* '''Mansplaining''' is when a man condescendingly explains a subject to a woman, especially if it's a subject where she has expertise ("Whitesplaining," "Straightsplaining," "Cis-splaining," and others are related terms). Certain...sectors of social media have begun using that word ''any'' time a man disagrees with a woman online, regardless of his own expertise or any legit points he makes.
* '''People of Color''' refers to all racial minorities in countries where whites are the majority. It is not just a "nice" way to refer to black people.
* '''Deign''' isn't a "fancier" way of saying "dare". It means to do something you feel is beneath you, such as: "I didn't deign to respond to such a stupid comment."
* A '''Majority''' is over half, or 50 percent. A '''Supermajority''' is over two thirds, or about 66.6 percent. A '''Plurality''' is more than any other group/category etc, although less than 50 percent (e.g., if candidate A gets 40 percent of the votes, and the other three candidates get 20 percent each, candidate A gets the plurality of the votes).
* For some reason, it's become fashionable for people on the internet to use '''Classical Liberal''' to mean something like "conservative-lite". The correct meaning of "Classical Liberalism" is something more like what's now called '''Libertarianism.'''
* A train's '''Conductor''' is not its driver. That would be the '''Engineer.''' Conductors are the attendants who check tickets and assist passengers during the trip.
* '''Millenials''' are a generation of people born somewhere between the early 80's and the mid-90's. It does not mean "young person." If anything, the generation is approaching middle age.
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entry violated Example Indentation In Trope Lists and was complainy; re-written to be more succinct and accurate.
Changed line(s) 82,85 (click to see context) from:
* A '''vaccine''' is a weakened form of a disease that trains the body how to fight that disease. As mentioned in MagicAntidote, though, people tend to simply replace it with the word "cure." A weakened form of the disease is ''not'' going to help you if you're undergoing the eleventh hour of the full-blown symptoms. It will just make things worse.
** A therapeutic use of a vaccine is most likely to actually be a '''sero-vaccine''', that is a mix between the '''vaccine''' and a '''serum''' containing antibodies against whatever ails the person being treated.
** Originally, "vaccine" specifically meant the ''smallpox'' vaccine. The ''vacc-'' prefix means "cow". It's derived directly from ''vaccinia'' — the cowpox virus — from which the inoculation was originally derived.
*** As an aside, the first person treated with Pasteur's anti-rabies vaccine very likely already had the rabies, the vaccine enabling him to fight the infection. (This is more of a quirk of rabies than anything, it has a very long incubation period meaning that you can vaccinate after exposure. The vaccine is still not a cure.)
** A therapeutic use of a vaccine is most likely to actually be a '''sero-vaccine''', that is a mix between the '''vaccine''' and a '''serum''' containing antibodies against whatever ails the person being treated.
** Originally, "vaccine" specifically meant the ''smallpox'' vaccine. The ''vacc-'' prefix means "cow". It's derived directly from ''vaccinia'' — the cowpox virus — from which the inoculation was originally derived.
*** As an aside, the first person treated with Pasteur's anti-rabies vaccine very likely already had the rabies, the vaccine enabling him to fight the infection. (This is more of a quirk of rabies than anything, it has a very long incubation period meaning that you can vaccinate after exposure. The vaccine is still not a cure.)
to:
* A '''vaccine''' is a weakened form component of a pathogen designed to induce immunity to it, not a miracle cure. Typically they are most effective before being exposed to the pathogen, though the rabies vaccine, which is typically given to humans after they are exposed to the rabies virus, is an exception. '''Vaccination''' and '''immunization''' are often, incorrectly, used interchangeably, but an immunization is simply anything that induces immunity, which includes vaccinations as well as antibody therapies that can cure a disease that trains the body how to fight that disease. As mentioned in MagicAntidote, though, people tend to simply replace it with the word "cure." A weakened form of the disease is ''not'' going to help you if you're undergoing the eleventh hour of the full-blown symptoms. It will just make things worse.
** A therapeutic use of a vaccine is most likely to actually be a '''sero-vaccine''', that is a mix between the '''vaccine''' and a '''serum''' containing antibodies against whatever ails the person being treated.
** Originally, "vaccine" specifically meant the ''smallpox'' vaccine. The ''vacc-'' prefix means "cow". It's derived directly from ''vaccinia'' — the cowpox virus — from which the inoculation was originally derived.
*** As an aside, the first person treated with Pasteur's anti-rabies vaccine very likely already had the rabies, the vaccine enabling him to fight the infection. (This is more of a quirk of rabies than anything, it has a very long incubation period meaning that you can vaccinateafter exposure. The vaccine is still not a cure.)exposure.
** A therapeutic use of a vaccine is most likely to actually be a '''sero-vaccine''', that is a mix between the '''vaccine''' and a '''serum''' containing antibodies against whatever ails the person being treated.
** Originally, "vaccine" specifically meant the ''smallpox'' vaccine. The ''vacc-'' prefix means "cow". It's derived directly from ''vaccinia'' — the cowpox virus — from which the inoculation was originally derived.
*** As an aside, the first person treated with Pasteur's anti-rabies vaccine very likely already had the rabies, the vaccine enabling him to fight the infection. (This is more of a quirk of rabies than anything, it has a very long incubation period meaning that you can vaccinate
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* '''Millenials''' are a generation of people born somewhere between the early 80's and the mid-90's. It does not mean "young person." If anything, the generation is approaching middle age.
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* A train's '''Conductor''' is not its driver. That would be the '''Engineer.''' Conductors are the attendants who check tickets and assist passengers during the trip.
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* For some reason, it's become fashionable for people on the internet to use '''Classical Liberal''' to mean something like "conservative-lite". the correct meaning of "Classical Liberalism" is something more like what's now called '''Libertarianism.'''
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** Casualty is also not the adjective form of casual, as Music/{{Jewel}} learned in an [[http://www.mtv.com/news/1430602/jewel-kurt-loder-square-off-on-poetic-license/ infamous]] TV interview.
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** Casualty is also not the adjective form of casual, as Music/{{Jewel}} learned in an [[http://www.mtv.com/news/1430602/jewel-kurt-loder-square-off-on-poetic-license/ infamous]] TV interview.interview (and she [[DeathGlare was not happy about it.]])
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The abbreviation "e.g." for "exempli gratia" gets full stops after both letters, not just the E. And neither letter is capitalised.
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* People often confuse '''Negative reinforcement''' with punishment. It actually means rewarding someone by taking ''away'' a bad thing e.g "Do what we say and we'll take your handcuffs off."
** To explain, in operant conditioning, the phrase "negative reinforcement" makes a pair with "positive reinforcement"; they both "reinforce", that is they both increase the likelihood that a behavior will be repeated. "Positive" and "negative" here do not carry the meaning of "good" and "bad", but rather the mathematical meaning of "adding" and "taking away". Therefore:
*** Positive reinforcement: adding a stimulus to increase the likelihood that a behavior is repeated; ''"You cleaned your room! Here's some candy."''
*** Negative reinforcement: removing a stimulus to increase the likelihood that a behavior is repeated; ''"You cleaned your room! I'll stop nagging you about it."''
*** Positive punishment: adding a stimulus to decrease the likelihood that a behavior is repeated; ''"You left dirty clothes everywhere again! You're grounded."''
*** Negative punishment: removing a stimulus to decrease the likelihood that a behavior is repeated; ''"You left dirty clothes everywhere again! You're not getting your allowance this week."''
** To explain, in operant conditioning, the phrase "negative reinforcement" makes a pair with "positive reinforcement"; they both "reinforce", that is they both increase the likelihood that a behavior will be repeated. "Positive" and "negative" here do not carry the meaning of "good" and "bad", but rather the mathematical meaning of "adding" and "taking away". Therefore:
*** Positive reinforcement: adding a stimulus to increase the likelihood that a behavior is repeated; ''"You cleaned your room! Here's some candy."''
*** Negative reinforcement: removing a stimulus to increase the likelihood that a behavior is repeated; ''"You cleaned your room! I'll stop nagging you about it."''
*** Positive punishment: adding a stimulus to decrease the likelihood that a behavior is repeated; ''"You left dirty clothes everywhere again! You're grounded."''
*** Negative punishment: removing a stimulus to decrease the likelihood that a behavior is repeated; ''"You left dirty clothes everywhere again! You're not getting your allowance this week."''
to:
* People often confuse '''Negative reinforcement''' with punishment. It actually means rewarding someone by taking ''away'' a bad thing thing, e.g g. "Do what we say and we'll take your handcuffs off."
** To explain, in" In operant conditioning, the phrase "negative reinforcement" makes a pair with "positive reinforcement"; they both "reinforce", that is they both increase the likelihood that a behavior will be repeated. "Positive" and "negative" here do not carry the meaning of "good" and "bad", but rather the mathematical meaning of "adding" and "taking away". Therefore:
*** ** Positive reinforcement: adding a stimulus to increase the likelihood that a behavior is repeated; ''"You cleaned your room! Here's some candy."''
*** ** Negative reinforcement: removing a stimulus to increase the likelihood that a behavior is repeated; ''"You cleaned your room! I'll stop nagging you about it."''
*** ** Positive punishment: adding a stimulus to decrease the likelihood that a behavior is repeated; ''"You left dirty clothes everywhere again! You're grounded."''
*** ** Negative punishment: removing a stimulus to decrease the likelihood that a behavior is repeated; ''"You left dirty clothes everywhere again! You're not getting your allowance this week."''
** To explain, in
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* The idiom '''The exception proves the rule''' is often misused as a HandWave for any inconsistency in a person's argument, despite how this makes no sense [[FridgeLogic if you actually think about it]] e.g If someone says "all birds are black" does the existence of doves prove they're right? Of course not. The real meaning of the saying is more akin to "the exception proves the rule applies by default" i.e if you see a sign at an intersection that says "no U-turn" you can infer that a U-turn is permitted whenever there ''isn't'' a sign forbidding it.
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* The idiom '''The exception proves the rule''' is often misused as a HandWave for any inconsistency in a person's argument, despite how this makes no sense [[FridgeLogic if you actually think about it]] it]], e.g g., If someone says "all birds are black" does the existence of doves prove they're right? Of course not. The real meaning of the saying is more akin to "the exception proves the rule applies by default" i.e if you see a sign at an intersection that says "no U-turn" you can infer that a U-turn is permitted whenever there ''isn't'' a sign forbidding it.
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* '''Real''' is an adjective, '''really''' is an adverb. While the former is often used in place of the latter (e.g "She's a real nice girl"), this is considered colloquial at best and straight up wrong at worst, unless you meant she is a girl who is both nice and real as in not imaginary.
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* '''Real''' is an adjective, '''really''' is an adverb. While the former is often used in place of the latter (e.g g., "She's a real nice girl"), this is considered colloquial at best and straight up wrong at worst, unless you meant she is a girl who is both nice and real as in not imaginary.
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* A '''Majority''' is over half, or 50 percent. A '''Supermajority''' is over two thirds, or about 66.6 percent. A '''Plurality''' is more than any other group/category etc, although less than 50 percent (E.G if candidate A gets 40 percent of the votes, and the other three candidates get 20 percent each, candidate A gets the plurality of the votes.)
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* A '''Majority''' is over half, or 50 percent. A '''Supermajority''' is over two thirds, or about 66.6 percent. A '''Plurality''' is more than any other group/category etc, although less than 50 percent (E.G (e.g., if candidate A gets 40 percent of the votes, and the other three candidates get 20 percent each, candidate A gets the plurality of the votes.)votes).
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* A '''Majority''' is over half, or 50 percent. A '''Supermajority''' is over two thirds, or about 66.7 percent. A '''Plurality''' is more than any other group/category etc, although less than 50 percent (E.G if candidate A gets 40 percent of the votes, and the other three candidates get 20 percent each, candidate A gets the plurality of the votes.)
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* A '''Majority''' is over half, or 50 percent. A '''Supermajority''' is over two thirds, or about 66.7 6 percent. A '''Plurality''' is more than any other group/category etc, although less than 50 percent (E.G if candidate A gets 40 percent of the votes, and the other three candidates get 20 percent each, candidate A gets the plurality of the votes.)
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* A '''Majority''' is over half, or 50 percent. A '''Supermajority''' is over two thirds, or about 66.7 percent. A '''Plurality''' is more than any other group/category etc, although less than 50 percent (E.G if candidate A gets 40 percent of the votes, and the other three candidates get 20 percent each, candidate A gets the plurality of the votes.)
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typo
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* The words '''racism''', '''prejudice''' and '''stereotype''' are often confused. Racism is defined as any policy or belief based in whole or in part on the pseudo-scientific theory that all humanity consists of biologically distinct races and that every member of each race has the distinct physical and/or behavioral characteristics of that race[[note]] Genetically, there are either tens of thousands of races or none, depending on whether you want to go for meaningful biological differences (none) or extremely minor ones (tens of thousands). The main problem with "racial" theory is that races aren't distinct, and not all the members of the supposed "races" have the characteristics they're supposed to have. [[/note]]. Prejudice means the belief that "[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prejudice a group of people [are] characterized by their race, social class, gender, ethnicity, sexual orientation, age, disability or religion]]." Stereotypes, on the other hand, are "generalizations of existing characteristics that reduce complexity" (also copied from Wiki/TheOtherWiki). So, the belief of the USA's 'Southern' slave-owners that anyone who was not an Anglo-Saxon European was by default of an inferior race was racism, the belief of Anglo-Saxon settlers that the USA's Amerindian peoples were savages was prejudice, and the belief that all Canadians constantly say "eh" is a stereotype. Stereotype is a ''neutral term''; often when people use the term in a perjorative manner, it is to attack a ''lazy'' stereotype -- that is, a blanket statement that assumes homogeny among an entire spectrum of demographic.
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* The words '''racism''', '''prejudice''' and '''stereotype''' are often confused. Racism is defined as any policy or belief based in whole or in part on the pseudo-scientific theory that all humanity consists of biologically distinct races and that every member of each race has the distinct physical and/or behavioral characteristics of that race[[note]] Genetically, there are either tens of thousands of races or none, depending on whether you want to go for meaningful biological differences (none) or extremely minor ones (tens of thousands). The main problem with "racial" theory is that races aren't distinct, and not all the members of the supposed "races" have the characteristics they're supposed to have. [[/note]]. Prejudice means the belief that "[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prejudice a group of people [are] characterized by their race, social class, gender, ethnicity, sexual orientation, age, disability or religion]]." Stereotypes, on the other hand, are "generalizations of existing characteristics that reduce complexity" (also copied from Wiki/TheOtherWiki). So, the belief of the USA's 'Southern' slave-owners that anyone who was not an Anglo-Saxon European was by default of an inferior race was racism, the belief of Anglo-Saxon settlers that the USA's Amerindian peoples were savages was prejudice, and the belief that all Canadians constantly say "eh" is a stereotype. Stereotype is a ''neutral term''; often when people use the term in a perjorative pejorative manner, it is to attack a ''lazy'' stereotype -- that is, a blanket statement that assumes homogeny among an entire spectrum of demographic.
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* '''{{Muppet}}''', apart from use as an insult, is repeatedly used (even on Wiki/ThisVeryWiki!) to refer to advanced rubber puppets of the type seen in ''Film/TheDarkCrystal'' and ''Series/{{Farscape}}''. In reality, Creator/JimHenson himself said that those characters are not Muppets, but rather [[http://muppet.wikia.com/wiki/Muppets_vs_Creatures Creatures]]. ''Muppet'' refers specifically to the felt-type characters seen in ''Series/SesameStreet'', ''Series/TheMuppetShow'' and ''Series/FraggleRock'', because they are a {{Portmanteu}} of "marionette" and "puppet".[[note]]What about Big Bird? Or is that a costume?[[/note]] It's also a trademarked name, meaning that if Creator/{{Disney}} (the currect rights holder for the name) doesn't say something is a Muppet, it's not a Muppet. (*Cough*[[Franchise/StarWars Yoda]]*cough*)
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* '''{{Muppet}}''', apart from use as an insult, is repeatedly used (even on Wiki/ThisVeryWiki!) to refer to advanced rubber puppets of the type seen in ''Film/TheDarkCrystal'' and ''Series/{{Farscape}}''. In reality, Creator/JimHenson himself said that those characters are not Muppets, but rather [[http://muppet.wikia.com/wiki/Muppets_vs_Creatures Creatures]]. ''Muppet'' refers specifically to the felt-type characters seen in ''Series/SesameStreet'', ''Series/TheMuppetShow'' and ''Series/FraggleRock'', because they are a {{Portmanteu}} {{Portmanteau}} of "marionette" and "puppet".[[note]]What about Big Bird? Or is that a costume?[[/note]] It's also a trademarked name, meaning that if Creator/{{Disney}} (the currect rights holder for the name) doesn't say something is a Muppet, it's not a Muppet. (*Cough*[[Franchise/StarWars Yoda]]*cough*)
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* '''{{Muppet}}''', apart from use as an insult, is repeatedly used (even on Wiki/ThisVeryWiki!) to refer to advanced rubber puppets of the type seen in ''Film/TheDarkCrystal'' and ''Series/{{Farscape}}''. In reality, Creator/JimHenson himself said that those characters are not Muppets, but rather [[http://muppet.wikia.com/wiki/Muppets_vs_Creatures Creatures]]. ''Muppet'' refers specifically to the felt-type characters seen in ''Series/SesameStreet'', ''Series/TheMuppetShow'' and ''Series/FraggleRock''.[[note]]What about Big Bird? Or is that a costume?[[/note]] It's also a trademarked name, meaning that if Creator/{{Disney}} (the currect rights holder for the name) doesn't say something is a Muppet, it's not a Muppet. (*Cough*[[Franchise/StarWars Yoda]]*cough*)
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* '''{{Muppet}}''', apart from use as an insult, is repeatedly used (even on Wiki/ThisVeryWiki!) to refer to advanced rubber puppets of the type seen in ''Film/TheDarkCrystal'' and ''Series/{{Farscape}}''. In reality, Creator/JimHenson himself said that those characters are not Muppets, but rather [[http://muppet.wikia.com/wiki/Muppets_vs_Creatures Creatures]]. ''Muppet'' refers specifically to the felt-type characters seen in ''Series/SesameStreet'', ''Series/TheMuppetShow'' and ''Series/FraggleRock''.''Series/FraggleRock'', because they are a {{Portmanteu}} of "marionette" and "puppet".[[note]]What about Big Bird? Or is that a costume?[[/note]] It's also a trademarked name, meaning that if Creator/{{Disney}} (the currect rights holder for the name) doesn't say something is a Muppet, it's not a Muppet. (*Cough*[[Franchise/StarWars Yoda]]*cough*)
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* '''AIDS''' is often used to refer to the notorious sexually-transmitted disease that cripples the host's immune system. "AIDS" stands for '''a'''cquired '''i'''mmuno'''d'''eficiency '''s'''yndrome, and many people don't understand the "syndrome" part. You cannot ''catch'' AIDS; rather, you are reduced to it by being infected with the aforementioned STD, which by the way is called HIV ('''h'''uman '''i'''mmunodeficiency '''v'''irus), and having it beat the snot out of your immune cells. It is possible for someone to have HIV, but not AIDS, so long as their immune system is still intact. In addition, no one dies from AIDS - they die from ''complications'' related to the condition.
** That last point seems excessively pedantic, even for this page. You could say the same for many - if not all - other conditions. No one dies from old age, they die from complications that arise from advanced age. No one dies from cancer, they die from complications that arise from cancer. While it's true that with AIDS, the thing that
** That last point seems excessively pedantic, even for this page. You could say the same for many - if not all - other conditions. No one dies from old age, they die from complications that arise from advanced age. No one dies from cancer, they die from complications that arise from cancer. While it's true that with AIDS, the thing that
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* '''AIDS''' is often used to refer to the notorious sexually-transmitted disease that cripples the host's immune system. "AIDS" stands for '''a'''cquired '''i'''mmuno'''d'''eficiency '''s'''yndrome, and many people don't understand the "syndrome" part. You cannot ''catch'' AIDS; rather, you are reduced to it by being infected with the aforementioned STD, which by the way is called HIV ('''h'''uman '''i'''mmunodeficiency '''v'''irus), and having it beat the snot out of your immune cells. It is possible for someone to have HIV, but not AIDS, so long as their immune system is still intact. In addition, no one dies from AIDS - they die from ''complications'' related to the condition.
** That last point seems excessively pedantic, even for this page. You could say the same for many - if not all - other conditions. Nocondition. (Simiarly, no one dies from old age, they can die from complications that arise from advanced age. No one dies from cancer, they alcholism, either. They can only die from complications that arise from cancer. While it's true that with AIDS, ''complications'' due to it, such as cirrhosis of the thing that liver.)
** That last point seems excessively pedantic, even for this page. You could say the same for many - if not all - other conditions. No
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* '''Charisma''' refers to someone's speaking talents and ability to influence others through force of personality and diplomacy. While good looks help, someone is ''not'' charismatic because she looks good in a formal dress, or because he has blue eyes and a nice smile; similarly, just because someone is able to speak publicly and get their point across doesn't qualify them either, not unless people are cheering wildly for ''how'' the news is presented, rather than the facts themselves.
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* '''Charisma''' refers to someone's speaking talents and ability to influence others through force of personality and diplomacy. While good looks help, someone is ''not'' charismatic because she looks good in a formal dress, or because he has blue eyes and a nice smile; similarly, just because someone is able to speak publicly and get their point across doesn't qualify them either, not unless people are cheering wildly for ''how'' the news is presented, rather than the facts themselves. For a historical example, UsefulNotes/{{Cleopatra}} was considered extremely charismatic, despite contemporary accounts of her being a very plain-looking woman.[[note]]Centuries of artists depicting her as a beautiful temptress have influenced the modern view of her.[[/note]]
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* The words '''racism''', '''prejudice''' and '''stereotype''' are often confused. Racism is defined as any policy or belief based in whole or in part on the pseudo-scientific theory that all humanity consists of biologically distinct races and that every member of each race has the distinct physical and/or behavioral characteristics of that race[[note]] Genetically, there are either tens of thousands of races or none, depending on whether you want to go for meaningful biological differences (none) or extremely minor ones (tens of thousands). The main problem with "racial" theory is that races aren't distinct, and not all the members of the supposed "races" have the characteristics they're supposed to have. [[/note]]. Prejudice means the belief that "[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prejudice a group of people [are] characterized by their race, social class, gender, ethnicity, sexual orientation, age, disability or religion]]." Stereotypes, on the other hand, are "generalizations of existing characteristics that reduce complexity" (also copied from Wiki/TheOtherWiki). So, the belief of the USA's 'Southern' slave-owners that anyone who was not an Anglo-Saxon European was by default of an inferior race was racism, the belief of Anglo-Saxon settlers that the USA's Amerindian peoples were savages was prejudice, and the belief that all Canadians constantly say "eh" is a stereotype.
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* The words '''racism''', '''prejudice''' and '''stereotype''' are often confused. Racism is defined as any policy or belief based in whole or in part on the pseudo-scientific theory that all humanity consists of biologically distinct races and that every member of each race has the distinct physical and/or behavioral characteristics of that race[[note]] Genetically, there are either tens of thousands of races or none, depending on whether you want to go for meaningful biological differences (none) or extremely minor ones (tens of thousands). The main problem with "racial" theory is that races aren't distinct, and not all the members of the supposed "races" have the characteristics they're supposed to have. [[/note]]. Prejudice means the belief that "[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prejudice a group of people [are] characterized by their race, social class, gender, ethnicity, sexual orientation, age, disability or religion]]." Stereotypes, on the other hand, are "generalizations of existing characteristics that reduce complexity" (also copied from Wiki/TheOtherWiki). So, the belief of the USA's 'Southern' slave-owners that anyone who was not an Anglo-Saxon European was by default of an inferior race was racism, the belief of Anglo-Saxon settlers that the USA's Amerindian peoples were savages was prejudice, and the belief that all Canadians constantly say "eh" is a stereotype. Stereotype is a ''neutral term''; often when people use the term in a perjorative manner, it is to attack a ''lazy'' stereotype -- that is, a blanket statement that assumes homogeny among an entire spectrum of demographic.
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* A '''reprisal''' is an attack, particularly in warfare, carried out in retaliation for a previous attack. It is ''not'' the repetition of a musical number or a performance; that would be a '''reprise'''.
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* A '''reprisal''' is an attack, particularly in warfare, carried out in retaliation for a previous attack. It is ''not'' the repetition of a musical number or a performance; that would be a '''reprise'''. Even Wiki/ThisVeryWiki made this mistake in the title of the trope RoleReprise, which was titled "Role Reprisal" for years.
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* A '''Monkey''' is a type of primate, usually one with tails that live in trees. An '''Ape''' (which includes gibbons, orangutans, gorillas, chimpanzees, bonobos, and humans) is not considered a monkey, although they belong in the same suborder(Catarrhini) as Old World Monkeys. Apes don't have a tail, have larger brains than monkeys, and tend to be larger than most monkeys. '''Simian''' refers to both apes and monkeys. Lampshaded in ''Literature/{{Discworld}}'' where the Librarian, an Orangutan, is annoyed at being called a Monkey.
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* A '''Monkey''' is a type of primate, usually one with tails that live in trees. An '''Ape''' (which includes gibbons, orangutans, gorillas, chimpanzees, bonobos, and humans) is not considered a monkey, although they belong in the same suborder(Catarrhini) suborder (Catarrhini) as Old World Monkeys. Apes don't have a tail, have larger brains than monkeys, and tend to be larger than most monkeys. '''Simian''' refers to both apes and monkeys. Lampshaded in ''Literature/{{Discworld}}'' where the Librarian, an Orangutan, is annoyed at being called a Monkey.
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* '''Deign''' isn't a "fancier" way of saying "dare". It means to do something you feel is beneath you, such as: "I didn't deign to respond to such a stupid comment."
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** On the same subject, '''bore''' and '''caliber''' are not necessarily interchangeable. Traditionally for rifled weaponry, especially rifled artillery, "bore" denotes the number of turns in the number of calibers (i.e. how many times the width of the projectile down the barrel the projectile must travel to have one complete turn imparted on it by the rifling). So a rifled late Victorian artillery piece with one turn per 38 calibers is a 38 bore, but a smoothbore early Victorian cannon is a zero bore. To confuse matters further, in the UK the word "bore" is also used to mean the same as "gauge" in regards to shotguns: a measure of barrel diameter based upon the weight of a solid lead ball that will fit perfectly into the barrel, expressed as the denominator of a vulgar fraction of a pound if the numerator is one. Thus if the largest lead ball you can fit into the shotgun barrel weighs one twelfth of a pound, you have a 12-bore (or, in the US, 12-guage) shotgun.
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** On the same subject, '''bore''' and '''caliber''' are not necessarily interchangeable. Traditionally for rifled weaponry, especially rifled artillery, "bore" denotes the number of turns in the number of calibers (i.e. how many times the width of the projectile down the barrel the projectile must travel to have one complete turn imparted on it by the rifling). So a rifled late Victorian artillery piece with one turn per 38 calibers is a 38 bore, but a smoothbore early Victorian cannon is a zero bore. To confuse matters further, in the UK the word "bore" is also used to mean the same as "gauge" in regards to shotguns: a measure of barrel diameter based upon the weight of a solid lead ball that will fit perfectly into the barrel, expressed as the denominator of a vulgar fraction of a pound if the numerator is one. Thus if the largest lead ball you can fit into the shotgun barrel weighs one twelfth of a pound, you have a 12-bore (or, in the US, 12-guage) 12-gauge) shotgun.
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* People who have been told that ''and I'' is not a panacea will often abuse the word '''myself'''. This is a mistake as well. Myself is ''reflexive'' -- when you're both the subject and the object. "I wet myself", "I touch myself" and "I cut myself" are all okay (grammatically, that is). "Please send the memo to Joe and myself" is wrong. You mean "... to Joe and me."
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*** There's some evidence "and myself" may be an Irish influence—Irish Gaelic (actually all the Celtic languages) has special emphatic pronouns, and Irish English often uses reflexives in a similar way (expanding on [[ShapedLikeItself English English]] constructions like "he himself didn't know what he wanted" or "you yourself should do it"). A related construction, also probably from Irish English, is referring to someone (self-)important as "himself" or "herself", e.g. "[[VideoGame/TheElderScrollsVSkyrim I guess Herself is finally getting worried about all the dragon attacks.]]"
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* '''Semen''' is the liquid that comes out during male ejaculation. '''Sperm''' are specifically the male gametes which are present in the semen of fertile males.
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* '''Semen''' is the liquid that comes out during male ejaculation. '''Sperm''' are specifically the male gametes reproductive cells which are present in the semen of fertile males.males. It is indeed possible to ejaculate semen without sperm if he's infertile.
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* Being '''agnostic''' does not mean that a person is "undecided" or "unsure" about the existence of a god; it means that they believe that that both the existence or nonexistence of the divine is either unknown or ''inherently'' unknowable. This is the reason for the word's Greek etymology: it comes from the prefix ''"a-"'' (meaning "lacking" or "without") and the root word ''"gnosis"'' (meaning "knowledge").[[note]] Technically, it should also be pronounced "AY-noss-tick" rather than "AGG-noss-tick", since the "g" is silent in the Greek word ''"gnosis"''. But that's another issue.[[/note]]
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* Being '''agnostic''' does not mean that a person is "undecided" or "unsure" about the existence of a god; it means that they believe that that both the existence or nonexistence of the divine is either unknown or ''inherently'' unknowable. This is the reason for the word's Greek etymology: it comes from the prefix ''"a-"'' (meaning "lacking" or "without") and the root word ''"gnosis"'' (meaning "knowledge").[[note]] Technically, it should also be pronounced "AY-noss-tick" rather than "AGG-noss-tick", since the "g" is silent in the Greek word ''"gnosis"''. But that's another issue.[[/note]]
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* '''Mansplaining''' is when a man condescendingly explains a subject to a woman, especially if it's a subject where she has expertise. (Similarly, '''whitesplaining''' is when a white person condescendingly does this to a person of color, '''straightsplaining''' would presumably mean a heterosexual doing the same to a person in the LGBT community, etc.) Certain...sectors of social media have begun using that term ''any'' time a man disagrees with a woman online, even if he makes a legit point or actually knows more about the subject. Sure, these are Internet neologisms, but they still have only one proper definition.
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* '''Mansplaining''' is when a man condescendingly explains a subject to a woman, especially if it's a subject where she has expertise. (Similarly, '''whitesplaining''' is when a white person condescendingly does this to a person of color, '''straightsplaining''' would presumably mean a heterosexual doing the same to a person in the LGBT community, etc.) expertise ("Whitesplaining," "Straightsplaining," "Cis-splaining," and others are related terms). Certain...sectors of social media have begun using that term word ''any'' time a man disagrees with a woman online, even if he makes a regardless of his own expertise or any legit point or actually knows more about points he makes.
* '''People of Color''' refers to all racial minorities in countries where whites are thesubject. Sure, these are Internet neologisms, but they still have only one proper definition. majority. It is not just a "nice" way to refer to black people.
* '''People of Color''' refers to all racial minorities in countries where whites are the
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* '''Mansplaining''' is when a man condescendingly explains a subject to a woman, especially if it's a subject where she has expertise. (Similarly, '''whitesplaining''' is when a white person condescendingly does this to a person of color, '''straightsplaining''' would presumably mean a heterosexual doing the same to a person in the LGBT community, ''etc.'') Certain...sectors of social media have begun using the term ''any'' time a man disagrees with a woman online, even if he legitimately knows more about the subject. Sure, these are Internet neologisms, but they still have only one proper definition.
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* '''Mansplaining''' is when a man condescendingly explains a subject to a woman, especially if it's a subject where she has expertise. (Similarly, '''whitesplaining''' is when a white person condescendingly does this to a person of color, '''straightsplaining''' would presumably mean a heterosexual doing the same to a person in the LGBT community, ''etc.'') etc.) Certain...sectors of social media have begun using the that term ''any'' time a man disagrees with a woman online, even if he legitimately makes a legit point or actually knows more about the subject. Sure, these are Internet neologisms, but they still have only one proper definition.
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* Members of the far right often use '''Cultural Marxism''' (or '''Post-modern Neomarxism''') to mean "anything I don't like." While Cultural Marxism ''was'' a real denomination of Marxism taught at the Frankfurt School, the term in this context characterizes the ideas and motivations of any number of different left-wing groups, many of whom are not aligned with each other or similar in any way. Used in this way, the term has no meaning aside from being a piece of political invective. If it is understood to mean "the left," then it is imprecise and leads to the impression that the left are a unified Marxist front, which is ridiculous to anyone on the left, or anyone who has observed the left at any length: the left is quite as diverse and prone to infighting as the right, as it is defined as half of the left-right political spectrum. To sum up: neither of the words is particularly meaningful in that phrase as it is used by the far right.
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* Members of the far right often use '''Cultural Marxism''' (or '''Post-modern Neomarxism''') to mean "anything I don't like." While Cultural Marxism ''was'' a real denomination of Marxism taught at the Frankfurt School, the term in this far-right context characterizes the ideas and motivations of any number of different left-wing groups, many of whom are not aligned with each other or with the Frankfurt School, or similar in any way. Used in this way, the term has no meaning aside from being a piece of political invective. If it is understood to mean "the left," then it is imprecise and leads to the impression that the left are a unified Marxist front, which is ridiculous to anyone on the left, or anyone who has observed the left at any length: the left is quite as diverse and prone to infighting as the right, as it is defined as half of the left-right political spectrum. To sum up: neither of the words is particularly meaningful in that phrase as it is used by the far right.
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* '''Mansplaining''' is when a man condescendingly explains a subject to a woman, especially if it's a subject where she has expertise. Certain...sectors of social media have begun using the term ''any'' time a man disagrees with a woman online, even if he legitimately knows more about the subject.
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* '''Mansplaining''' is when a man condescendingly explains a subject to a woman, especially if it's a subject where she has expertise. (Similarly, '''whitesplaining''' is when a white person condescendingly does this to a person of color, '''straightsplaining''' would presumably mean a heterosexual doing the same to a person in the LGBT community, ''etc.'') Certain...sectors of social media have begun using the term ''any'' time a man disagrees with a woman online, even if he legitimately knows more about the subject. Sure, these are Internet neologisms, but they still have only one proper definition.
