spin

Eventually I hope you'll buy a decent dictionary.

You've had two people cited portions of the Oxford dictionary regarding the matter. Either that should give you an idea or you should go and buy a good dictionary.

Both the German (falsch) and the English (false) are ultimately derived from Latin, both through Old French. Here is Kluge:

falsch
falsch Adj Adjektiv std. Standardwortschatz (12. Jh.), mhd. vals(ch) Entlehnung. Entlehnt aus afrz. fals, das seinerseits aus l. falsus "falsch" stammt (zu l. fallere "täuschen").

The part that I've italicized tells the story: Borrowed from Old French fals, which in turn is derived from the Latin falsus "falsch".

This is certainly your problem. You should be able to guess its derivation from "retro-" and "projection", ie projecting something back.

I start to see why some newspapers aim for a reading age of 12 years.

Why don't you tell us all which words you will accept and which you won't? You don't like the fact that people use words that aren't in your personal lexicon and you refuse to learn or even to try to understand the words, even when definitions are forthcoming.

If you don't see what is wrong with using modern ideas and expecting them to be appropriate for ancient times, ie retrojecting your modern ideas back onto the ancient writers we are dealing with, you will never be able to understand what they were saying.

Learn something about coin usage in the ancient world. And stop retrojecting.


spin

avi

Retrojection: n.
Projection: n. The point is this: once again, as with "falsify", spin has employed a word, in this case, retrojection, with a meaning contrary to the accepted meaning. At least with "falsify", spin was on high ground vis a vis the historical Germanic roots, however, in the case of mental imagery, one projects, not "retrojects", and this is true irrespective of the temporal component of the projection, i.e. whether or not the time envisioned is forward from the present, or distant, in the past. We do not "retroject" images. We project them.

Apart from his misuse of English, however, spin errs in two other important ways: first, his own prejudices interfere with his judgement, by imagining that he can comprehend the mental processes of humans living thousands of years ago ("...able to understand what they were saying".) We cannot understand one another today let alone last week, or two centuries ago. If we cannot understand each other, given the opportunity to exchange communications, how can one imagine that it is possible to comprehend the mind set of people living thousands of years ago, particularly, absent a bona fide historical document to support one or another hypothesis?

Secondly, spin errs here, in believing that his knowledge of the manufacture of ancient coins, is sufficiently broad to permit him to decide which parameters were influential in maintaining or terminating a particular design on a specific coin, absent a written directive explaining that decision making process for that particular coin. In other words, spin exhibits, with regard to his impression of the significance of one or another particular coin, superstitious thinking. Spin lacks independent confirmation of the rationale for creating, preserving, or terminating that particular coin's design; instead, he arbitrarily projects his own prejudices in designating a rationale for the duration of the coin's distribution.

Biblical criticism depends upon challenging traditional thinking, and in this domain, spin excels, however, one must temper that sword with the reality that misuse of terminology to simulate erudition is counterproductive to the forum. If spin has some analysis of the coin's features, which could shed light on his conclusions, then he should expound, else, if his goal is merely to attempt to belittle another, he may wish to reconsider whether such a modus operandi is ultimately fruitful. Thus far, in my opinion, it has borne only barren twigs, not apples, in fact, not even blossom buds.

:banghead:

spin

What, are you too poor to buy a good book?

Ignorance is no defence. It's not good for you to go around saying "look, I'm ignorant and proud of it. I don't even want to learn anything!"

What are you going to do with the text if you don't want to understand what the writers were saying? Payer your bathroom with them?

Great mumbo-jumbo there, avi.

So you don't wanna know nothin' about ancient coins. You don't wanna know nothin' about your own language. You'd rather not know. If it's not in your pocket dictionary or some online version of the same, hey, who needs it?

You've shown no misuse of terminology. You've just shown that you're too stingy to buy a decent dictionary.

All this because you aren't interested in the propaganda use of coin symbolism in ancient times. Things usually didn't get put on coins randomly. The christian emperor has a reference to Sol Invictus on many coins and you talk about buffalo pennies or what ever. Doh!

I think you've already been doing that much too long.


spin

J-D

I have shown you a method of solving the puzzle. It makes no sense to prefer a different method which does not provide a solution.It makes no difference. The current meaning of a word is what people currently use it to mean, and this is still true even if people originally used it to mean something different. 'Nice' means 'pleasant'; it doesn't mean 'stupid'.Again, it makes no difference. Words in English now mean what people use them to mean in English now, and the roots they came from don't change this.You are free to use words the way you prefer. It is not, however, a relevant criticism of the way other people use words that they fail to conform to your predilections.Although French does derive from Latin, neither French nor Latin has greater proximity to Greek than do English and German, for example. Moreover, modern scientific methodology owes nothing to the Romans, and perhaps not much more to the Greeks. It is true that scientific terminology in English derives mainly from Greek and Latin roots, but that is a fact of no larger significance. We use the terms 'hydrogen' and 'oxygen', employing Greek roots, but German scientists call the same gases 'Wasserstoff' and 'Sauerstoff', using equivalent roots from their own language, and are not the less scientific for it.Any obscurantism here is yours, not spin's. spin chose the word 'retrojection' as one which precisely expressed the intended meaning. It did, to anybody familiar with the word (like me, as I mentioned earlier). Unfortunately, you were not familiar with the word. This is something that can happen to anybody, and it doesn't reflect discredit on you any more than it does on spin. The reasonable response on your part was to seek clarification. What is unreasonable is for you to insist now, once clarification has been provided, on willing not to understand.

Somebody I know--a literary professional, in fact--once heard of a charge of 'aggravated assault' being laid and was indignant, thinking that 'aggravated' meant 'provoked'. I was able to remove the confusion by explaining the meaning of 'aggravated' as 'made graver'. The response was not 'it is wrong of the law to use language in a way unfamiliar to me' and that's good, because that would have been a silly response.

Jeffrey Gibson

/[QUOTE=J-D;5710427]The curious thing here is that, as I've shown, the Oxford English Dictionary does have an entry for "retojection". One wondess, then, if Avi did not read my post or if he is ignorant of what OED signifies.

In any case, what on earth does any of this have to do with Pete's claims?

May I suggest that these posts about whether retrojection is a word and has a definite meaning (and all of Avi's remarks about how "falsification" does not bear the meaning that Spin [and I] have demonstrated it most certainly does have -- and has had for some time) be split off from this thread?

Jeffrey