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Date: | Sat, 12 Jun 2004 13:23:27 -0400 |
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On Jun 12, 2004, at 10:17 AM, Jim Bowles wrote:
> Hello Ron and all,
>
> By what ever label one wishes to use .. the extinction of the native
> Chumash {one of the peoples
> from S.W. California} was nothing less than brutal.
>
> But I think the decimation
Terminology creep just drives me up a wall. Decimation is taking one of
ten. "To encourage the others" was the common French phrase. But folks
use it to mean extermination, extinction, annihilation, obliteration.
They're not synonyms.
The electronic Merriam-Webster dictionary has as a third meaning to
drastically reduce in number. The earlier Webster's New International
Dictionary has a third meaning of "considerably reduce in number"
referring to epidemic disease reduction.
Terminology creep has gone from the original tenth to an undefined
considerably reduce (?ca. 25%) to a further undefined drastically
reduce (?50%) to a popular exterminate (?90-100%).
Might we all be a bit more precise, please?
Thanks in advance.
Lyle Browning
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