Agreed; there are some people who cannot grasp the concept of evolving language, often forgetting that much of the language we use today was considered "incorrect" as recently as ten years ago. The irony of this prescription is that many of the writers whom we consider the most influential and talented are often those who do not constrain themselves to these rules (and in doing so, often develop new phrases and structures that become part of regular language).
Some of the advice given in this article is simply wrong. As an alternative to this article, I'd suggest Paul Brians' site, (http://www.wsu.edu:8080/~brians/errors/errors.html) which points out legitimate errors while recognizing trends and usages which have become acceptable.
The problem is that for every evolving "rule", you reduce (or have the potential to reduce) the clarity of the message.
Ergo a language with loose rules is a language with loose communication capability. (Of course this is arguable too, since a language that is too rigid is unable to adapt to a fast changing world.)
English is the start-up of the language world, apparently. :-)
I respectfully disagree. If we refused to accept colloquial usage of a word as valid, we would actually be reducing meaning therein.
Would you advocate using archaic definitions of common words from 100 years ago? 200 years ago? How about we maintain this purported clarity by reverting to Middle English?
I used to be anal toward the definition of words until I got a little older. Then I realized that, over time, language does indeed evolve.
Here's a good example for you. "The web." If we didn't accept the "evolved" definition of this word as a synonym for "the Internet," then the statement "Catch Hacker News on the web!" would be nonsensical.
You can be a purist to a degree, but to declare that such an approach improves clarity is a bit... misguided. :) (I'll grant that you did suggest it has the "potential to," but I want to assist in preventing others from making broad generalizations against the evolution of language, so this isn't necessarily directed to you.)
Some of the advice given in this article is simply wrong. As an alternative to this article, I'd suggest Paul Brians' site, (http://www.wsu.edu:8080/~brians/errors/errors.html) which points out legitimate errors while recognizing trends and usages which have become acceptable.