steepholm

We're not inventing a new word to replace the old word. We're inventing the new word to free the old word to mean what it's always meant. Doesn't work. I've even had this argument explicitly on words in less contentious subjects. Someone wants to change the meaning of a word, and chides me for wanting to keep the old meaning. I say fine, we can use the old word for the new meaning, but then we need a new word to mean what the old word used to mean. So wouldn't it be less confusing if we use the old word in its old meaning, and use a new word for a new meaning?

That seems to me a sensible argument, but it doesn't prevail.