[lit-ideas] Your Favorite Misnomer
- From: Jlsperanza@xxxxxxx
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Tue, 31 Aug 2004 11:57:51 EDT
Eric Yost writes (in "Hylomorphism -- a dogma?"):
"Form" is certainly subject to ambiguous analysis. Bartok's Piano Sonata is
called a sonata, even though it doesn't really follow sonata form.
-----
A typical case of a misnomer.
Incidentally, Geary was wondering the other day whether there is a _concept_
for every _word_ and vice versa, and I was reading in A Book of Quotations
that Science is, for some, the art of using the _right_ names (to name the
things).
But if one thinks about the number (the great number) of _misnomers_ around
us, one wonders...
My favourite misnomer of late:
From
Stephen Barry, "Royal Secrets: The View from Downstairs" (New York: Villard
Books). He recalls his stay at Buckingham Palace:
"We used to sit in the billiards room (which
isn't a billiards room at all, but just a place
used for meetings) and say our pieces."
(p. 28)
A logician (cf. R. Paul) would consider this a sort of Kripkean identity
fallacy:
The billiards room ~ = a billiards room
("The billiards room isn't a billiards room").
One may say that _etymologically_, it _was_ (One presumes the billiards room
is called "the billiards room" because the royals (or the Earl of
Buckingham) did use to play billiards in that room...
A second favourite of mine is the Isle of Thanet in Kent, which is _not_ an
Isle. (cf. Barataria).
Cheers,
JL
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