RE: the old insure ensure assure

["McLauchlan, Kevin" <Kevin -dot- McLauchlan -at- safenet-inc -dot- com>]

We had perfectly good, simple, useful distinctions in:

Assure - assert that something is so, or verify that it is so

Ensure - MAKE it so  (didn't we all love when Picard said that to
Ryker?)

Insure - indemnify us if it turns out it ain't so.

But thanks to eager compliance by dictionary makers, we get to lose that
distinction and cozy down further into the warm, fragrant ooze of
mediocrity, which is even now lapping sluggishly past our chins... don't
make waves... don't make waves.

Ahem.

 Good?

:-)



> -----Original Message-----
> From: Leonard C. Porrello [mailto:Leonard -dot- Porrello -at- SoleraTec -dot- com]
> Sent: Monday, November 24, 2008 5:48 PM
> To: McLauchlan, Kevin; Andrew Warren; Rob Hudson; TECHWR-L
> Subject: RE: the old insure ensure assure
> 
> What the heck, Kevin?! I'm just gonna ignore that. If you ain't got
> nothin' good to say, don't say nothin' at all.
> 
> Leonard
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From:
techwr-l-bounces+leonard -dot- porrello=soleratec -dot- com -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com
>
[mailto:techwr-l-bounces+leonard -dot- porrello=soleratec -dot- com -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- c
> om] On Behalf Of McLauchlan, Kevin
> Sent: Monday, November 24, 2008 2:42 PM
> To: Andrew Warren; Rob Hudson; TECHWR-L
> Subject: RE: the old insure ensure assure
> 
> Dontcha just love how the American dictionaries seem so eager to bow
> down to the lowest common denominator.  Once again, we seek the
> subtraction of meaning and value from a perfectly good word.  Well, we
> don't, but the idiots (who can't be bothered to learn the nearby,
simple
> word that means what they actually want to say) are inordinately
pleased
> with themselves when they destroy yet-another word and spread the
> dumming ever-further (or is that farther?... doesn't matter, they'll
> erase the distinction soon enough).
> 
> I have the same respect for those people - and for their panderers at
> the dictionary organizations - as I do for people who leave a new tool
> out in the rain to rust, and then don't even have the grace to be
> ashamed, because it wasn't so much an oversight as a "don't give a
f..."
> I'll stop now.
> 
>  - Kevin
> 
> (No-no Kevin, don't hold back like that. Tell us what you really
think.)
> 
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From:
> techwr-l-bounces+kevin -dot- mclauchlan=safenet-inc -dot- com -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com
> >
>
[mailto:techwr-l-bounces+kevin -dot- mclauchlan=safenet-inc -dot- com -at- lists -dot- techwr-
> > l.com] On Behalf Of Andrew Warren
> > Sent: Monday, November 24, 2008 5:31 PM
> > To: 'Rob Hudson'; TECHWR-L
> > Subject: RE: the old insure ensure assure
> >
> > Rob Hudson wrote:
> >
> > >  From a law firm's email signature:
> > >
> > > "To insure compliance with requirements imposed by the U.S.
Internal
> > > Revenue Service ..."
> > >
> > > Shouldn't it be "ensure"?
> >
> > Rob:
> >
> > Check your (American English) dictionary; many allow "insure" to be
> used
> > as a synonym for "ensure".
> >
> > -Andrew
> >
> 

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