Devolution toward Simpler

“… Comcast will wave its early termination fee …”

Adjectives, Common English Blunders, Devolution toward Simpler, Hyphens, Misspellings, Nouns, Verbs

I saw this in an April-23 article on the RCR Wireless News website.

Problems:
1. The verb is wrong.
2. A hyphen is missing.

Explanation:
The missing hyphen is a common English blunder, but a simple rule tells us that the hyphen is required in a particular part of this expression.

Here is the rule: When an adjective (e.g., “early”) and a noun (e.g., “termination”) together modify another noun (“fee”), there should be a hyphen to join the adjective to the first noun — to create a “compound” modifier, if you will, of the second noun.

I am not sure how common the other English blunder is: writing “wave” where “waive” — which means to forgo or give up — is required.

However, I believe that both problems are consistent with my “Devolution toward Simpler” linguistic hypothesis. It is simpler to write “wave” than to write “waive”; it is simpler to omit a hyphen than to include one.

For fun, I searched Google for each of the following phrases (with the quotation marks) and got about the indicated numbers of matches:

  • “waive the fee” — 106,000 matches
  • “wave the fee” — 1,790 matches

This tells me that Web authors have written the phrase correctly vs. incorrectly by a ratio of 59.2:1, which is heartening.

Solution:
“… Comcast will waive its early-termination fee …”

“The police car was hidden in the medium.”

Common English Blunders, Devolution toward Simpler, Nouns

I heard this on a radio program yesterday morning.

Problem:
The speaker used the wrong noun to indicate where the police car was hidden.

Explanation:
The DJs on KRBE radio yesterday morning were discussing speeding tickets and how traffic officers like to hide their vehicles to catch speeders.

One of them said something to the effect that “the police car was hidden in the medium.”

At first I wondered whether I had mis-heard what was said, but then the other two DJs started to say “medium” with no hint of sarcasm.

It became sadly clear that the three DJs did not know the correct noun — “median” — for that portion of a street that runs down the middle of it.

I believe that the use of “medium” in place of “median” is consistent with my “Devolution toward Simpler” linguistic hypothesis. It is simpler to say the “um” in “medium” than to say the “an” in “median” for two reasons: the vowel (“u” vs. “a”), and the final consonant (“m” vs. “n”). Try saying each noun, and you’ll feel what I mean.

Solution:
“The police car was hidden in the median.”

“Disconcerning”

Adjectives, Common English Blunders, Devolution toward Simpler, Verbs

My wife heard this yesterday.

Problem:
“Disconcerning” is a nonsense word.

Explanation:
Nearly everyone who says “disconcerning” actually is trying to say an adjective whose meaning is causing an emotional disturbance.

“Disconcerting” (notice the ‘t’ before the ‘ing’) — not “disconcerning” — is the adjectival form of the verb “disconcert”.

I believe that the use of “disconcerning” is consistent with my “Devolution toward Simpler” linguistic hypothesis. It’s simpler to say “disconcerning” than to say “disconcerting” (which requires the speaker to emphasize the ‘t’).

For fun, I searched Google for each of the following words and got about the indicated numbers of matches:

  • disconcerning — 22,600 matches
  • disconcerting — 2,260,000 matches

This tells me that Web authors have written the word correctly vs. incorrectly by a ratio of 100:1, which is very encouraging.

Solution:
“Disconcerting”