arundelo comments on Help! Name suggestions needed for Rationality-Inst! - Less Wrong

20 Post author: Eliezer_Yudkowsky 28 January 2012 02:24AM

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Comment author: arundelo 30 January 2012 01:50:46PM *  3 points [-]

"Just saying" / "I'm just sayin'":

(Short version: Yes, you've basically got the intended meaning right, but this figure of speech has its detractors who don't like its use as an all-purpose escape hatch. End of short version. For what it's worth I'm not one of the aforementioned detractors. My translation of the phrase is: "What I just said was intended not as an insult or provocation, but as a factual observation, and I'm letting you know that in a mildly humorous way by using a current figure of speech.")

Edit: Bonus fun link: Here's the song "Punch Bowl" by Punch Brothers, which uses the "I'm not sayin', I'm just sayin'" variant of this phrase.

Edit 2: My Mom says she only likes this phrase when it's used by an animal.