Swimmer963 comments on Avoid inflationary use of terms - Less Wrong

74 Post author: lsparrish 30 May 2012 08:31PM

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Comment author: wedrifid 28 May 2012 02:48:00PM 9 points [-]

Similarly, Cryogenics is the science of keeping things really cold. And of course Cryonics is a form of that. But saying "Cryogenics" when you really mean exactly Cryonics is an incredibly harmful practice which actual Cryonicists generally avoid. Most people who work in Cryogenics have nothing to do with Cryonics, and this kind of confusion in popular culture has apparently engendered animosity towards Cryonics among Cryogenics specialists.

I wouldn't so much call that "inflationary". I'd usually call that a typographical error! ie. The speaker is usually intending to use the label of the corpsicle specific practice and just said it wrong.

Comment author: Swimmer963 29 May 2012 01:43:49AM 2 points [-]

Agreed. I didn't know there was a difference until I was 17-18 (possibly because a couple of novels in which I encountered it misused the term.)