Sunday, March 1, 2020

Precision Language

Economics professor Tyler Cowen noticed that a nearby library is being renovated and expresses his fear that the remodeled structure will have fewer books rather than more. He created a German neologism to express that fear:

Öffentlichebibliotheksumbaurenovierungssammlungsbeschränkungsangst.

I started to read the comment thread, thinking that because professor Cowen is an extremely intelligent man the people who read his posts -- your humble author excepted -- must also be extremely intelligent and I would benefit from perusing the discussion. I was wrong; there was a bunch of sniping about censorship and then a bunch more sniping about how public libraries are an artifact of a past life that we need to leave behind.

Very fun post, though.

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