From a letter to the editor of a South Carolina newspaper. The subject: Events at South Carolina State University.
[SCSU President Thomas] Elzey has made two incredulous declarations to all viewing from near and afar: “SCSU will not close, and I will not resign.” Though he emphatically states these, he has control of neither.
The writer means incredible. Elzey has made statements that we cannot believe. Things are incredible – experiences, statements.
Incredulous refers to the human condition or feeling of not being able to believe something. I am incredulous when I hear Elzey say incredible things.
Had Elzey said I cannot believe what is happening to me! Everyone thinks I should resign! – then he would have been declaring his incredulity.
February 22nd, 2015 at 12:10PM
And, at times, Descartes could be almost, but not quite entirely, incredulous.
February 23rd, 2015 at 8:45AM
Incredible/incredulous–yep. Compound words, hyphenated words, and separable words bug me. “Girlfriend”, “girl-friend”, and “girl friend” are not the same to me. I’m not sure I’m handling what seems to be a trend toward compounding of words that are usually separable, or, at most, hyphenated.
February 23rd, 2015 at 11:31AM
Jack —
I’ve never thought of words with prefixes that change their meaning (say “incredible” but strangely not “inflammable”) as compound, though in a sense they are, but one part of them is not a full word on its own. The “in” is not the preposition “in” but its homonym, a word that negates whatever word follows.
You might enjoy this Wikipedia entry on kennings which take compounding to another level:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kenning
February 23rd, 2015 at 4:42PM
Greg, thanks. I’m not sure I’m using “compound” correctly to refer to one word made of two words completely joined without a hyphen.
FWIW-When I see “girlfriend” or “Website” (instead of “girl friend” and “Web site”), I guess I’m put off a little by the unexpectedness of the compound, the writer’s unknown intent, implications for usage, psychology, etc.
FWIW-As a youngster, I was scolded by a boss who wasn’t aware that “either” was something of a Janus word. My respect for the guy took a beating. I learned something. When I became a sales manager, I gave my best people pretty much freedom of action, and just warned them lightly to not get me into trouble. I never bothered trying to foolishly crack the whip over people whose skills clearly exceeded mine, and whose hearts were in the right place for the job.