MEMO

[fox]

to:  ALL ENGLISH SPEAKERS EVERYWHERE
from:  ME
re:  RAAAR

ATTENTION EVERYONE:

UNIQUE ≠ UNUSUAL.  THE WORD MEANS 'ONE OF A KIND' AND THAT IS ALL IT MEANS.

i'm sorry to raise my voice, but honestly.  this has gone on long enough.

Comments

[king-chiron.livejournal.com]

What? Obviously I haven't been debating the fact that unique is binary, but rather your claim that unusual isn't a proper definition for unique.

Maybe you're right and the leading dictionaries I checked are all wrong, but I doubt it.

[darthfox.livejournal.com]

i'm saying that because 'unique' is binary, 'unusual' is an imprecise and therefore incorrect definition of it. as jgesteve points out downthread, actually anything unique is naturally unusual. it's just that something that's one of a kind isn't just unusual; it's unique. conversely, using 'unique' to describe something that isn't one of a kind is wrong. it's like saying someone is a graduate of a university just because he used to be a student there and now he isn't. all graduates were once students, that is, but not everyone who was once a student is a graduate.

and dictionaries say a lot of things. they give 'flout' as one acceptable definition of 'flaunt'. doesn't make it right. :-)