Word and phrase misuse

[Noemon]

Why indeed!

[Ela]

In an online discussion on breastfeeding, people started talking about "discreet" nursing. At some point one person misspelled it as "discrete" and others picked up on that. I was dying to point out the error (and difference in meanings), but it seemed kind of rude to do so, so I refrained. Everyone knew what we were talking about - discreet not discrete. But it was really bugging me every time I saw "discrete" instead of "discreet."

Further down the thread, it appears that someone else didn't think it inappropriate to correct the error. But I expect some will blip over her comment and still make it.

[Annie Subjunctive]

That's one of those distinctions that I know exists but can't make stick in my head - I have to look up which is which every time I want to use it. I think it might be because "discrete" is such an abstract concept? It's hard to make an easy example of the concept stick in my head. And it's used rarely enough that I imagine a good number of people might not ever encounter it. All the contexts that I can think of seeing it in are scientific or mathematical.

[rivka]

Discreet nursing means covering up.

Discrete nursing would be nursing in 5 minute sessions, with 2 minute gaps between each session.

The word discrete may primarily be used by scientists and mathematicians, but it could be a useful word in many other contexts. Except for the fact that most people who are not scientists or mathematicians will think you mean discreet.

[Jonathon]

Annie: Would it make you feel better to know that discreet and discrete are really the same word? link

They originated as spelling variants, and eventually one variant became attached to one meaning while the other became attached to the other. (See also mantle/mantel, complimentary/complementary, palette/pallet, borne/born, passed/past, to/too, and than/then. Here's a Grammar Girl post I wrote about it.)

[Ela]

Interesting!

[Annie Subjunctive]

That is interesting!

Yeah, I know both meanings, but I guess I just haven't used them in writing enough to ever remember which spelling goes with which meaning. I feel like it's a distinction that might be on the road to extinction. It's a distinction . . . headed for extinction. This calls for a linguistic rap battle, I think.

[Jonathon]

My mnemonic is that in the one that means "separate", the e's are separated.

[Annie Subjunctive]

Good one!

[rivka]

My mnemonic is that in the one that means "separate", the e's are separated.

I was taught more or less the same. Except since I was taught the mnemonic I know by a mathematician, it's "the e's in discrete are discrete".

[Keith]

The e's in discreet aren't just hanging out there on the end of a word.

[rivka]

Was that to me? If so, I don't understand the objection.

[Keith]

I'm just proposing a different mnemonic, not directed at anyone in particular.

[rivka]

Ah!

[Ela]

And now someone is using "died in the wool."

Oh the images that brings to mind!

[pooka]

This seems the best place to discuss a word that supposedly means something I didn't know it meant until this, my 54th year.  (I don't mean dildo, people got on my case about that, which I was using to mean "doofus" in high school). 
The strict or archaic meaning of flavor was smell, taste, and other qualities combined, and meant smell/scent more than taste, as well as character (such as of a neighborhood). 

I'm reading about this in Bill Bryson's "The Body: a guide for occupants" which I generally enjoy due to his frequent tracking down of myths to old but unfounded publications, i.e. that tongues have zones for different taste receptors. 

These two ideas together make me wonder, if one is saying that taste can only be sweet, salty, bitter, sour and umami, if umami really is a taste in this sense (of the word)*, or if this is like how all colors are made from red, green, blue and then light or its absence.  I shall read on and maybe find out.  The wikipedia page on taste receptors indicates that sweet and bitter are the foundational receptors in mammals. 

Definitely a tomato [fruit] and tomato [vegetable] distinction.   
*eta

[rivka]

When most people describe tastes, they are definitely talking about something more elaborate than sweet/salty/bitter/sour/(umami). So if we are going by usage . . . .

[pooka]

Now this guy is saying Diphtheria starts with dif and not dip sounds.  Though he also said Alabama borders Arkansas, which is not quite true, and if it were, there's a mile wide river between.  (This is the chapter on infectious disease).   
"Give him a hand!  He's British!"