Language Log

As is often the case, the opinion in a recently-decided legal case (Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals in U.S. v. Phillip Abawa) turned on the meaning of a word:

“Inflict” is a narrower term than “cause.” Here, while in federal custody, Phillip Zabawa assaulted a federal law enforcement officer. The officer responded by headbutting Zabawa, which left the officer with a cut over his eye. A federal grand jury later indicted Zabawa for assaulting a federal officer in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 111(a)(1) and (b). Zabawa was convicted of both offenses. But § 111(b) specifies that the defendant must “inflict[]” the predicate injury to the officer, rather than just proximately cause it; and here, the officer himself admitted that his injury might have resulted from his application of force (i.e., the headbutt) to Zabawa, rather than from any force Zabawa applied to him. The district court found this distinction irrelevant, construing “inflict” to mean “cause.” We respectfully disagree, and reverse Zabawa’s conviction under § 111(b).

Reader S.L. pointed to this opinion's "selective use of dictionary definitions, as well as literary and other references", and wondered "if anyone at Language Log might have any observations".

From an email solicitation for an "Electronic Evidence Workshop", run by "E-Discovery Training Solutions":

What process do you have in place that will protect your clients [sic] privacy on their smartphones or from electronic discovery in general? Your clients are relying on you, as their counsel, to help them avoid staying out of jail or being "slapped" with a large litigation fine.

This is clearly a workshop that no responsible defense attorney can fail to miss.

Gigi Douban, "Tim Cook goes to Washington", Marketplace Morning Report 5/21/13, commented on Apple's tax-avoidance techniques (basically stashing profits overseas and arranging to pay no taxes on them, by transferring intellectual property assets to an paper subsidiary in Ireland and then paying extensive royalties to this foreign aspect of itself, which through a quirk of Irish law is not "tax resident" anywhere):

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All of this is perfectly legal, if not arcane, says Robert Pozen, senior fellow at the Brookings Institution.

Four different readers wrote to suggest that Mr. Pozen probably meant "legal, if arcane". I agree with them, but the construction is a curious one, and so it takes a bit of digging to make an argument either way.

From the 5/16/2013 decision of the Third Circuit, invalidating an NLRB decision based on the argument that the "recess appointment" of one of the board's members was invalid:

The "main purpose" of the Recess Appointments Clause, therefore, is not—as the Eleventh Circuit held and the Board argues—only "to enable the President to fill vacancies to assure the proper functioning of our government." Evans, 387 F.3d at 1226. This formulation leaves out a crucial aspect of the Clause‘s purpose: to preserve the Senate‘s advice-and-consent power by limiting the president‘s unilateral appointment power. Accord Noel Canning, 705 F.3d at 505 (explaining that the Eleventh Circuit‘s statement of the Clause‘s purpose "omits a crucial element of the Clause, which enables the president to fill vacancies only when the Senate is unable to provide advice and consent" (emphasis in original)).

The importance of this aspect of the Clause‘s purpose is difficult to understate. [emphasis added]

The buses run by Lothian Buses in Edinburgh currently have a prominent sign near the entrance that says "REVISED Adult Fare".

Revised. I will leave it to you to guess whether the fare has been revised upward or downward.

Mark Mazzetti, "A Secret Deal on Drones, Sealed in Blood", NYT 4/6/2013:

"John E. McLaughlin, then the C.I.A.’s deputy director, who the 9/11 commission reported had raised concerns about the C.I.A.’s being in charge of the Predator, said: “You can’t underestimate the cultural change that comes with gaining lethal authority."

GeorgeW, who sent in the quotation, added "I wonder if failure to underestimate contributed to the CIA difficulties associated with the drone issue".

"No pictures should have been sent out, let alone been taken," said Trent Mays after he was found guilty of disseminating a nude photo of a minor, according to this account of the notorious Steubenville rape case.

If that is what Mays said, then he has apparently internalized the wrong meaning of the idiom let alone. He used it as if it had the inverse of its usual meaning. In other words, he apparently thinks that let alone means or even.

William James, The Principles of Psychology, 1890:

[A]ny number of impressions, from any number of sensory sources, falling simultaneously on a mind WHICH HAS NOT YET EXPERIENCED THEM SEPARATELY, will fuse into a single undivided object for that mind. The law is that all things fuse that can fuse, and nothing separates except what must. […] Although they separate easier if they come in through distinct nerves, yet distinct nerves are not an unconditional ground of their discrimination, as we shall presently see. The baby, assailed by eyes, ears, nose, skin, and entrails at once, feels it all as one great blooming, buzzing confusion; and to the very end of life, our location of all things in one space is due to the fact that the original extents or bignesses of all the sensations which came to our notice at once, coalesced together into one and the same space. [emphasis original]

Eleanor Rosch et al., "Basic objects in natural categories", Cognitive Psychology 1976:

The world consists of a virtually infinite number of discriminably different stimuli. One of the most basic functions of all organisms is the cutting up of the environment into classifications by which nonidentical stimuli can be treated as equivalent. Yet there has been little explicit attempt to determine the principles by which humans divide up the world in the way that they do. On the contrary, it has been the tendency both in psychology and anthropology to treat that segmentation of the world as originally arbitrary and to focus on such matters as how categories, once given, are learned or the effects of having a label for some segment.

From JF, here's one for the misnegation files, undernegation department: According to the Sun Sport Live Match Centre:

With all but a monumental collapse now standing between Manchester United and a record 20th league title, all eyes turn to who will win the fight between the alsorans for second place.

Steve Butcher and Maris Beck, "Journalists appeal in bid to protect sources", The Age 2/5/2013:

The grounds of appeal announced on Monday state Justice Sifris erred in not finding Mr Goldberg was wrong in failing to set aside the summonses.

Five negatives. Degree of difficulty: E. Judges' score: 9.6.

Conversations among linguists may sometimes be interesting to non-linguists for reasons that are not entirely the same as those that appeal to insiders. As an example, I present without further comment a recent back-and-forth on Facebook between Linguist X and Linguist Y, slightly redacted to preserve anonymity.

Earlier today, "Patriot Voices" (Rick Santorum's PAC) sent out an email containing the following paragraph:

I strongly oppose President Obama's nomination of former Senator Chuck Hagel for Secretary of Defense because his confirmation would send a dangerous signal to Iran and other radical Islamic elements which would make our country and our allies less secure. Not only did Senator Hagel tip off the Iranians that he would not use strength to prevent them from obtaining nuclear weapons, he disrespects our strongest ally in the middle east, Israel. Time after time, Sen. Hagel has sought to distance the United States from Israel and refused to stop efforts to end terrorist attacks on Israel. [emphasis added]

This is my nomination for misnegation of the month.

Here are some items sent in by readers over the past few weeks, to add to our list of misnegations. Larry Horn, on ADS-L:

"We'll see the fate of the coaching staff of Dallas…This cannot be understated, though, or overstated: whether it's his fault or not, Tony Romo is now 1-6 in win or go home games, either in Week 17 or the playoffs."

–ESPN SportsCenter anchor Steve Levy following another last-game elimination of the Dallas Cowboys

Maybe that should be the general strategy for all hypernegations:

"No head injury is too trivial to ignore, or to pay attention to."

"His problems can't be underestimated, or overestimated."