Newsgroups: alt.religion.scientology
From: michaelg@neon.Stanford.EDU (Michael Greenwald)
Subject: Re: Why all the jargon?
Message-ID: <1991Aug11.171004.18206@neon.Stanford.EDU>
Organization: Computer Science Department, Stanford University, Ca , USA
References: <551@uucs1.UUCP> <RBNSTEIN.91Jul28212527@bucsf.bu.edu> <563@uucs1.UUCP>
Distribution: alt.religion.scientology
Date: Sun, 11 Aug 1991 17:10:04 GMT
Lines: 42

gaf@uucs1.UUCP (gaf) writes:

>Michael Rubinstein writes:
>>
>>I doubt that jargon is created intentionally to confuse people. From the
>>point of view of the person or persons creating it, it is not jargon,
>>but more likely a new vocabulary to decribe things that English just
>>doesn't have the words for.

>Wellllll, yes and no.  If you need a word to describe a new thing, say,
>the speed of sound, and there isn't one already, you make one up ("mach").

>The original poster used the word "argot" instead of the already
>existing and well understood word "jargon".  I'm not picking on that
>person at all, I just use that as an example of how Scientology has
>needlessly invented a word to replace one which is already well
>established in the language.

"Argot" is a fairly standard word -- already existing and well
understood.  Both refer to a dialect or slang of a particular group,
with "jargon" being pejorative (implying unintelligibility) and
"argot" simply referring to slang.  (There's a whole chapter in "Les
Miserable's" discussing the argot of the street urchins.  This (even
the translation) predates Scientology. :-)  In recent years the word
"jargon", when referring to a technical or scientific discipline, has
become a synonym of "argot".  The implication here is that the
technical jargon, although unintelligible to outsiders, >does< have a
well-defined, consistent, conventional meaning.  This last definition
makes "jargon" a slightly more confusing word than "argot".  On the
net, and in technical circles, "jargon" is probably more commonly
used than "argot", though.

This isn't to say that the Scientologists don't coin new words, or
redefine old ones.  I'm just pointing out that "argot" is not a new
word -- it is a fine, respectable word -- and, therefore, your choice
of example wasn't great.

>-- 
>Guy Finney					"Ah, this is obviously some
>UUCS inc.   Phoenix, Az				new usage of the word 'safe'
>...!ncar!noao!asuvax!anasaz!uucs1!gaf		I was previously unaware of."
>...!sun!sunburn!gtx!uucs1!gaf