The third edition of my book Thinking from A to Z has come out today in a dinky new format (pocket sized). I hope you like it. New entries include:
- principle of charity
- lawyer's answer
- least worst option
- poisoning the well
- sentimentality
- sunk cost fallacy
- weasel words
- 'you would say that wouldn't you'
Oh dear! 'Least worst'. Yes, I know, it's in common usage. As a fan of A to Z – and I have 1st and 2nd editions at the moment – I hope you sort of bemoaned the lousy English that has gone into that horrible phrase (not your lousy English, but that of whoever thought that one up). I mean, if something is worst, you've already used a superlative to describe it. The same with 'least'. To say 'least worst' means, logically, that there must be a less worst and something called merely a worst; or maybe a least bad, a least worse and a least worst. I think I need a cup of tea.
Posted by: Andrew J | June 29, 2007 at 02:31 PM