Fair point.
Team Venom.
See above.
What you fail to understand is that (although there is a distinction,) centuries of common use mean that “poisonous” is simply not the wrong term when applied to snakes or biting insects.
Look, let’s define “poisonous”:Collins: 2) capable of killing or inflicting injury; venomous
[McMillan: 1a) capable of producing poison a poisonous snake
[url=“Poisonous Definition & Meaning - Merriam-Webster”]Merriam-Webster](Welcome to Macmillan Education Customer Support): 2) : having the properties or effects of poison : venomous
Webster’s: capable of injuring or killing by or as by poison; containing, or having the effects of, a poison; toxic; venomous
Webster’s 1828: Venomous; having the qualities of poison; corrupting; impairing soundness of purity.
Webster’s 1913: Having the qualities or effects of poison; venomous; baneful; corrupting;Stubbornly insisting that the word “poisonous” does not carry the meaning it has been carrying perfectly well in conversation, literature, and academia for centuries is perfectly absurd.
You’ve looked to the etymology of “poison” as though it invalidated its centuries of common use. To use this sort of reasoning, you might also say that “venom” is the wrong word to apply to the poison secreted by animals for defensive use, because before it took on its more familiar specific meaning, it signified any toxic substance, and before it signified any toxic substance, it simply meant “potion,” and before it came to mean “potion,” it meant specifically love potion. (Referencing Venus.) So in the same sense that poison is the wrong word for a toxin that isn’t ingested, venom is the wrong word for any substance without a history of use as an aphrodisiac. Spanish flies are venomous.
Of course, we don’t use specious arguments like these as though they had any bearing on what a word actually means, because that’s just silly.
Yeah, basically the English language is highly adaptable and variable. Context is supremely important.
If I’m a science teacher who has a 10 question quiz for a group of 7th graders, in which they have to match a set of animals from Column B to the words “Poisonous” and “Venomous” in Column A, then animals like poison dart frogs would obviously be drawn to “Poisonous” and animals like Hornets and Rattlesnakes would be mapped to “Venomous.”
But that doesn’t mean anything other than that anywhere in the world is wrong. In many contexts the word “ship and boat” are totally interchangeable, in strict nautical terminology, these words often have very specific definitions (variable based on age in which you are talking about…ships were defined based on masts at one point and then later based on displacement.) But it’s never right to come in and say um that’s a SHIP you’re talking about, not a boat. I mean it’s fine as a good natured semi-joking comment, but you aren’t actually unambiguously correct to do that anymore than the person who is calling the large oceangoing vessel a boat is incorrect to use that word.
Nobody talks in general. Everyone talks in specific instances.
If in a specific instance the audience understood the speaker’s thought, then it was a good choice of words. There is no other rational measurement for communication.
Sure, there are certain mystic orthodoxies, viz. the Church of Safire etc., that disagree. But once you start appealing to superstition, incense, and high ritual, all bets are off.
We rationalists recognize that words exist only as vehicles for thoughts. When they carry those thoughts successfully, communication succeeds; otherwise, not.
The very idea of “the wrong term,” as you use it above, is conceptually incoherent. It’s like saying that the route I drove to work was the wrong route, even though it started at my house and got me to work successfully.
Never trust a big butt and a smile.
You learned the difference between “poisonous” and “venomous” in grade school biology?
I’ve taken lots of bio in different schools, from basic grade school worksheets to AP and college courses, and the only reason I know the two aren’t technically synonyms is from outside reading.
We always knew BigT was special.
As I was cleaning up my third grade classroom yesterday, I came across a National Geographic for Kids all about poisonous animals. They used both “venomous snake” and “poisonous snake” to describe creatures like rattlesnakes.
So even in grade school biology, “poisonous” may be used in that context.
The problem is that words do not have a copyright by any particular group, either experts in a given field or the common man. Complicating the matter is that the word usage changes, as several people have pointed out, and that the common usage of the term “poisonous snake(s)” predates modern biology, with its particular definitions of poison and venom.
Any particular field will more carefully define terminology than what the masses do. Does this make that definition “correct” and all others “incorrect?” If so, what must be done with cases where the same object is called one term in one field and referred to with another name in a separate field? Which definition is the “absolute correct” one, in which the other’s may be scoffed at and ridiculed? Or does a language permit words to have different meanings when used in different situations, and allow both to be correct? As the word is not copyrighted, and there is no ultimate court to rule on usage, the latter is the case, and both usages are correct.
So, while it’s tempting to believe that when there is a difference between the lay definition and the expert definition, this is no more different than the case between two expert definitions.
Hence, calling the commonly accepted usage “wrong” in the case is wrong. To insist otherwise is to fail to rise above the level of my toddler who now proudly pronounces all new rules she has learned.
And, as others have pointed out, the poll does not accurately reflect the true question, which should be “Is the term “poisonous snake” correct or incorrect in all circumstances?” The result of that question would be more interesting; although similar to the results of the anecdotal poll, “How long is the emperor’s nose?” no more enlightening. For that, you need to go no further than the experts in the field of language who periodically publish their rulings in big volumes called “dictionaries.”
Come back when you can get OED to reject the term you dislike. We’ll welcome you then.
. Anything else is simply masturbation.
Actually while I agree with your overall analysis of the situation I just thought I would point out that the OED is not among the dictionaries cited thus far and it does make the distinction.
But the OED doesn’t make them wholly incompatible words (just like all the other dictionaries, it has separate entries for both poisonous and venomous–some of the dictionaries actually defined the word poisonous with the word venomous showing how interchangeable these words are), in the first definition of poisonous the OED definition says “introduced to or absorbed by.”
Well, is not a bee stinger or a snake’s fang a system which can “introduce” their poison to the body? If you’ve been stung by a bee or bitten by a snake have you not had poison “introduced” into you?
Right but then it goes on to define venom as a ‘poison’ that is typically injected via bite or stinger. Anyway you’re preaching to the choir… I agree that in this and almost every context when discussing snakes the words are interchangeable. I just also agree with the OP and English purists that they aren’t always interchangeable. We have two words with two meanings to communicate two different things. There are distinctions but they are insignificant in many contexts.
It confuses the issue even more that we are talking about the adjective poison (e.g. poisonous snake) rather than the noun poison because a person can be poisoned by venom, ideas, polluted air, etc.
That’s not the issue. The OP says that venomous and poisonous are never interchangeable. They have disjoint meanings. The Venn diagram has no overlapping region. So when someone says that venomous snakes are poisonous, they are wrong*. Like the trusty OED:
Rigmarole’s position is that the OED is incorrect. If one wishes to know the meaning of a word, check with the Arizona Game & Fish Department of Wildlife.
*Except in cases where snakes are both venomous and poisonous.
Now welcome to the aha moment. The original objection was to the adjective poison. This is quickly demonstrated:
jtgain and Colibri said the objection was incorrect (look at the posts linked in the OP)
He’s changed the goal posts. The objection was over the term “poisonous snakes” and not “poison” or venom." Both **jtgain **and **Colibri **argued that “poisonous snakes” is accectable but Rigamarole has argued that since the respective nouns are defined as such, by certain experts, that jitgain, Colibri, the OED, as well as the rest of the fucking world is wrong.
“Poisonous snakes” is perfectly correctly used in the circumstances of the linked thread. To create a thread based on a false dichonomy is not only overly pedantric but has crossed into a dishonest arguement. The two other posters were not arguing what Rigamarole is claiming they were.
That’s some serious ownage. Pwnage even (do the kids still say that?).
Wow. You really think this poll has actually has determined the usage? That people don’t use the term “poisonous snake” to mean “venomous snake”? Really?
I’m actually on the side of educating people with regards the difference in meanings. But if he’s trying to persuade people to change their actual usage, I suspect he won’t be successful. And pedants, especially ones who desperately cling to their pedantry when proven wrong, don’t seem to me to be the type who are trying to educate.
Yeah, I’m all for saying things like, “Often venomous is used to refer to animals that convey their toxin via a bite or a sting, while poisonous simply refers to anything that produces a toxin.” just to clear the air as it were, or if I were writing a paper or an article, I might make a note that I’d be using this particular dichotomy in my writing, but I wouldn’t expect others to necessarily follow it.
I wonder, though, under Rigamarole’s definition, are spitting cobras venomous? I imagine they can bite if they want but if they just spit at you, have you really been poisoned as opposed to envenomed?
Here’s another example of poisonous being used as an adjective, by Merriam-Webster
(my bolding)
Looking at the second example, which I’ve bolded, poisonous is used exactly the same way as has been called wrong. With M-W’s blessings on this usage, what exactly is the argument about? That the dictionaries are incorrect?
I agree with Colobri in the sense that not all poisons are venom, but all venoms are poisons. Although I’m not sure if there’s a distinction between poison and toxin and other terms for harmful substances. Is a prion a poison? There might be a meaningful distinction based not only on method of delivery but also on method of harm.
You could make a linguistic argument either way. An introduction of venom into the system via the eyes, or other mucus membranes is still referred to as an envenomation by medical staff and those who work with animals though.