Language and Evolution

I strongly disagree. I would be lost without semicolons; they exist for a good reason. Commas, on the other hand, exist for an entirely different, but still very good reason.

First of all, I do see your point. The line between a semicolon and a comma is a little blurry. Sometimes they're interchangeable, but not always. In the previous sentence, and this one, if I was to replace all the commas with semicolons, it wouldn't work. Commas are more for interjecting something. I see it as having to do with the way we speak. A comma is more of when a sentence snakes its way around a bit. A semi colon is when the sentence is conveying an idea with one flow, which is better broken up into pieces. A comma stitches separate flows together. It pauses a bit, like we do when we speak and qualify something. A semicolon is where a sentence could end but doesn't because there's something more to add. A comma makes a sentence more readable to your brain. A semicolon indicates that two separate sentences are related enough that they shouldn't be separated by a period.

You wrote in your post "The symbol has become arcane; people don't know what to do with it." Both of these pieces could be their own sentence. They read better when combined as one because they're both directly referring to "the symbol". So a semicolon makes sense. A comma could work too, but it would be subtly different and, to me, wouldn't work as well. It would read to me as someone speaking in a specific way that is difficult to describe. Like they're brushing from point to point. Meh, not very good but that's the best I got. Hope it makes sense. I could just be wrong, but this is how I see it.

Colons are pretty clear. You use it when presenting something. Here's some examples: "Here's my take: blablabla." and "And now: the moment you've all been waiting for." It's like an equals sign. What comes after the colon equals the meaning before. "blablabla" = my take on something. "the moment you've all been waiting for" = now, it's happening right now.

A comma and a semicolon aren't interchangeable. A colon CAN be substituted by a period (or full stop, as they are called in the UK), because both sides of a semi-colon are actually 'complete sentences.' The semi-colon simply tells the reader that the thought in the first clause needs the second one to complete it. It's a handy device, and it would be a shame to lose it. (I agree that it's a device that can call attention to itself if it's over-used, but there is nothing wrong with it on occasion.) AND it's optional. Nobody is going to mind if you don't choose to use a semicolon.

It's a tool, and no other tool does its particular job quite so well. You can probably use the side of a pair of pliers to pound in a nail, but a hammer works better. Nice to have both in the tool box.

The comma, on the other hand, should never be used to separate complete sentences or clauses that could be complete sentences. That's called a 'comma splice' and it's actually a grammatical error that produces run-on sentences. However, its usage seems to be creeping in. For some reason, folks think it's okay.


I can live with it, if a writer (of fiction) wants to produce a breathless quality to the prose, that's what comma splices do, they make it really hard to actually pause, whenever you need a calm pause you should use a period, if you don't the sentence is going to start to go on and on, this produces the kind of effect I'm trying to illustrate here, comma splices make it difficult to take a breath while reading, when you can't breathe you tend to turn blue in the face.


I do agree that rules can 'evolve,' as language evolves. However, language rules exist so that people can communicate without misunderstanding. Once we start deciding for ourselves that we can just ignore rules that don't suit us, we're flirting with incoherence. It won't take more than a generation to lose the ability to accurately communicate with written language if we do that. That worries me.