There is a “lie” in “believe” — How I try to accept some “smart” idea that conflict with my belief and shifting of language, word and idea
Background
While watching a TV drama, my partner asked me if I realized there is a “lie” within the word of “believe”.
I replied to her that we need to look into etymology, and I believe the two words are from different origin and unrelated on the spelling level.
The thought developing
It’s so easy to hold on the one’s belief, be it being default behavior or maintaining harmony psychologically.
But feeling right vs being right (or unable to find a counterfactual) is different, I would not prefer to be people trying to hold on believes and ended up discard obvious counterfactual or defend faulty / flawed old believes.
Why the phrase sounds good/right
I believe the reason of people find “there is a lie in believe” convincing is that “believe” and “lie” is related to truth, trust and faith. Believe is to have faith in something / some idea, which one step further is to prove / justify it being truth, while lie is to try deceiving other to believe some false being truth.
By spotting the the contradicting idea fit into spelling (lie within believe), one can develop an additional layer of meaning — lie is always there, even if one want to believe, one just have to get pass it and focus on the bigger — trust / faith.
What I am struggling
That’s actually smart, if seeing it from a marketing slogan perspective, the only struggling in me is that phrase is likely not directly related in terms of etymology (I checked):
For believe — https://www.etymonline.com/word/believe#etymonline_v_8277
For lie — https://www.etymonline.com/word/lie#etymonline_v_9487
And an additional layer of contrast is: to accept this is smart imply I have to put aside etymology — my belief in how word and meaning developed.
So what is it for language / word / meaning
Etymology is trying to help me understand how word develop in historical perspective, but a lot of time, we are creating new word to help us communicate some new idea effectively, and sometimes we would append new meaning to existing word.
Etymology itself is historical (knowledge until now), while word and language is alive (and changing over time), this ease the some part of the struggle.
The root cause of my struggle
Slowing, the struggle unmask and reveal itself to me, it’s related to several things:
- Society change (old beliefs and structure being shifted or destroyed)
- Observing of loss of power to expression and influence
1 is simple, getting older and seeing dramatic changes in society lately (Hong Kong, you know it if you know it), one would observe things and meaning change over time day by day
2 is in similar context with a deeper thought, in which, not only the language (HongKongese, a variant of Cantonese) is used less locally or globally, some vocabularies are being 1984-ing (yes, George Orwell 1984), and the new generation also creating their own vocabularies and slang, it make holding on to the language and vocabulary so symbolic and emotionally attached.
Conclusion and moving on
After able to face the struggle and see it face to face, it just like demon in horror films, it no longer fearful when it reveal.
So what can be done is, move on, accept and maybe keep it to oneself without forcing people to accept. Trying to look on the bright side or loook aside…
