I'd like to be quite neutral on this subject - I'd like to believe that language is a fluid medium and provides us with so much evidence of its changes over time.
But . . . . I have to say, that every time I read 'their' meaning 'that place' or 'there' meaning 'belonging to some people', then my education makes me hesitate and re-read it looking for the intended meaning.
I've had a modest 'classical' education, which can be very useful at times (only today, I read some 18th century carvings which were partly in Latin, partly 'church latin' and partly the period English of the day, and they just read as a single line of text to me. I'm used to all that.) So, that's great, no?
No. The downside is, if we recognise the vast range of possible words in a variety of dialects and languages and eras, then any misspelling or typing can change a word from one meaning to another more readily. Unintentionally. That can be a very real problem.
The most persuasive factor I'm aware of is the size of our personal vocabularies - e.g. if we have a vocabulary of 10,000 words or less, then even double spelling errors may be understandable (which is how text speak can work), and if we have a vocabulary of 10,000,000 words, then even the smallest error is likely to produce another, unintended word.
(BTW. I don't recall having seen any Tweets in Latin, Sanskrit or classical Greek. Yet!)
'Morons'? Hmm, having posted the above, I must sound like some pompous, proud, conceited and self-righteous git. So, do we prefer 'morons' or 'pompous gits'? And just what difference would that make to anything that matters? Really matters?
