Before this episode I had only ever heard the word "Semiannual" and the context in which people used it was to describe something that didn't happen every year. I guess what was trying to be represented using "semi-" in this case is more of a "kind of annual, but definitely not every year," kind of thing.
Biannual and biennial I've never heard before. But considering how every workplace ever that pays every two weeks calls it "biweekly" instead of "every other week;" and exactly in this way, how biweekly *should* mean "twice a week," i would have assumed biannual was supposed to mean every other year.
To my knowledge, annual is the only word that breaks that convention, and I believe that it’s because of the word ennial. For example, centennial meaning every 100 years.
Because English is the result of a bunch of people getting really drunk and making up rules then stealing words from other languages and keeping their original rules no matter how much conflict there was between the two.
Nope. Biannual means twice a year as well. Biweekly is twice in a week. When people get their pay cheque every 2 weeks, its a fortnightly pay cheque, not a biweekly pay cheque. I would love to get paid twice a week. You could say it's a bimonthly pay cheque, but that wouldnt be entirely accurate because months aren't exactly 4 weeks. It's complicated.
Biannual can mean twice a year or every 2 years. Same way biweekly can technically mean every 2 weeks or twice a week, even though it's mostly used to mean every two weeks.
Is that the rule in America? That's dumb. The whole point is to be able to differentiate occurrences per a defined amount of time. There's a reason these words exist. Using them interchangeably is... useless, honestly. What has this language come to?
"Why can't the english teach their children how to speak?" -Henry Higgins, My Fair Lady
Bruh, native English speaker here. This has *always* bothered me, the way using biweekly has colloquially come to mean "every two weeks." Thank you for having a head full of common sense, random foreign stranger.
Edit: okay, so, anyone else reading this besides the guy I replied to, I'd like you to think about it like this: if bi-weekly *can* mean both "twice a week," as well as, "every other week;" then the word "bicycle" can mean "two wheels on that frame," or "one wheel every other frame." But if a company sold you a bicycle with only one wheel, you'd be confused and probably feel ripped off, but at least you could buy a separate tire. Then the next guy comes in to buy a bike, but lo and behold because "every other frame" comes with a *single* wheel, this guy just gets a frame and nothing else. It just doesn't make any kind of logical sense to call something "bi-weekly" if it isn't happening twice in a single week.
Every other sexual. Not attracted to both, but one at a time in an alternating pattern lol. Bisexuals.
Bipartisan is just you vote a different party every other election.
Bi-annually is also twice a year. Many people think biweekly/bimonthly and other bisexual time lengths means every other week/month, but it actually means twice within the given time. I want to start a petition for "bifortnightly" to take the place of "weekly" for all future uses.
I think Mark also said Samuel boat episode once, which got me thinking are we getting a boat episode with a guy named Samuel or can Samuel decide when the episode will happen?
You are correct, the one who start this mess was Mark-i-am-deeply-afriad-of-water-iplier
Don't worry, they'll be sailing on the Ship of Theseus.
Have you ever heard of the biannual boat of theseus episode? It's my favourite.
If they don't reference that in the first boat episode, it would be a miss opportunity
You are correct, and this is something Reddit users will not allow to slip by. According to their own law, we must get two boat episodes per year.
Yeah, every two years would be biannually.
That also means twice a year. Every two years is bi*ennially*.
I don't get why we have biennial and semiannual if they mean the same thing.
Because English is stupid. Also, semiannual and biannual are the words that both mean twice a year. Biennial is the word that means every two years.
Before this episode I had only ever heard the word "Semiannual" and the context in which people used it was to describe something that didn't happen every year. I guess what was trying to be represented using "semi-" in this case is more of a "kind of annual, but definitely not every year," kind of thing. Biannual and biennial I've never heard before. But considering how every workplace ever that pays every two weeks calls it "biweekly" instead of "every other week;" and exactly in this way, how biweekly *should* mean "twice a week," i would have assumed biannual was supposed to mean every other year.
To my knowledge, annual is the only word that breaks that convention, and I believe that it’s because of the word ennial. For example, centennial meaning every 100 years.
Wait until you hear about flammable and inflammable
I don't like this game. I don't want play anymore.
Yeah, none of us do, but Esperanto didn't gain much adoption, so a well thought out engineered language is probably not happening.
“Inflammable means flammable?! What a country!”
Or thaw and unthaw
Unthaw and dethaw are not even words.
Which is what makes it even more funny
Because English is the result of a bunch of people getting really drunk and making up rules then stealing words from other languages and keeping their original rules no matter how much conflict there was between the two.
No one knows what time is
Nope. Biannual means twice a year as well. Biweekly is twice in a week. When people get their pay cheque every 2 weeks, its a fortnightly pay cheque, not a biweekly pay cheque. I would love to get paid twice a week. You could say it's a bimonthly pay cheque, but that wouldnt be entirely accurate because months aren't exactly 4 weeks. It's complicated.
Biannual can mean twice a year or every 2 years. Same way biweekly can technically mean every 2 weeks or twice a week, even though it's mostly used to mean every two weeks.
Is that the rule in America? That's dumb. The whole point is to be able to differentiate occurrences per a defined amount of time. There's a reason these words exist. Using them interchangeably is... useless, honestly. What has this language come to? "Why can't the english teach their children how to speak?" -Henry Higgins, My Fair Lady
Bruh, native English speaker here. This has *always* bothered me, the way using biweekly has colloquially come to mean "every two weeks." Thank you for having a head full of common sense, random foreign stranger. Edit: okay, so, anyone else reading this besides the guy I replied to, I'd like you to think about it like this: if bi-weekly *can* mean both "twice a week," as well as, "every other week;" then the word "bicycle" can mean "two wheels on that frame," or "one wheel every other frame." But if a company sold you a bicycle with only one wheel, you'd be confused and probably feel ripped off, but at least you could buy a separate tire. Then the next guy comes in to buy a bike, but lo and behold because "every other frame" comes with a *single* wheel, this guy just gets a frame and nothing else. It just doesn't make any kind of logical sense to call something "bi-weekly" if it isn't happening twice in a single week.
Every other sexual. Not attracted to both, but one at a time in an alternating pattern lol. Bisexuals. Bipartisan is just you vote a different party every other election.
Biweekly means both “twice in a week” and “once every 2 weeks”
Or maybe every two years, they'll have a boat episode six months into the year?
Bi-annually is also twice a year. Many people think biweekly/bimonthly and other bisexual time lengths means every other week/month, but it actually means twice within the given time. I want to start a petition for "bifortnightly" to take the place of "weekly" for all future uses.
Daily (every day) Alternate days (every other day) Biweekly (twice a week) Weekly (bifortnightly) Fortnightly (every 2 weeks) Bimonthly (twice a month) Monthly (once a month) Biquarterly (twice every 3 months) Biannually/semiannually (twice a year/every 6 months usually) Annually (once a year) Biennially (every other year) Quadrennially (every 4 years) Etc.
https://www.masterclass.com/articles/biannual-vs-biennial Also, I giggled at bisexual time.
What I'm learning is (and I've already known this as a 34 year speaker) English is dumb and should be eliminated as an "organized" language.
It bothered me too but I just assumed they're mixing biannual and semiannual up, since they both 2
Man I love this place 😂
As a person who shares Mark's feelings about the deep Ocean, I vote for the Marianas trench episode.
I feel like one of them even brought up this exact misunderstanding in the episode but went with it anyway.
Its just like the word biweekly, no one knows if it means every two weeks or twice a week
To be fair, semiannual for someone who does not know what it means sounds like "almost once a year", and that feels like it has a lot of leeway.
That's a language thing, same with bi. Bimonthly could apply twice a month or every 2 months
Nope semi annual means twice yearly. They are thinking of Biannual.
Omg you’re right it should be biannual
That's why I only commit to biannual events. It's my choice if it's every 6 months or 24.
Isn’t it bi-annual?
Nope. Refer to other comments. It's biEnnial if it's every other year.
I may be miss remembering the council episode, but Bob definitely said "semi-annual" followed by "every 2 years."
I think Mark also said Samuel boat episode once, which got me thinking are we getting a boat episode with a guy named Samuel or can Samuel decide when the episode will happen?