The irony of 'Unprecedented Times'!

Lounge
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Am I alone in thinking that the irony antennae of the poor stooge writing for Transpennine Express must have been switched off, or stuck in a siding when s/he wrote the nigh-on oxymoronic:

‘these continue to be unprecedented times’

or was it a cunning ploy to pique the interest of my pedantic grammarian self?

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On a par with the ‘new normal’?

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I thought it looked more or less okay. The times continue to be unprecedented.

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In reality yes, but terminology wise…
A time can only be unprecedented if its like has not occurred up to that point.

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Can a time be unprecedented or just an event? Alternatively are all times unprecedented?

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It’s the ‘continue’ that creates the grammatical issue, not the ‘unprecedented’…

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Indded, but that’s not what the title asks.

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All times are unprecedented. Pandemics aren’t.

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This is a job for @bhoyo !

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Unprecedented times, whilst possibly accurate, has become a cliche, and an increasingly lazy one at that. For me, that’s a stronger reason to avoid its use than any possible contradiction.

Mark

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My bugbear is ‘more unique’. For me something either is, or is not.

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Not just for you, Bruce. “Unique” is, by definition, absolute. However, common usage appears to be shifting the definition. Hold the line!

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I agree with what most of you appear to be saying: “unprecedented times” is not necessarily incorrect, but it is lazy and clunky. As per @n-lot, can the times be anything other than unprecedented?

At least Transpennine Express didn’t say “past experience” or “previous history.” That would prompt me to wield Bhoyo’s Big Red Pen. :grinning:

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“Unique”

Quite often heard used as “…that’s a pretty unique specimen” or “…that’s a pretty unique way of achieving that outcome”

“pretty unique” = “rare” or perhaps “unusual” or simply “different”

But “wow, that’s more unique than I was expecting …” also raises my eyebrow.

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Like I’m giving 110% effort …

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Whatever…

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Agree. It’s fine.

Indicates ever growing unprecedentedness. :smiley_cat:

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Unprecedented: For which no precedent can be cited; of an unexampled kind. 1623

Precedent: late Middle English from Old French:

  1. A thing or person that precedes or goes before another.
  2. That which has been mentioned just before: 1607
  3. That which precedes in time or goes before another, an antecedent: 1788
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Past experience

It’s tautological. However, it’s a common enough phrase that people accept.

It’s a fairly common phenomenon in language that as a word starts to feel weaker, people add riders to it to draw attention to it. Hence, ‘from past experience’ or ‘from previous experience’ help to accentuate the word.

Quite a few people like to denigrate this kind of thing, but given how ubiquitous it is, I think it’s obvious it’s an important element in the evolution of speech. Maybe it’s not something you’d use in the most elegant writing, but it’s fine in conversation.

A Forum such as Naim’s, is basically a place for conversation.

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I see nothing wrong with it. ‘These times’ refers to one on-going event, the pandemic (presumably). It started, it hasn’t ended so it’s still a single event, unprecedented and continuing.

Quite valid. If I cycled to work yesterday and it took me an hour & 7 minutes to knock out the 20.8 miles that’s pretty good. If I do tomorrow in 1:01 that’s better - I’ll have put in something around 110% of yesterday’s effort. 100% isn’t a maximum possible, it’s the total amount of a value that could easily be larger on a different day.

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