Thank you to everyone who shared their favourite sayings, it was great to hear from you all, and I’ll get back to you all by tomorrow if I haven’t already. In fact, I might feature a few of them tomorrow.
My second saying that I have created, and would love to see catch on, is “an animal is a cat”. Confused? Let me explain.
This saying is an answer to an unstated question, although it can be inferred quite easily. That question is “what is an animal?” and the answer is “an animal is a cat”.
Explanation: I use this when someone tries to explain something by using an example, rather than a definition. Sometimes you can get away with it, but sometimes it’s lazy, ineffective, or confusing.
What is an animal? A cat is an animal, but so is a frog, and so is a fish, and so is a person. Knowing a single example doesn’t help; a cat has four legs, is a table an animal?
Usage: I use it occasionally at work, but more frequently when discussing or thinking about politics. A classic example may be someone describing themselves as a conservative, and when you ask why, they might say something like “I support Trump”. But that’s not a definition, that’s an instance. Often, people haven’t really thought about it, which is fair enough, there are lots of immediate things that need attending to.