Pedantic

I have on occasion been addressed with the epithet of pedant, I can't think why. I guess I do have a tendency to wish to correct inaccuracies where I find them, or to ensure that my communication is as unambiguous as possible (unless, of course, I am being willfully ambiguous). However, to my mind this serves a practical purpose. As I recently pointed out, I like writing code, which is as close to unambiguous as any language can ever come, and still there are many ways the language can be used to get the desired result.
Ms P and I simply cannot have a discussion about the ambiguity of human language, as she refuses see any ambiguity, whereas I see human communication to be a minefield of ambiguity. In my linguistic world you cannot ever fully understand what another person means when they use a word, as you do not have full knowledge of their understanding of that word.
Take the word 'comfort': the sensations you associate with that word are likely to be event or location specific. It may just be your bed on a cold winter day, but even so, if I've never been you in your bed on a cold day, my closest approximation of your idea of comfort is me in my bed on a cold winter day. OK, so in that instance our individual definitions are fairly comparable and we will have a decent understanding of each other if we use the word 'comfort' because there is sufficient crossover between our two experiences for the translation of sensation to lose little of consequence. For this is what human language is: a way of translating my experience into yours. This translation becomes more difficult when we start dealing with concepts that are less familiar to each of us, or even with concepts that may have broad range. If we look at the word 'few': I always take this to mean a number greater than two but not much greater*, whereas some people will take it to generally mean a number around ten or possibly even greater as indicated by the phrase "quite a few". Subsequently if I asked such a person to get me 'a few' of something, I may end up with more than I bargained for.
One of my favourite books is Le Grand Meaulnes by Alain Fournier, which is sometimes called 'The Wanderer'. However, 'meaulnes' does not mean 'wanderer'; there is no direct translation of the word in English. This could easily be dismissed as high handed French refusal to acknowledge the existence of any other language, but for the fact that such words exist in all languages, indeed entire tenses do or don't exist in other languages; entirely different concepts of linguistic time and therefore our relationship to time. So there are concepts of time that are precluded from some cultures because they are not within the structure of their language. It is clear therefore that language, any language is insufficient to fully communicate human experience, but has the ability to circumscribe it. If we cannot articulate something, how can we be said to have experienced it. This means language can have a control over how we see the world, which was very much the point Orwell was making with newspeak in 1984. The language in that book seems faintly ridiculous for its seemingly hamfisted attempt to redefine common objects or experiences, but Orwell's point is that if you'd grown up with those words, they would simply be natural to you.
There is clearly a worrying aspect to the ability of language to shape people's ideas and attitudes, especially since the language that we have has been inherited from a monotheistic patriarchal system. We are so familiar with aspects of our language that we do not even think about their origins or inferrence. We will assign gender to unknown others based on their profession and our unconscious prejudice. This is partly a fault within our language, as we have no specific gender neutral subject like the French 'on', but we can use 'they' in this context. However, as a rule, we don't. Try changing your default gender assumption next time you are aware of it and see if it impacts on your perception (or indeed anyone else's) of the conversation.
That is a little change of preconception rather than something embedded in language, so perhaps we should consider the impact of the use of the word 'Man' as in mankind. Whilst this word is simply intended to identify the whole of humanity, it is hard not to associate it with the singular noun denoting male gender (they are the same word after all). This implicit association permits the assumption of patriarchal precedence. One can argue that 'Man' means 'mankind', means all humankind, but people will still hear and associate it with 'man', meaning the singular of 'men' and (not necessarily consciously) assume man is the important part of Man. We can know this is not the case, but the language will reaffirm it with every use.
I wonder who first assigned the descriptions of political inclination that are 'right' and 'left'. One would have to assume that it was someone on the right of the political spectrum, because you've missed a trick if you're not associating your cause with all that is correct, with rectitude, with being right. It might just be me, but it seems that those on the right wing of politics take this sense on board. Left wingers (or progressives, to change the referential context) will always present their arguments as rational logical or emotional things to be understood through thought or feeling; right wingers (or conservatives) feel no need to present their argument even as an argument, it is quite simply right, by linguistic definition. If ever there was a good reason to change the political lexicon, that is one. People engaged in ideological battles are aware of the power of language: it is the reason why anti-abortion campaigners refer to themselves as 'pro life', it sounds so much more friendly. More than that, it is a linguistic attempt to close down the argument: only psychopaths are anti life, so how can you, as a rational being, not be pro life? The answer of course is that this is not telling the whole story, that there is a debate to be had about abortion, and there always will be (not necessarily by me, I'm not a woman) and that debate cannot and should not be precluded by linguistic assumption. Indeed it shows an unwillingness to engage in an argument, which is typical of extremists everywhere, for debate leads to understanding and understanding leads to compromise.
So yes, I am a pedant, I try to be careful what words I use, because the words I use define the world I live in and I want it to be a world based on rationality, not assumed precedent.

*in fact I think I have previously confessed that I traditionally interchanged 'few' and 'couple', perhaps as a result of my early contextual encounters with these words.