Etymology of the Word Nice

[Gary Childress]

Etymology of the Word Nice.png (39.05 KiB) Viewed 3851 times

Ever since I first stumbled upon this etymology it has made me wonder. Why is there a connection between the word "nice" and the words "ignorant" or "stupid"? Why do you think that is the case? Does it say anything profound about the human condition that a word signifying what we all tend often to like in someone else is somehow tied to words that we tend to think insulting?

[vegetariantaxidermy]

Perhaps it evolved from when humans were less phony, and anyone who smiled too much was often the village idiiot, or mistrusted. Even fairly recently it was a vaguely insulting way of describing a rather nondescript, uninteresting person.
Is there even a word for someone who is always 'nice'? I suppose 'kind' has a more positive and flattering feel to it. Genuinely kind people are very rare, but 'nice' people are pretty standard these days-- where no one says what they really think.

[Gary Childress]

Perhaps it evolved from when humans were less phony, and anyone who smiled too much was often the village idiiot, or mistrusted. Even fairly recently it was a vaguely insulting way of describing a rather nondescript, uninteresting person.
Is there even a word for someone who is always 'nice'? I suppose 'kind' has a more positive and flattering feel to it. Genuinely kind people are very rare, but 'nice' people are pretty standard these days-- where no one says what they really think.

I suppose that's a fair assessment. I didn't think of there being a difference between nice and kind until you said something. I just googled and found the following example of the difference between nice and kind:

For example, if you are at a party and hear someone make a sexist joke that is degrading to women, your “nice” response might be to not say anything to avoid making anyone uncomfortable. You may choose to sit in silence, laugh nervously, or leave the room. The kind response may be to speak up about the joke. It may not feel “nice” to do so, but ultimately, it is far kinder — to both the joke teller and the others in the room with you — to call out this type of harmful conduct.

https://www.blackburncenter.org/post/ni ... -it-matter

What are your thoughts on that example?

[Gary Childress]

Here's an etymology of the word "kind" that I googled. It comes from Oxford Languages too according to Google.

Etymology of the Word Kind.png (79.89 KiB) Viewed 3828 times

There seems to be a connection between "kind" and "well-bred" or "well-born". That sounds kind of like what some might call "elitist" in some ways.

[vegetariantaxidermy]

Perhaps it evolved from when humans were less phony, and anyone who smiled too much was often the village idiiot, or mistrusted. Even fairly recently it was a vaguely insulting way of describing a rather nondescript, uninteresting person.
Is there even a word for someone who is always 'nice'? I suppose 'kind' has a more positive and flattering feel to it. Genuinely kind people are very rare, but 'nice' people are pretty standard these days-- where no one says what they really think.

I suppose that's a fair assessment. I didn't think of there being a difference between nice and kind until you said something. I just googled and found the following example of the difference between nice and kind:

For example, if you are at a party and hear someone make a sexist joke that is degrading to women, your “nice” response might be to not say anything to avoid making anyone uncomfortable. You may choose to sit in silence, laugh nervously, or leave the room. The kind response may be to speak up about the joke. It may not feel “nice” to do so, but ultimately, it is far kinder — to both the joke teller and the others in the room with you — to call out this type of harmful conduct.

https://www.blackburncenter.org/post/ni ... -it-matter

What are your thoughts on that example?

I think it's a terrible example The latter sounds like a self-righteous virtue-signalling twat. It would also be really bad manners to do that at someone else's party.

I can barely read your examples, but I can't make out any connection between 'kind' and 'elitist'. That sounds ridiculous. I don't see how the two are connected.

[vegetariantaxidermy]

Sometimes the kindest people aren't remotely what anyone would call 'nice'. 'Nice' is a person's outward appearance. 'Kind' comes from 'inside' the person. It's who they are, not how they outwardly present. I've known 'nice' people who were essentially sociopaths.
'Nice' tends to be a word you use when you don't know a person very well but are initially impressed by. They might have really good interpersonal skills. An extreme example would be those killer nurses, who everyone had described in 'saintlike' terms before they were caught out.
Would anyone describe someone close to them i.e. a family member, as 'nice'? Probably not.
Kindness often involves some risk or inconvenience to yourself. 'Niceness' does not.

[Gary Childress]

Perhaps it evolved from when humans were less phony, and anyone who smiled too much was often the village idiiot, or mistrusted. Even fairly recently it was a vaguely insulting way of describing a rather nondescript, uninteresting person.
Is there even a word for someone who is always 'nice'? I suppose 'kind' has a more positive and flattering feel to it. Genuinely kind people are very rare, but 'nice' people are pretty standard these days-- where no one says what they really think.

I suppose that's a fair assessment. I didn't think of there being a difference between nice and kind until you said something. I just googled and found the following example of the difference between nice and kind:

For example, if you are at a party and hear someone make a sexist joke that is degrading to women, your “nice” response might be to not say anything to avoid making anyone uncomfortable. You may choose to sit in silence, laugh nervously, or leave the room. The kind response may be to speak up about the joke. It may not feel “nice” to do so, but ultimately, it is far kinder — to both the joke teller and the others in the room with you — to call out this type of harmful conduct.

https://www.blackburncenter.org/post/ni ... -it-matter

What are your thoughts on that example?

I think it's a terrible example The latter sounds like a self-righteous virtue-signalling twat. It would also be really bad manners to do that at someone else's party.

I can barely read your examples, but I can't make out any connection between 'kind' and 'elitist'. That sounds ridiculous. I don't see how the two are connected.

Sorry my picture doesn't come out very clear but it says at the bottom that "kind" comes from:

Old English gecynde ‘natural, native’; in Middle English the earliest sense is ‘well born or well bred’, whence ‘well disposed by nature, courteous, gentle, benevolent’.

Being "well bred' or "well born" may sound kind of snobby at first glance. That is what I meant by elitist.

[vegetariantaxidermy]

I suppose that's a fair assessment. I didn't think of there being a difference between nice and kind until you said something. I just googled and found the following example of the difference between nice and kind:



https://www.blackburncenter.org/post/ni ... -it-matter

What are your thoughts on that example?

I think it's a terrible example The latter sounds like a self-righteous virtue-signalling twat. It would also be really bad manners to do that at someone else's party.

I can barely read your examples, but I can't make out any connection between 'kind' and 'elitist'. That sounds ridiculous. I don't see how the two are connected.

Sorry my picture doesn't come out very clear but it says at the bottom that "kind" comes from:

Old English gecynde ‘natural, native’; in Middle English the earliest sense is ‘well born or well bred’, whence ‘well disposed by nature, courteous, gentle, benevolent’.

Being "well bred' or "well born" may sound kind of snobby at first glance. That is what I meant by elitist.

Only an American would think that. It's more like 'well brought up', or 'well mannered'. Although I don't necessarily agree with that.

[Gary Childress]

I think it's a terrible example The latter sounds like a self-righteous virtue-signalling twat. It would also be really bad manners to do that at someone else's party.

I can barely read your examples, but I can't make out any connection between 'kind' and 'elitist'. That sounds ridiculous. I don't see how the two are connected.

Sorry my picture doesn't come out very clear but it says at the bottom that "kind" comes from:

Old English gecynde ‘natural, native’; in Middle English the earliest sense is ‘well born or well bred’, whence ‘well disposed by nature, courteous, gentle, benevolent’.

Being "well bred' or "well born" may sound kind of snobby at first glance. That is what I meant by elitist.

Only an American would think that. It's more like 'well brought up', or 'well mannered'. Although I don't necessarily agree with that.

Maybe that's true. To me, "well-born" implies that one is innately in possession of some characteristic. That it's not learned or rationally arrived at or whatever other means one might think of. "Well-bred" implies to my ears something along the lines that one has been properly raised by good parents or teachers, something that may not be available to everyone.

[Iwannaplato]

As far as well-born.....

well-born
in British English
ADJECTIVE (well born when postpositive)
having been born into a wealthy or upper-class family

as far as 'nice'

What Does 'Nice' Mean, Anyway?
'Nice' has a shocking number of meanings. Is that why it seems so meaningless?
There is a reason why dictionaries tend to split definitions up into different senses. If we didn’t split them, and just listed all the things that a word might mean, you might look up a common word and see the following definition:

Lewd, wanton, dissolute; coy, modest, diffident, reticent; fastidious; marked by refinement; requiring meticulous choice; requiring or marked by delicate discrimination; lacking vigor or endurance; trivial; pleasing and satisfying; enjoyable, attractive, or delightful; well-intentioned; mild, pleasing, clement (of weather); well or appropriately dressed; most inappropriate (used ironically); unpleasant, unattractive, mean; virtuous, chaste; not profane, indecent, or obscene.

What madness is this? What unholy and devilishly complex word could contain such a multitude of meaning?

The word is nice.

nice
Though 'nice' is used to mean "pleasant," it historically meant "wanton or dissolute." The word's other meanings include both "appropriate" and "inappropriate"—and in "Good Omens: The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, Witch," authors Gaiman & Pratchett note that 'nice' can also mean "exact."

Nice is a splendid example of a word that is highly polysemous, which means that it has multiple meanings. It would be nice if polysemous itself also had multiple meanings, such as “of or relating to slugs,” and “reminiscent of one’s first major disappointment in life,” but alas, this is not the case. However, nice more than picks up the slack.

Nice comes from the Latin word nescius (“ignorant”), which is also the origin of a lesser-known English word, nescience (“ignorance”). The word took a trip from Latin through Old French and Middle English before ending up in Modern English. It is a bit difficult to say with much certainty what the earliest meaning of nice was in Modern English, since by the end of the 14th century there were already a number of different senses of the word.

Nice has meant "dissolute":

May we not this day read our sin in our punishment? O what nice and wanton appetites, what curious and itching ears, had thy people in the dayes of plenty?
—John Flavel, Husbandry Spiritualized, 1674

Nice has meant "chaste":

“But Reddy Wheeler knew Daisy. We were properly introduced. It was quite all right!”
“Yes, but nice girls don’t do this sort of thing, you know--unchaperoned, and so late at night, and all that.”
—Fred Jackson, “Young Blood,” Munsey’s Magazine, 1917

It's easy to tell which sense is being used in which instance, in part because nice has not been much used to mean “dissolute” or “wanton” in the last several hundred years. But even with modern senses we generally are able to use context to distinguish between shades of meaning. For instance, one of the following uses of nice would be defined as “demanding or marked by great precision,” and one would be defined as “unpleasant - used ironically.”

The difference is not enough to prove confusing, it is true, but it exists, and in nice measurements would have to be allowed for.
—Electrical World, 16 Sept. 1911

“I give you my word they did not speak to each other during that dinner, nor would Louise stay to the cotillon. Charlie danced it with Frankie. Nice state of affairs, isn’t it?” I felt myself grow weak.
—Lillian Lida Bell, The Love Affairs of an Old Maid, 1893

Oddly enough for a word that has so many possible meanings, and which carries such specificity in a number of its senses, nice is frequently banned by writing teachers. This is due to students' apparent overuse of the word in its “agreeable, pleasant” sense, particularly in situations where another word might be a better fit. "It was a sunny, mild day" is more specific than "It was a nice day," and "Our librarian is funny and patient" tells you more than "Our librarian is nice." Yet nice, like the overwhelming majority of words, is neither good nor evil in and of itself. If an instructor or editor is determined to remove nice from your writing, you can always claim that you're using it in one of these myriad other senses. That would be nice—in some sense of the word.

[Age]

The word 'nice' was once used as a term of abuse.