Phrases that mean their opposite
Added 2021-12-12 04:12:38 +0000 UTCI'm reading a github issue on a correctness bug where the first comment from the lead developer is about how much they care about correctness and how much effort they put in.
I find the comment quite striking since the project is, for things I've used that are in its class, worst in class on correctness.
I've seen a similar response to correct bugs on a few other projects and those projects are also worst in class.
To be clear, this is distinct from a project having a page explaining that they care about correctness and detailing how they check correctness (e.g., explaining that they have 8 million tests, or they use an oracle to test for correctness and run millions of randomly generated tests per day, etc.). This is about project maintainers reflexively respond to bugs with something like "we try really hard to catch bugs like this".
After running into this, I thought about this further and I think there are a number of other statements that often convey the opposite. One that we've discussed previously here is when someone at a big company tells you that their team is "just like a startup". The more they insist, the more big company obliviousness they're likely to have.
One that we haven't discussed is when someone is described as humble. I've seen this a few times in, e.g., a eulogy given by a spouse, and in every case, it was for someone who was not only arrogant, but one of the most arrogant people I've ever met. Of course, I know people who are actually humble, but I don't really see those people often described as humble.
One that I've seen a lot more is when, in an online discussion, in a heated debate, person A asks, "why are you so angry?" or, better yet, a more passive aggressive phrasing, like "imagine getting angry over this" / "imagine caring about this", etc. It is, of course, generally the more angry person who accuses the other person of being angry.