“less” usually points out the lack of something. The missing thing is the hindernes.
“free” on the other hand describes that leaving out a part is the feature.
Paperless, meatless, frictionless, touchless, wireless, solderless, serverless and a lot of different other technical terms got very conventional for some reason.
Its somewhat necessary to use these terms tho, since they have become very established. I understand language is constantly changing and it is a good thing that language evolves.
Still, it sometimes annoys me a bit to use these terms since I find them somewhat inaccurate.
Comments
Please remember what subreddit you are in, this is unpopular opinion. We want civil and unpopular takes and discussion. Any uncivil and ToS violating comments will be removed and subject to a ban. Have a nice day!
I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.
Nerd
Wait till you learn the difference between less and fewer!
So because you have decided that the postfix -free means it’s a feature and the postfix -less can not mean it’s a feature means thise words are incorrect for not following your logic?
Do you have any authoritative source that also says that -less is not used when the lack of something is a feature?
Many of these are accurate though.
Frictionless is correct (the idea of an absolute zero coefficient for friction is usually not the case).
Touch less is correct as you typically still have a touch interface either connected or separate (Alexa being a good example. There are still buttons but you touch less)
Wireless is accurate as wires are still needed to make a wireless system function.
Less does not mean none and just because you don’t see or even use the minimum features does not mean they are absent from existence
Brainless post
The real question, is when a lot of these are used “incorrectly” do you still understand what’s being conveyed? If you do, then I would argue it’s NOT incorrect any longer and has evolved.
Word meanings come usage, for better or worse.
theyre called suffixes
I feel like I need some clarification, here. Where are you getting the idea that “-less” indicates the missing thing is a hinderance? It can be, but isn’t always. If something is “spotless” is the lack of spots a hinderance? Is something being “ageless” a bad thing? “Timeless”? “Blameless”? And these are all hundreds of years old.
“-less” is mostly used to indicate a lack of a thing that is typically present. “-free” is almost always used to indicate that the lack of the thing is explicitly positive, but “-less” does not necessarily carry a negative connotation. Someone who says they are childless may or may not be happy about that fact. Someone who says they are childfree is glad not to have children.
Of course, some of this is just about what people think sounds good, because language is like that sometimes. Why handsfree cordless phones and not handsless cordfree phones? Who knows?
This is pointless. As in missing the point feature.
You’re fighting a losing battle hoss
I have to do this with my student workers regarding receipts vs invoices.
In accounting they have defined meanings but in the real world people use them interchangeably. One gets us what we need and the other forces us to investigate further.
I don’t agree with your premise that -less and -free are as clear cut in their actual application as you seem to think they are.
Wow, what an odd issue to have. Life must be good OP.
Eh, I wouldn’t worry about it too much.
Am I misunderstanding something?
Paperless = the lack of paper.” Meatless = the lack of meat. Friction = the lack of friction. Whats wrong about that?
Sort of a tangent but as someone with allergies it’s frustrating that unscented can mean things added to mask a scent while fragrance-free is the hypoallergenic one. It’s not too bad because most manufacturers get this… but not all.
Wait till you learn about though.
But you are wrong on the distinction. -free means there is an absolutely no presence of the thing. -less is well less definitive. Bottomless pit is not bottom free.
Aside from “carefree,” I’m hard pressed to think of any common words that end with “free.” Meanwhile, there are easily hundreds of words that end in “less.”
Free as a suffix feels silly and contrived in most instances – more like marketing than language.
I think that u/Samael13 ‘s point is correct in that less isn’t necessarily negative, however I can’t think of an instance of the suffix free being used negatively, which might be where you got this misconception in the first place.
Anyone has an example of -free being intentionally used as a negative?
Your premise is wrong, I’ve never heard of -free only referring to the lack being a positive feature while -less referring to when the lack isn’t a positive feature. You just made that up
Take some more tea,” the March Hare said to Alice, very earnestly.
“I’ve had nothing yet,” Alice replied in an offended tone, “so I can’t take more.”
“You mean you can’t take less,” said the Hatter: “it’s very easy to take more than nothing.”
“Nobody asked your opinion,” said Alice.
Meatless has less meat. 0 is less.
Depending on the word depends on the meaning that comes out of it, but less includes nothing
Consider homeless versus home free. Home free is a phrase and that phrase means something very different. So we can use homeless because no homes is less than the normal number.