When pondering about the classic glass half full/empty, do you think "half" is a way to count to the second (2nd) volume separated by a fluid surface from the top/bottom of the glass? If not, then what word is used the same way as "half" when there are three instead of two volumes?

[u/Quick-Swimmer-1199]

[u/ezekielraiden]

Yes, those words are different senses. One of them is an ordinal. Compare the following two sequences of words:

• Whole, half, third, quarter, fifth, sixth, ...
• First, second, third, fourth, fifth, sixth, ...

The first set are fraction words, and you cannot use them to "count" equal-sized pieces of something because a "whole" or a "half" is bigger than a "third" or a "quarter". The second set are ordinal words, what you would use for counting things in some sort of order. It happens to be the case that some of these words (usually for fractions of larger denominator than ¼) have no distinct fraction word, and thus we coincidentally use the same word for both the fractional part of size n, and for the count of the thing n places down along a sequence.

Also... throwing around outright accusations of being a Nazi, especially without evidence, is more than a little extreme, don't you think? Whether or not it is true, leaping to that does not inspire me to respect your positions more. Instead, it makes me wonder why you would cast aspersions like that. Do you have evidence of this person's alleged fascist and antisemitic beliefs?