https://www.dictionary.com/browse/execute
"Execute" primarily means "carry out", not "kill". The latter definition is an adaption from the person designated to carry out the act of killing people for violating the law, which presumably at one point was done directly by the hereditary executive.
execute doesn’t mean to start, it means to stop…
No?
First Known Use 14th century, in the meaning "to carry (something) out fully : to put (something) completely into effect"
You ever heard the phrase: "Worked well in theory not execution"?
Poorly executed doesn't mean they had to slowly hack through someone's head because the guillotine was blunt lol
The original usage was to carry out (a command). In that original sense it was the sentence, rather than the prisoner, who was executed; but the meaning got transferred over time.
In earlier days of computing people first became accustomed to computers "executing" the "instructions" they'd been programmed with. By the time anything resembling today's software executables came along that was the established word for the thing computers did.
The first definition of 'execute' on Merrium Webster is this:
To put into effect; carry out.
Which seems very in keeping with running a software command.
Got to consider context. Whatever you do, do not look up the definition of "set", or "run".
Transitive verb
Weird bait
You have to understand the impact of euphemism, hypocrisy and modesty to language.
Example : at one point it was seen as obscene to talk about copulation, coit and fornication. So, for the houses where the king approved fornication, they simply created a modest acronym F.U.C.K. (short for : Fornication Under King's Consent) that later became itself seen as (of course) obscene.
Similarly at one point, long ago in history, it was seen as rude to tell a guard// servant// soldier to kill someone else and the euphemism chosen at the time was to say "execute" meaning "carry on" without saying what was to be carried on.
This word "execution" is being increasingly seen with that later "capital punishment" meaning ... this might be telling something of our preoccupations and/or obsessions.
all 38 comments