When an event happens and someone begins trying to explain its occurrence, someone else may say that that event doesn’t need to be explained, or doesn’t merit further attention. I’m not sure these fit under the label of semantic stop signs, because they can be useful, but they deter further inquiry similarly.
Words the second person might use include “luck, chance, coincidence, quirk, circumstance, miracle”, and for excusing bad performance “fluke, accident, slip, glitch, error, mistake”.
“It was just a chance. Don’t read into it. No trend here. Stop and turn around. Direct your attention elsewhere.”
There is an opposite form of this attention deterring advice which I don’t have many examples for. Instead of saying an event is singular and shouldn’t contribute much evidence to your estimation of a trend, the second party says that the event is already explained by a trend that is familiar the second party, and perhaps also familiar to the first. “Yes, that’s just the way it is,” the second party says. “It’s just like that. Boys will be themselves.”
On writing that I notice that my examples for both templates of semantic stop sign use the word “just”, and aren’t as persuasive without it. Perhaps “just” is the real stop sign, and puts the listener in a mindset of dismissal, or explaining away, or reducing priorities. Other adverbs of focus like “only, merely, simply”, probably do the same duty.
When an event happens and someone begins trying to explain its occurrence, someone else may say that that event doesn’t need to be explained, or doesn’t merit further attention. I’m not sure these fit under the label of semantic stop signs, because they can be useful, but they deter further inquiry similarly.
Words the second person might use include “luck, chance, coincidence, quirk, circumstance, miracle”, and for excusing bad performance “fluke, accident, slip, glitch, error, mistake”.
“It was just a chance. Don’t read into it. No trend here. Stop and turn around. Direct your attention elsewhere.”
There is an opposite form of this attention deterring advice which I don’t have many examples for. Instead of saying an event is singular and shouldn’t contribute much evidence to your estimation of a trend, the second party says that the event is already explained by a trend that is familiar the second party, and perhaps also familiar to the first. “Yes, that’s just the way it is,” the second party says. “It’s just like that. Boys will be themselves.”
On writing that I notice that my examples for both templates of semantic stop sign use the word “just”, and aren’t as persuasive without it. Perhaps “just” is the real stop sign, and puts the listener in a mindset of dismissal, or explaining away, or reducing priorities. Other adverbs of focus like “only, merely, simply”, probably do the same duty.