Moment to Minute
I have difficulty remembering the proper usage of several words and phrases. Although I am rock solid with the difference between lay and lie, I still struggle with some of their tenses and cases. Fortunately, I had a mother who incessantly corrected my English. It also helps that my wife picks at me critically.
I also have a great editor who would rein me in if she sees this Substack. I believe that she occasionally checks up on me although I have yet to instruct her to, “please edit.” I thus risk embarrassment by flying blind herein. [I caved. I requested her help.]
My favorite chapter in all of my 25 books is a chapter entitled, Linguistic Sophistication. Therein, I detail, among other conflations and misusages, the atrocities of damp and dampen, speed and velocity, precision and accuracy, AND aerobic and Aerobics.
One common misusage that I did not mention for another 15 years is the conflation of moment with minute. Although I can’t remember my personal progression to acknowledge this particular conflation, I do recall my occasional hesitation with choosing which to speak or write. I believe that my awareness began with listening to many news anchors who commonly broke for commercials and station identifications with, “We will return in a few moments.”
Moment and minute are so close. They are both either an expression or a suggestion of time. They are both two-syllabic. They both begin with an M. And they both end with a T sound. So, as I asked myself for years without deep analysis, “Aren’t they interchangeable? Don’t they mean the same thing?” As a result of this cursory reflection and the observation that no one else seemed to care, I ignored the possible distinction. [If people were to be disturbed by my speech, my hesitation for word choice would have drawn more attention than the incorrect choice.]
And this begged other questions: If their meaning is synonymous, why are there two words? And if synonymous, why not merely delete one of them from the language?
As you may presently or eventually appreciate, “We will return in a few moments,” is truly gibberish… Not that many or anyone will notice.
A minute is a definite measure of time. If someone says, “We’ll return in a few minutes,” they speak intelligibly. They are providing an estimate of measured time. The indefinite part of the phrase is the few. Few means a limited and relatively low number of those minutes.
But a moment is an indefinite expression suggestion of time. And “We’ll return in a few moments,” then provides an additional indefinite. So, essentially, we now have, “We’ll return in an indefinite, indefinite time.” Hence, we have a double indefinite.
Another translation of the phrase is, “We’ll return in a few indefinite lengths of time.”
Another way to analyze this conflation is to substitute moment in the phrase with a different indefinite. Since a phrase like, “We’ll return in a few moments,” is so common, it feels natural to the ear. So with the substitution, the ear perks up to our linguistic insanity.
Useful indefinites of time include moment, while, spell, era, epoch, period, term, phase, age, and others. A moment is a relatively brief indefinite suggestion of time, while an epoch is a relatively long indefinite suggestion of time.
[There are words that sometimes serve as both definites and indefinites of time, but I decline to confuse myself and the reader with these.]
If someone says, “We’ll return in a few whiles,” OR “… in a few spells,” our ears will surely ring our brains with “huh?”
Basically, we must be on guard when using the plural of moment. If we intend a plural of minute, we’re safe, but if we risk a plural of moment, watch out!
[Saying, “I’ll return in a moment,” is fine as moment is singular.]
And I state this with the admission that a plural of moment is acceptable in restricted ways. For instance, “Over the past 15 years, I’ve experienced several extremely traumatic moments” is perfectly acceptable as its context implies multiple and separate episodes of indefinites of time.