Definition 3 from Merriam-Webster[1] of "only": FEW
I can say "one of the few", or "one of the only", and they both make perfect sense (and have the same meaning). You're being blindly prescriptive without even doing the legwork.
Yes and I'm sure Webster will also say[1] that literally is a synonym for figuratively, because of how people also like to destroy the meaning of that word, and descriptivists will forcefully (and ironically) prescribe indifference to that.
Heh, I just write too much too readily about unimportant opinions, and a lot of people read sentences longer than a few words as incontrovertible proof of being triggered :D
Also it's difficult not to call out the hypocrisy of descriptivists simultaneously saying that basically anything goes, but my preferred use of language in particular is wrong and I need to listen to what they prescribe :P
Words change. Meanings change. This has always happened an always will. If enough people are ironically using literally, even if unknowingly, then yeah, the meaning will change and we need things like dictionaries to describe this new meaning.
I would like a non-native speaker to weigh in, but I gloss it as "there are ONLY a few and this is ONE OF them" and have never found that confusing or contradictory.
That's exactly the difference: "one of the few" necessarily implies scarcity, whereas you could say e.g. "one of the only grains of sand at the beach" while clearly there are many.
I wouldn’t use that phase for sand grains exactly because there are so many. If you added a qualification like “… that is colored blue” then it sounds fine again to me.
It's not that I don't understand what they want to express and how they use the phrase. I'm arguing that it's a poor phrase for the job, when "one of the few" exactly and necessarily implies that, while "one of the few" doesn't necessarily.
In fact it's even more vacuous ("nothingburger") because sometimes it's not even clear which way the person means it; if I say "I'm one of the only people to do a handstand on a Thursday morning", do I imagine that I'm in a large group or a small one?
[Edit: this paragraph added to respond to post below saying I'm not going to win, which was edited out and I couldn't respond to for some reason.] I'm not trying to "win" any more than I would try to tell people that literally isn't a synonym for figuratively; I know that ship has sailed. That doesn't mean I'm not allowed to say it doesn't make sense, and I'm very aware that people get extremely angry about it for some reason, as if it's a personal affront. Not everyone has to buy into the cargo cult of descriptivism (particularly in the face of absurdity), differences of opinion are still allowed :)
Is your objection to the use of 'only' to refer to multiple things, or specifically the phrase "one of the only"? Would you consider "I am only five minutes late" to be valid?
(edit - for the record, this was in response to the first paragraph only, as the others were edited in afterwards)
My objection is in direct analogy to "could care less": it fails to rule out the very thing that is to be ruled out.
The grains of sand example should make it clear: it is not true that this grain is one of few at the beach, but it is true that it's one of the only. This makes it a poor expression for scarcity, and while obviously we know what was actually intended (as with "could care less"), that doesn't really make it any better.
I'm trying to understand but struggling -- so it is specifically the phrase "one of the only" that bothers you, but the example of "only five minutes late" is acceptable? And the issue is that "only" in that context doesn't mean a singular item, but rather a group of ambiguous size?
If the subject matter weren't somewhat baffling in the first place the edits and deletions certainly didn't help.
FYI for anyone reading this (not directed at you specifically): the 'delay' option in profile setting adds a delay before your comments appear publicly, giving you a buffer for edits and deletions before it goes out to the world.
Personally it helps a lot with ensuring I'm happy with the comments I make, and it helps avoid situations like this where multiple layers of retroactive changes make the conversation hard to follow.
You can't respond to fresh comments in a back-and-forth on HN, there's a delay of a few minutes before the reply button shows up when many comments are being posted in quick succession. (or maybe it has to do with depth? unsure)
as a nonnative fluent speaker, to me "one of the few" and "one of the only" mean the same thing, with "of the only" possibly being even less than "of the few"
From the perspective that "only" can mean only one, sole, etc., this is still the correct usage of the idiom "one of the only". Idioms don't match the literal meanings of the words that make them up. Even if unsure, the context makes it clear.
This is in contrast to people mistaking one word for another.
That reminds me, I still have to put up the explanation at oneoftheonly.com for why this phrase doesn't make sense and is the new "could care less".