Jeff: Ya, I think terms can lose meaning in a sense…but they can also take on other/new meanings, even though they might be contradictory to earlier definitions. Maybe this is where the social conflicts arise–or maybe the term itself is the social battleground, or a proxy for it, or something. In the case of developers, I tend to take a somewhat jaded view that many people use the term not because they are all that concerned with the core meanings of the term, but instead because it has purchase and marketing power. But the term has no less meaning, really, just different meanings with different intentions and agendas behind it. The term “development” has similar issues. I have always found it fascinating how these kinds of terms can carry so many meanings–often so different–and still be used un-ironically by so many people.

John: There was actually a bit of a debate about using the term sustainability at one of the community meetings I attended. I should write something about this. One member of this meeting proposed a different concept–what he called “regenerative design”–instead of sustainable development (which he saw as passive and static). The new concept held sway for about two days, but was then almost completely dropped from the conversation. It vanished, and sustainability/sustainable development continued to dominate. Even then, the meanings that many people attached to the concept often expanded beyond many of the more official definitions. At certain points it was used as if it was a sort of panacea to everything that had gone wrong with development on the other side of the cape (Los Cabos.)

Anyway, thanks for the comments folks.