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Comment by nend | Hacker News Reader

I mean, I get that this needs to be studied in order to understand Earth's climate better, but I feel like the title would be more accurate and responsibly written if they said "partially mitigates".

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Mitigate means to make less severe. It does not mean prevent.

I was going to comment that it has both means, i. e. partial as well as full mit.. aehm, let's say "reduction (in harmful effects of)".

But the dictionary is somewhat disappointing in only mentioning the gradual/partial reduction in harms. Here are the examples:

    • make (something bad) less severe, serious, or painful: drainage schemes have helped to mitigate this problem.
    • lessen the gravity of (an offence or mistake): there had been a provocation that mitigated the offence to a degree.

What's interesting is that both examples seem to use the term in a way that suggests that it does mean full-and-complete mitigation, otherwise the specifications "to a degree" and "have helped to" would not be needed.

I've never understood mitigate to mean a complete reduction of harm. In that case, you would use a word like "solved" or "fixed". "Mitigate" is used when the fixing is only partial.

> What's interesting is that both examples seem to use the term in a way that suggests that it does mean full-and-complete mitigation

I think that is for extra clarity. Both definitions say that mitigation is a partial effect "less severe" or "lessen the gravity of".

You might take a survey amongst your friends before claiming that the dictionary tells you all you need to know about the word "mitigate".

"mitigate /ˈmɪtɪɡeɪt/ Late Middle English: from Latin mitigat- ‘softened, alleviated’, from the verb mitigare, from mitis ‘mild’."

It doesn't mean to eliminate negative effects, just to lessen them.

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