Words …even normal, daily yakkings … carry scars, culture, history, and a family lineage with them…much like people do. If one is an over thinker like I am (not a badge of honor, to be sure…like Aristotle once said, you must consider the conversation only to the degree that is appropriate for the subject matter), one tends to look just a little deeper at things than the surface level.
Being an over thinker, I tend to at least think, if not take conversations, intentions, assumptions waaaay beyond anything that resembles reasoned or “normal” levels. As such, I’ve learned how to say “I’m sorry” and “I apologize” for the wreckage my mental disease can reek.
I always used the two terms as identical notions. I thought they both conveyed regret. Not so much…
An apology is a verbal defense of a wrong doing. Etymologically speaking, apology stems from the latin apo-to do or from and logos-speech or thought. So an apology is a speech with the intention of the speaker to defend themselves or it’s a type of “self justification”.
To say “I’m sorry” is different. Sorry comes from an Old German term, serag, which means to feel pain both physically and mentally. Tracing this word all the way to its origin, it means to be full of painful sores or to suffer.
In a sense, the two words denote opposing ways to view a mistake done. If you apologize then you are defending your decision even though you might recognize that it was a mistake. If you are sorry, then you are denoting the pain brought to you and/or others by a stupid, short sighted decision … which implies deep regret.
To this end… I’m sorry you had to read all this to get my point.
Thrasymakos 