Grammar, Spelling Errors And Word Meanings - Some Understandable, Some Not ...

[joko]

Many common grammar and spelling mistakes are understandable - such as there, they're and their, and should of rather than should have - because you can see the reason why the mix ups happen with those examples.

But there are some that seem to be getting more and more common - such as then and than, and weary and wary ...

I just cannot understand those two... the words are somewhat similar but do not sound the same, are not spelled the same and do not mean the same thing ... so how come so many unrelated people seem to be making the same errors?
It's not just a typo, or lack of care because they are on an internet forum either - they actually don't know the difference!

I thought it was more of an American thing, but recently I have noticed young Brits doing it too ... but even my 36 year old friend, whose job it is to proof read and adjust legal documents, said weary to mean wary...!

I am no grammar expert, but these are pretty basic, aren't they?

Have these ones always been mistaken, or is it a fairly new thing?
I am 41 and have never really noticed it happen much before the last say 8 years or so.

Thanks

[tearinghair]

Nice thought , thetaliesin, but they weren't!

[maxtown]

These two errors are quite common. I have seen both of them in many students' works. Honestly, I'm not a native English speaker, and I used to write many essays at school. I use computers to type my homework and I do always misspell "then" and "than" because I sometimes both mix up their pronunciations and meanings.:-( And spell checker can check my grammar and spelling so that I become not so serious on such kind of stupid mistakes. Also, these mistakes can occur more commonly when I type faster or get out of time.
So, the bad part is that I cannot leave grammar checkers, but the good part is that we do have many grammar checker products.
By the way, just recommend a fairly useful proofreading and grammar check software. http://www.1checker.com/Home/Index