Within the context of the four languages you listed and your example, I don't think Forth word vs function is merely terminology, it tells us a great deal of useful and important information. You clearly were able to grasp that but you worked under the assumption that I did not understand. There is nothing in Forth that requires you to make ambiguous constructs like that, you will come across them but like most every language (if not all), we sometimes trade readability for some other gain, or out of habit, ignorance, laziness, etc.