I said “multiple” in front of my 4 year old and he asked what it meant. I explained, “it can mean many, several, a lot, bunches” etc.
After explaining to him the meaning I realized— why do we have different words that practically mean the same thing?
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I’m not sure if the words you mention do classify as synonyms, as they actually carry a nuance – “several” and “a lot” don’t have the same meaning.
(I’m not a native speaker so correct me if I’m wrong)
What you do see here is the word “multiple” which means “more than one” and therefore inherently could be replaced with any word that specifically indicates a size or number above one – like all the words you mentioned.
As for how synonyms come into being – most languages have developed from a mixture of local or regional languages, and influences from languages around it as well. I can imagine this can lead to multiple words being used for the same thing. If one doesn’t gain favor over the other, they both stay.
Also sometimes a brand becomes synonymous with its product – leading to a different type of synonym. I can’t think of an english example rn.
As I said I’m not a native speaker or linguist by any means so this is just my theory
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