The only times I have ever heard the word "die" to refer to one dice are from my mother, and from my primary school English teacher. Every person I ever hear always says, "give me a dice" if they want one, and "give me the dice" if they want two. I used to "correct" people to say "die" if they meant one, but that just makes me look overly pedantic and asinine.
So I have personally started using "dice" in the singular, and "dices" in the plural, which people understand, and a few of the priggish ones will try and correct.
And on that vein of thought, I thought, why not use "ox" and "oxes" instead of the stupid "oxen". Why is there such a strong pull to hold on to archaic constructs, which don't really add flavour to the language, and in fact, just make it more confusing?
Answer
I take the real question here to be: "Why do some people pedantically cling to dying forms?" That's a good question. I think the answer is relatively straightforward.
People who want to present an air of education and in general lay claim to upper class privilege are the ones who tend to do this. It's largely because it is an index of education and a high degree of literacy (either that or role playing games, which is somewhat different, but still primarily an upper middle class past time...).
There is a lot more to it than that, of course. There is an intricate set of language ideologies which give rise to this kind of behavior. But the short answer is that in using such forms people attempt to identify with culturally and economically powerful (hence linguistically conservative) groups .
Everyone does this to some degree, of course.
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