Word of the day - Not to be mistaken for "Word de jour."
I contributed to some confusion in @Wayfarer's "Word de jour" discussion by misunderstanding its purpose. I liked the idea though, so here it is. At a place I used to work, there was a whiteboard in the lunch room. Every day someone would put up a new word of the day and we'd discuss it. I used to enjoy it. Gotta love words.
The words I used in Wayfarer's discussion were "gregarious" and "craptacular." "Gregarious" because it feels good to say and "craptacular" because it is the perfect word.
My word for today is "woebegone." - looking sad, pitiful. A friend was having a bad day yesterday and I described her this way. Feels good to say. Elicits an image in my mind of whomever I am talking about with an expression like Eeyore's. Reminds me of German - they build their words like brick walls, one word on top of another. Love German.
So, please contribute. Let's keep it to English. That odd English they speak in the UK, Australia, Canadia, etc. is fine. Words you love. Words you hate.
The words I used in Wayfarer's discussion were "gregarious" and "craptacular." "Gregarious" because it feels good to say and "craptacular" because it is the perfect word.
My word for today is "woebegone." - looking sad, pitiful. A friend was having a bad day yesterday and I described her this way. Feels good to say. Elicits an image in my mind of whomever I am talking about with an expression like Eeyore's. Reminds me of German - they build their words like brick walls, one word on top of another. Love German.
So, please contribute. Let's keep it to English. That odd English they speak in the UK, Australia, Canadia, etc. is fine. Words you love. Words you hate.
Comments (316)
I like "recalcitrant" people too, although I sometimes use a more vulgar word. The word feels good to say also.
Say it!
Came up regularly in a book I once edited and I had to look it up. It still sounds to me to be the opposite of what it is. But maybe that's just me.
Yeah - sounds like a disease. Or maybe a brassica - you know, broccoli, cabbage, brussels sprouts, bucolic.
Bucolic sprouts
Here's a quote using "tenebrous" I tripped across while looking up its definition. From Lovecraft; "Dunwich Horror":
One dreads to trust the tenebrous tunnel of the bridge, yet there is no way to avoid it. Once across, it is hard to prevent the impression of a faint, malign odour about the village street, as of the massed mould and decay of centuries.
Lovecraft’s writing is a guilty pleasure of mine.
Old King Cabbage was a sharp witted savage
and a sharp witted savage was he.
He called for his pipe, he called for his stash
and he called for his brass players three.
He wanted to be chopped, and then be slopped
with mayonnaise, sugar, and cream.
Cole, apples and bananas, odd it may seem,
for a fine supper salad can't be topped.
'Cole' appears in Latin, German, Dutch, and Old Norse, and Old English.
I forgot to say "No doggerel," another good word. Although it means verse or words that are badly written or expressed, it aught to mean the fenced area where dogs are kept before the big drive to Abilene.
Or maybe it can be used in a sentence like "@ArguingWAristotleTiff and @TimeLine, what a couple of doggerels.
Is that a variant of dogatory?
Old English ?wiht
Antique now, but it also means 'zero'.
Doggerel indeed! My doggerel is bigger than your doggerel.
That's a word that sounds right, but a naive parsing suggests a meaning that is the opposite of what it actually means. Woe - be gone! But, according to Dictionary.com, the etymology is "Middle English wo begon orig., woe (has or had) surrounded (someone); wo woe + begon, past participle of begon, Old English beg?n to surround, besiege".
It's been a quiet week in Lake Wobegon...
Quoting Baden
To speakers of Slavic languages it should sound just right: the first syllable stands of "shadow" or "darkness."
A word that I often encountered in Falkner, and practically nowhere else, is susurrating. Now that's a word that doesn't even need an explanation.
Latin roots though, right? I would guess. Anyway, it reminds me phonically too much of its opposite, "luminous".
Thanks for the correction.
Quoting Bitter Crank
I don't have a doggerel. Maybe my pen is bigger than yours though.
Quoting T Clark
Craptacular is excellent, but don't forget "crapulous", from Latin crapulosus
Caused by or showing the effects of alcohol.
‘I was a little too crapulous to register what had happened’
‘I'm surprised to see Graham spouting crapulous nonsense like this’
Then there is plain old crap which is, sadly, not derived from crapulous or crapulosus;
Crap, of course, means crap.
noun
noun: crap
1.
something of extremely poor quality.
nonsense.
rubbish; junk.
2.
excrement.
an act of defecation.
plural noun: craps
verb
verb: crap; 3rd person present: craps; past tense: crapped; past participle: crapped; gerund or present participle: crapping
Used in an obscure novelty song, "I Crept Into the Crypt and Crapped" by Homer & Jethro"
I'm disappointed. I had believed the word came from Thomas Crapper, who manufactured toilets back in the late1800s.
My son's 28th birthday.
Word - whippersnapper
Official definition - A young and inexperienced person considered to be presumptuous or overconfident.
My definition - Anyone more than 10 years younger than I am.
[quote=oxford dictionaries.com]Origin
Mid 17th century: from Latin tremendus (gerundive of tremere ‘tremble’) + -ous.[/quote]
Everyone loves a gerundive, surely?
I can get a little tenebrous after I've had a few beers.
Quoting T Clark
I like the way you work it, no doggerel, I got to bag it up, bag it up.
Quoting Benkei
Bring me to life, wake me up inside, wake me up inside, call my name...
I regard the calumnies I have to suffer to read are amongst the worse of the Vicissitudes encountered on this Forum.
It's a word, like "terrific" or "awesome", that used to refer to something frightening or overpowering but now refers to something really good.
What the.
My excuse is that I was drinking. It seemed funny at the time. Actually, it seems funny to me now. But then again, I'm drinking now.
Quite. Well, I do not drink alcohol so I have no excuse... you bumberclat. Nevertheless!
I can drink because I'm not a slave to reason. Although it is my understanding that Kant drank heavily. Or maybe I just made that up.
"Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe.
“Beware the Jabberwock, my son!
The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!
Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun
The frumious Bandersnatch!”
He took his vorpal sword in hand;
Long time the manxome foe he sought—
So rested he by the Tumtum tree
And stood awhile in thought.
And, as in uffish thought he stood,
The Jabberwock, with eyes of flame,
Came whiffling through the tulgey wood,
And burbled as it came!
One, two! One, two! And through and through
The vorpal blade went snicker-snack!
He left it dead, and with its head
He went galumphing back.
“And hast thou slain the Jabberwock?
Come to my arms, my beamish boy!
O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!”
He chortled in his joy.
’Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe."
-Jabberwocky, Lewis Carroll
:clap: :100:
I'm just now realizing how profound this poem was for me since childhood as I re-read it. The way that words that have no real meaning convey a story is a parallel to how music works, and to how I write both music and words....yeah, anyway
Great words. Great poem. As with many spoken things, the way it feels in my mouth is as important as how it sounds or what it means.
:snicker:
Pugnacious - Eager or quick to argue, quarrel, or fight.
For me, this word has eveything. I like pugnacious people. Sound - Emphasize the "P" and it sounds aggressive. Feels good to say. Visual
@CuddlyHedgehog is right. You need some help with your witty repartee.
You mean, you're not my number one fan? :gasp:
Everyone knows who your #1 fan is.
Bumberclat, from the web - A Jamaican curse word which literally means "buttocks cloth." It refers to a dirty cloth used to wipe your bottom probably after you have used the toilet.
I am honored both by the addition of a worthy new word and by it's use in reference to me.
Your standards change when sober, I guess. :confused: Some foreign words seems to have better ways to describe things then we could ever in the English language. Right now, this is my favourite word:
Forelsket: The indescribable euphoria experienced as you begin to fall in love.
I think I kind of miss the idea of loving someone. It is a pretty amazing feeling, wanting to take of yourself, to make yourself attractive. I miss it because I haven't felt it for a long time.
Mamihlapinatapei: The wordless, meaningful look shared by two people who both desire to initiate something, but are both reluctant to do so.
Kilig: The feeling of butterflies in your stomach, usually when something romantic takes place.
Toska: A sensation of great spiritual anguish, often without a specific cause; a longing with nothing to long for.
Fernweh: Feeling homesick for a place you have never been to.
I say this without criticism or irony - I am thankful to be of an age when I am unlikely to experience any of these again. What language or languages?
My blood literally boils when someone misuses it.
The wonderful thing about English is that is there is not a word to describe something we invent one or borrow one.
English is a smorgansbord! A veritable meze of tapas delights.
Stop being such an ageist. Besides, I am of the fruitful age of fruitfullness. Is that word?
As in:
[I]If one examines semanticist capitalism, one is faced with a choice: either reject subcapitalist desublimation or conclude that the collective is elitist, but only if language is equal to truth; otherwise, sexual identity, paradoxically, has objective value. It could be said that the subject is contextualised into a feminism that includes reality as a reality.
wat[/I]
I prefer "wut".
Not ageist, wistful. A sense of what I've lost and what I've gained, how it balances out, and what comes next for you.
wat
wot
Most of these are words I never use except when I'm talking about words.
Palimpsest - Originally parchment from which the original writing was scraped so it could be reused such that traces of the original could still be seen. Now, more broadly, something, usually text or image, which is changed or removed but where the original can still be seen.
Portmanteau - Originally, and still, a leather suitcase. Now also "a word blending the sounds and combining the meanings of two others, for example motel (from ‘motor’ and ‘hotel’) or brunch (from ‘breakfast’ and ‘lunch’)."
Pontificate - When the Pope just won't stop talking. No, seriously. Well, not quite. Anyway - "to speak or express opinions in a pompous or dogmatic way." From the same latin root as "Pontiff."
Phantom - A word with personal meaning for me. Means an apparition, ghost. There used to be, may still be, a comic in the newspaper called The Phantom. The Phantom was a superhero of sorts, more like Batman than Superman. No super powers, just strong and clever. If I remember correctly, the stories took place in Africa. He wore a purple suit and hood with a black mask. I used to read the comic everyday. I remember saying the name to myself - "pon'tom", like "pompom." One day I heard someone say the correct pronunciation. I remember feeling relieved I had never said it out loud to anyone else. Such is the exciting childhood of T Clark.
Palindrome - or "palinilap" as we like to say.
Popinjay - Someone who thinks highly of themselves and shows it.
Podiatrist - running out of "P" words.
I loved this word until I realized it means "eggplant."
And a wonderful color.
The, one of the, words that shall not be spoken.
M____c - Very foolish or stupid.
I tried. You can't say the word that ends in "n," not "c" either.
I'm assuming you can't say "moron" either.
Some words from foreign languages.
Sui generis - from Latin - In a class by itself. I always use this word when I want to show people how smart I am.
Colour - A misspelling of "color."
Ukase - an Italian legal term - "Izzata ukase?"
Cul de sac - a dead end street, but so much classier. Who would want to live on a dead end street? Who wouldn't want to live on a cul de sac. Literally "bottom of the sack."
About - Canadian - Answer to the question "What's that on your foot?"
Putz - from Yiddish. Stupid person. Penis. "Where are you going?" "I'm going to work on my putz."
Kvetch - also from Yiddish. To complain or someone who complains. "Hey, Agustino, stop kvetching."
I won't endeavour to correct you on that one.
Desanguinate: to remove the blood; to drain one of blood or hope. Or it's opposite -
Ensanguination: to stain with blood, to make of something a blood-red colour. Both derivatives of -
Sanguine: hopeful, social, full-blooded or blood-red in colour. Can have religious connotations as well, as when one speaks of de sanguine Christi, the blood of Christ, hence Dali's "Christ (Sanguine)":
From the same root as "sangria."
Some "E" words.
Eccentric - I like this word. It goes two ways. 1) Describes a person who's behavior is unconventional and maybe a bit odd. 2) Also describes a physical phenomenon when an action or force does not act through the center of an object and puts a moment, twist, on it. If you're designing a foundation for an eccentric load, you have to take into account that the maximum load on the soil might be higher than you'd otherwise think and also that you have to design the concrete and steel to resist bending moments. I like the way the two meanings interact in my mind.
Ecumenical - Addressing common issues and beliefs among differing Christian churches. More broadly, it's sometimes used to refer to an approach that tries to bring differing parties together.
Eleemosynary - Another word I would never use except in a discussion of words. Means "charitable."
Eldritch - Weird, dreadful, fearsome. A word that H.P. Lovecraft loved.
Echidna - Something else odd from Australia. Egg laying mammals. Monotremata. Not the same as marsupials.
Ratiocination - What we're supposed to be doing here - The act of forming judgments by a process of logic; reason.
I've gotten in arguments about pronunciation "rat e o sination" or "rosh e o sination." I think both are correct. I like the second better.
I love that word. I wonder why. Probably because I never would have thought we needed a word for chucking people out the window. And then, of course, there's the Defenestration of Prague. I don't remember why they did it. I do remember that the defenestrees didn't die. What's the point then? I do remember where it happened. Bucharest, right?
Made that up. Really - how often do people throw other people out of windows?
I was surprised to find that Norm Crosby is still alive.
So...use it in a sentence.
My favorite defenstration:
A secondary definition is "remove or dismiss (someone) from a position of power or authority." There have been lots of opportunities to use that here in the US recently.
:up: Didn't know that one.
Perambulation.
1: travelling over or through especially on foot : traverse
2 : making an official inspection of (a boundary) on foot
Not as good as a Spoonerism!
Quoting Baden
That's the poor cousin of peregrination.
I think the child went voluntarily. Don't think that counts
Rather than make a lexicological argument, it's my discussion and I say it counts!!!
Some good compound word insults.
Bonehead - A stupid person
Knucklehead - The definition in the dictionary is the same as for "bonehead" but they certainly have different feels about them, which is what's important with synonyms. If they don't have different tones, what's the point? To me, knucklehead is more affectionate, has more a feeling of silliness rather than just stupidity.
Meathead - Same definition, but for those of us of a certain age, it has special meaning.
Shithead - I it's meaning is self-evident. Again special meaning for some of us. Colonel Scheisskopf is a character from "Catch 22" which was very influential for some of us who grew up in the 60s. Our introduction to irony and cynicism.
While we're at it, "Catch 22" is another good word. One of the best. It's a word that is ruined by explanation. Read the book.
Nah, malaprop is better.
As the final arbiter, I say "malaprop" wins. Of course, my decision is affected by Charleton's quibble about "defenestration."
Love spiminal lace!!
Funny name for a lobster.
More compound words. Wheelwright. Wainwright. Millwright. Cartwright. Playwright. Shipwright. Plowwright.
Are there any other English words with double "w"s? How about double "u"s other than vacuum?
Wright - Someone who makes or fixes something.
While we're on the subject - Wight. Originally a person. Now it usually refers to a ghost or spirit.
Arthron was also just the word Plato used when talking about 'carving Nature at it's joints', the vocation of philosophy as such. Also related to the words 'particular' and 'article': 'a small part', the bits of wood which are articulated by the joint.
Continuum! Residuum!
I wonder how the word came to also mean "speak carefully."
Quoting StreetlightX
Thanks.
Something about how the word roles off the tongue … can never take it’s saying seriously (due to the sound; not the meaning).
'String your words together carefully' (join them well). Wordsmithing. Like carpentry or woodsmithing.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00st9z8
Christians, eh? Don't they consume human blood and flesh in their ceremonies and refuse to recognise the emperor as a god?
Here's a link to a story in "Vox." Don't know if you'd heard about this.
https://www.vox.com/science-and-health/2017/5/17/15646450/antikythera-mechanism-greek-computer-astronomy-google-doodle
This is from a post that TimeLine made in a different thread. I've never heard the word "Hanoverism" before and can't find a definition on the web.
Never crossed my mind. Really? Hanover? As an example of humor?
I did read this when it came out, I remember finding it inordinately cool.
Not even a word is it?
Can you give an example?
I think we've come to the conclusion it is a neologism. Another good, but not new, word.
I wonder if the guy who came up with "neologism" enjoyed the irony.
Can you give an example?
See my quote from TimeLine above.
Odd's and ends.
"Opt" - hate this. Hate, hate, hate.
"As such" - Drives me crazy.
Correct - CuddlyHedgehog is a hedgehog and, as such, has hair and spines.
Incorrect - CuddlyHedgehog went shopping and, as such, was late getting home.
"Which" and "That" - Always get this wrong.
Correct - Dogs, which are friendly, make good pets. i.e. Dogs in general make good pets.
Correct - Dogs that are friendly make good pets. i.e. Some dogs, those that are friendly, make good pets.
"Method" vs. "Methodology." In my experience, you use "methodology" when you want to sound smart.
"Method" - A set of procedures to do something
"Methodology" - A set of methods or an approach to establishing methods. Or something like that.
"Use" vs. "Utilize." In my experience, you use "utilize" when you want to sound smart.
"Use" - "Take, hold, or deploy (something) as a means of accomplishing a purpose or achieving a result. Employ."
"Utilize" - "Make practical and effective use of." Sounds like I was right. It's just to make you sound smart.
I have so many pet peeves about big words that sound impressive. Vis-a-vis is one. Say it as simply as possible, people.
While it has been entirely ineffective for cardiac arrest, I have found it effective for curing hiccups"
American Indian place names:
24 of 50 US states have American Indian names. Doesn't count towns, cities, counties, rivers.....
Okay you got me to open the thread with your comment in the shoutbox. Excellent start.
Many of the Indian nations still exist and if they arrest you on the reservation, you are NOT entitled to a phone call or a whole lot of other "rights" you have just on the other side of a street, off the Inidan nation.
@Hanover Did you know you were being discussed? What a flippin honor!
I think next time I'll do words which come from American Indian languages that are not proper nouns, e.g. toboggan.
Carry on.
"But though this topic be specious and sublime, it was soon found in practice weak and ineffectual".
The cool thing here is that Hume uses 'specious' in a positive way, and not a negative one, as is usually done today. In his day, to be specious meant to be beautiful, to have a good specular appearance. Today specious instead means something pejorative, like 'mere appearence' and lacking depth. But this merely scratches the surface of a really cool network of cognates: the Latin specere, means means 'to look' or 'to see', and is the root of species, which is of course today what we use to designate kinds of animals or organisms. The idea being that animals that look different are animals of different species. And this root ramifies through a whole series of other words too:
'Specular', already mentioned, 'spectral' (image or ghost), 'spectrum' (as in, the color spectrum) 'perspicuous' (transparent, easily understood), 'specimen' (example, sign), as well as 'spectacular' (awesome, overwhelming), 'specific' (particular), and 'spectacle' (display, performance) along with 'spectacles' (pair of glasses). Philosophically, the deepest connection is to the 'species', which has connotations of 'form', as in the Platonic eidos or Idea. In the Middle Ages, the species or species-being designated a very particular kind of being, one that was neither just 'in the mind', nor 'out there in the world' (neither ens reale, mind-independent, nor ens rationis, mind-dependant), but half-way between the two, the clearest instance of this being the image in the mirror, which is neither a 'substance' nor a 'thought', but, precisely, a special being. 'Species' also means 'aspect', which is why Spinoza will talk of looking at things sub specie aeternitatis - under the aspect of eternity.
Giorgio Agamben also draws attention to the theological, mythic, and even amorous dimensions of the word(s): "The being of the image is a continuous generation, a being (essere) of generation and not of substance. Each moment, it is created anew, like the angels who, according to the Talmud, sing the praises of God and immediately sink into nothingness"; and "Given the proximity between the image and the experience of love, it is not surprising that both Dante and Cavalcanti were led to define love in the same way: as an “accident without substance" ... "The mirror is the place where we discover that we have an image and, at the same time, that this image can be separate from us, that our species or imago does not belong to us. Between the perception of the image and the recognition of oneself in it, there is a gap, which the medieval poets called love. In this sense, Narcissus’s mirror is the source of love, the fierce and shocking realization that the image is and is not our image." (Agamben, Special Being).
So yeah. A series of really special words. And let's not even start to talk of the sublime...
Hey man. No sharing.
Aww Hanover, that is simply adorable. You named a fine lady after a gourd we carve, to scare people as we jack them for free candy, when the sun goes down on all Hallows Eve. Brilliant! :roll:
He is every girls dream.
Carry on.
Don't be jelly Sweet Petunia.
You know I am not a flower in any interpertation of the word.
You can affectionately call me 'EvilBitchLilth" :snicker:
Fine, here's a pic of me.
https://media.giphy.com/media/YI0HM7ix6pFbW/giphy.mp4
Homophones with at least three different spellings
Rude, rood, rued
Two, to, too
Sees, seas, seize
You’re, your, ewer
Wright, write, rite, right
Adds, adze, ads
Poor, pore, pour
Maize, maze, Mays
Roe, row, rho
New, knew, gnu
Added later:
Rapt, wrapped, rapped
High, hie, hi.
Meat, mete, meet
Hoard, horde, whored
Flew, flu, flue
Toad, towed, toed
Rowed, road, rode
Seer, sere, sear
Raise, rays, raze
Can you please use "Hide and Reveal" for that clip. It's making it hard for me to come to this page. I have, as you know, delicate sensibilities. By which I mean it gives me the heebie-jeebies.
As we are posting gifs lifted from the internet of 1994, here is a dancing garden gnome:
[gif]Dancing garden gnome[/gif]
(Obviously you have to imagine it. Delicate sensibilities.)
Avuncular. Sounds like a medical condition. "He has an avuncular spleen." Means "like an uncle." Whoda thunk you needed a word for that. I don't know of a similar word for "like an aunt."
Also, feels good to say.
From the Latin for maternal uncle.
Schadenfreude, the pleasure one finds in other people's misfortunes. Schadenfreude should have an opposite -- the not-altogether-pleasant feeling one experiences when hearing about somebody else's good fortune. Apparently to the German, this isn't the same as jealousy.
Last year I started making a list of words I had never heard before -- amazingly obscure words authors of spy novels, science fiction, history, and so forth would let drop.
Like...
Crepuscule - twilight
Tyro - a beginner or novice
Marmoreal - made of or likened to marble
Revanchist - someone who wishes to reclaim lost national territory
Peculate - embezzle or steal. Embezzle is a nice word. Quite woody.
Perlustrate - inspect thoroughly. Too tinny. Don't like it.
Accouchement - the process of giving birth to a baby (which is what one usually gives both to, Mr. dictionary writer)
Mensuration - Not something women do. It means measuring of geometric spaces like... blocks on the streets.
Operose - tedious, wearisome
Hubris - not too obscure; a good word to know.
Invigilating - keep watch
There are many more in the list. I'll stop now with Monocausotaxophilia - the love of a single cause than explains everything. There are a few Monocausotaxophiliacs around here.
Merriam Webster definition of irregardless:
nonstandard
: regardless
In thinking about the evolution of language—which has many examples, such our tendency to trust “The Bank of Billy” more than “Billy’s Bank” and other such often aesthetic factors that play out in which words fall out and which become popularized—wanted to address the word ejaculation: expressing brief and abrupt statements. Just checked with Wiktionary and this definition is not even outdated, and also includes thus expressed prayers. The term can be found in older novels, as in “the person ejaculated many things upon the others” … was copiously used in books such as Withering Heights in such manner. So here we are, ejaculating concepts to each other all the time on TPF … both men and women. No wonder we can on occasion gain new conceptions of things. :cool:
Kookaburra.
You don't watch Vikings? :gasp:
There aren't that many of them around these days. In South East Asia at least.
It's a bloody good book, that. One of the best.
I ate words wot make ya sand impressive.
Found one! :party:
Quoting Mr Phil O'Sophy
This may seem like a non-sequitur, but...I'm pretty sure Norsemen never got to Thailand, but they did make it as far south as Sicily. That has always amazed me.
Exegesis: Interpretation of religious texts.
Synecdoche: Figure of speech when you use the name of a part or property to represent the whole (or the reverse, where you use a name or property of the whole to represent a part). An example would be calling businessmen "suits".
: a small gift given to a customer by a merchant at the time of a purchase; broadly : something given or obtained gratuitously or by way of good measure The waiter added a cup of lobster bisque as a lagniappe to the meal.
I remember looking that word up when I saw it for the first time. It's meaning is nothing like what I imagined it would be. I also pronounced it wrong. Correct - lan yap
Made me think of "peripatetic." Also means moving around. Also means philosophical.
I have been AWOL on the WOTD for a bit.
AWOL. acronym for Absent without leave.
But that's not the word of the day.
Mumbletypeg, sometimes Mumblety Peg - A game we used to start playing when I was a kid. As soon as we'd start, I'd say "no f.....ing way," or the1961 equivalent for 10 year olds, and quit. You play by throwing a knife into the ground as close to your foot as you can. Closest wins. Muh, buh, peh. All those bilabial stops.
Is 'archduchy' adjectival the way that 'crunchy', 'raunchy', and 'frosty' are, or is it more nouny like 'flunky', 'donkey', or kennedy? (The Mcdougall clan was very Kennedy, really, and the Kenneds were more like the mafia.)
This, along with many other great things, comes from "National Lampoon" in the 1970s. @Bitter Crank - didn't you say you had read it?
Vagino-American
This "googliniscience" you speak of has ruined conversations everywhere. We can no longer have long, rambling arguments about meaningless facts. In the good old days, we could argue and argue about what Frank Lloyd Wright thought about Special Relativity. Now, someone will pull out their phone and have the real answer in 17 seconds.
I love wings, but I've never been in a bar with good ones. If they're so good, why do you have to put crappy sauce on them. I'd rather eat wings from a Chinese restaurant.
Quoting Hanover
You call that a wing? I've seen better wings on a dodo.
[I]Zing?[/I]
Word of The Day: Zing
The new term for owned, said after saying something witty to someone in an insulting manner.
http://www.metrolyrics.com/trolley-song-lyrics-judy-garland.html
Ambivalent - don't care what it means.
Ambidextrous - opp of ambisinister. See also evenhanded and oddhanded.
Ambitious - not sure what to do.
Ambit - debatable ground.
Ambient - not sure where its coming from.
Schmomething - as in Something Schmomething. Inspired by @StreetlightX's discussion "Predicates, Smehdicates."
There's actually a name for it in linguistics - Shm-reduplication.
Quoting T Clark
Yes, "shm-" sounds better. Every time I see that title, it annoys me that it isn't: "Predicates, Shmedicates".
I used to tell people I had invested part of my retirement fund in Molybdenum futures, but only because I love to say the word, Mu lib den um, emphasis on lib. Molybdenum, molybdenum, molybdenum. I also like the way the ybd looks. An odd sequence. I like Kyrgyzstan too. Rgyz! Love those "y"s in the middle of words mixed in with lots of consonants.
Molybdenum - A very hard metal element. Atomic number 42!!!
Speaking of elements, now I'll embarrass myself by trying to name the first three rows of the Periodic Table from memory. I used to be pretty good at this, but it's been a long time:
Hydrogen, helium, lithium, beryllium, boron, carbon, nitrogen, oxygen, chlorine, neon, potassium, magnesium, titanium, zirconium, vanadium, chromium, manganese, cobalt, iron, nickel, zinc, arsenic, phosphorous, bromine, krypton.
I know that's not right, but I'm not even going to look. When I want to memorize this kind of thing, I go to Sporcle. I need to spend some more time there.
Dingbat -
1) A typographical device other than a letter or numeral (such as an asterisk), used to signal divisions in text or to replace letters in a euphemistically presented vulgar word.
2) A stupid or eccentric person.
Some exclamations I like:
Ahem... - An example of ontomonapia. Simulates the sound of clearing the throat to indicate mild impatience, disagreement, or castigation.
Alas - Exclamation of sadness or regret. As for "alack," it seems to mean about the same thing. Never cared for it. Why do you need "alas and alack?"
D'oh - No explanation needed.
Is it the same as "meh," which my annoying daughter uses a lot when she wants to dismiss what someone else says without any effort?
It’s a variant of “meh” yes, but the meaning is different, as I illustrated.
Catchy, amiright?
I couldn't have said it better myself.
Just noted, this emoji - :meh: - is actually called "meh."
Schmeh is more like this: :shade:
In case people don't understand what our friend Sapientia is saying, he's giving me the old razzamatazz about something I said on the "Body and Soul" discussion.
In Maureen Dowd’s current column,
Ah, yes. A feeling I haven't had in 40 years and don't expect to have again. Thank goodness.
Prototype - A preliminary example of something, generally a machine or equipment.
Archetype - A typical example. Also, an example that represents or symbolizes a class.
Stereotype - A rigid and oversimplified belief held by a group of people.
Consupponible - came across this word in R.G. Collingwood's "An Essay on Metaphysics." Can't find a direct definition and it's not used much. According to him, in order for a group of suppositions to be consupponible "it must be logically possible for a person who supposes any one of them to suppose concurrently all the rest."
I'm going to be looking for opportunities to use this.
If I order fries from McDonalds, it's consupponible that, if I eat one fry, I will concurrently eat all the rest. No?...
I don't think so. I think the supposition "I have eaten one fry" is consupponible with "I will eat all the rest."
Right...concurrently was the joke...
Erstwhile - one of my favorite words because it's so easy to misunderstand it's meaning. It's often difficult to pick up from context. For a long time, back when it took effort to look up words, I thought it meant "worthy." It actually means "former."
... like I care.
Meow!
G
-noun
a mixture or blend.
"a curious amalgam of the traditional and the modern"
CHEMISTRY
an alloy of mercury with another metal, especially one used for dental fillings.-
President Trump was elected because of attitudes like those expressed in your post. If it feels good, knock yourself out.
Ever encounter a book title, song name, etc., that's so good as a title that you don't even want to experience the work itself, for fear the magic will be ruined? I've recently been obsessing over "The Dream Quest Of Unknown Kadath" by H.P. Lovecraft. Those words strung together are unbelievable; they feel exciting and fascinating in the mouth, and the obscurity of the whole thing ignites the imagination.
You'd have no chance if I stood against you. Me versus you would play out, respectively, like Trump versus Jeb.
Antepetul... Ampitenul... Antemetulnitup...
Yeah, what he said.
I prefer "The Call of Cthulhu". Same author. (Also a great Metallica song).
I've always liked "50 Shades of Cthulhu." Ol' Lovecraft was way ahead of his time.
I tried to write a parody erotic fanfic of a forbidden romance between a Shoggoth and a Night Gaunt at one point. It was quite difficult to make the indescribable have sex with the mysterious.
I'm guessing it was unspeakable.
Meliorism, as a conception of the person and society, is at the foundation of contemporary liberal democracy and human rights and is a basic component of liberalism.
Found here
It is what I say it is, it works how I say it works, and you do it if I say you do. Capiche?
Anyways, one way of putting it is that it's like heliocentrism, only instead of maintaining the illusion that the Earth and planets revolve around the Sun at the centre of the Solar System, it acknowledges that I am at the centre of everything, and everything revolves around me.
Narcissophy: The collective output of any congregation of auto-fellationists (per Darth) Alternately, the collective braying of self-centered jackasses who hee haw irrelevantly in the Quadrangle of Academe.
No, nein- that's not right, richtig. Contributes to narrow-minded Brexiteernicity :naughty:
I love German too.
'Ausgezeichnet' is a favourite of mine. It's outtasight. It feels good and bright. Far out, man :cool:
"Geschwindigkeitsbegrenzung" and "faust handschuh."
You're really searching back through the rubbish bin, I mean archives.
What ? Goethe's gloves - Faust 1 and 2 ?
Quoting T Clark
Consider me a T Clark stalker :snicker: :love: :gasp:
I mean 'follower' of wisdom :nerd: :smile: :sparkle:
Thank you.
Prego :cool:
Experience
20 years of trying to do it right, experiencementation. :chin:
[Rant]
I assume you refer to England, the land where the English people live, and where they speak their own language: English? That our language has been copied and mutated so widely is a compliment, but English is our language, and those who live elsewhere do not speak it, they speak variants of it. And why not? Imitation is flattery. But the people of America (for example) speak American. Or, if we must acknowledge the source of their language, American English. It, and all other variants of English are the ones that are "odd", of course. [/Rant]
One of my favourite words is "solidungulate". It just sounds so good!
The English speak different languages from pub to pub. The variants of English are so specific, I speak August 19th Hanoverian. Today at least.
At the risk of taking your rant too seriously...
As I understand the view of linguists, English English, and more widely British English, are just as much variants (varieties or dialects) of English as American English. Why should the variety spoken in the original home of the language be regarded as primary, in a world in which English is a native language in other places? After all, English has mutated in England too.
The original strain is primary because ... it's the original strain, and it's primary. English is the language of the English. English is a "native language" in very few places, these days. American is the language that is so widely spoken throughout the Western world.
Quoting jamalrob
English continues to develop and grow, in England, its home. :wink: :up:
Quoting Tony Blair's speech
Why? Because I said so, that's why.
Is that someone trying to order a ham sandwich whilst suffering a stroke?
Bratwurst.
Too many syllables. I reckon that would come out like, "Brashvurrrghsh".
Quoting Nell Frizzell
I don't get it. What does morning have to do with red blood cells?
Hah.
I could tell you but then I'd have to bite your neck and suck you dry :death:
Sortal is a concept that has been used by some philosophers in discussing issues of identity, persistence, and change. Sortal terms are considered a species of general term that are classified within the grammatical category of common or count nouns or count noun phrases.[1] This is based on the claim that a perceptual link allows perceptual demonstrative thought if it enables sortal classification.
There's a SEP article on them. Other post I used sortals in is referencing type 2.
Thanks. I'll look.
I read the first page. It's still something of a mystery to me. The idea that popped into my head was the Ship of Theseus, which I think is relevant. I might be able to define the word, but I don't think I could say how it might be used. No need to go into more explanation. Unless you feel like it.
From @Fooloso4 in the 'Mortimer Adler, How To Read' thread.
'...the dialogues typically end in aporia, but the danger is what he [Plato] calls misologic or nihilism.'
Misology is defined as the hatred of reasoning; the revulsion or distrust of logical debate, argumentation, or the Socratic method. (Wiki)
A few words on the problem of misologic. It occurs in the Phaedo. Socrates is about to die and the subject of discussion is the fate of the soul. He tells some stories that he says are intended to ease the childish fears of death, stories about the immortality of the soul. For some this is satisfactory but the objection is raised that the philosopher does not want stories but the truth. But the truth is that Socrates does not know the truth about such things. It is those who have the highest expectation for philosophy to provide the answers about such things who come to hate what they previously loved when the discover that philosophy cannot do what they desire it to.
Thanks. I should really have posted the full quote; another informative and succinct summary.
And, of course, there's that other word:
Zetetic.
Adjective - hoyendish.
I have an affinity for hoyendish girls.
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/clamjamfry
Quoting Lizzie Cernik
The power of ownship.
Self-partnership.
Quoting As above
from discussion: https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/7206/the-art-of-living-not-just-for-stoics
Could almost be part of the song lyrics in
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious
Charles Sherrington's word for the referral of sensory sources to locations outside the brain.
Anyway, the word is turbidity.
What does it mean? Or do I have to google it. :gasp:
Google now accepted as a verb. Seems a bit bloody stupid though.
The cloudiness of a liquid. Also reminded me of turgid, another old fav.
The tumescence of passion comes before the turbid waters.
I've ejaculated a poetic idiom with double entendre.
Quoting Nils Loc
Get your hands out of your pockets. :wink:
Believe it or not, my enjoyment of both turgid and turbid as words is purely poetic; but the potential for sexual jokes was not lost on me.
Quoting Sir2u
I prefer to present a word of the day without context; I like words because of how they sound, not because of what they mean. It circles back to that thread I made about artist statements...
In that spirit, today's word is French, but has meaning within English in the wine world: vigneron. There is poetry to the word that may get lost without context. But again, I merely present the word. It's poetic potential is based on individual perspective; for me to attempt to provide perspective may only subtract from the word's poetic potential.
But the 'Fils de pute' was waiting with a revolver in hand.
"Gout de Terroir!" he shouted as he fired in the direction of René.
I will christen the vignes with his blood if it is the last thing I do. Le sang est le goût de la terre.
:clap:
I've been looking for this word without fully realizing it, thanks. I may have to add you to the credits to my next album...
You can thank @TheMadFool who was using it to argue that the mind isn’t physical, somehow.
Would seeing an image of Trump or Boris and thinking leader count?
There’s no accounting for esurient hearts.
Give them all a heart shaped cookie/biscuit.
There are accountants and angioplasties for esurient hearts.
:rofl:
Unfortunately I was slurring vowels together trying to distinguish diphthongs today while skimming leaves out of the ponds. It's based on sound and not the spelling.
So "beer" is a diphthong but "heart" is not.
Words of the day should have a certain something to them, no?
In an attempt to bring things back a bit, I offer a word that to me is interesting, but not one used to measure appendage length, although it's fairly obscure. Maybe I'm speaking in circles now.
Tawdry.
In some towns there are not the smallest of tittynopes left to sustain even rodent life.
Tittynope maybe the finest and least tawdry word ever to grace any tome of diction. One can grow fat on the tittynopes of nobles.
?? Kotatsu (kanji for fire and footwarmer)
I still wonder how the Japanese prior to the Westernization of Japan dealt with poorly insulated houses during colder months. The overbearing heat of summer is given as an explanation of large sliding or removable doors which can help air move through the house. But Japanese winters are also brutally cold.
At some time the precursor of the Kotatsu developed, which was a grate for hot coals over which a table top could be placed. Then some-kind insulating cloth/blanket was placed over the table top. You sit with your legs under a table feeling the radiative heat of hot coals with the blanket covering the lower half. I get the idea but it sounds kind of smokey to me but I'm sure everything was smokey back then.
Today electric Kotatsu are still popular because central heating systems are cost prohibitive. How many Japanese sleep under a Kotatsu?
The Canadian voice in my audioguide at the Moscow kremlin yesterday said "turn to face the iconostasis" when I was in one of the cathedrals. It was obvious what he meant, but I'd never heard it before.
Wiki: "In Eastern Christianity, an iconostasis (plural: iconostases) is a wall of icons and religious paintings, separating the nave from the sanctuary in a church."
Fans of Tarkovsky may be interested to learn that some of the icons and frescoes in these kremlin churches were done by Andrei Rublev and Theophanes the Greek.
You basically carve away glaze on the surface to contrast with the underlying medium (glaze or pot).
Anything to distract oneself from watching the hollow rodomontades of the RNC. Murica elites first!
I've always had a tenuous grasp on the definition of the word glib which has been used recently on the forum.
When someone talks as if they know what they're talking about when they don't really know at all what they are talking about, but the audience is taken in, are they being glib?
Are professional sophists, like the infamous Stefan Molyneux, always glib?
I think of glib more in terms of sounds made by frogs. But that may be strangely appropriate.
Also, "Hand-like feet always grasp in nature" is not only more coherent and concise, but weirdly poetic? Without the big words. That's just me. I may repurpose that...if it's not plagiarism to do so.
I was thinking about how to respond to a post the other day and stumbled onto the not so impressively obscure word antipode.
The frigid waters off the cost of Madagasikara are antipodal to my current location.
Near Perth is antipodal to New York.
https://www.antipodesmap.com/
I've no impressive family pedigree. None of us have great facility for academics or entrepreneurship, though both grandpas were golden playboys from the greatest generation.
The word pedigree came a precursor literally translated as crane's foot, so the foot theme is still going. Peter Pettigrew's surname in the Harry Potter series means crane's foot.
This should not impede your advancement in life.
Just to keep on about feet for a while.
The false article in the encyclopedia* of J.L. Borges short story, Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius, is a cause for nightmares (eg. see power of the spreading meme "fake news" by a nation's figurehead). We are contaminated (or changed) by everything we are exposed to. The fiction we read helps us to read/(mis)interpet the world.
Footnote: * I was so hoping the suffix of pedia related to feet rather than the ancient greek word for child. I was imagining an encyclopedia in line with Borges projection of the world as a library, such that one could wander the realm of knowledge (the encyclopedia) by foot as one can perambulate the actual landscape of the world.
If pedia is child and encyclius is circularity then the meaning is a child going is circles, as though lost in the woods of knowledge.
What are you worried about and why are you voicing your disgust? What word ought one to post? Teach your readers a new word. Noblisse oblige.
Quoting praxis
No argument here. Borges motif is as much about being in prison (of infinite space) as it is wandering a labyrinth (library/encyclopedia). We should do/use the word praxis since it has quite the philosophical history. Maybe Noble Dust would like that.
[quote=Wikipedia: Praxis]In Ancient Greek the word praxis (??????) referred to activity engaged in by free people. [/quote]
If you follow the history, I didn't start this thread, I only revived it. What I'm worried about is the fact that this thread began as a love of words, and has devolved into a love of impressive/and/or/obscure words. It's essentially become a dick measuring contest. But pleasing words don't have to be any of these things. "Grip", for instance, is a great word, and one we all know.
Why on Earth would you be worried?
Quoting Noble Dust
Maybe you should have posted some rules in bold and upper case, like "Please post words that you love, unless they are impressive and obscure. Only familiar words are allowed. If you break this rule I will throw tantrums."
Quoting Noble Dust
You can demonstrate this by continuing to post unimpressive and familiar words that you like.
Generally, why can't you just let people post words that take their fancy? Why this weird need for control? Why so serious? You're just spoiling people's fun.
The next part that you didn't quote explains this.
Quoting jamalrob
As I said, I didn't start this thread; I only revived it. I dunno what else you want.
Quoting jamalrob
Cradle
Quoting jamalrob
I can; however, this is not what people are actually doing.
Quoting jamalrob
Wh0ot?
No, it doesn't.
Quoting Noble Dust
I want to criticize you for bizarrely trying to police this thread.
Quoting Noble Dust
Very nice. But I could say, inspired by you: may I remind you that the point of this thread is not to just give us a word you like, with no comment about it. T Clark showed us the way, by giving us some words and telling us why he liked them. I'm worried that this thread has devolved into a word-mentioning contest, devoid of actual appreciation. And so on. It should be obvious that this isn't serious; I hope you get the point.
Quoting Noble Dust
This is a scurrilous accusation. Perhaps dick-measuring is what Sir2u is doing, but I don't see any evidence otherwise. Anyway, so what?
In my case, I chose a word that was obscure to me, but not because I wanted to impress anyone. I was really struck by the word and was quite excited about it. It kind of ... opened up a world to me.
Haha kool broh
Incidentally, I quite hate "scurrilous". It's a word that sounds stupid.
I didn't need you to tell me that.
And I'm blah blah blah
Here's something about words that I find interesting, but I'm not sure if you Americans will understand it. When I'm bantering with my brother or my close friends, we will call each other names, and I often reach for American ones like dingus, dweeb, doofus, douchebag/douche, and poindexter (it's not all Ds).
There's an amusing ironic quality to the insults when I use those words, because they're not natural words for us to use with each other. They sound almost corny--we Brits pick them up from old movies and TV, of course--so they undercut the offensiveness of the insults. To use one of those words is to make oneself ridiculous, thereby introducing the classic comedy of a self-righteously angry but ridiculous person.
[quote=me in this very post]... I'm not sure if you Americans will understand it[/quote]
I imagine that Americans might sometimes use British (or Italian or Spanish or whatever) terms in a similar way, but surely the resulting quality, texture, and humour of the insult are quite different?
I venture an alternative to "dick waving" in the spirit of British humor. This is a knob turning event... not unlike wine tasting and nothing as uncouth as an American circle jerk.
Two words that I've noticed in my first reading of Frank Herbert's Dune that were unfamiliar: covey (n. a group of birds/people/things) and cozen (v. to trick or deceive).
Once you're addicted to the spice melange (French for mixture/medley) in the Dune universe you're in a bit of a pickle. Withdrawal is fatal.
As those terms are pretty much passé they could have pretty much the same effect here. For example, I might say something with an English accent like, “Them lot over there is a bunch of bloody dinguses, ay guv’na?”
Quoting Nils Loc
Just reread it in anticipation of the new film adaptation and there’s a word I noticed that Frank used a lot, which is presently. He uses it in narration and in the dialogue of characters. I remember when noticing it that it kind of broke the spell of being lost in the story. I like the word though, and thought to try using it in everyday language, but I haven’t so far. I vow to attempt it presently, however.
Just a fun fact.
Here in Vienna, Austria a Melange is half a cup of "black coffee" and half a cup "creamy milk", topped with milk foam.
But they say that the benefits are worth it. Good books the originals by Frank, read them many years ago. Then the son wrote another bunch which I read most of.
The tyrant hold-fast had no need to suborn witnesses against his own blatant depravity and corruption. They served as loyal figures in a mock play of justice, theatrical pawns of a kangaroo court, held in check by an atmosphere of absolute terror.
Feyd-Rautha gave the Baron's guest an insouciant glance as he walked away.
I like the sound of the word, and its meaning, but I can't imagine using it in day-to-day language, unfortunatly.
One agent's undesired output is another agent's desired input.
Symbionts, commensals and parasites are all relative qualifications/valuations from an agent's point of view.
I will now warm my soul by the internal blazing hellfire of envy for what lies on the other side of the proverbial fence.
Long ago I saw a documentary film were a guy on the deck of a ship was cracking open a Roman(?) era amphora of wine and tasting it. The wine was brilliantly colored. Still looking for that scene.
What about a scurrilous 'sapiosexualist' ?
A special sorta smarty-pants ?
1. Imagine you are in a restaurant and you forgot your wallet. You immediately shout: mecachis I forgot my damn wallet at my home!
2. (This is more usual). Imagine you are running fast because the train/bus is already in the station but you don’t approach at time. You would say: mecachis the bus/train leave me in the station like a dumb head.