Wiktionary:Tea room/2021/June

discussion rooms: Tea room • Etym. scr. • Info desk • Beer parlour • Grease pit ← May 2021 · June 2021 · July 2021 → · (current)

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C

@Justinrleung, RcAlex36, Suzukaze-c Is C (in C位, C肽, etc.) pronounced /seɪ̯⁵⁵/, /ɕi⁵⁵/, or /si⁵⁵/ in Standard Chinese? --沈澄心✉ 13:38, 1 June 2021 (UTC)

@沈澄心 Most people in Hong Kong do /si⁵⁵/, but that's Cantonese, not Standard Chinese. RcAlex36 (talk) 13:40, 1 June 2021 (UTC)

@沈澄心: I imagine all three are used, with sēi being more common in Mainland (especially northern China), and xī being more common in Taiwan. I think [si⁵⁵] is used throughout, especially by people who have more English education. — justin(r)leung _{{ (t...) | c=› }} 15:54, 1 June 2021 (UTC)

Italian praticare = "to practice" in the sense of "to train"

(Notifying GianWiki, Metaknowledge, SemperBlotto, Ultimateria): Can praticare mean "to practice" in the sense "to practice the piano"? Someone added this fairly recently. I can't find this in dictionaries but it may well exist as a calque from English. Benwing2 (talk) 03:07, 2 June 2021 (UTC)

BTW who are the native speakers in Italian? Benwing2 (talk) 03:08, 2 June 2021 (UTC)

I'm not sure about the original question, but I would ask active natives GianWiki and @Imetsia. (Imetsia, you may want to add yourself to the new Italian workgroup here to be pinged when the language comes up.) Ultimateria (talk) 05:30, 2 June 2021 (UTC)

I remember learning esercitare. The linked "Accademia della Crusca" article doesn't talk about praticare, but a general trend of forming new '-are' verbs. – Jberkel 08:01, 2 June 2021 (UTC)

No, praticare does not mean "to practice" in a sentence like "to practice the piano." It's used when talking about a "constant" activity as in "praticare il diritto - to practice law," "praticare medicina - to practice medicine," "praticare uno sport - to practice/be engaged in a sport." You can be engaged in these activities while not necessarily "practicing" them at the moment the sentence is being spoken. Definitely "*practicare il pianoforte - to practice the piano" sounds wrong. Imetsia (talk) 16:27, 2 June 2021 (UTC)

@Imetsia Thanks, I'll remove that entry. Benwing2 (talk) 07:44, 3 June 2021 (UTC)

Turkish degrees of comparison

The Turkish comparative and superlative are always regular: “daha <positive>” and “en <positive>”. The template {{tr-adj}} does not even offer an opportunity to specify alternative forms. For French, in which the comparative and superlative are almost always regular (“plus <positive>” and “le plus <positive>”), we do not provide them, except for irregular bon – meilleur – le meilleur. Also for Italian and Spanish, regular higher degree forms are not provided in the headword line. Is there a reason to keep them for Turkish? Any objection to their removal?  --Lambiam 09:21, 2 June 2021 (UTC)

Now removed.  --Lambiam 17:16, 22 June 2021 (UTC)

thatin

What this 'thatin' mean? — This unsigned comment was added by 240d:1a:bc:2700:3d09:32ec:b5a6:aa38 (talk).

Navajo tádiin; Burmese သတင်း; သီတင်း ? -_⸘- dictātor·mundī 16:44, 2 June 2021 (UTC)

Or that in (as in, “or I am deceiu’d by him that in ſuch intelligence hath ſeldome fail’d”. All’s Well That Ends Well, Act 4, Scene 5.^[1])  --Lambiam 17:32, 22 June 2021 (UTC)

Late Latin - was it Gaul or France?

This conversation has been moved to Talk:formaticus so it no longer hijacks this page.

သီလ (sīla) etc. 'precept'

Is this really a learned loan into mainland SE Asian languages? It seems a natural word to pick up from Buddhist rituals, especially with the 'five precepts' that Buddhist laymen ought to adhere to. Additionally, the display of parameter |lbor=1 to {{desc}} gives the impression that the borrowed word is learned, which does not seem right for Burmese သီလ (sila.) or Thai ศีล (śīla). With its anomalously short vowel, Lao ສິນ (sina) doesn't look particularly learned either. — This unsigned comment was added by RichardW57 (talk • contribs) at 19:26, 2 June 2021 (UTC).

See my comment here. Also, owing to the inherent phonology of the language in question, the pronunciation of the word sometimes may be diverging. This is common in Bengali, for example. Compare Sanskrit योग्य (/⁠ˈjoːɡjɐ⁠/) vs. the learned loan Bengali যোগ্য (/⁠ˈd͡ʒoɡːɔ̝⁠/); Sanskrit श्मशान (/⁠ɕmɐˈɕɑːn̪ɐ⁠/) vs. the learned loan Bengali শ্মশান (/⁠ˈʃɔʃɑn⁠/); etc. etc (do mark that these Bengali words are not semi-learned loans; a semi-learned borrowing looks native-ish like an inherited word). So to conclude, neither the pronunciation, nor the state of currency of the word, has any bearing whatsoever on the etymology. Words of all Mainland Southeast Asian languages from Pali are by default learned borrowings. ·~ dictátor·mundꟾ 02:05, 4 June 2021 (UTC)

That comment is even wronger. Are you going to argument that the borrowings of buddha are all learned? One observation I have taken on board is that Indic (i.e. Pali/Sanskrit) loans in Thailand and similar countries are far commoner in ordinary speech than loans from Latin in English. So what would you accept as evidence that an Indic word loan was not a learned borrowing? You've already accepted that Thai โควิด-19 is not a learned loan, but I don't see how the case is different. What about Thai รถ (rót, “wheeled vehicle”)? It's the ordinary word for 'car'. --RichardW57m (talk) 13:08, 4 June 2021 (UTC)

We do need to add learned borrowing and semi-learned borrowing to the glossary; I was going to raise this at the Beer Parlour. clearly the Wiktionary definition of the latter is wrong. As you have pointed out, undergoing the borrower's sound changes does not prevent a word being learned. What tends to happen is that learned words tend to keep their spellings, resolving conflicts in favour of their spellings. In your Bengali examples, though, how was the Sanskrit actually pronounced at the times of the loans? The point about the Lao word is that although the rime /i:n^A/ is still around in Lao (e.g. ຫີນ (hīna)), the vowel of the Lo word is now short in Lao. I suspect there may have been some interaction with a homophone (or near homophone) meaning 'money' - the overlapping sense might be 'obligation'. --RichardW57m (talk) 13:08, 4 June 2021 (UTC)

The case is not as simple as you are thinking. The short answer is that you have been confusing learned loans with learned words; a learned loan can come into common parlance very easily and it still remains a learned loan. For example, Bengali is full of Sanskritisms that are ordinary words; just listing here 15 such random words: কিন্তু (“but”), যদি (“if”), মেঘ (“cloud”), রক্ত (“blood”), স্বামী (“husband”), নষ্ট (“destroyed”), কষ্ট (“sufferance”), সাহায্য (“help”), সমস্ত (“all”), সমস্যা (“problem”), সময় (“time”), শীত (“cold”), বর্ষা (“rain”), শিশির (“dew”), বরং (“instead”). Therefor, when we say a word is a learned loan, nothing is being implied about how commonly or learnedly the word is used. Since Pali is the superstrate language for Mainland Southeast Asian languages, all words adopted from Pali are bound to be learned loans. As for Bengali, learned loans have been present through the New Indo-Aryan stage, so Old Bengali has learned borrowings from Sanskrit that are pronounced according to its phonology, Middle Bengali has learned borrowings that are pronounced according to its phonology, and New Bengali has learned borrowings that are pronounced according to its phonology: Sanskrit words always got reinforced at each stage of the language thanks to scholars who favoured them (the learned loans that are now ordinarily used were formerly learned words). At the same time there are also words that were learned loans in an earlier stage but were inherited by New Bengali: these are the semi-learned borrowings. (And Sanskrit words were/are pronounced per the phonology of the chronolect whose speakers utter(ed/s) Sanskrit.) ·~ dictátor·mundꟾ 16:52, 4 June 2021 (UTC)

Physics sense of "bluff"

Discussion moved from Wiktionary:Tea room#Physics sense of "bluff".

As part of some research, I think I've found a definition of bluff that is specific to physics and that we so far do not have recorded. I've found some sources which discuss the term, and have listed them at the end of this post, but, in part because of my lack of knowledge regarding aerodynamics, I've been unable to synthesize them into a cohesive definition. Of note, the antonym of bluff is streamlined, which is also missing a technical definition. Any in coming up with such a definition would be greatly appreciated. Take care.

• "...in the case of dominant pressure drag, the body is called a blunt or bluff body." (w:Drag coefficient)
• "A bluff body is an object that, due to its shape, causes separated flow over most of its surface." ([2])
• "A bluff body is one in which the flow under normal circumstances separates from a large section of body surface thus creating a massive wake region downstream." ([3])
• "Compared with conventional airfoils, bluff bodies exhibit considerably different aerodynamic performance, characterized by vortex shedding and significant profile drag due to separation. Generally, bluff body flows exhibit interaction of the separating boundary layer with the free shear layer and the wake (Williamson, 1996). The vortex-shedding process begins as the separated boundary layer supplies vorticity to the shear layer, which in turn rolls into a vortex." ([4]) —The Editor's Apprentice (talk) 21:05, 3 June 2021 (UTC)

• It's not just physics. We have the adjective definition "Having a broad, flattened front" already. SemperBlotto (talk) 05:00, 4 June 2021 (UTC)
  • I considered that definition, but I can't think of an easy pathway between that definition and the information discussed in the above quotations. In addition, some of the objects that I see described as bluff (or, equivalently, blunt) I would not describe as "having a broad, flattened front". The first is the sphere in this diagram, a second is the shuttle-like object featured on this NASA page. This second one I might describe as "broad", but I would not say its front is "flattened". —The Editor's Apprentice (talk) 17:18, 4 June 2021 (UTC)

more dollars than sense

The definition given is "Situation of having enough money to not be worried about value." But I feel this is wrong, or at least another meaning. I have always heard it used as a derogatory term to describe someone being so rich that they make stupid purchases at exorbitant costs. Things like paying a million dollars for a bit of otherwise worthless art, or buying a mansion for a cat. I was tempted to put this through RFV but thought I'd get some feedback first. --Dmol (talk) 09:05, 4 June 2021 (UTC)

Both these definitions implying being able to squander with impunity. At least with 'more money than sense', the form I'm familiar with, it allows the possibility of squandering money being severely detrimental, more in the territory of a fool and his money are soon parted. --RichardW57m (talk) 13:19, 4 June 2021 (UTC)

We have a page called more money than brains which seems to be defined quite well, perhaps we should link to that? Google n-grams seems to have ‘more money than sense’ as the most widely used of the variations (the one I use) but despite the quote from the 17th century for ‘more money than brains’, I suspect ‘more money than wit’ is the oldest form, as it was the most used form in the early 1800s and seems to be modelled on ‘more hair than wit’ from Shakespeare’s ‘A comedy of errors’Overlordnat1 (talk) 17:45, 4 June 2021 (UTC)

I think all these mean the same. The definition at more money than brains has an issue: it is not the definition of a noun phrase but of an adjective. It would be an acceptable definition for having more money than brains, but that is not the term being defined. Also, IMO, not only should a person be loaded in order to be so characterized as well as not entirely sensible, but also be seen to actually spend their wealth unwisely.  --Lambiam 21:36, 4 June 2021 (UTC)

I broadly agree with that. I can see the phrase occasionally being used to describe people of modest means who are both extremely bad with money and stupid if it is part of a longer phrase like ‘he/she has more money than sense and (s)he doesn’t even have much money’ but, loaded or not, someone has to have displayed or be in the process of displaying a lack of financial wisdom through misspending to be accurately described using any of these equivalent phrases. I have no objection if you change the definition of any of these phrases to reflect that DmolOverlordnat1 (talk) 00:25, 5 June 2021 (UTC)

I'm not sure if this needs to be mentioned in the entry, but I've always understood the expression "more dollars than sense" to be making a deliberate pun on "sense" and "cents". —Mahāgaja · talk 09:05, 5 June 2021 (UTC)

in a hurry

Looking for a translation of French c’est pas demain la veille, I found "that's not going to happen in a hurry". I don't think our current gloss, "rushed, hurried; short of time", works quite well in the present case. Another example ("He won't be going back to work in a hurry") is found in this English dictionary, which glosses it as: "if you say something will not happen in a hurry you mean it will not happen for a long time".

Should we add that as a second sense? And it's a negative-polarity item, right? PUC – 18:06, 5 June 2021 (UTC)

The wording of the definition is fine for adjectival uses of the prepositional phrase, but your case is for an adverbial use. I don't think it is a negative polarity item in general. Consider the following, all adverbial, same semantics, no negative polarity conditions present: He had to get there in a hurry, Everything must be done in a hurry., He needed it in a hurry..

MWOnline's wording "without delay, as rapidly as possible" works for the adverbial, but not the adjectival usage.

Oxford includes both adjectival and adverbial definitions in the same definition line: "Rushed; in a rushed manner." AND they have two other definitions, one "informal usually with negative Easily; readily."

IOW, besides missing the negative polarity usage you have noted, our wording does not accommodate adverbial usage. Oxford Lexico's entry seems like a good model for our entry. DCDuring (talk) 21:54, 6 June 2021 (UTC)

imprecision

[5] I believe Kent Dominic is not making any sense here, and "lack" works better than "absence". Others' opinions please. Equinox ◑ 03:43, 6 June 2021 (UTC)

I think that ‘lack’ works a little better as it suggests to me a partial rather than complete lack, whereas ‘absence’ suggests a complete rather than partial absence and the word ‘lack’ indicates necessity to a greater extent than ‘absence’ but both definitions seem to be broadly equivalent imhoOverlordnat1 (talk) 06:59, 6 June 2021 (UTC)

@Overlordnat1: Thanks for rightly addressing only the relevant sense (semantics: "A single conventional use of a word; one of the entries for a word in a dictionary") entailed in this discussion unlike Equinox, who interpolated the sense (i.e. "The meaning, reason, or value of something") of a fellow editor. Earlier, Equinox falsely asserted, "'lack and absence'" are synonyms." They share some collateral usage but they're hardly synonymous. From Wiktionary:

• lack: "A deficiency or need (of something desirable or necessary); an absence, want.
• absence: "Lack; deficiency; nonexistence."

Note: Wiktionary is not itself a reliable source for cites. I'm merely pointing out what's currently published here.

Versus this -

• im-: "Expressing negation; not."
• imprecise: "Not precise or exact; containing some error or uncertainty."
• not: "Negates the meaning of the modified verb." (Note: This definition needs suppletion to account for the negation of an adjectival characteristic.)
• negate: "To deny the existence, evidence, or truth of; to contradict"

So, if "imprecise" means not precise (i.e. having an absence of precision), then "imprecision" must accordingly mean an absence of precision. (Or else "imprecise" must be changed to "having a lack of precision.") A second sense of imprecision (i.e. "a lack of precision; poor accuracy") might account for the purported overlap between absence and lack. Indeed, rather than aggregating the meanings for "lack" as they are here, the two senses should be properly bifurcated, e.g.

Noun

lack (countable and uncountable, plural lacks)

1. (obsolete) A defect or failing; moral or spiritual degeneracy.

2. An absence or nonexistence of something. // President Thomas Jefferson never bemoaned his lack of a wife.

3. A deficiency or need (of something desirable or necessary); want. // There's a lack of ventilation in this room.

There you have it. --Kent Dominic (talk) 14:37, 6 June 2021 (UTC)

@Equinox: While you're at it, you might want to to have a look at these entries:

• immaterial: "Having no matter or substance." (Compare: "Having a lack of matter or substance.")
• impolite: "Not polite; not of polished manners; wanting in good manners." (Compare: "Having a lack of politeness; lacking of polished manners...")
• imbalance: "The property of not being in balance. (Compare: "The property of lacking in balance.")

Etc. --Kent Dominic (talk) 06:17, 7 June 2021 (UTC)

lack is objectively better. Precision isn't something you have or don't have, but rather a spectrum. "not precise" does not mean "that does not have precision", it means "that does not have much precision". I've changed it back as there are three editors now against one. — surjection ⟨??⟩ 21:39, 7 June 2021 (UTC)

"fetiales": does it really exist as a plural form of the English noun "fetial"?

The entry fetial currently lists two possible plural forms for the English noun, "fetials" and "fetiales". But I'm inclined to say that the second is not actually a pluralization of fetial, but instead a direct borrowing of Latin fetiales (which is the plural of Latin fetialis, not of English fetial).

The two plural forms have the same meaning, but for comparison, consider "legions" and "legiones"; both are used as plural noun forms when writing about ancient Rome (e.g. see this entry in A Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities, etc), but that hasn't caused us to list "legiones" (the plural of Latin legio) as an alternative plural form of the English word legion.

Before I edited it today, the entry for fetial used to say the pronunciation of fetiales is "probably IPA^(key): (RP) /ˈfiːʃəleɪs/, (GA) /ˈfiʃəˌleɪs/)". If this pronunciation is attestable, it would probably count as evidence that the word is thought of as a plural of fetial for some speakers. But searching Youtube, I couldn't find any examples of /ˈfiːʃəleɪs/ being used, and my intuition does not agree that this form would probably be pronounced with initial stress: I would read it aloud with penultimate stress, as in Latin. Checking our separate entry for fetiales, I see that we cite Merriam Webster, which lists "fetiales \ ˌfātēˈäˌlās \" as a plural form of fetial; this pronunciation (IPA: /ˌfeɪtiˈɑˌleɪs/) seems more plausible to me, but I remain skeptical that /ˈfiːʃəl/ and /ˌfeɪtiˈɑˌleɪs/ are best thought of as the singular and plural forms of the same noun in English.--Urszag (talk) 06:25, 6 June 2021 (UTC)

Why not just RfV fetiales? DCDuring (talk) 21:57, 6 June 2021 (UTC)

I'm not sure how the RfV process would help here? The issue is not whether "fetiales" is used; there's already a citation for it, and it is easy to find more examples of it being used in text. The issue is whether it is a plural form of "fetial". Anyway, based on my judgement, I'm just going to move the content about the form fetiales away from the page for fetial. if someone wants to add it back, they can do the work of showing that these function as inflected forms of the same word.--Urszag (talk) 01:36, 7 June 2021 (UTC)

Our RfV process attempts to obtain attestation of the meaning of a word, not merely of its existence. As you point out, the entry for fetiales cites as reference MWOnline's entry. That is more evidence than you have provided for deleting it as a plural in [[fetial]]. DCDuring (talk) 02:56, 7 June 2021 (UTC)

There is no issue with ascertaining either the meaning or existence of fetiales: it's clear that fetials and fetiales have no significant difference in meaning. The bare fact that Merriam-Webster lists three plural forms (fetials, fetiales, fecials) together under the single headword fetial is not a compelling argument for us to do the same: I think it's clear that despite how the Merriam-Webster entry is formatted, there is nobody who follows a consistent pattern of spelling the word with "ti" in the singular and "ci" in the plural, and we have correctly not followed their lead in regard to listing fecials as a plural form of fetial. I think the main problem with the Merriam-Webster entry is that it fails to mention the existence of the form fetialis; as this is attested in English, I've created an entry for it now on Wiktionary, which allows for a less jumbled presentation of the same information.--Urszag (talk) 04:42, 7 June 2021 (UTC)

Perusing what google books:"fetial" "fetiales" turns up, I see books that use" fetiales" as a plural noun and "fetial" as an adjective (rather than a singular noun) or that use "fetial" as an English word and italicize "fetiales" like a borrowing, like:

• 1999, Vergilius, page 34:

  Vergil's description, however, refers to attendants rather than presiding fetial as shown by the reference to the limus, […] college of fetiales and his use of the allegedly ancient fetial ritual for declaring war against Cleopatra […]

But if anyone peruses the search results more closely they might be able to attest books that use "fetial" as the singular and "fetiales" as its plural. - -sche (discuss) 20:05, 14 June 2021 (UTC)

Senses of 鼻緒 / はなお (hanao)

@Eiríkr Útlendi – Currently, はなお is defined solely as “the part of a geta or sandal that the toes grip”. If I understand the Japanese Wikipedia correctly, the term is also used in a broader sense. Can this be confirmed? See also the discussion at Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2021 June 5#Japanese sandal terms.  --Lambiam 08:57, 6 June 2021 (UTC)

@Lambiam: I've made a quick edit, I'll look at this more deeply in the next few days. (Things IRL have gotten busier. :) ) ‑‑ Eiríkr Útlendi │^{Tala við mig} 00:43, 11 June 2021 (UTC)

@Lambiam: Have a look now.  :) ‑‑ Eiríkr Útlendi │^{Tala við mig} 18:52, 14 June 2021 (UTC)

Presumably мину́ть is without effect rather than without affect!

The second definition of мину́ть (minútʹ) says “to go by, to go past (without any affect)”, but presumably “effect” is intended, and anyway looking at ru.wiktionary(with DeepL) I see no particular reason to specify the lack of effect (or affect). Perhaps someone with reliable knowledge of Russian could look into this? PJTraill (talk) 12:38, 7 June 2021 (UTC)

"this isn't free speech"

I've noticed that the term free speech is used, at least in some publications, to refer not to a right to make utterings, but to the utterings themselves. Specifically, it seems to be used to mean "utterings that should be allowed". For example, this article is titled "Al Jazeera: Free speech or a voice for extremists?", suggesting a dichotomy. Another example is this one; under our current definition, asking whether an uttering "is free speech" is meaningless. Also, the phrase "hate speech isn't free speech" seems to be something of a mantra, and isn't really compatible with our current definition.__Gamren (talk) 08:50, 9 June 2021 (UTC)

Perhaps we could formulate a second definition as something like “Speech in exercise of the above right”. PJTraill (talk) 11:05, 9 June 2021 (UTC)

Somewhat tangentially but relatedly, I see that right to keep and bear arms (as in See also) is defined as “The right of individuals to possess firearms and armor”, but “possess” seems to me too weak and “and armor” extraneous (the word occurs only peripherally in the Wikipedia article). PJTraill (talk) 11:23, 9 June 2021 (UTC)

I'd say "weapons" as the right presumably applies also to swords and to bows-and-arrows. —Mahāgaja · talk 14:53, 9 June 2021 (UTC)

What cleanup does this Sanskrit entry need?

Hello, What type of cleanup does this sanskrit entry need? I think this is correct. Lightbluerain❄ (Talk | contribs) 05:47, 10 June 2021 (UTC)

father of the nation

Entry-worthy? PUC – 12:25, 10 June 2021 (UTC)

Not in my opinion. It is just use of a figurative sense of father. DCDuring (talk) 14:33, 10 June 2021 (UTC)

Yes. It’s used idiomically, cannot be a SoP. Cf. founding father. ·~ dictátor·mundꟾ 21:26, 23 June 2021 (UTC)

be my guest when addressing several people

Can this be used in the plural: be my guests? PUC – 13:08, 10 June 2021 (UTC)

That sounds wrong, but I can't recall a case where that came up so I can't say that someone might not use it that way. Chuck Entz (talk) 13:46, 10 June 2021 (UTC)

Using it in the plural substantially diminishes the likelihood it would be heard in the idiomatic sense, IMO. DCDuring (talk) 14:31, 10 June 2021 (UTC)

"Be our guests" may be likelier (of course it requires more than one host), e.g. 1963, Beth Jacobs, Look to the Mountains (page 177): “But if you're closing the station - could we spend the night under your overhang roof?” “Sure, sure, be our guests.” Equinox ◑ 18:13, 10 June 2021 (UTC)

“I write to invite you and your family ... to be my guests”^[6] is perfectly fine.  --Lambiam 09:27, 13 June 2021 (UTC)

Presumably that's not the idiomatic sense of "help yourself, go ahead"! Equinox ◑ 14:52, 13 June 2021 (UTC)

upon us

Is the meaning of this phrase (in a sentence like "Christmas is upon us!") currently covered at upon? I've also only ever heard "upon us," but is it possible to use a different accusative pronoun? Imetsia (talk) 18:09, 10 June 2021 (UTC)

Other pronouns: yes. "Dark times had come upon them." Equinox ◑ 18:11, 10 June 2021 (UTC)

And also “the terrors of death are fallen upon me” (Psalm 55:4, KJV). Does it even have to be a pronoun? “As pen goes to paper, a new year and a new president is upon this great nation.”^[7] This sense of “to be upon someone” appears to be “to have arrived at someone”. Compare also “the enemy is upon you”,^[8] implying that there is no second to spare.  --Lambiam 09:56, 13 June 2021 (UTC)

mapadre

Allegedly a Swahili word; presumably this is some sort of software error. It's either a duplicate of the Spanish, or was meant to be some other language among those which use madre and padre as standalone words. Note that the Swahili entry is actually the original, and we may have taken ma- for the Swahili plural classifier prefix. —Soap— 21:34, 10 June 2021 (UTC)

Actually I'd like help with this since there seems to be more to it .... I posted here instead of just deleting it outright because I wasnt quite sure what I was seeing. It seems upadre is in fact a loanword into Swahili, and mapadre may be as well, though u- and ma- don't form a singular/plural pair. I couldnt find any evidence of mapadre meaning parents in Spanish, but if it is it's a neologism, and may be difficult to find. Thanks, —Soap— 21:52, 10 June 2021 (UTC)

@Soap In Rechenbanch's 1967 dictionary (from the Catholic U of America), they have padre ~ padri ~ padiri, plural ma-, as a Portuguese loan for 'clergyman' (not nec. Catholic), = kasisi. Upadre is the priesthood. kwami (talk) 05:30, 13 June 2021 (UTC)

• Had anyone thought to look at the edit history, it would have been clear that I created the entry in its correct form, and it was later messed up by a Spanish editor who accidentally ruined the Swahili section in the process. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 07:03, 13 June 2021 (UTC)

@Metaknowledge Can we verify that it's spanish, or is that just someone's joke? I'm deleting for now, but please restore if it can be justified. kwami (talk) 09:00, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

@Kwamikagami: When you doubt a word exists, do not remove it unless it is obvious vandalism. The correct process is to tag it with {{rfv}}, and click the + sign to create a new section at WT:RFV. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 17:00, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

Thanks. Had already reverted myself. Will tag. kwami (talk) 17:22, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

Pali for Tennessee

The translation to Pali of Tennessee is given as ṭenisī. It would be good to have a quotation for a use of the word, even a fleetingly preserved quotation, so that we can see whether it is a feminine noun or the form is merely the nominative singular of *ṭenisin. Perhaps the author of the entry, @DPUH, would help. --RichardW57 (talk) 22:27, 10 June 2021 (UTC)

It was entered in the Devanagari script (टेनिसी), so possibly it was taken from pi:w:टेनिसी, which would be an invalid source. In that case, do we just summarily delete it? --RichardW57 (talk) 22:27, 10 June 2021 (UTC)

I'd take it to RFV on the off chance someone can find a citation in a durably archived source. Is there a Pali newspaper anywhere in the world? —Mahāgaja · talk 17:09, 11 June 2021 (UTC)

I'm unwilling to do that with a word that may very well be real but lack a durable archive. As it is, I also can't create a proper entry for it, because I don't know what its citation form is! The only place on-line I could find it was on the Pali Wikipedia. --RichardW57 (talk) 18:12, 11 June 2021 (UTC)

tap/spigot/faucet

The word 'tap' has 3 related senses: 1. a standpipe/spout, 2. A valve for regulating the flow of water through a standpipe, 3. A visible section of piping, consisting of a standpipe and a valve or some valves considered collectively. 'spigot' and 'faucet' aren't part of my idiolect but I believe that they can also mean all 3 of these things and we should clearly delineate these 3 meanings in all 3 articles and link each meaning of each word to the others through lists of synonyms, IMO. I've made some minor improvements to some of our entries already but for now would anyone object if I changed the wording of the definition of the second noun sense of 'spigot' from 'plug' to 'valve'? (I don't think taps or faucets have 'plugs' personally Overlordnat1 (talk) 14:46, 11 June 2021 (UTC)

From what I understand, some dialects of Southern American English use spigot to simply refer to the common household fixture.

Yet, except for faucet, all of the words that you mentioned have general application of some sort even in dialects that do not use them as the general word for the common household fixture.

Case in point, in my neck of the woods (I speak a dialect of New England English), the normal word for the common building and household fixture is "faucet". However, water that comes out of a faucet is called "tap water". And phrasing like "water from the tap" is used and fully understood.

On the other hand, it is my understanding that a few dialects in the Northern Midwest or thereabouts use "tap" as the normal word for the fixture consistently. And some areas of the Southern U.S. use "spigot" as the general word for the fixture.

So the answer is that some of those words have more specified meanings/uses in certain dialects, but are broader in meaning/usage in others. Tharthan (talk) 20:38, 11 June 2021 (UTC)

You make some interesting and valid points but defining tap, faucet and spigot in terms of one another and not specifying which meaning is being referred to displays vague and circular reasoning. For ‘tap’ we only have sense 3 and arguably sense 1 (as ‘spout’ is listed as a synonym) in the definition; for ‘spigot’ we only really have sense 2 listed (as senses 2 and 3 of our entry for spigot are poorly defined); for faucet we have senses 2 and 3 and arguably sense 1 listed Overlordnat1 (talk) 01:38, 12 June 2021 (UTC)

Ah. What you wished to do was not entirely clear to me from your original comments. If your intent is to essentially disambiguate our tap, faucet, and spigot entries, then that is certainly quite sensible so long as any senses added can be proven to exist for all three words (if added to all three words). Tharthan (talk) 15:14, 12 June 2021 (UTC)

statute

How is the second definition of this term different from the first one? First reads “law, as laid down by the legislature [scilicet for society]”, second “legislated rule of society”, which would also come from a legislature, but the definition imagines it “given the force of law by those it governs”. How can those that are governed give force of law? It can only be a tiny minority of lawmakers. If it is not blatant baloney I suspect that is the thing that is called in German Satzung in reference to Selbstverwaltungskörperschaften and perhaps private Körperschaften defined by OED, or rather exemplified and synonymized, as follows: “A rule or regulation made by a guild, corporation, university, or other organization, esp. concerning the conduct of its members. In early use also: a by-law of a borough; a provision in a municipal charter.” But this seems missing. The German translations given for both are both wrong; the first is Gesetz (scilicet: materielles Gesetz; also gesetztes Recht), the second could be Satzung for the sense I understand, while Statut is not used in the FRG; what our translators understood when adding e.g. the gloss to Finnish säädös cannot be imagined well. OED then follows with an alleged specific “a particular enactment or document of this type” which seems redundant.

An abstract sense seems more relevant: “scientific statutes”, “statutes” given by your imaginary friend or fate i.e. the law of causality. It seems not consistent though that the OED starts with an obsolete sense “decree or command made by a sovereign, ruler, or ruling body”. They lack our generally meant law sense, our first sense which I deem hitting it. Their “authoritative rule or direction” sense coming before their god sense is too abstract again, I don’t find it expressed what the word usually precisely means in English.

They have but one law sense, which we miss, for it is uncommon–the ECJ judges or translators don’t employ it but say applicable law—a sense I defined at the German and Russian parallel term, because there it is widely used in the field, as “the law applicable to a legal relationship in civil and commercial matters containing foreign elements, as determined by private international law”, for which the OED has seven quotes with a janky definition ( 3. Law.: “A (theoretical) type of statutory law specified [by whom?] as regulating a person or thing [I think laws don’t regulate things in the same sense as they do persons]; (also) the legal status [unbrilliant to define statute as status] of being subject to this [who had thought that a law that regulates makes man subject?].”

I warn that OED has some ellipses, comprising statute fair, statute staple and kinds of garment of measurements fixed by statutes. It also has an alternative form of statue of this form. It also has a verb called chiefly Scottish and appearing to correspond more or less to to institute and German (Recht) setzen, festlegen. Fay Freak (talk) 22:57, 11 June 2021 (UTC)

Declension template error

Hello, how to correct the declension template error here? The bottom right term should be "निर्धनों" not "निर्धनो". Lightbluerain❄ (Talk | contribs) 07:00, 12 June 2021 (UTC)

Hellenistically: needs more Greek

My new quote at Hellenistically has some Greek in it. Can someone add it using this link? Indian subcontinent (talk) 10:54, 12 June 2021 (UTC)

It looks like ἀδικία (adikía), and the 'unjust' meaning fits. I added it, but I don't know if I should format it in some special way. Kritixilithos (talk) 11:22, 12 June 2021 (UTC)

looks good, thanks! There's another at perispomenon that needs more Greek too Indian subcontinent (talk) 14:20, 12 June 2021 (UTC)

Also done.  --Lambiam 09:20, 13 June 2021 (UTC)

As you're doing such a good job, I'll ask you for another one - epanastrophe (some notes are found at Talk:epanastrophe Indian subcontinent (talk) 12:45, 13 June 2021 (UTC)

Cusses

Hi! The article for English word cusses is missing the meaning as plural of cuss. --Dipsacus fullonum (talk) 16:36, 12 June 2021 (UTC)

 Done Equinox ◑ 16:47, 12 June 2021 (UTC)

skew-whiff alternative forms

A load of these have been added with no glosses. It seems most would not meet CFI and are obsolete, Scottish, etc. They should not be given as though they are everyday modern standard spellings, and some should probably be deleted entirely. Equinox ◑ 16:46, 12 June 2021 (UTC)

Italian hiatus in falling diphthongs

(Notifying GianWiki, Metaknowledge, SemperBlotto, Ultimateria, Jberkel, Imetsia): Can native speakers speak to which of the following words have a hiatus before the i?

• abbaino (third plural subjunctive of abbaiare)
• aire (variant of aere)
• giudaico
• asteroide
• glenoide, glenoideo
• gratuito
• intuito
• rameico
• paraboloide
• coincidere
• suicida
• suicidare
• controindicazione
• caodaisto
• omogeneizzare

Thanks! Benwing2 (talk) 04:30, 13 June 2021 (UTC)

If I understand what a "hiatus" is correctly, all these words have one before the i. Imetsia (talk) 15:57, 13 June 2021 (UTC)

@Imetsia. Thanks. What I mean by "hiatus" is that the vowel before the i is pronounced as a separate syllable, instead of the vowel + i forming a diphthong that makes a single syllable. Benwing2 (talk) 20:41, 13 June 2021 (UTC)

@Benwing2: Ok, thanks for the clarification. Indeed then, every word you listed has a hiatus before the i. Imetsia (talk) 20:47, 13 June 2021 (UTC)

Term for opposite gender in grammar?

What is the specific term for denoting (Wiktionary:Semantic relations) words of opposite gender, especially in languages with gendered animate nouns? For "man vs woman" or "dude" vs "dudette". In Malayalam language, it is termed എതിർലിംഗം (etiṟliṅgaṁ) and is given its own identity and equal importance as antonyms, synonyms and homonyms. I have seen that often antonym is used for this purpose. But is there a specific word for this relation? Thanks in advance Vis M (talk) 13:14, 13 June 2021 (UTC)

I am not aware of any English word for this. Equinox ◑ 14:53, 13 June 2021 (UTC)

Ok, thanks. Vis M (talk) 15:29, 13 June 2021 (UTC)

If there's not a more specific term, they could go under ====Coordinate terms====, as far as what Wiktionary:Semantic relations header to list them under. (PS your mention of "languages with gendered animate nouns" made me think of languages where the grammatical 'gender' distinction is not between masculine gender nouns vs feminine ones, but animate gender nouns vs inanimate ones, as in Alonguqian languages; I don't know of a term that would encompass that either.) I can find a single book which refers to "sentences or word pairs involving direct (e.g., boy - sister) gender antonyms", which seems like an intelligible SOP phrase but hardly usual or idiomatic. (And genderonyms are something else.) - -sche (discuss) 19:38, 14 June 2021 (UTC)

@Vis M "gender pair" is used, but I don't know how you'd say 'the other member of a gender pair' except by spelling it out. Most people would probably be somewhat vague and just say "the opposite gender". kwami (talk) 09:12, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

worry oneself sick

Other verbs can replace "worry" (make, work, starve, and laugh are all attested according to Lexico: [9], [10]). At the same time, it doesn't quite feel like it's totally SOP. So is there a better way to treat this entry - or a better place to locate it? Imetsia (talk) 22:01, 13 June 2021 (UTC)

Isn't this just a general resultative construction, like "laugh oneself silly" or "read oneself blind"? There is nothing special about "sick". Equinox ◑ 20:22, 14 June 2021 (UTC)

Francis Bacon quote for "question" (verb)

At the entry for question, the Francis Bacon quote "He that questioneth much shall learn much." is listed under the sense "(transitive) To ask questions of; to interrogate; to ask for information." Note that I recently modified this sense. The placement of the quote seems weird to me, especially in terms of transitivity. The sense that seems more relevant to me is "(intransitive, obsolete) To argue; to converse; to dispute." which was added at the same time. Does anyone have any advice or ideas?, particularly given that this has to do with Early Modern English. Thanks and take care. —The Editor's Apprentice (talk) 04:51, 14 June 2021 (UTC)

It seems more logical that Bacon meant ‘he that asketh/asks for information much, shall learn much’ rather than ‘he that argueth/argues much shall learn much’ as far as I can see Overlordnat1 (talk) 08:22, 14 June 2021 (UTC)

The 1911 Century Dictionary uses the selfsame Bacon quote for an intransitive sense we do not appear to list, in fact as the first sense of the verb: “To ask a question or questions ; inquire or seek to know ; examine.“  --Lambiam 12:11, 14 June 2021 (UTC)

Good catch, Lambiam! That does seem to be a sense that is missing from our list. I've gone ahead and added it to our list with the Bacon quote listed underneath and a citation of the 1911 Century Dictionary. —The Editor's Apprentice (talk) 17:59, 14 June 2021 (UTC)

Romanian "a vrea" imperfect vroiam/vream

I thought I'd write this here because the chances of somebody reading the talk page of that specific article are slim.

In the article vrea, the conjugation table (the first of the three) doesn't include the indicative imperfect 1st person form "vroiam" even though it is MUCH more common than vream (I've never even heard this...). Maybe we should replace it or at least also provide vroiam as an alternative?

--Fytcha (talk) 13:41, 14 June 2021 (UTC)

No, I don't think it's a good idea because vroiam is the indicative imperfect 1st person form of the alternative vroi, not vrea. It's possible that people conflate the two, but we should definitely keep them separated. --Robbie SWE (talk) 16:54, 14 June 2021 (UTC)

струна = “long line (e.g. of a road)”

What is the “long line of a road”, which струна (struna) is alleged to mean? I do not understand this expression (long line does not clarify it), and I see nothing at https://ru.wiktionary.org/wiki/струна (as translated by DeepL) to justify this “sense” in any way. Come to that “side, feature (of human nature)” for the sort of string that may be touched in one’s soul seems a bit obscure as well. PJTraill (talk) 15:58, 14 June 2021 (UTC)

@PJTraill: Hopefully I've managed to clarify both of these. Brutal Russian (talk) 19:32, 16 June 2021 (UTC)

top-hamper

hamper defines top-hamper as "unnecessary spars and rigging kept aloft"; top-hamper defines itself as upper rigging (without mention of whether it's necessary). What's right? - -sche (discuss) 17:32, 14 June 2021 (UTC)

unique question

I would like to see someone revise, reword or potentially split the fourth definition for 'an' in English, as well as the relevant parts of the usage notes. Personally, I would rarely orally say "an unique" unless I was trying to be formal. I found three durably archived cites for that usage from 1998 & 2010 without lifting a finger. My 'low English' understanding is that "all words beginning with a vowel take 'an' as the indefinite article". That's obviously a mistaken understanding, but it's an understanding that is extant and causing "an unique" usages. Despite that rule, I would never have spoken or written "an one"- but that may be because of its scarcity generally. --Geographyinitiative (talk) 19:12, 14 June 2021 (UTC)

How strange. I don't think that's formal, just actually wrong! "An utility company"?? "An unicorn"?? Equinox ◑ 20:11, 14 June 2021 (UTC)

The novelty song ‘Part of the Union’ by the one-hit-wonder Strawbs would sound odd indeed if he sang “I’m an union man”! Overlordnat1 (talk) 21:47, 14 June 2021 (UTC)

I should have said 'faux formal', 'crass formal', 'pretend formal' or 'don't-know-what-you're-doing formal'. It's an attempt to follow the a/an rule for any words starting with a vowel. It is a mark of unculturedness. --Geographyinitiative (talk) 21:57, 14 June 2021 (UTC)

"If we stick fully to our idea of reading the meaning from the text, without looking anywhere else, then it seems that we should simply include these "mistakes" in an exactly equivalent fashion to the real entries that they are mistakes for, modulus a note that implies that this seems to be a less common way of writing the word, or a less common meaning of the word. This does indeed seem to be the logical way forward, however it makes sticklers and some philologists hold up their hands in horror. How on earth could you ever advocate that misspelling is acceptable?!...By generalising this concept so that it covers describing not only the languages under discussion but also what other people say about those languages, we can include all the information that we would include if we were prescriptive and also maintain a relatively neutral position without being totally dependent on other dictionaries." Wiktionary:Descriptivism --Geographyinitiative (talk) 22:24, 14 June 2021 (UTC)

I will say this: I have heard the phrase "truly an unique experience" in oral English before, and the impression I have of the phrase is that it is sickeningly hoity-toity. That is all I have to say on this entire matter; I have nothing else. Feel free to use the examples on the page and your own resources to modify that page as you will have it; all I wanted to do was document an extant phenomena to some extent. I found an example of each of the above-mentioned combinations, including a Biblical passage on an unicorn. --Geographyinitiative (talk) 00:25, 15 June 2021 (UTC)

Utterings of /ən.juːˈniːk/ may alternatively occur as instances of the fifth definition for an.  --Lambiam 20:49, 15 June 2021 (UTC)

first (“of or belonging to a first family”)

E.g., First Cat, First Daughter, First Dog, First Son. We do not have it yet; is this a separate sense or does sense 2 apply (“most eminent or exalted [cat, etc.]”)? J3133 (talk) 20:08, 14 June 2021 (UTC)

I think it's a separate sense, based on analogy with First Lady/First Family. A First Cat wouldn't be the most exalted cat, but a cat belonging to the President or similar Head of State. Leasnam (talk) 17:20, 15 June 2021 (UTC)

Good point. I can find cites for "Florence's", "Italy's", and "San Francisco's First Family of Fashion", etc, so we may need to expand first family/First Family to note that extended use extends beyond politics (unless we're assuming people will know to look up the words individually when the context is fashion and only look them up as a unit when the context is politics), but it seems like first daughter, etc may indeed be limited to political-executive families: e.g. google books:"first lady of fashion", google books:"first gentleman of fashion" designate the woman or man who is most prominent in the fashion industry, but don't seem like they require that woman and man constitute a nuclear family with each other, so the terms could just be interpreted as sense 2 of first ("most eminent") and not this "first-family-" sense. - -sche (discuss) 10:54, 16 June 2021 (UTC)

перемена: alteration or alternation?

перемена (peremena) is defined as “change, alternation” – should the latter not be “alteration”? That would agree better with https://ru.wiktionary.org/wiki/перемена . PJTraill (talk) 13:05, 15 June 2021 (UTC)

I don't know Russian but alteration can be change (meaning something is modified) and alternation can also be change (in the sense of switching something back and forth). Let's be careful out there. Equinox ◑ 13:11, 15 June 2021 (UTC)

We list Russian перемена (peremena) as one of the translations for alteration, and the Russian Wiktionary gives “перемена” as a sense for English alteration, so yeah, this looks like a typo.  --Lambiam 20:35, 15 June 2021 (UTC)

Heh, I noticed only today my own confusion about these two English words - that or I've ended up confusing myself about them for the first time. I don't think "alteration" is in most cases an equivalent translation of перемена, as the latter implies a switch-over, an internally-caused shift, and cannot - it seems to me - express a gradual alteration effected from without. Brutal Russian (talk) 19:11, 16 June 2021 (UTC)

Alternation is a to-and-fro switching between several (usually two) alternatives, as in the alternation between sexual and asexual generations in the reproductive cycle of aphids. “Alteration” without ⟨n⟩ is a synonym of modification, most commonly by an outside agent but quite possibly not gradual. A deft tailor can make an heirloom bridal gown fit the bride by an apt alteration. New Latin Uromastyx is an unetymological alteration of Uromastix.  --Lambiam 12:58, 18 June 2021 (UTC)

A simple resolution is to scrap alternation from the definition of sense 1.  --Lambiam 13:12, 18 June 2021 (UTC)

@Lambiam: Thanks for the explanation, this is how I thought - indeed the Russian word can't mean “modification“ like измене́ние (izmenénije) can. alternation is too felicitous a translation for me to want to remove it, and I believe the current range of synonyms given is enough that the reader shouldn't get confused (and may well end up clarifying the difference in English for themselves). Brutal Russian (talk) 00:59, 28 June 2021 (UTC)

Potentially erroneous IPA at Italian figurati

For both 'etymology's. I'd've imagined the stress (the apostrophe) would start on a consonant, not a vowel. Also, is the expression figurati in response to grazie just the second person singular infinitive of the verb? Kritixilithos (talk) 18:55, 15 June 2021 (UTC)

@Kritixilithos: IPA is fixed. The "don't mention it" sense is the second person singular imperative (not infinitive) of the verb. —Mahāgaja · talk 20:11, 15 June 2021 (UTC)

@Mahagaja: Grazie. Kritixilithos (talk) 07:09, 16 June 2021 (UTC)

@Kritixilithos, Mahagaja: This convention seems to be especially common in Italian. I suspect it may be to avoid breaking up geminate consonants, especially when they're transcribed <Cː>. The Kiel convention of the IPA states that stress marks should come before the onset of the syllable, but placing them immediately before the vowel has a long history. kwami (talk) 09:28, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

English pronunciation request

Can someone add pronunciation for English word kippah. 108.2.74.234 03:14, 16 June 2021 (UTC)

 Done, though it's possible some people pronounce it /kɪˈpɑː/ with the stress on the second syllable to follow the Hebrew stress pattern. But I only know it stressed on the first syllable. —Mahāgaja · talk 09:49, 16 June 2021 (UTC)

Indeed, Kippah gives only the pronunciation stressed on the second syllable, so I'll add that too. —Mahāgaja · talk 09:51, 16 June 2021 (UTC)

Spanish derecho

I'm not a native Spanish speaker, but my understanding is that the noun form of the Spanish word derecho only means "right" in the sense of entitlement and never "right" in the sense of direction, i.e. "to the right". However, we give both meanings: "right (direction, entitlement)". And we've been giving that meaning since the earliest version of the entry back in 2003.[11] It seems unlikely that we would have been giving an incorrect definition for such a common Spanish word for 18 years without anyone correcting it. So that makes me think I must be wrong. But then two reasons make me continue to question it:

• This random article agrees with me: "But as a noun, el derecho never refers to a direction, but to an entitlement."
• It would be very confusing if the noun derecho could mean the "right" (direction), as when giving directions in Spanish, the single word instruction "derecho" means "[go] straight [ahead]". At the very least, this would require some usage clarification.

Note also that the 4th noun meaning, "right side", is correct per my understanding, although I think it might be limited to certain contexts like clothing. Could someone with a solid command of Spanish help clear this up? Nosferattus (talk) 05:38, 16 June 2021 (UTC)

@Ultimateria PUC – 09:50, 16 June 2021 (UTC)

@Nosferattus: I've cleaned up and corrected the definitions; I think I addressed everything you brought up. Btw it is confusing to give directions with derecho (or even recto) and a la derecha. I was navigator to another non-native speaker behind the wheel, and we turned off the highway and lost 10 minutes on our road trip :o Ultimateria (talk) 18:42, 16 June 2021 (UTC)

@Ultimateria Thank you!! For the record, is there any non-confusing, widely understood, one-word instruction in Spanish for "go straight ahead"? I'm hesitant to use derecho (for the exact reason you describe), but recto seems to have the same problem (and also means "rectum")! What would you use? (My context is Latin America.) Nosferattus (talk) 22:20, 16 June 2021 (UTC)

@Nosferattus: For clarity's sake I would avoid a one-word direction. I believe the most common way to say it would be sigue recto or todo recto, or you could say sigue todo recto. I'm not sure whether recto or derecho is more common in American Spanish, but I heard both in Spain. Ultimateria (talk) 22:36, 16 June 2021 (UTC)

walk the walk

This expression makes no sense to me. Is it a misconstruction of walk the talk, or is it perfectly standard? PUC – 08:58, 16 June 2021 (UTC)

Is the expression used with this definition? Actual usage examples, with context, would help.

There are a few legitimate English expressions of the form A#Verb the/a/DET A#Noun, most of which seem NISoP. It is conceivable that that pattern facilitated a misconstruction of walk the talk. DCDuring (talk) 09:26, 16 June 2021 (UTC)

I've never heard "walk the talk" in my life. I usually hear "walk the walk" paired with "talk the talk", as in "he talks the talk" (= he says all the right things) "but can he walk the walk?" (= will his actions be consistent with his words?). I've also heard both phrases used to mean "to speak and behave in a particular manner", as when a lesbian friend of mine told me about a waitress who "talked the talk and walked the walk", meaning the waitress's speech and mannerisms suggested to my friend that the waitress was also a lesbian. As for the "X_V the X_N" pattern, see Cognate object. —Mahāgaja · talk 09:42, 16 June 2021 (UTC)

I'm familiar with "walk the talk", but other than that my experience is the same as Mahagaja's, that "walk the walk" is normal, and what it means. I'm intrigued to find that Ngram Viewer has "walk the talk" being about twice as common as "walk the walk". Merriam-Webster, Lexico and Collins all label "walk the walk" and "walk the talk" informal (except that MW doesn't have "walk the talk"), but other than being informal I think it's normal English. - -sche (discuss) 11:14, 16 June 2021 (UTC)

What does it take for something to be deemed informal?

From a headline in Politco (today) EU tells Biden to ‘walk the talk’ ahead of summit , from Newsweek 6/9/21 Philanthropist Mo Ibrahim Tells Countries to 'Walk the Talk' in Supplying Africa COVID Vaccines, from South China Post 5/28/21 China tells US to ‘walk the talk’ to improve dialogue between militaries, from The Indian Express 5/25/21 Centre, states should fight pandemic unitedly; PM should walk the talk: Anand Sharma, WHO has a recurring event called Global Walk the Talk; dozens of article titles from Google Scholar. I think that the ship "Informal" has sailed. DCDuring (talk) 21:50, 16 June 2021 (UTC)

The GloWbE corpus has about the same total number of hits for "walk the walk" and "walk the talk" (around 600 each). But proportions are hugely variable in different sources. US sources have 179:67 (walk:talk); UK 133:40; IE 30:12; JM 23:5 and CA, AU, GH, and BD, all show an excess for walk over talk. On the other hand, nearly all the Asian and African sources, as well as NZ, have a large preponderance of talk over walk (eg IN 20:71, and MY 11:83). --ColinFine (talk) 22:51, 17 June 2021 (UTC)

negerinnentet

@Morgengave, Azertus, PadshahBahadur, Lambiam An IP removed the label "offensive" from this entry with a bare comment "no, it's not". I must say that my feelers for what exactly is offensive in Belgian Dutch are not that well-developed, but I'd be surprised if the word's use were not in dispute at all. The northern word negerzoen is labelled "potentially offensive" and I have considered removing "potentially"; it is certainly rapidly falling out of use in polite usage. I for one would be surprised if negerinnentet would really be less offensive. The frame of reference for any labelling of offensiveness should, of course, be Belgian Dutch or any other variety in which the word is or was actively used, rather than any other variety. ←₰-→ Lingo ^Bingo _Dingo (talk) 10:59, 16 June 2021 (UTC)

As a Belgian: in recent years, neger(in) has become an offensive word to some, and consequently, its compound words have become offensive to some as well. So the label potentially offensive is in my view correct for both negerinnentet and negerzoen. For many (a majority?), these two words are not offensive, but for some they are, so if used in the wrong setting, they will offend. Belgian examples that showcase this: [12] and [13]. This also led to usage of the neologism chocoladezoen. Morgengave (talk) 12:10, 16 June 2021 (UTC)

Agree about it being offensive or at least potentially offensive. I had to think way to hard to remember what I used to call them: we are definitely still missing nonnentetten. --Azertus (talk) 17:08, 16 June 2021 (UTC)

Also, for what it's worth, I prefer the short version of the usage note by Lingo Bingo Dingo, but I don't have the heart to edit-war about it. In Wikipedia terms, the part "considered neutral by all speakers" feels {{cn}} to me. I know this is a different project, but it illustrates why I feel the short version is better. Also, as mentioned above, there's an (older) alternative (nonnen-...), which may still be a little offensive, but at least less so than the word in question. --Azertus (talk) 17:15, 16 June 2021 (UTC)

@Morgengave, Azertus Perhaps we could reach a consensus here and change "neutral" to "uncontroversial" as we seem more or less agreed on the facts on the ground and only quibble about text and subtext. My main concern is that the usage note at negerzoen should be identical unless it is necessary that one entry has more information. That said, some people with a more conservative outlook may find chocoladezoen PC or whatever, so perhaps that isn't uncontroversial? "Inoffensive" might work as well. ←₰-→ Lingo ^Bingo _Dingo (talk) 17:59, 16 June 2021 (UTC)

@Lingo Bingo Dingo Yes, good suggestion, "uncontroversial" instead of "neutral" works for me as it doesn't imply that negerinnentet cannot be neutral. The current situation - at least in my own experience - is that much (most?) usage is neutral (i.e. no one intends or feels offense). Morgengave (talk) 18:13, 16 June 2021 (UTC)

@Morgengave Great, that may serve as an agreed wording then. It is worth mentioning that "offensiveness" with regards to labelling does not really pertain to intent; plenty of older white people in the US may still say negro without meaning to be insulting, but the word is nonetheless considered offensive. Simply put, something can be derogatory without being offensive and something can be offensive without being pejorative. ←₰-→ Lingo ^Bingo _Dingo (talk) 18:26, 16 June 2021 (UTC)

I believe that these situations are not comparable. My impression is that a minority may find negerinnentet offensive. Hence, the potentially is key lest one person would think, based on our lemma, that their conversation partner is racist. The N-words are so highly controversial in the US (to the level of their being taboo words) that I doubt you can find many people - even older white people - that use it truly neutrally, and for certain neutral usage is not common. Morgengave (talk) 18:56, 16 June 2021 (UTC)

"Compound of negerin (black woman, negress) + -en- + tet (boob, tit)". Wow! If that's not offensive, what is offensive in Belgian Dutch? And yes, I'm an American (who doesn't consider themselves easily offended). I mean it's literally objectifying a black woman as a piece of candy. That's just wrong on so many levels, lol! Nosferattus (talk) 23:36, 16 June 2021 (UTC)

That is more or less why I would have expected this to be more offensive than negerzoen, but of course Flemish speakers consider some words to be offensive. Anyway our standards for labelling something "offensive" or "potentially offensive" seem to be all over the place. ←₰-→ Lingo ^Bingo _Dingo (talk) 17:34, 17 June 2021 (UTC)

This reminds me of the David Sedaris comedy vignette "Six To Eight Black Men". The premise of the vignette is how Dutch Christmas traditions are weird and offensive (to Americans), but somehow seem completely reasonable to Dutch people. Of course I imagine there are also American traditions that are weird and offensive to Dutch people! Nosferattus (talk) 00:24, 17 June 2021 (UTC)

Actually not Christmas (not even in the traditional Christmas season), and yes you should learn about such details before you comment on it. And they are offensive to many Dutch speakers too (not only to Dutch people), that's why Black Pete is much less of a thing now. ←₰-→ Lingo ^Bingo _Dingo (talk) 17:34, 17 June 2021 (UTC)

Of course the situations are comparable, they are not equivalent but they are analogous. ←₰-→ Lingo ^Bingo _Dingo (talk) 17:34, 17 June 2021 (UTC)

The word in question (without the -zoen or -innentet) is considered a light swear in the Netherlands, to my knowledge. If they find the Flemish variant of the treat reasonable in Flanders, that's completely possible, but I'm sure it still does warrant a "possibly offensive" note. --110521sgl (talk) 13:50, 18 June 2021 (UTC)

"kow"

How do I add that "kow" is a misspelling of "know"? Wallglobemat (talk) 13:22, 16 June 2021 (UTC)

Is it a common enough misspelling that we even want to add it? For that matter is it a true misspelling (= the writer genuinely believes that's how it's spelled)? Or is it just a typo? —Mahāgaja · talk 16:09, 16 June 2021 (UTC)

My experience tells me it's just a typo (not a misspelling). —TeragR ^disc./con. 04:50, 23 June 2021 (UTC)

*lukoss or *lukos ?

Why is the headword form, *lukoss, not found anywhere in the declension table ? Leasnam (talk) 17:13, 16 June 2021 (UTC)

What entry are you talking about? —Mahāgaja · talk 21:25, 16 June 2021 (UTC)

Nothing (except the Tea room) links to *lukoss or to *lukos, according to Special:WhatLinksHere/Reconstruction:Proto-Germanic/lukos &c. PJTraill (talk) 20:19, 17 June 2021 (UTC)

I think this was meant to link to Proto-Celtic *lukoss, where indeed the headword form does not occur in the declension table.  --Lambiam 11:05, 18 June 2021 (UTC)

Fixed. Now it does. —Mahāgaja · talk 18:00, 18 June 2021 (UTC)

Borry/borrie/borree/bory/borie/boree

Back in the 1980's a slang for a turd was borry/borrie/borree/bory/borie/boree. I never had occasion to read or write it, so I'm not sure what the best spelling would be, but it rhymed with "sorry".

Here's one example [14] using the "borry" spelling, albeit used in a metaphorical sense (as evident from the other tags used in combination with this one).

—DIV (1.129.106.0 06:03, 17 June 2021 (UTC))

be bothered

Is this ever used (with the same meaning) outside of the phrases can't be bothered, couldn't be bothered, or more generally not be bothered? Imetsia (talk) 15:42, 17 June 2021 (UTC)

I think you can say things like “They could be a first-class lexicographer if they could only be bothered to take it seriously”, so that hypothetical is possible as well as negative. Maybe even “Once he could be bothered to ...”, but I do not think you can omit then “can/could”. As for “not be bothered”, I think it only has this sense with “can/could”: “I’m not bothered” means something more like “Either alternative is all right by me”. PJTraill (talk) 20:33, 17 June 2021 (UTC)

Google Books has Hailes, K. (2018). The Little Unicorn Gift Shop. United Kingdom: HarperCollins Publishers. “To be bothered to think or care, about her daughter at all.” as part of a to-do list appearing in the book. Also there’s Morgan, S., King, K., Garbera, K., McArthur, F., Wilson, S., Grady, R., Gordon, A., Fielding, L., Faye, J., Flynn, C. (2017). Mills and Boon Christmas Joy Collection. United Kingdom: HarperCollins Publishers. “He wanted her to be aware of him and to be bothered by him.” There are also many results for “He/she didn’t want/wish to be bothered”. Overlordnat1 (talk) 21:20, 17 June 2021 (UTC)

See Polarity item#Determination of licensing contexts, paragraph 3, for some hints of the specific contexts that permit negative polarity items. many of which do not have not or indeed any explicit negative term, eg, never, no one, nothing, neither, etc.

So simple Google searches can identify numerous instance in which not does not precede be bothered, but almost all of them will turn out to be instances of these licensing contexts. We could make not be bothered a hard redirect to be bothered and, eventually, provide some Appendix that discussed negative polarity items and these diverse licensing contexts. DCDuring (talk) 00:30, 18 June 2021 (UTC)

If I'm reading this correctly, it rarely - if ever - appears in a non-infinitive form (and always in a generally impersonal form.) Should we declare it a defective verb? 110521sgl (talk) 00:37, 18 June 2021 (UTC)

Instead, we should have a relevant sense at bothered and delete this entry. Other copulative verbs work too: "He doesn't seem bothered", "I'm not getting bothered", etc. Compare arsed, for which we have an adjective entry, and no entry be arsed. —Mahāgaja · talk 06:40, 18 June 2021 (UTC)

Agreed. A sentence like ‘I am bothered by his slurping’ is one where ‘bothered’ is used with positive polarity and not preceded by an infinitive, so it’s not a defective verb and it’s probably licensed in too many situations where negation isn’t present to be a negative polarity item (though ‘pissed of’ would be more usual then ‘bothered’ in this example). We could perhaps find some way to keep the ‘chiefly negative’ tag, or even use ‘chiefly negative and preceded by the infinitive’ as a usage note for a newly created sense in the ‘adjective’ section of our ‘bothered’ entry? Overlordnat1 (talk) 09:47, 18 June 2021 (UTC)

But we're not talking about "bothered" as that adjective. In "I am bothered by his slurping," you could say that I then become "a bothered person" who gets "more bothered" with time and, after the fact, that "I was bothered" by it. No, we're talking about "It was annoying, but I couldn't be bothered to tell him to stop slurping." you can't say that "I am bothered to tell him as such." I'm fine with listing it as an adjective compatible with the copulative verbs (still only in a defective/impersonal sense,) but only as a separate entry. There's a clear difference between "I can't be bothered by these things right now. Focus, Denny, Focus," and "I can't be bothered to do the dishes right now," clearly have separate meanings for "can't be bothered." (By the way, @Overlordnat1, don't forget to indent your messages! I'm replying to you and you're replying to Mahāgaja, but Lambiam isn't replying to you.) --110521sgl (talk) 13:18, 18 June 2021 (UTC)

In the active voice, one can bother someone to do something: ”I told her that I did not think we should bother Him to do the things we could do ourselves.”^[15] Even if tried, this may, of course, be futile: “I doubt we can bother him to use his talents to fix the issue.”^[16] (not permanent media). Using the passive voice: although TechnoJacker has the talents to fix the issue, they can’t, supposedly, be bothered to use them to this end. Compare dictions like “Some people just can’t be told to shut up” and “DJs are often fools who run everything into the red and can’t be told to behave and use the mixer”. These are not arguments for an entry be told.  --Lambiam 10:56, 18 June 2021 (UTC)

Does Vicky Pollard's "Am I bovvered?" (= I don't care) count? Equinox ◑ 16:55, 19 June 2021 (UTC)

cummer, co-mother

Both defined as "the relationship of..." but seeming to refer to a person, the one who has that relationship to another. I don't understand the relationship well enough to rephrase it. Equinox ◑ 16:55, 19 June 2021 (UTC)

snikt

Sound of Wolverine's claws from a comic series. Does this pass WT:FICTION? It seems to be a sound effect written in the comic strips. I seem to remember CROOM used for the Star Trek transporter sound in comics, and of course Batman had lots of campy sound effect words of its own. Dictionary material? Equinox ◑ 17:51, 19 June 2021 (UTC)

It seems to have just enough cites in Google Books to support a cite as an onomatopoeia for the sound of sharp knife-like objects.--Prosfilaes (talk) 06:08, 20 June 2021 (UTC)

...which is to say an alt form of snick. Equinox ◑ 06:09, 20 June 2021 (UTC)

Yeah, it should be redefined to be broader. (And then a Wolverine cite could be used as one of the citations―for a general "the sound of a sharp object" sense―I think, just like Wolverine could provide a citation of bub (term of address).) - -sche (discuss) 02:03, 21 June 2021 (UTC)

deep

Adj. definition 6.2:

(sports, soccer, tennis) A long way forward.

However, as far as I understand it, if a soccer player is "deep", it means that he is a long way back, towards his own goal, i.e. the exact opposite of what we say. Is there a separate soccer sense that does in fact mean "a long way forward"? What about e.g. a "deep cross" or "deep ball"? Does this refer to direction, if so what direction, or only to distance? Mihia (talk) 18:00, 20 June 2021 (UTC)

I have the same understanding of ‘deep’ in its (Association) football context. I think ‘high’ (which we have listed with its football-related meaning) and ‘long’ (not explicitly defined with its football-related meaning) are antonyms Overlordnat1 (talk) 09:59, 22 June 2021 (UTC)

Right, I added that sense to "high" the other day. OK, so it seems that we definitely are missing the "near to one's own goal" sense for soccer, which I will add, but I am unclear what to do with the "long way forward" sense. In tennis and similar sports, a "deep" shot would (I think) be a shot that penetrated far into the opposing court. Does any analogous adjectival sense exist in sports such as football? (We can say e.g. "kick the ball deep into the opposition half", but this is adverbial. By the way, on a separate issue, adverb "deep" is simply defined as "deeply", whereas in fact the two words are far from interchangeable in many contexts. I hope to get on to looking at that in due course.) Mihia (talk) 17:54, 22 June 2021 (UTC)

Furthermore, I have a hunch that a "deep" player position in tennis might also be a position further back, and given that "a long way forward" is anyway a rather poor definition for the "deep shot" sense, I wonder whether our present definition actually exists at all? Could "deep" in "deep shot" merely mean "long", or could "deep" again refer to a position further back, but "back" from the perspective of the opponent? Mihia (talk) 18:24, 22 June 2021 (UTC)

It seems to me that ‘close to the baseline’ works as a definition of ‘deep’ for tennis (and football?), for example if someone’s positioned deep they’re close to their own baseline and if they play a deep shot it lands close to their opponent’s baseline. A ball which is booted a long way in football towards your opponent’ goal from your half to their half is called a ‘long ball’ by commentators on TV all the time, I’m not sure if a ‘deep ball’ has an equivalent meaning but then I’m not a huge sports fan. On an unrelated note, I’ve noticed we’re missing the slang sense where ‘long’ appears on its own to mean ‘boring’, ‘late’ or as a contraction of ‘a long time’ (For example, ‘My homework’s long’ = ‘my homework’s boring’, ‘this bus is long’ = (in the right context) ‘this bus is late’ and ‘I’ve been waiting long’ or ‘I’ve been waiting time’ to mean ‘I’ve been waiting (for) a long time’). We have ‘four long months’ meaning ‘four boring months’ but that’s a slightly different and far less colloquial usage.Overlordnat1 (talk) 07:59, 23 June 2021 (UTC)

FWIW, I don't know most of those senses. I would understand "My homework's long" as referring to lengthy questions/answers, or many of them, that would take a long time to complete. Yes, it could be boring too, but I wouldn't understand "long" to actually mean that. I wouldn't understand "This bus is long" at all (except in the obvious literal sense, of course), or recognise "I've been waiting time" as possible in English. Are these US usages perhaps? Assuming that they do exist, they may need regional labels. The final one, "long" meaning "for a long time", I do know, but this is already listed at long (ety 2). However, "I've been waiting long" is not very natural to me as an example, though "Have you been waiting long?" is. Mihia (talk) 17:22, 23 June 2021 (UTC)

No, it’s MLE (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multicultural_London_English#Vocabulary), I’ve heard ‘long’ used to mean ‘boring’ (Wikipedia has the similar meanings ‘laborious, tedious’) in Coventry too though. ‘Taking a long time’ is probably a better translation of a sense not listed there than ‘late’ tbh, as you wouldn’t say ‘I was long for work’ but I have heard something like ‘This bus is long, man/blood/cuz’. I hasten to add that I’m not a native speaker of this particular variety of English! Overlordnat1 (talk) 12:26, 24 June 2021 (UTC)

• I did the best I could with the sporting senses, though work on the deep article still remains. I don't know the MLE senses for the other words, so someone else will have to do those, innit. Mihia (talk) 10:47, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

high

Adj. sense 4:

(in several set phrases) Remote in distance or time.

high latitude, high antiquity

Does anyone perceive that "high" in "high latitude" means "remote"? Mihia (talk) 19:23, 20 June 2021 (UTC)

@Mihia: I don't. (Welcome back!) 212.224.235.64 21:18, 20 June 2021 (UTC)

Thanks! Mihia (talk) 08:36, 21 June 2021 (UTC)

It's how other dictionaries analyze it, e.g. Dictionary.com has "remote: high latitude, high antiquity", Merriam-Webster has "relatively far from the equator: high latitude", and Century has "Remote, either as regards distance north or south of the equator, or as regards lapse of years in chronological reckoning". This could be wrong, but then what would "high" in "high latitude" mean instead? It's tempting to think "Svalbard is at a high latitude" could just be using the same kind of sense (~"elevated"?) as "the red ornament is high in the tree", as if the speaker is conceptualizing earth as having a top and bottom with Svalbard high up near the top, but the fact that areas both north and south of the equator (e.g. Svalbard and Vostok station) are simultaneously (at) "high latitudes" does suggest it's something different, since I don't think one could say "both the red dot and the blue dot are located high on this diamond". - -sche (discuss) 01:56, 21 June 2021 (UTC)

I had always assumed this came about as a mix of two reasons: (a) the latitude numbers get larger ("higher") at high latitudes; and (b) northern "high" latitudes are "high up" on the globe, and the term was later reapplied for the southern latitudes by equivalence. This, that and the other (talk) 05:59, 21 June 2021 (UTC)

That's exactly what I would have thought. Noting also the existence of "low" latitudes, e.g. defined here as "between the Equator (0 degrees N/S) and 30 degrees N/S". If "high" latitudes are "remote" then are "low" latitudes "nearby"? If the interpretation of "high latitude" is in doubt, I wonder if we can come up with a better example of "high" meaning "remote in distance". I can't think of anything at the moment. Mihia (talk) 08:35, 21 June 2021 (UTC)

Not to mention the obvious question: remote from where? There's an awful lot of nowhere around the equator. As for an example, what about the high sea? Chuck Entz (talk) 08:58, 21 June 2021 (UTC)

In the plural form high seas, the sense is definitely one of remoteness from land. In general, any relativity in the original sum-of-parts meaning of set phrases is conventionally fixed.  --Lambiam 10:03, 21 June 2021 (UTC)

"high sea(s)" is a great idea, but according to https://www.etymonline.com/word/high%20seas, "high" in this phrase actually means "deep". Some guy on the Internet at https://www.quora.com/Where-does-the-term-high-seas-originate-from says the same. Mihia (talk) 10:06, 21 June 2021 (UTC)

OED has a pair of obsolete senses at height, which we lack: "5. a. Geography. = latitude n. Obsolete. Cf. the expression high latitude. b. More generally: position (at sea) in the parallel of, alongside of, and, hence, off some place. (French à la hauteur de.) Obsolete."

I also note the existence of the phrase "the height of antiquity", which matches our sense 4 at height ("the highest point or maximum degree"). Perhaps the high in high antiquity really means something like utmost. This, that and the other (talk) 03:24, 22 June 2021 (UTC)

• Sent to RFV. Mihia (talk) 12:29, 24 June 2021 (UTC)

s.l.a.n.

I cannot find any information about what purpose this abbreviation was used for - that is, what kinds of entities were being described as "without place, year or name". Webster has it but with no additional info visible in the free edition. Our entry mentions that it relates to publications (presumably anonymously issued ones), but this detail is not included in the sources I have looked at. Is anyone familiar with this expression or would know where to look? This, that and the other (talk) 05:30, 21 June 2021 (UTC)

sine loco and sine nomine are listed individually in the Dictionary for Library and Information Science [17], where they (or their abbreviations) are said to be terms used in library cataloguing. They say that nomine refers to the name of the publisher or distributor, whereas we say it refers to the name of the publication. The Oxford Dictionary of Abbreviations [18], defines s.l.a.n. as "without place, year, name (of printer)" (my emphasis). Mihia (talk) 08:55, 21 June 2021 (UTC)

These abbreviations (s.l., s.a., s.l.a., etc.) are also used in bibliographic referencing. The Harvard Reference Guide explains s.n. as “sine nomine: without a [printer’s] name”.^[19] An unnamed edition of a work can be referred to as sine titulo, but this Latin phrase is (in this specific usage) normally not abbreviated.  --Lambiam 09:53, 21 June 2021 (UTC)

Harved Reference Guide has:

1. "Latin abbreviations for missing information (date, place, or publisher)"
2. "s.n. (sine nomine: without printer’s name)"
3. "No publisher s.n. (sine nomine: without a [printer’s] name)"

Publisher and printer can be two different persons/companiens. As it's once [printer's] in brackets and given as a translation of the Latin, the text with publisher seems more right. --93.221.43.105 12:17, 21 June 2021 (UTC)

Whatever. As long as we agree it is not about a missing “name of publication”.  --Lambiam 13:17, 21 June 2021 (UTC)

Coraggio... fatti ammazzare

The Italian title of the dubbed version of the film Sudden Impact is “Coraggio... fatti ammazzare”. It was taken from the translation of the catchphrase of that film, “Go ahead, make my day”. The definition we give for the interjection coraggio is “cheer up!”. However, the translation “Cheer up... get killed” can’t be right. It seems more like “I dare you...” or “Have the guts...”. What is the range of senses in which the interjection coraggio can be used appropriately?  --Lambiam 09:31, 21 June 2021 (UTC)

The interjection is just an exhortation to not lose heart, to persevere, and/or to face a situation with resolve/strength of will. That just about covers the range of meaning. So "have the guts" is sometimes an appropriate translation. Imetsia (talk) 15:04, 21 June 2021 (UTC)

авось

As a native Russian speaker, I find the first definition incorrect. The closest analog of the actual meaning of the word is "hopefully"(2) -- (Added in revision 62931681 by User:2a02:2455:51f:3700:905d:49c8:4397:b9ac)

Hopefully is an adverb. Isn’t авось a noun? (Also, I see no clear difference between the two given senses.)  --Lambiam 11:59, 21 June 2021 (UTC)

It is unfortunate that the IP did not make clear which definition they meant: that of the adverb, or the first of the noun. It is a little odd that here we present an adverb with one sense and a noun with two, while Russian Wiktionary has a particle and a noun, both with only one sense (where the latter definition is translated by DeepL as “luck, good fortune, favourable circumstances”). PJTraill (talk) 14:17, 24 June 2021 (UTC)

speech recognition

This is a soft redirect to voice recognition, and has been since it was created a decade ago. An IP has questioned this on the talk pages of both entries. Are these the same?

Just looking at the literal meaning of the component words, one would expect voice recognition to be the recognition of specific voices to determine who is speaking, while speech recognition should be the recognition of what is being said. I realize that usage doesn't match this, but I doubt that the two are complete synonyms.

Without looking at the usage, it seems likely to me that voice recognition would be a combination of both the literal meaning as I would interpret it and a separate sense that is indeed synonymous with speech recognition. Indeed, WP's page for w:Voice recognition is a disambiguation between speaker recognition (the first concept) and speech recognition (the second).

Could someone familiar with actual usage sort this out and update the two pages accordingly? Chuck Entz (talk) 14:29, 21 June 2021 (UTC)

I’ve swapped their roles and made speech recognition, being the more usual term for the software function, the main entry, with voice recognition softly redirecting there. And I have added the sense of “speaker identification” to the latter.  --Lambiam 11:24, 23 June 2021 (UTC)

return on investment

Is this strictly a financial term, or is it also used figuratively? 212.224.224.150 22:26, 21 June 2021 (UTC)

I would say that a non-finance usage of "return on investment", which I'm sure could be found, is not so much a figurative use of a technical finance term, but more like "ordinary English", i.e. sum-of-parts for non-finance meanings of the parts. I would also say that our present definition, "A benefit gained by an investor from an investment", does not very successfully explain the technical finance meaning, or show why it would not merely be sum of parts, in my opinion. Mihia (talk) 18:01, 23 June 2021 (UTC)

User keeps overwriting the Proto-Romance pronunciation module

@Widsith, Jusjih, EncycloPetey, TheDaveRoss, Mike, SemperBlotto, Hippietrail, Paul G, PierreAbbat

Hello everyone. I'm not sure if this is the correct way to request administrative help, so I apologize in advance if this is not the right place.

First the background info. On the Latin pronunciation module there is a subsection titled 'vulgar' (or 'vul') which is used to provide pronunciations for reconstructed Proto-Romance entries on Wiktionary, such as *adventura or *desidium.

Currently all features of the pronunciation are based on multiple reliable sources cited here and here. The pronunciation indicated there is the reconstructed Proto-Romance pronunciation, which is appropriate for reconstructed Proto-Romance words on Wiktionary.

The problem is that the user @Brutal Russian has several times now attempted to replace these pronunciations with his pet project: his personal idea of how Pompeiian Latin sounded circa 79 A.D. (To date he has not provided a single source that supports any of the phonological features that he assigned to it.) Twice now he has tried to overwrite the Proto-Romance pronunciations with his 'Pompeiian Latin'.

I have already suggested that he start a separate sub-module for his 'Pompeiian Latin', instead of overwriting the Proto-Romance one, since the latter is currently being used for dozens of Proto-Romance words, and I think this is a reasonable thing to ask. Unfortunately he has shown no sign of listening.

I am leaving this message here for now simply to bring attention to the issue. I am not asking for him to be blocked or anything, at least not yet. The Nicodene (talk) 04:41, 22 June 2021 (UTC)

వార్పు

వార్పు has a couple of unusual characteristics. Firstly, the definition: change - The process of cooking rice.. Secondly, the heading ====Examples==== Would anyone be able to make this clearer? Pious Eterino (talk) 14:40, 22 June 2021 (UTC)

For what it is worth, the cited source has this:

వారుపు or వార్పు vārupu. n. The act of straining water or letting it flow, ఆచమనము. Water poured off from boiling rice, గంజి.^[20]

The term ఆచమనము (ācamanamu) (no entry here) is defined as “[Skt.] n. Sipping water three times before religious ceremonies or meals, or after meals, or after relieving oneself, repeating at the same time the 24 principal names of Vishnu”. We do have an entry for గంజి (gañji), defined as “gruel, rice-water”. Apparently, వార్పు (vārpu) is a verbal noun of a verb meaning “To flow down, or drain off, as water from boiled rice” (no entry here) that is homonymous with the pronoun వారు (vāru).  --Lambiam 17:06, 22 June 2021 (UTC)

Accent on Russian те́чь?

Is it correct that an accent is shown on the infinitive те́чь (téčʹ, “flow”)? I see no accent here in Russian Wiktionary, and nothing about accents on Russian monosyllables in English Wikipedia. Moreover, some links there (e.g. at the perfective стечь (stečʹ)) also omit the accent. PJTraill (talk) 21:52, 22 June 2021 (UTC)

The vast majority of Russian 1-syllable words does not have stress marked. “Ó бо́же” looks silly to me. The declension templates add a stress mark also to monosyllabic forms.  --Lambiam 10:46, 23 June 2021 (UTC)

one's socks off, one's ass off, one's butt off, etc.

We classify one's socks off as an adverb. Does anyone think that this is an adverb? While it can be given a substitutable adverbial definition, to me it seems grammatically a fragment that would defy classification as a specific PoS.

While we separate out one's socks off, presumably on the basis that it can be preceded by many verbs, we list work someone's ass off, and others, explicitly with the verb "work", even though other verbs can again be used. I would fix this directly, i.e. move the main entry to one's ass off, except that I am not thrilled about listing these fragments (as it seems to me) as lemmas. Is there any better solution?

We have separate "butt" entries at work someone's butt off and work one's butt off, yet one "ass" entry at work someone's ass off. The complication is how to cater for the fact that one can work someone else's butt/ass off, as well as (more commonly) one's own. Does this entail having two separate entries, or can we somehow cater for both under one entry? work someone's ass off attempts to cater for both, but to my eye the use of "someone's" seems not to properly fit the most common usage of working one's own butt off.

Any good ideas about how to treat these kinds of entries are welcomed. Mihia (talk) 18:47, 23 June 2021 (UTC)

These collocations function as if they were adverbs. We have a limited number or PoS headings. They are not constituents and, so, are not phrases. So "adverb" is probably as good as we can do.

IMO one's socks off should be moved to someone's socks off, possibly without leaving a redirect. Is it ever used about oneself?

I would think that a hard redirect from one's ass off to someone' ass off, together with a usage note and usage examples showing the reflexive use would be good enough. But is there really a large (open) set of verbs that collocate with these? DCDuring (talk) 06:34, 24 June 2021 (UTC)

In answer to your first question, for me, yes, most definitely "one's socks off" can be used about oneself, and this is by far the predominant use. "I've been working my socks off", "He's been working his socks off", etc. all are normal and natural to me, whereas "My boss has been working my socks off" seems kind of weird. Are you sure that you see it the other way around? For your second question, I think there are quite a few verbs that can collocate with one's ass off, e.g. "laugh", "dance", "play" (e.g. a musical instrument), "party", "lie" (tell untruths) etc. etc. -- certainly more than enough usage to justify a generic entry. Mihia (talk) 12:28, 24 June 2021 (UTC)

Not only that, but many words can substitute for "ass", including "butt", "arse", "nuts", "balls", "bollocks", "tits". Seems that we ideally need a template entry for "X one's Y off". Do we have any mechanism for this? Mihia (talk) 12:55, 24 June 2021 (UTC)

I am familiar with knock someone's socks off. I'm not familiar with your usage. We do have snowclones in Appendix:English snowclones. DCDuring (talk) 16:46, 24 June 2021 (UTC)

OK, knock someone's socks off is different. Perhaps one's socks off in the sense "With a large amount of effort or intensity" is specific to BrE. On the "snowclone" point, if I created an entry "X one's Y off", then how would someone wanting to look up e.g. "he played his tits off" find this? Is there a established mechanism? Mihia (talk) 17:48, 24 June 2021 (UTC)

One would have to add the Appendix namespace to the namespaces on which searches are run. My inclination would be to assess as non-native anyone who said, say, work one's socks off, so it might be much less common in the US. DCDuring (talk) 05:25, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

And that would, I suppose need to be done manually by the user, would it? So something that essentially no one would do or know to do ... Mihia (talk) 17:58, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

To me, calling the non-reflexive usage, e.g. "someone's arse off", e.g. "the boss worked our arses off", an "adverb" seems even more far-fetched than the reflexive case, in fact just wrong. Therefore I have reverted to "phrase" at someone's arse off, even though it is not strictly grammatically a phrase. As I say, any better ideas please suggest them. Mihia (talk) 17:45, 27 June 2021 (UTC)

something

Presently we define "something" in the sense of e.g. "I miss them something terrible" as "To a high degree", which I think is not adequate and possibly just wrong. It seems to me that one function of this "something" is to "adverbialise" the following adjective. Does it also have an intensifier function, as many dictionaries claim? Is "I miss them something terrible" stronger than "I miss them terribly"? I have doubts. What do you think? Mihia (talk) 20:54, 23 June 2021 (UTC)

You might be on to something. I wonder whether that's been addressed in the literature. DCDuring (talk) 06:39, 24 June 2021 (UTC)

Yes, I think a non-gloss definition indicating that it's an adverbializer would be an improvement. It should also have a usage note explaining that it only applies to a few set phrases. Ultimateria (talk) 17:35, 28 June 2021 (UTC)

• I have changed the definition to mention that it is an adverbialiser. I have removed the claim that it is an intensifier, on the basis of my original comment, i.e. taking the usex "I miss them something terrible" as an example, to me this is not an intensification of "I miss them terribly", or "I miss them to a terrible extent/degree", but just another way of saying the same thing. However, if anyone definitely believes that there is an intensifier function, please put this back in. Mihia (talk) 20:58, 28 June 2021 (UTC)

English choops

Does it rhyme with /-uːps/ or /-ʊps/? ·~ dictátor·mundꟾ 21:01, 23 June 2021 (UTC)

dompt

WOTD. Labelled "reflexive", which I would understand to mean that it is used in the pattern "dompt oneself", yet the examples do not bear this out. Or is "reflexive" supposed to mean something else in this case? Mihia (talk) 12:02, 24 June 2021 (UTC)

I don't see what else it could mean, so I removed "reflexive". —Mahāgaja · talk 13:06, 24 June 2021 (UTC)

Had I known ...

Under were, we list the counterfactual use as an instance of the simple present/past subjunctive of be, as follows:

• with “if” omitted, put first in an “if” clause:

  Were it simply that she wore a hat, I would not be upset at all. (= If it were simply...)

  Were father a king, we would have war. (= If father were a king,...)

For had, we list its use as a past subjunctive, labelled “(now rare)”, but not its use for retrospective counterfactuals, which I think is not that rare. What is a good way to handle this?  --Lambiam 13:20, 24 June 2021 (UTC)

The "now rare" sense is defined as meaning "would have", while in standard modern English we cannot say "If I would have known" for "If I had known", nor "Would I have known" for "Had I known", so it seems like these may be different things. I would say that the counterfactual "had known" in these examples is a kind of "unreal past perfect" tense, backshifted from "I knew" (analogously to "I know" -> "If I knew"). Whether it is truly a subjunctive may be doubtful, though I am happy to defer to experts on that. Mihia (talk) 17:33, 24 June 2021 (UTC)

In fact, an existing example for the "auxiliary used to form the past perfect tense" sense of "had" does involve a counterfactual. I don't know whether we want to split this out and make it explicit, or just treat it as a regular grammar feature that doesn't need covering by a separate dictionary sense, similar to the way that we would, I assume, not want to list a separate counterfactual sense for ordinary past tenses, such as "knew" in "if I knew". Mihia (talk) 17:40, 24 June 2021 (UTC)

had

Adj. sense 1:

1. (informal) Duped.

   We've been had.

Does anyone agree that "had" in "We've been had" is an adjective? If it was, then, by analogy with similar sentences, e.g. "We've been quiet", "We've been had" would apparently mean that the speaker had been in a state of "being had" over a past period leading up until the present, which surely is not what it does actually mean. Failing this example, are there any true adjectival examples? Mihia (talk) 19:12, 24 June 2021 (UTC)

Someone could be in a state of being continuously had/conned over a long period of time rather than tricked into handing over or losing their money or valuables in an instant, surely? The main objection has to be that ‘had’ can’t precede a noun like other past participles; one can be a ‘drunk man/woman’ but not a ‘had man/woman’, as I see it. Verb sense 23 of ‘have’ has ‘trick, deceive’ which perhaps covers this meaning, but it’s not ideal that the example they give of this uses the past tense ‘had’Overlordnat1 (talk) 08:32, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

Uses like “We’ve been had by the New Journalism”,^[21] “I’ve been had by a Seafair pirate!”^[22] and “We’ve been had by the galactic goons!”^[23] should make clear that this is a past participle. Uses of have sense 23 in the present and future tenses are indeed rare or nonexistent, as are uses of the present particple.  --Lambiam 12:00, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

To me, "We've been had" would usually refer to a discrete action suffered. I suppose, yes, it's possible to be "had" over a duration -- to me it seems slightly marginal -- but I would still see it as verbal. E.g. "We've been had all year" to me would not mean that someone was in a state of "had" all year, but would refer to an action suffered over a duration, i.e. passive verbal, not adjectival. When you say "main objection", I'm not quite sure objection to what, but I see the lack of attributive use as, if anything, evidence against its being an adjectival rather than verbal use of "had". Mihia (talk) 13:51, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

Yes I mean that’s the main argument against ‘had’ being an adjective. As it’s rare (impossible?) to use sense 23 of ‘have’ in the present or future tense, perhaps we should add a usage note explaining this and delete the separate entry for ‘had’ as an adjective?Overlordnat1 (talk) 17:46, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

I see, thanks. While we're at it, do you (or anyone) have a view on the other, obsolete, alleged adjective sense, that of "available"? Is this likely to genuinely be adjectival? Mihia (talk) 17:56, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

• Sent to RFD, along with be had. Mihia (talk) 19:15, 26 June 2021 (UTC)

zeros is the preferred spelling of the plural noun, not zeroes

Details on the Talk page. — This unsigned comment was added by Cerberus0 (talk • contribs) at 20:49, 24 June 2021 (UTC).

Mazu: Asturian for "massif"?

I recently left this comment: Talk:mazu (the first one in case more are added after mine). Regards. --37.11.122.76 00:39, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

It was added by Wonderfool, who used to pretend to know Asturian. I removed it TVdinnerless (talk) 07:36, 26 June 2021 (UTC)

OK, I see. Thanks so much! --37.11.122.76 13:09, 26 June 2021 (UTC)

muffin

We have ‘muffin’ defined as ‘a cupcake, usually frosted’ but surely the important distinction between the two is size? Surely it’s ‘a large cup/fairy/queen cake, usually iced/frosted’? Also the ‘usually U.S’ tag should probably be changed to ‘originally U.S’ or removed. It’s a U.S invention but ‘usually U.S’ suggests that it gets called other things around the world, which I don’t think is true (‘crumpet’ doesn’t have a ‘usually U.K’ tag, for comparison)Overlordnat1 (talk) 10:31, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

Actually we have "muffin" defined as "a cupcake without frosting, but sometimes glazed" (emphasis added). I definitely don't think there's necessarily a size difference between muffins and cupcakes; I use the same pans when making either one, so my cupcakes are the same size as my muffins. The difference between cupcakes and muffins in my opinion is more about texture than anything else: muffins have a more breadlike texture and cupcakes a more cakelike texture, but there's a spectrum between the two with no clear delineation. I do think we should find a way to merge senses 2 and 3 of "muffin" to include sweet muffins like chocolate muffins while still not implying that chocolate cupcakes are chocolate muffins if I haven't put frosting on them. —Mahāgaja · talk 11:46, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

I hadn’t thought about home-made versions or about the relative textures of the cakes but, when sold commercially, cupcakes tend to be smaller and have swirls of less dense icing (‘frosting’) on them and muffins tend to be larger with a thinner, denser and more even layer of icing (‘(sweet) glaze’) in my experience. Sorry for the careless misquote, I agree with you about the difference in texture that you just brought to our attention Overlordnat1 (talk) 17:30, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

@Overlordnat1: I am in general agreement with Mahagaja. In my experience, a "muffin" is like this, whereas a "cupcake" is like this.

Muffins are often eaten with/as breakfast. In contrast, the cupcake is explicitly a dessert, and is the sort of thing that one would commonly find at a get-together or other event. Incidentally, the traditional English food item that is simply called a "muffin" in England, is called an "English muffin" in the United States, and is a common breakfast item.

Personally, I don't think that the actual thought "Aren't muffins and cupcakes nearly identical things?" ever really occurred to me until a Briton pointed it out. Since one is a common breakfast item, whereas the other is explicitly a dessert, the clear connection between the two food items may not be naturally realised by every individual. Tharthan (talk) 18:00, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

@Thartan: I can’t get your first link to work but the second picture is clearly a cupcake and a muffin, when used to refer to a type of bread (usually a thin bread roll with a dense and lightly floured crust which is designed to be toasted; an ‘English muffin’) not cake, is indeed usually eaten at breakfast time Overlordnat1 (talk) 23:35, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

I agree that size is not a definitional distinction (unless qualified in some way like "sometimes larger"). I removed the "especially US" label (though reading Wikipedia, maybe it should be restored? more input from British, Canadian, etc editors welcome), and also the "informally" label since that's also not accurate (AFAIK it's the official name of the things on commercial packages of them, etc). I also added images of senses 1 ("English muffin") and 3 (cupcake-shaped "American muffin") from Wikipedia. It is not clear to me what sense 2 is getting at that would be different from sense 3. (I would regard this as using the same sense of "muffin" as this, yeah? And both are "cupcake-shaped"/"cupcakes", since sweet dessert cupcakes also exist in either shape, either the "muffintop"-spreading shape or the domed, not-spreading shape, right?) - -sche (discuss) 19:35, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

Great job on adding the picture and removing some of the dubious wording. After seeing on Wikipedia those pictures of home-made poppy seed muffins and pumpkin muffins that look small, have no ‘muffin tops’, have (in the case of the pumpkin muffins) a swirly icing pattern and are probably no different in consistency to cupcakes, I’m rapidly losing confidence that the two words can be clearly distinguished in American speech to be honest but I would only ever use the word to describe the domed cakes myself (as an Englishman). Sense 2 of muffin is a complete mystery to me too Overlordnat1 (talk) 00:02, 26 June 2021 (UTC)

The problem, as I see it, is that the clear distinction between the more breadlike muffins and the more cakelike cupcakes that I remember from childhood has become blurred over the years by a growing tendancy to make muffins sweeter and more dessertlike. I'm guessing this is because plain things like traditional muffins are considered too boring, while desserts are perceived as more fun- so people keep adding dessertlike features to muffins to "dress them up". Chuck Entz (talk) 00:32, 26 June 2021 (UTC)

Yeah. @Overlordnat1: This is the kind of thing that is traditionally called a "muffin" in the United States. They are a common breakfast food. A "cupcake", as I said before, looks like these.

They can definitely be distinguished in American English speech. However, as Chuck Entz pointed out, there has been a trend in more recent years to make muffins sweeter and more "fun". But the average American's "muffins" are like this. Tharthan (talk) 01:37, 26 June 2021 (UTC)

As a Canadian, it had never occurred to me that muffins and cupcakes are the same thing anymore than that meat pies and fruit pies are the same thing. Obviously, they look the same, but one is a dessert and the other isn't. Muffins can be savoury (like cornmeal muffins) or sweet, but are usually breakfast or snack food even when sweet. Andrew Sheedy (talk) 02:36, 26 June 2021 (UTC)

What you’re both saying tallies entirely with my understanding of a (sweet/American) muffin and a cupcake and the pictures are clearly as you describe but some of the pictures on the Wikipedia ‘muffin’ article are clearly of cupcakes and yet some people must call them muffins, so how do we account for this? Anyhow, I think we’re all agreed that defining the two words in such a way as to effectively make then synonyms (for example by saying muffins are ‘cupcake-shaped’) isn’t ideal. It never occurred to me that they were the same either until I read this article Overlordnat1 (talk) 02:59, 26 June 2021 (UTC)

I don't think saying that muffins are cupcake-shaped (or vice versa) is defining them as synonyms, just saying the shapes are (broadly) the same. Since they're baked in the same containers from a fairly similar range of ingredients and rise in very similar ways (as one cite I added to the citations page mentions), it's unsurprising that the range of shapes a muffin can take and the range of shapes a cupcake can take are the same; more generally, it's unsurprising (to me) that there's a grey area rather than a bright line that separates the two. There are even frosted muffins, and unfrosted cupcakes. If there's a better way to explain the shape, that'd be good and useful in any case since cupcake doesn't explain its shape, so defining something as "cupcake-shaped" is currently uninformative to someone who doesn't know what a cupcake is. - -sche (discuss) 03:17, 26 June 2021 (UTC)

[edit conflictThe only one on the Wikipedia page that I might consider a cupcake are the pumpkin muffins. But that's partly explicable by the fact that it comes from an Italian website and seems to have a different kind of icing than would normally be found on a cupcake. In my experience, cupcakes are pretty icing heavy, and it's cake icing that one would find on them, not meringue or whatever is on those muffins (but those are borderline). All the rest are not desserts, and are therefore not cupcakes. Andrew Sheedy (talk) 03:39, 26 June 2021 (UTC)

Another issue is that ‘muffin’ is a regional term for any bread roll (not just a flat one) in parts of England and that sense is missing. In fact the term for a ‘round lump of bread’ is the most regionally varied term in England by a country mile (‘roll/bread roll/bap/cob/batch/bread cake/tea cake/muffin/barm/bun’ and probably others I’ve missed are all used completely generically in some areas but some of these terms are used more specifically in others.) Overlordnat1 (talk) 00:21, 26 June 2021 (UTC)

Note that there is a related section at requests for deletion.—The Editor's Apprentice (talk) 16:18, 26 June 2021 (UTC)

English word for Sprühbeutel

What do you call this thing in English. The bag being used to spray stuff on the cakes.__Gamren (talk) 15:21, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

pastry bag DTLHS (talk) 15:59, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

piping bag Overlordnat1 (talk) 16:45, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

"Icing bag" is also fairly common, and there are fewer, but still many, uses of "decorating bag".  --Lambiam 17:25, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

frosting bomb (JK) ‑‑ Eiríkr Útlendi │^{Tala við mig} 17:28, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

Are these specifically for extruding icing/frosting? What if it's, say, whipped cream, or dough (e.g. churro dough or vaniljekrans dough), or meringue, or flødebolle filling, or soft ice?__Gamren (talk) 18:30, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

I agree with "piping bag", but never in a million years would it have occurred to me to call it a Sprühbeutel in German, since you're not spraying the frosting on the cake, you're squeezing (or, to be technical, extruding) it on. In fact, I just checked and the one in my kitchen calls itself a Spritzbeutel. —Mahāgaja · talk 18:40, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

It doesn't seem to be common. It's just what google translate said, and searching for it gave a few images. spritzen is defined as "to squirt, to spurt", which, doesn't that also suggest a liquid substance?__Gamren (talk) 21:38, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

@Gamren: Yes, but sprühen and spray imply many fine droplets (like an aerosol spray or spray paint), not a viscous mass. At any rate, German Wikipedia calls it w:de:Spritzbeutel and adds Spritzsack, Dressierbeutel, and Spritztüte as synonyms. —Mahāgaja · talk 08:08, 26 June 2021 (UTC)

• @Gamren: In my admittedly limited exposure to US baking practice, I've seen these used most commonly for applying frosting, icing, whipped cream (which can sometimes be considered as a type of frosting), or other decorative touches. In the UK baking I've seen on programs like "Bake Off", these appear to be used much more extensively, to pipe out batter, meringue, etc. ‑‑ Eiríkr Útlendi │^{Tala við mig} 19:32, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

• frosting and icing currently seem to be defined as exact synonyms: a sugary coating on baked goods. If whipped cream is a kind of "frosting", that entry may need to be changed. American-style cupcakes have something on top that is definitely not just a "coating", that is, a thin covering layer; would this be considered "frosting"?__Gamren (talk) 21:48, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

• @Gamren: Subjectively, I'd call that frosting. ‑‑ Eiríkr Útlendi │^{Tala við mig} 22:22, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

Ironically, I can find cites for google books:"whipped cream icing" but not google books:"whipped cream frosting". But I suspect that any category of thing which one of the terms frosting or icing is sometimes broadened to include, the other can sometimes also include. (Even the set phrases/terms fondant icing and royal icing are also found as fondant frosting and royal frosting.) Our definitions for frosting and icing are suboptimal, though, since defining it as a "glaze" or "coating" indeed misses that it can sometimes have significantly more thickness and 'puffiness' than a "coating" or a glaze, as noted above. There's probably not a bright-line distinction demarcating when something stops being a glaze and starts being an icing, but I do think icing/frosting often (not always) refers to thicker things than glaze normally would... - -sche (discuss) 03:33, 26 June 2021 (UTC)

We'd have to double check with some Brits, but I think the term frosting isn't really used in en-GB, and icing is the usual term, while in en-US they're synonyms, with frosting being somewhat more common. In addition, I think in the U.S. at least, most ordinary people consider the two terms completely synonymous, but professional bakers make a distinction; see [24] for example. —Mahāgaja · talk 08:08, 26 June 2021 (UTC)

That’s absolutely true, ‘frosting’ is an Americanism. I’m not sure I can ever remember one of us Brits saying or writing ‘frosting’ other than when quoting a North American, or taking part in a debate about semantics and word use like this one. Overlordnat1 (talk) 08:29, 26 June 2021 (UTC)

What was swept out of the way?

“..., yet once strategists realised their [i.e., of killer robots] perceived advantages as a means of carrying out targeted killings, all objections were swept out of the way.”

What was swept out of the way here?

1. Acts of objecting.
2. Statements expressing opposition, or reasons or causes for expressing opposition.

 --Lambiam 19:42, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

Almost certainly (2), I would say, so the example seems to be in the wrong place. Mihia (talk) 20:48, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

Re def. 2, shouldn't it be propositions rather than statements? It's not about writings or oral presentations, rather it's about the substantive objection. DCDuring (talk) 22:50, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

Yes, in logic the term statement is used as a synonym of proposition, but in common use the first connotes the expressed form, while the second connotes its intention.  --Lambiam 10:56, 26 June 2021 (UTC)

Let's hear it for "common use". DCDuring (talk) 15:35, 26 June 2021 (UTC)

Show up, sense 2

Somehow the current definition at show up doesn't seem right to me: To make visible or expose faults and deficiencies in, usually by comparison. To 'show (someone) up' is related to 'show out' ("make a show of"); and 'show up' is "to outdo someone in show or showing"...like, 'to one up' in show. So if a girl goes to a party made up in a casual dress, she might get 'shown up' (i.e. "outdone in show") by someone wearing an evening gown with glitter. Anyone else agree with this ? Leasnam (talk) 01:21, 26 June 2021 (UTC)

I would guess that this sense of "show up" is a development of the "make visible" sense, with the idea that faults/deficiencies are made conspicuous. I would put senses 2 and 3 the other way round, even make 2 a subsense of 3. I don't recognise any connection with "show out", and in fact I did not even know that that phrase could mean "make a show of" (are you sure you don't mean show off?). By the way, on a separate point, the usage note alleging that, for the "make visible" sense, "The object normally comes after up, even when it is a pronoun" seems weird to me. Would we ever say e.g. "show up it" or "show up me", in any sense of "show up"? Mihia (talk) 21:34, 26 June 2021 (UTC)

As with most (all?) phrasal verbs pronouns and short NPs (objects) can come between the verb and the particle. Long NPs (objects) almost always follow the particle.

Examples: "The foregoing has discussed the general selection of material to show up optical analysis errors."

"The foregoing has discussed the general selection of material to show up optical analysis errors"

Searching for instances of [SHOW] PRONOUN up are Google Books provides an abundance of examples, but all that I've seem have punctuation between PRONOUN and up or would benefit from such punctuation. DCDuring (talk) 22:01, 26 June 2021 (UTC)

Are you sure that came out as you intended? Anyway, the usage note makes no sense to me, so I have deleted it. If anyone can explain why it makes sense then please do so. Mihia (talk) 17:23, 27 June 2021 (UTC)

I also swapped the order, so sense 2 is now sense 3. Mihia (talk) 17:28, 27 June 2021 (UTC)

I've made a slight change to (now) sense 4. Please let me know if I've missed something/anything. Leasnam (talk) 15:39, 1 July 2021 (UTC)

wampish

Should this entry be under a "Scots" heading? —The Editor's Apprentice (talk) 17:24, 26 June 2021 (UTC)

war of religion = religious war = holy war?

The Wikipedia article on religious wars begins thus: "A religious war or holy war is a war primarily caused or justified by differences in religion"; in other words, it seems to treat holy war as a synonym of religious war. Is that correct? I feel holy war carries connotations (of conquest and conversion) that religious war doesn't have. 2A02:2788:A4:205:3CC8:9F5F:53CB:FDCF 19:25, 26 June 2021 (UTC)

"Holy war" seems like a positive descriptor; if a war is "holy", then it is also just.__Gamren (talk) 13:34, 27 June 2021 (UTC)

They indeed aren't true synonyms, Wikipedia is wrong. Holy war is suggestive of an explicit (religious) justification for a higher good and fanaticism, with heavy emphasis on the efforts of the marketing department, and can be used figuratively for efforts that are neither religious nor wars. Wiktionary's definition isn't very good, these from OneLook are better despite other shortcomings: [25] [26] [27] In practice many if not most religious wars involve religious justifications and may be considered holy wars. By contrast, calling the First World War a holy war makes a lot of sense but calling it a religious war does not. The Troubles on the other hand had an obvious religious dimension but they are seldom called a holy war, despite at least one book and one song on the subject having that in the title. ←₰-→ Lingo ^Bingo _Dingo (talk) 13:13, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

English of all time, Scandinavian alle tiders / alla tiders

Moved from Talk:of all time

Looking for a translation of this into Danish/Norwegian/Swedish (disclaimer: I have no knowledge of these languages), I stumbled upon Danish / Norwegian alle tiders and Swedish alla tiders, which look like literal translations of of all time, but I'm puzzled.

As an example of use, our Danish entry gives Du er alle tiders, literally "You are of all time", meaning "You're great". How come? What's the etymology? I'm speculating here, but might it have arisen by ellipsis from (the Danish equivalent of) "You're [the best] of all time", "You're [the coolest] of all time"?

And relatedly, can you (still? assuming my conjecture above is correct) use these phrases similarly to of all time (i.e. with a superlative adjective: "the X-est of all time"), or do you have to resort to other turns of phrase?

As a translation for "the greatest of all time", I've found tidenes største / de største av alle tider in Norwegian, den största genom tiderna in Swedish, but no luck for Danish.

@Robbie SWE, Gamren, I'd appreciate your input here. 2A02:2788:A4:205:3CC8:9F5F:53CB:FDCF 21:17, 26 June 2021 (UTC)

Well, there's nogensinde (“ever”), but perhaps you wanted something more poetic?__Gamren (talk) 21:19, 26 June 2021 (UTC)

Yes. Looking a bit harder I've found Danish af alle tid ("de største af alle tid", "en af de mest strålende økonomer af alle tid", etc.). Is this correct / actually used? 2A02:2788:A4:205:3CC8:9F5F:53CB:FDCF 21:28, 26 June 2021 (UTC)

The Swedish phrase alla tiders basically means "excellent" or "smashing". I wouldn't necessarily say that it is the equivalent of of all time, which in Swedish would be någonsin. --Robbie SWE (talk) 17:52, 28 June 2021 (UTC)

Vowel length in vallum/vāllum and derivatives

@Brutal Russian, Urszag An IP edited the pages for norma, vallum and derivatives to have a short vowel. Per [28], the vowel in norma is short but the vowel in vāllum is long. The evidence given for the long vowel is as follows:

vāllum, vāllus: vállári, CIL. ii. 4509; also Vállivs, Vállia, CIL. xix. 4039.

Contrary to this, the IP claims no evidence for vowel length and says "most 21st century dictionaries that mark vowel length in closed syllables don't mark it here" without specifying which dictionaries. If these dictionaries are from Leiden, I think they should be discounted; the Leiden school has heterodox ideas, to say the least. (For example, I think the Leiden school claims that Osthoff's Law was synchronically active in Latin, but there are clear counterexamples like fōrma, where the vowel length is quite well-supported.) I am inclined to put back the vowel length in vāllum, vāllus and derivatives. Benwing2 (talk) 10:05, 27 June 2021 (UTC)

@Benwing2: I was under the impression that nō̆rma, fōrma displayed the same unexplained phenomenon, but both LaNe and Gaffiot 2016 mark only the latter as long, which is the exact opposite from Greek (which isn't strictly relevant since Latin didn't borrow from it directly). norma doesn't appear to have any descendants, and Alatius' page mentions no epigraphic Ós. Its etymology seems obscure, but here and here (follow-up) I've found two papers that propse a very appealing one: the carpenter's square is the letter L > nōna > *nōnma > nōrma (like carmen, germen) after the other tools fōrma and grōma. My problem is that I don't know how to reliably search epigraphic databases for apices (these are often not transcribed and put in the apparatus).

vā̆llum doesn't fall under the Osthoff's law because long vowels weren't shortened before /ll/ (nor was the consonant degeminated as after diphthongs). There seem to be quite a few epigraphic apices - but it's borrowed as short into Germanic. LaNe and Gaffiot 2016 give it as short. Our etymology also seems suspect - De Vaan positis *uh₂l-so-, comparing Ancient Greek ἧλος (hêlos) (there too the etymology seems spurious, where's the long vowel from?? some kind of laryngeal metathesis?). The Latin word could come from the o-grade of *welH- with /wo > wa/, but this requires an open pre-stressed syllable. De Vaan sees the same problem with vallis and valgus, which turns up an objection from me: if there was a laryngeal in that root, wouldn't that make the syllable open after all (PItc. *wola-so-)? Need more info on laryngeals after liquids in PItc. and in general. —A bigger objection is that vā̆llum is much easier connected with Ancient Greek ἧλος (hêlos) and the semantics of “stake, nail” than with any semantics for turning. Esp. enticing is Aeolic ϝάλλοι (wálloi): although I don't know what's responsible for the difference in vowel and consonant, it could easily be the same assimilation ls > ll as in Latin (then what's responsible for the difference from Attic?).

In short I think we'd need to dig up some epigraphic evidence maybe as well as establish the etymology more firmly in order to decide, but as it stands the IP's edit looks justified - there's not enough evidence for a long in these. Brutal Russian (talk) 22:34, 27 June 2021 (UTC)

someone's arse off

The numerous expressions "~ one's/someone's [body part] off" can all be used with verbs other than "work", so a generic entry (or entries) is needed. Do you think that we also need specific entries with "work", such as work someone's ass off or work someone's butt off? Mihia (talk) 11:36, 27 June 2021 (UTC)

probably not, though “work” is probably the most common example of a verb used in this way. Perhaps we could have another definition for some of these phrases, ‘profusely’, though that only really works with ‘sweating (one’s/someone’s) bollocks off’, so maybe that should be created as a stand-alone entry?Overlordnat1 (talk) 11:11, 28 June 2021 (UTC)

I added "to an extreme degree" to the generic def at someone's arse off, which hopefully will cover any verb-specific senses such as "sweating profusely". Mihia (talk) 20:02, 28 June 2021 (UTC)

That’s an ideal solution, as it works better with “freezing one’s bollocks/tits off” too Overlordnat1 (talk) 00:01, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

• I've left a "translation hub" entry at work someone's ass off to host the existing translations, of which there are a number, but otherwise tried to eliminate some of the duplication at this tangle of entries. Mihia (talk) 20:57, 2 July 2021 (UTC)

mãezinha / [[maẽzinha]]

Are these two words variants of the same term or is the second one a misspelling of the first one? If it's a wrong form it should be either deleted, modified as a misspelling or fused together into "mãezinha". Regards. --37.11.122.76 20:49, 27 June 2021 (UTC)

There is no grapheme ⟨ẽ⟩ in the orthography of Portuguese, so the second variant is a misspelling.  --Lambiam 23:47, 27 June 2021 (UTC)

That's odd, because @Alumnum, Munmula is a native speaker.Chuck Entz (talk) 00:28, 28 June 2021 (UTC)

Sorry, that was a typo I didn't notice. I mistyped "mãezinha" and created the entry with the wrong spelling, failing to notice that mãezinha already existed. - Munmula (talk) 14:11, 28 June 2021 (UTC)

Great! Thanks everybody! --37.11.122.76 22:40, 28 June 2021 (UTC)

a in "too X a Y"

What is the a in phrases like "(That would be) too big a request" or "(I've never seen) so great a leader"? It's definitely similar to the usual indefinite article, but can an article appear in the middle of a noun phrase? (Or is this not really a noun phrase, but just some strange sentence ordering? "I've never seen a leader so great" would be a valid sentence, but *"That would be a request too big" doesn't sound grammatical to me) Smurrayinchester (talk) 08:27, 28 June 2021 (UTC)

It is the indefinite article. A hint is that too X a Y can only be used with singular nouns. I’m not sure what grammarians have to say about the transformation [a <qualifier> <noun phrase>] → [<qualifier> a <noun phrase>], also seen in [a such leader] → [such a leader]. (When does it occur? If it does, is it obligatory?). While a request too big is weird, we have a bridge too far.  --Lambiam 20:58, 28 June 2021 (UTC)

Thanks. "A bridge too far" did pop into my head when I wrote that, but I think that's something slightly different. The bridge is a unit of measurement there, like "a mile too far" - the "too far" acts adverbially, not adjectivally. "The army went a bridge too far" (but not *"The army went too far a bridge"), but on the other hand "That's a too far a bridge to see clearly" (but not *"That's a bridge too far to see clearly") Smurrayinchester (talk) 14:18, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

• I also parse that as the indefinite article. However, I also view this construction as an abbreviation or shortening, omitting an earlier of: too big of a request, or so great of a leader. Even with such, I view such a NOUN as an abbreviated construction from such of a NOUN. ‑‑ Eiríkr Útlendi │^{Tala við mig} 23:19, 28 June 2021 (UTC)

Hmmm. To my ear, the insertion of "of", as in "too big of a request", is a horrible error. Mihia (talk) 08:54, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

block

Noun sense:

(Wikimedia jargon) A type of temporary or permanent ban which automatically prevents the blocked user from editing pages of a particular wiki.

The page-blanking vandal was hit with an indefinite block.

Verb sense:

(Wikimedia jargon, transitive) To place, on a user of a wiki, a type of temporary or permanent ban which automatically prevents the recipient from editing pages of the wiki.

The user who started the edit war was blocked for a day to cool off.

Does anyone agree that there is any "Wiktionary and WMF jargon"-specific sense of these words? To me, these look like general definitions, once any Wiki-specific wording is generalised. Mihia (talk) 17:35, 28 June 2021 (UTC)

Obviously, the wordings “to block” and “to institute a block” are synonymous in many contexts. One can block and unblock Google accounts.^[29] The meaning is not quite the same in its particulars, but is nevertheless a slightly different use of a more generic sense in which certain actions are made impossible for certain actors. Uses on the Internet of block as a noun in a non-WMF context, meaning the result of a blocking action, are also not hard to find.^[30][31][32]  --Lambiam 20:33, 28 June 2021 (UTC)

I had to learn what people meant by wikify when I first got here. I didn't have to learn what people meant by block, only that it was usually temporary. I don't see how that makes this a subsense, as I don't think of it as being used in a different way. DAVilla 18:17, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

• OK, I've generalised the definitions. Mihia (talk) 19:38, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

yet

Are sense 1 and 2 of the adverb identical?

1. (usually with negative) Thus far; up to the present; up to some specified time; still
2. Continuously up to the current time; still.

Both have tons of translations, which is the only reason I'd hesitate to merge them. Ultimateria (talk) 19:20, 28 June 2021 (UTC)

I think “he has not yet replied“ and “he has yet to reply” mean the same, and can be rephrased as, respectively, “he still has not replied” and “he still has to reply”. This suggests that there is nothing special about the use of sense 2 in a context of negative polarity. Another example: “they have not yet received the money” and “they are yet to receive the money”. In all cases a change of state, although not certain, is anticipated at a future unspecified time.  --Lambiam 20:14, 28 June 2021 (UTC)

1. (usually with negative) Thus far; up to the present; up to some specified time; still

He has never yet been late for an appointment;   We don't yet know what must have happened;  I’m not yet wise enough to answer that;   Have you finished yet?

Noting that "still", which is in the definition line, is not substitutable into "Have you finished yet?", while it is substitutable (with word-order change as necessary) into some of the others, but nevertheless changes the nuance. Mihia (talk) 11:13, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

Relatedly, we have a second sense at not yet that reads: "almost, not quite", with "We have not finished an action yet" as an example. Doesn't seem right to me. 212.224.238.191 13:43, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

I've gone ahead and removed sense 2. Ultimateria (talk) 18:30, 3 July 2021 (UTC)

mare

Why do French mer f and Romanian mare f have a different gender than (all?) the other descendants of Latin mare n ? – Jberkel 20:51, 28 June 2021 (UTC)

Not 100% sure, but is it possible that the gender is derived from an old neuter plural ("seas"), re-analysed as a feminine singular ? Whatever the reason, I know that this gender switch happened early in French, Old French to be specific. I'm not sure about when it happened in Romanian, or if later French influence had something to do with it (?), but such influence of the gender seems highly unusual to me Leasnam (talk) 18:40, 2 July 2021 (UTC)

In Romanian, the regular phonetical evolution from Latin "mare" yields "mări", which is now the plural and the singular has been reanalyzed back to "mare" (as feminine), so you are correct about this. From "mări" it could have been reanalyzed as masculine, but then it would end up like "măr", which is the word for apple, leading to confusion. Bogdan (talk) 21:34, 21 July 2021 (UTC)

Not much confusion in practice, probably, as you could almost always tell from context whether a person was talking about the sea or an apple. The feminine gender in French has made la mer (“the sea”) a homophone of la mère (“the mother”), but it's a tolerable homophony because ambiguity almost never results in practice. —Mahāgaja · talk 07:51, 22 July 2021 (UTC)

standpenning vs. standaardmunt

@Lambiam, Morgengave, Mnemosientje In dictionaries these historical terms are often presented as synonyms, but actual usage in non-popular publications suggests to me that they were not seen as synonyms at all. [33] [34] [35] I am not completely sure what the difference is, but Pierson defined a standaardmunt as a coin whose nominal value is equal to its real value, so perhaps a standpenning may depart from that a little? ←₰-→ Lingo ^Bingo _Dingo (talk) 13:33, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

I found an earnest warning contra Pierson: “Gaat men dien term [viz. “standpenning”] dooreen gebruiken met den nieuwmodischen van standaardmunt, dan loopt men gevaar door de tweeërlei benaming voor ééne zaak het publiek nog meer in de war te brengen”.^[36] This establishes two things: (1) there was a clear distinction in the minds of at least some speakers; (2) some other speakers apparently did not always strictly adhere to this distinction. I cannot say I have a good grasp of the meanings conveyed in the texts, particularly the rambling and repetitive discourse of Mr. van Zuijlen van Nyevelt. (The term scheidemunt occurring in his text is apparently a partial calque of German Scheidemünze, meaning the same as Dutch pasmunt: a coin of a (relatively) small face value, making it possible to make cash payments that are precise “up to the last cent”.) I have the impression (but I may be wrong) that the term standaardmunt is used in two senses: (a) the standard (main) coin (being legal tender having a fixed face value); (b) the standard monetary unit in terms of which which the value of both coins and bank notes is expressed. The latter sense may have arisen from the use of the standard monetary unit as the face value of the main coin. The term standpenning implies (or should imply) a coin, not a unit. I think a standpenning is any coin that is legal tender, having a fixed face value, minted and backed by the State. Common sense tells us that a standaardmunt in sense (a) is a standpenning, but there may be coins with other face values that are equally officially standpenningen. The only way I can make sense of Mr. vZvN’s words is by assuming he uses the term standaard in the sense of “de facto standaard”.  --Lambiam 21:40, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

Yes, standaardmunt was used for the monetary unit, but it really seems to me that the same applied to standpenning. The rival terminology is clearly confusing to me, though the fact that it involves monetary minutae alien to the modern world does not help either. Anyway, the 'warner' clearly viewed them as two words for the same thing and very plausibly suggests that one word was just a more recent... erm, coinage. ←₰-→ Lingo ^Bingo _Dingo (talk) 16:42, 2 July 2021 (UTC)

in the flower of one's youth

Should this just be the flower of one's youth? A cursory look shows plenty of usage for that, with in occasionally. DAVilla 18:13, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

The eventual base form may be just "flower of youth". Mihia (talk) 23:10, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

too many cooks spoil the broth

I'm curious: the meaning is obviously "[there being too many cooks] spoils the broth", "when there are too many cooks, it spoils the broth", and the alternative form too many cooks spoils the broth bears this out. So why the plural agreement (spoil), which makes it seem like it means "there are too many cooks who spoil the broth"? PUC – 13:01, 30 June 2021 (UTC)

It just sounds wrong to say "cooks spoils" in succession. This goes along with common proscribed constructions like "the flock of birds are flying south for winter". You might even be corrected for saying "birds is" because those two words out of context sound wrong. Ultimateria (talk) 18:47, 30 June 2021 (UTC)

@Ultimateria: Yeah, I imagined this would be the reason. But do you agree that theoretically, "too many cooks spoil the broth" with plural agreement could/should be construed as "there are too many cooks who spoil the broth"? PUC – 21:07, 30 June 2021 (UTC)

If I didn't know the phrase I might read it that way. Ultimateria (talk) 22:44, 30 June 2021 (UTC)

I think you are overcomplicating. Suppose that the cooks are Alice, Bob, and Carol. These three people are too many cooks (we're talking about the people, not the abstract situation). Alice, Bob, and Carol spoil the broth. They are too many cooks; too many cooks spoil the broth. Equinox ◑ 21:09, 30 June 2021 (UTC)

I mean, you'd never say "Great cooks is essential in a restaurant". Equinox ◑ 21:10, 30 June 2021 (UTC)

"Too many cooks spoils the broth" is not unheard of, though. Here the "common form" (with a plural verb form) is called "not understandable literally", and this dictionary of proverbs quotes someone’s use of the saying with the singular verb form.  --Lambiam 23:02, 30 June 2021 (UTC)

I find that incredible! A better way to state what I said two days ago would just be "too many" is a determiner and "cooks" is a plural noun and thus it has plural agreement. Equinox ◑ 22:11, 2 July 2021 (UTC)

Curiously, Balthazar Gerbier was quoting and translating a French proverb that did have plural agreement: [37] The older quote from Hooker in that dictionary of proverbs has "the more cooks the worse potage", which likewise refers to a state rather than agency. Attestations from the eighteenth century appear to exclusively use "too many cooks spoil..." ←₰-→ Lingo ^Bingo _Dingo (talk) 08:38, 3 July 2021 (UTC)

that's me told!

Does it mean "I stand corrected"? PUC – 15:52, 30 June 2021 (UTC)

Similar. More like "you sure told [or showed] me!", perhaps suggesting that I am suitably chastened for my foolish error. Equinox ◑ 15:55, 30 June 2021 (UTC)

• Related to the (mainly UK?) exhortation to be told, which I'm mildly surprised to see we don't have yet. ‑‑ Eiríkr Útlendi │^{Tala við mig} 17:22, 30 June 2021 (UTC)

Yes, ‘told’ can be U.K. slang for ‘told off’, especially in the phrase “You got told!”. It may be regional even here though as I know someone from Essex who became a teacher in Coventry and was amused when he heard “You got told!” for the first time! There’s also the phrase ‘He/she won’t be told’ meaning that they won’t listen to reason, or act reasonably upon so listening.Overlordnat1 (talk) 17:50, 30 June 2021 (UTC)

butterflies in one's stomach

Do we need two senses? PUC – 21:00, 30 June 2021 (UTC)

I don't think so. The distinction between the physical sensation associated with nervousness, and the nervousness associated, or notionally associated, with the physical sensation, is too hair-splitting to warrant separate senses, IMO. Mihia (talk) 21:55, 1 July 2021 (UTC)

I have to say I think this is an RFV issue (groans from the class). Sense 1 is an actual physical sensation (like something is moving inside you), and sense 2 is a mere emotional feeling. Equinox ◑ 22:12, 2 July 2021 (UTC)

There are instances of ‘feel/get butterflies in one’s stomach’, though the form with ‘have’ is more common, so I think the redirect should be to butterflies in one’s stomach, not have butterflies in one’s stomach. In fact, the earliest quote I found on Google Books before I got bored trawling is from the 1915 book called Crashing Tides: “I feel butterflies in the pit of my stomach”. The meaning related to physical sensation is easy to prove, as there are many references to hearts beating/pounding, palms sweating, nausea and the like but how can we know if someone is using the expression to describe an emotional feeling rather than a physical sensation without being a mind-reader? On that basis we should leave the definition as it is Overlordnat1 (talk) 02:02, 3 July 2021 (UTC)

Looking at this again, it seems to me that there are three possibilities:

1. to feel nervous and also have a 'fluttery' feeling in the stomach
2. to feel nervous without any 'fluttery' feeling in the stomach
3. to have a 'fluttery' feeling in the stomach without any feeling of nervousness

To prove the intent of (2) rather than (1), it seems to me that we would need something along the lines of "On the big day I had butterflies in my stomach, but my stomach felt completely calm" – and this in itself, IMO, demonstrates the unlikelihood of (2). Would an "associated with" wording not cover anything other than (3) to any reasonable degree of certainty? Can you really have "butterflies in your stomach" without some association with a stomach feeling? On the face of it, (3) could plausibly exist (cf. collywobbles), although personally I don't believe it does. Whatever we decide, the present article is not satisfactory since the usage examples for the allegedly different senses in fact use the expression indistinguishably, IMO. Mihia (talk) 17:43, 6 July 2021 (UTC)

• Sent to RFV. Mihia (talk) 18:02, 11 July 2021 (UTC)