- Note: the below discussion was moved from the Wiktionary:Tea room.
I'm seriously doubting that people honestly intend to mean "abdominal muscles" in general when they use (deprecated template usage) ab or (deprecated template usage) abs. In reality, this sounds like a folk taxonomy, and what is so designated is more specifically the banding patterns of the rectus abdominis muscle. cf. (deprecated template usage) six pack, when you'd need to make a larger provision if you were actually counting all the pattern of the frontal abdominal muscles. Circeus 04:02, 22 January 2009 (UTC)
- Why wouldn't "abs" be a clip of "abdominal muscles"? "Abdominal muscles" > "abdominals" > "abs" is certainly the derivation of the term. Any other derivation is a stretch and violates Occam's Razor. (Taivo 05:36, 22 January 2009 (UTC))
- Just because that's the etymology doesn't mean that's what people use it for. If you ask people to actually count abs, how many are likely to count the oblique abdominals (technically, the rectus is a pair of muscle, but the point regarding the definition still stand)? Many people won't consider somebody even has abs unless the ridges are actually visible.
- We have a virtually identical issue in the definition of (deprecated template usage) pec, which is not just a pectoral muscle, but very specifically the pectoralis major. Circeus 06:29, 22 January 2009 (UTC)
- But if a person is doing situps, whether they have visible ridges or not, and you ask them what they are doing, they are quite likely to respond with "I'm working on my abs." While the onlooker may require visible ridges to say "abs", the person doing the workout can call his own stomach "abs" whether or not ridges are visible. Both aspects of the definition are important. (Taivo 07:34, 22 January 2009 (UTC))
Personally, I have never heard "ab" (singular) used. I have heard trainers say "This exercise will target your abs.", and there is no reason to think that a person must have visible abdominal banding of the rectus abdominus muscles for that statement to apply. --EncycloPetey 16:36, 25 January 2009 (UTC)
- Some people are told to "work their abs" by orthopedists, "sports doctors", and chiropractors not for the appearance, but to reduce the incidence of back injury or pain. Surprisingly not every speaker of English is in the 21-44 demographic. DCDuring TALK 16:53, 25 January 2009 (UTC)
Mathematics
editI think abs in the sense of absolute function in mathematics is worldwide usual. Should we put it under translingual? H. (talk) 17:59, 23 June 2010 (UTC)