Ambiguous words

[HopperParticipant @hopper]

Posted by Mike Hurley on 22/04/2022 10:34:23:

Refurbished.

One of the major on-line car dealers who advertise on TV regularly say something along the lines of 'each vehicle has a 300 point check and is fully refurbished….. '

Now to me, fully refurbished means every single moving part in the vehicle is dismantled, checked, adjusted and replaced if below spec. not just a general safety check, tweak the brakes, check the tyres. somewhat misleading IMHO

Mike

I wonder who furbished it the first time? And why it had to be redone ?

[NealebParticipant @nealeb]

When I bought my first lathe and began using it, the instructions said, "Chuck the work and face it." So I threw the work across the workshop and looked at it, but nothing happened!

[Jon LawesParticipant @jonlawes51698]

Terrific.

Is it large? Terror inducing? Or is it really good?

[Bill Davies 2Participant @billdavies2]

Awesome – awe meaning full of dread, giving us aweful. But I blame our neighbours for that one!

Premium – first (top) quality, or cheap? Used as a product description, I sometimes wonder.

[BazyleParticipant @bazyle]

Posted by pgk pgk on 22/04/2022 08:31:46:

the local Spar shop uses. "There for you", They aren't there, they're here and not for me but for their profit.

They must be there for you unless you come over here to my local shop, or so I hear.

Can we have 'curate' and 'optics' back too.

'Pure' – look up Victorian slang meanings.

Apparently lots of people are dog walking these days, no wonder there are so many puppies around. Well, must go and cover my horse (with a blanket – what were you thinking Michael as you are perhaps the only one to know the alternative meaning).

[pgk pgkParticipant @pgkpgk17461]

There for you on the sign outside the shop. Perhaps I should drive to yours? Covering your horse, hoars or whores or hoarse and I misheard?

Pgk

[StueeeeParticipant @stueeee]

Can I offer 'Made of Aircraft Alloy' a great favourite statement from sellers of cheap tech tat.

So would that be the material that the locker handles in the galley are made of, or the stuff used for the stressed components of the landing gear?

[egaParticipant @ega]

MichaelG:

Janus words may not be what you had in mind but here is a small list of ones I made some time ago:

Janus words:
left – gone, remaining
oversight
cleave
mitt – hand, glove
scan
downs
best – worst (in contest)

[SillyOldDufferModerator @sillyoldduffer]

Random.

The yoof of the day are to be blamed for this stuff. Wizard Prang, Top-hole, By Jingo, Crikey, Oddsbodkins, etc …
Just asI became a wrinkly everything was a 'situation'. This thread is an Ambiguous Words Situation, and we allowed 'I have a flat-tyre situation', and ' it's a go to the doctor situation'.

Back in the day young folk cared about woofers and tweeters and cords were the height of fashion. In the end it all goes the way of the gramophone needle, horsedrawn tram, Gas Street Lighting, Bay Rum and winkle-pickers…

[Perko7Participant @perko7]

shot, meaning either:

– completely knackered

– numerous small projectiles in a casing for use in a rifle

– being struck by such small projectiles, or larger individual projectiles, having been impelled from a rifle or other firearm

– the injection of a small quantity of medicinal fluid into ones anatomy

– the measurement of a small quantity of alcoholic spirits

[Rod RenshawParticipant @rodrenshaw28584]

Wonderful idea!

I believe that in English, which for this purpose includes American and Australian and a few other territories, the word "set" has the most meanings, some dictionaries listing as many as 250 meanings.

Rod.

[NealebParticipant @nealeb]

I discovered the first time I ate in a US restaurant that I was required to pay my check with a bill, rather than my bill with a cheque as I did at home in the UK.

[Rod RenshawParticipant @rodrenshaw28584]

To an engineer, stress causes strain

To some medics, strain causes stress

And to the public the words are near enough identical!

Rod

[roy entwistleParticipant @royentwistle24699]

The use of double negatives is a no no

The use of double positives is frowned on as well. Yeah, right.

Roy

[Howard LewisParticipant @howardlewis46836]

Those of us with a lathe turn

Do we machine, rotate (As in reverse as in turn around0 Now we're going to argue about turning things that are not round (present, or circular? )

But we can also turn to face the other way (Rouging, finishing or in the opposite direction? )

Will this never end, conclude, finish?

Howard

[blowlampParticipant @blowlamp]

Owain.

Wyn.

Evans.

[Michael GilliganParticipant @michaelgilligan61133]

Here’s one for Microscopists, Horologists, Navigators, Secretaries, et al

Minute

MichaelG.

[Anonymous]

I'll second that.

[Robin GrahamParticipant @robingraham42208]

I'm not sure how serious you are in this list-making endeavour Michael. If you were inviting pet hates and puns (of which there have been a few), well it's made for an entertaining read. But entertaining the possibility that you are actually trying to enumerate the finite denumerable set of words which have non-unique mappings to a (possibly!) infinite non-denumerable set of 'meanings' I think you may have a task which would have defeated even Heracles. I'm not very sure it can be done. You might be better off trying to populate the set of words which have unique mappings – it would be the null set I suspect, It's a wicked project though, I have to say.

Fowler has views of course – his take is that ambiguities arise not so much from words but from the ways of putting them together. Which seems sensible.

Robin

 

 

Edited By Robin Graham on 24/04/2022 01:52:33

Edited By Robin Graham on 24/04/2022 01:53:39

[HopperParticipant @hopper]

Indeed. It seems most English words have multiple meanings. Up to 430 for the verb "set". And there's more for the same word used as a noun. So the task could be endless.

Context is everything. And let's not forget that no word has a meaning at all. The meaning is in the receiver's head. And may or may not match what was in the sender's head at the time of dispatch.

[Michael GilliganParticipant @michaelgilligan61133]

Posted by Robin Graham on 24/04/2022 01:50:50:

I'm not sure how serious you are in this list-making endeavour Michael. […]

.

You have ‘sussed me out’ Robin

No this is not serious ‘list-making’ … it is just something that amuses me sometimes.

Having spent much of my working life with reports and contractual documents, I tend to find ambiguity [and its avoidance] fascinating.

MichaelG.

[HopperParticipant @hopper]

Which is why many contracts and legal documents begin with a list of terms and definitions of what they mean when used in this document. Otherwise the lawyers' picnic would last until six weeks past doomsday.

Edited By Hopper on 24/04/2022 08:18:10

[V8EngParticipant @v8eng]

How about Sewer?

Smelly drainage systems or people who sew.

 

Edited By V8Eng on 24/04/2022 13:08:29

[BazyleParticipant @bazyle]

Kind of in the opposite direction I remember listening to Voice of America news read in 'Special English' – a vocabulary of just 200 words but sufficient for the task.

[SillyOldDufferModerator @sillyoldduffer]

Posted by Bazyle on 24/04/2022 13:44:05:

… I remember listening to Voice of America news read in 'Special English' – a vocabulary of just 200 words but sufficient for the task.

Isn't that how all Americans speak? I've heard their version of the Queen's English only has 200 words, all spelt incorrectly!

[Author]

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