T.H.E.: 'Remember the economics student who attributed the run on Northern Rock to the "laxative enforcement policies" of the Financial Services Authority?
'Or last year's winning insight into the work of author Margaret Atwood: "The Handmaid's Tale shows how patriarchy treats women as escape goats"?
'Yes, it is that time of the year again. Times Higher Education is inviting entries to its annual "exam howlers" competition - the chance for scholars to share this year's most off-the-wall offerings.'
Rock, Paper, Shotgun: 'There’s something about the idea of creating an FPS that is lower-res than Wolfenstein that seems brilliantly perverse. Demakes often don’t follow the exact principles of the game they’re based on, but in this case it’s a fully-functional FPS, albeit in four colours.'
Joo Sung-ha, the defector turned South Korean journalist, says there is an easy explanation for North Korea's use of seemingly antiquated words like "brigandish" to refer to its opponents.
"They're using old dictionaries," he says.
"Many were published in the 1960s with meanings that have now fallen out of use, and there are very few first-language English speakers available to make the necessary corrections."
'My other car is a modal counterpart.' 'Show drivers behind you that your car does not have trans-world identity, but has counterparts in other possible worlds.'
Ben Goldacre: 'Regular readers with be familiar with the intellectual land-grab of “medicalisation�?. Sometimes it’s about transforming a subjective moral objection into an objective, sciencey problem, as we saw with homosexuality and psychiatry. Sometimes it’s about reframing a problem to sell a solution: drug companies foster a belief that depression is down to serotonin, even though the evidence is hugely contradictory, to a public eager for simple, molecular answers. Bad school performance is related to omega-3, imply the supplement peddlers: so buy an omega-3 fish oil pill. Clomicalm, say the adverts, is “the first medication approved for the treatment of separation anxiety in dogs�?.'
But an exact explanation as to why the game glitches in this exact way? Some questions just don't have answ-
The tail wag sound effect is written (B0), then the 1-UP (40) is ORed, resulting in F0. It writes the wrong "length" for the 1-up, and as it reads bytes in reverse, the beginning is broken instead of the end.
I love that the Internet is home to people devoted enough to explore these sorts of things. "Video Game Archaeologist" isn't a real job title yet, but it definitely should be.
Spiked: 'As employed by the government and the anti-obesity industry, denormalisation is a made-up word that functions as both a noun and as a verb to describe both a state in which the obese are perceived to be abnormal, aberrant, even deviant, and a series of activities designed to achieve this end.
'In practice, denormalisation means that the government attempts to shame adults into changing their behaviour.'
A spending spree, that is: 'The politician Mayawati has been accused of wrongly using public cash to make statues of herself and her allies, in a case at India's Supreme Court.'
If you're not already familiar with this story, you won't know whether it refers to the British embassy in Iran or an embassy in the U.K., and you won't know whether five people from the embassy were freed or whether five people were freed from the embassy.
T.H.E.: 'Researchers have become experts in "stealth research" - taking money with the promise of a specific goal and then using it to support a wider "space of play".'
Ruins of the Present: 'Another version is the abandoned, incomplete high-rise. Commonly a steel and cement framework is erected (because that’s pretty easy), and then there’s some legal or economic brouhaha and the builders just down tools and walk off. In Brazil a skeleton framework of this kind is called a “squelette.�?'
Edit: and my attempt to create a comment readable only by viewing the page source has been foiled... John must have set Wordie up to block such tricks.
I imagine they are. Any game called something like Thrust Out the Harlot has at least one odd aspect, though it would be nice to know whether it actually does involve harlot-thrusting.
Supposedly meaning: 'Martin McGuinness has warned the Orange Order that Sinn Fein stewarding of protests at controversial parades "cannot last forever".'
T.H.E: '"Interdisciplinarians" may reply that this trend towards ever more specialisation is exactly what they are striving to counter, but how do they intend to do so?'
T.H.E.: '"Interdisciplinarity." The word has become a mantra. The concept has become a human right. The US Constitution needs to be amended to add it to the original Bill of Rights. The French Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen must be updated to include it. Any curtailment of the interdisciplinary impulse warrants a hearing at The Hague.
'But just what is interdisciplinarity, and why is it touted as the intellectual equivalent of penicillin? Taken tamely, interdisciplinarity means venturing beyond one's own discipline to another. The expectation is that something in the other discipline - a fact, a theory, an approach - will abet the practitioner of the home discipline... Taken boldly, interdisciplinarity means more than acquaintance with another discipline. It means the beholdenness of one discipline to another. Here interdisciplinarity is not merely an option but a requirement. Here progress within a discipline can be found only by looking beyond one's native land. To stay within one's discipline is to guarantee parochialism and stagnation. Disciplinary boundaries must be crossed, perhaps even effaced.'
A not altogether explanatory citation: 'After 250 written responses, 12 "unconferences" (whatever they are) and "more than 500 bilateral engagements between stakeholders ... and the core team", yesterday saw the release of the government's Digital Britain report.'
Spiked: 'Goerlitz’s empathy with smokers is one reason why he finds himself out of line with a movement that has become preoccupied with ‘denormalising’ smoking to the point where it is denormalising human beings. Groups like Action on Smoking on Health (USA) have called for smokers to be banned from fostering children and has suggested businesses should not employ smokers.'
'Junfeng Geng at the University of Cambridge, in the U.K., and buddies have found a way to polymerize these microballs so that they line up into buckywires.
'The trick that Geng and co have found is a way to connect two buckyballs together using a molecule of 1,2,4-trimethylbenzene--a colorless aromatic hydrocarbon. Repeat that and you've got a way to connect any number of buckyballs. And to prove it, the researchers have created and studied these buckywires in their lab, saying that the wires are highly stable.'
I keep seeing old posts with no body text: on syllogism, for example. I wonder whether they were entered with no content, whether they're failing to load properly, or whether maybe the content was in the title field and this is a manifestation of the vanishing comment title bug.
Elizabeth Anscombe's retort to the idea of a practical syllogism: that if there was a special kind of syllogism for reasoning about what one ought to do, we might as well speak of a distinct kind of syllogism for any topic, such as mince pies. 'The peculiarity of this would be that it was about mince pies, and an example would be "All mince pies have suet in them – this is a mince pie – therefore etc."'
B.B.C.: 'Even in your own language, it is difficult to catch accurately the words of a song if they are not written down in front of you, and in France, which imports most of its music from the US or UK, there is even a word for the appropriation of lyrics.
Thanks to Google's autosuggester we know that popular searches beginning with this character are:
۩۞۩๑
۩ orkut v.i.p. account ۩
۩๑
In spite of which ۩ itself returns no results. According to decodeunicode.org it's the Qur'anic Place of Sadjah Sajdah (and the Wikipedia link above does work accordingly).
Dunsany.net: 'Lord Dunsany is cited as a major influence by many writers and artists and as an important figure in the development of fantastic literature by editors, academics and critics. His work formed part of the foundation of fantasy, along with that of Poe, Morris and Rider Haggard, and fed into later work such as that of Tolkien, Lewis and Lovecraft. The reference Dunsanian evokes a particular style and atmosphere which has, in the words of more than one commentator, been much imitated but never duplicated.'
Some words from his fantasies may be perused on this list.
'So why ride that swaybacked steed, weighed down with its multifarious semantic baggage, in the first place? ... Becauseall our political terms are shopsoiled by history; to talk about autonomy or toleration or dignity is to join a conversation that has been ongoing long before you arrived and will continue long after you've departed.'
Kwame Anthony Appiah, The Ethics of Identity, p. xi.
T.H.E.: '"Edu-babble" has been identified as a threat to the British education system by a University of Oxford study. The Nuffield Review into education for 14-19-year-olds warns that teachers' efforts are being stymied by "Orwellian language seeping through government documents" that is dominating educational planning. Mary Bousted, general secretary of the Association of Teachers and Lecturers, said on 9 June: "We call it 'edu-babble'. It completely denudes education."'
Museum of Hoaxes (which concludes that this story is probably apocryphal): 'Hughes told the media that he had financed an expedition to search for a rare South American creature, the Reetsa. For a year he supplied them with updates about the expedition. Then, finally, he announced that a Reetsa had been caught and would be shipped to New York City. On the day of its arrival, reporters were gathered at the pier as Hughes proudly led a mangy bull down the gangway. Reetsa was "a steer" spelled backwards.'
Guardian: 'The unknown enemy is cast, very much like the ill-defined threat presented to Oceania in Nineteen Eighty-Four, as a pervasive, cunning and unseen foe that requires total watchfulness and, it follows, the sacrifice of the essential right of privacy. In the programme, Pepper explains the challenges that face his former colleagues at GCHQ with a diagram that shows how information is carried in discreet packets across the internet, a development which he implies must be met by granting the agency total access to all our communications.
'You can see GCHQ's problem, but we should not take the word of a securicrat with a narrow view of how a free society works to be the only voice in this debate.'
Physorg: 'Psikharpax -- named after a cunning king of the rats, according to a tale attributed to Homer -- is the brainchild of European researchers who believe it may push back a frontier in artificial intelligence.'
The Register: 'The theory implied by their PR is that Wikipedia is a stuffy, respectable resource which provides very little information on topics of an adult nature – and that Carnalpedia will therefore fill in the gaps for all those interested in exploring their personal sexual fantasy through the medium of an online index (encyclopedophiles?).
'Unfortunately for the theory, a short browse through Wikipedia reveals perfectly good, descriptive articles on practices such as "cunnilingus" and "fellatio", as well as a variety of articles on practices previously unheard of at El Reg, including "dacryphilia" and "autogynephilia" – which appears to have nothing at all to do with cars.
'More seriously for the publishers of Carnalpedia, their work appears never to have heard of these terms either.'
I feel this would be a suitable term for a writer of lengthy and impenetrable Terms of Service documents stating that by using the site on which they're located you agree to sign away the soul of your firstborn child, etc.
Culture24: 'Culture Minister Barbara Follett has placed a temporary export bar on a medieval carved ivory oliphant or hunting horn valued at £3.35million.'
According to a comment here, this 'refers to a (possibly apocryphal) story of IBM sending a customer an empty tape box, then explaining when it arrived that it must have been screwed up in the shipping department. This bought the necessary time for the software to be completed.'
Scientific American: 'A team of researchers says they have found in a Russian mineral sample the first natural example of a quasicrystal, an unusual material that displays some of the properties of a crystal but boasts a more intricate and complex structure. Since quasicrystals were characterized 25 years ago, numerous versions have been cooked up in the laboratory, but a natural example would indicate that nature's products are more diverse than previously thought.
'Quasicrystals display ordered arrangements and symmetries but are not periodic—that is, they are not defined by a single unit cell (such as a cube) that simply repeats itself in three dimensions. The term "quasicrystal" was coined by physicists Dov Levine and Paul Steinhardt, both then at the University of Pennsylvania, to describe the class of quasiperiodic crystals in 1984, shortly after another group published observational evidence for such a material.'
Your local students' union may offer both university-branded merchandise for sale during the day and opportunities to get drunk at night. (In collegiate university towns it's not unusual to see people wearing college colours.)
I see WordNet doesn't know about the boozing sense. A few years back 'stash=branded merchandise and lash' was a standard coupling around my university; I don't think I've seen it recently, but that may be a result of spending less time around undergrads.
WeirdNet's preferred sense is absent from the O.E.D., although it does turn up on dictionary.com (credited to the Random House Dictionary) as an alternative spelling of laager.
I love the way WeirdNet calls hedgehogs both 'relatively large rodents' and 'relatively small placental mammals', and then uses plain 'small' in the other definitions. What's the average volume of an adult placental mammal?
From citation on phantom island; I removed it from the Phantom Islands list on realising that it was probably either a misspelling or a variation on Frisland.
Strange Maps: '...many of the islands pictured here in the western Atlantic Ocean are quite clearly some of the many phantom islands that for a long time were recorded on maps, but were never more than legends. One such example is Hy-Brasil, probably one of the islands pictured closest to Ireland.
Another phantom island, mentioned on this map, is Antillia, also known as the Island of Seven Cities or St Brendan’s Island, and often used as a synonym for the Isles of the Blessed or the Fortunate Islands. The muddled legends of Antillia have been around since at least Plutarch’s time (ca. 74 AD). Its name might be a corruption of Atlantis; or a derivation of anterioris insula, Latin for an island located ‘before’ Cipangu; or a transformation of Jazeerat at-Tennyn, Arabic for ‘Island of the Dragon’. Toscanelli on his map uses Antillia as the main marker for measuring distance between Portugal and Cipangu.
The reference to Sete Ciudades (‘Seven Cities’) is reminiscent of an Iberian legend of seven bishops fleeing the Arab conquest of the peninsula and founding a city each on the island, which became a sort of Utopian commonwealth. Some claim the legend of Antillia represents an earlier discovery of the islands that eventually became known as… the Antilles. Improving nautical knowledge eventually led Antillia to disappear from maps, but the legends surrounding it continued to inspire explorers for a long time – e.g. the ‘Seven Cities’, that were sought in the Southwest of the US or even posited on Cape Breton Island in Canada.'
Strange Maps: 'In 1811, the Russian merchant and explorer Yakov Sannikov reported seeing a ‘bluish fog’ to the northeast of the New Siberian Islands. In 1886 and 1893, fellow Russian explorer Eduard Toll also sighted what many by then presumed to be an as yet undiscovered island, provisionally named ‘Sannikov Land’. Intensive searches couldn’t locate it, but Sannikov Land appeared on maps well into the first half of the 20th century.
'Only then could scientists prove beyond doubt that Sannikov Land did not exist. In fact, it might be considered something of a modern version of Frisland...'
Strange Maps: 'In 1569, Gerhard Mercator copied the Zeno map into his influential World Map. Abraham Ortelius did the same for his renowned map of the Northern Atlantic in 1573. In 1595, Mercator included Frisland (not to be confused with Friesland, which does exist on the North Sea coast of the Netherlands and Germany) in a separate inset on his 1595 map of the North Pole. Thus Frisland, and the other fanciful lands fabricated by the 16th century Zeno (most likely), came to be known as ‘fact’, and were copied by other cartographers, often with variations on the name such as Fixland, Freezeland or Frischlant. Only much later did it become clear they were imaginary.'
The geographical version of Lieutenant Kizhe. Strange Maps: 'I had never heard of Fagunda. A 17th-century map places it in the North Atlantic, not far from Estotiland, Bus and Frislant. These and other so-called phantom islands were a by-product of the Age of Discovery. They started out as errors of nautical observation, and lived on as cartographic misconceptions – sometimes for centuries...'
There used to be a bug that produced a 500 Application Error (see comment 9 months ago by oroboros), but it was fixed. (I don't know exactly when John fixed it.)
B.B.C. News: 'The discovery of a Jupiter-like "exoplanet" orbiting the star VB 10 is the first to be made using the astrometry method. Astrometry is based on measuring small changes in a star's position.'
B.B.C. News: 'New software has enabled researchers to recreate a long forgotten musical instrument called the Lituus. The 2.4m (8ft) -long trumpet-like instrument was played in Ancient Rome but fell out of use some 300 years ago. '
Private Eye: 'Wally begins to describe a secret night life in which he creeps out into Manhattan and has sex with cats... Wally exhaustingly catalogues sexual possibilities that even the most sophisticated member of the audience can rarely have contemplated: felinatio, moggylingus.'
I added it to the spammer's list along with spam, abuse, etc., then noticed it had been listed 1 time with 0 comments. So it's on the side of Right, but nevertheless was born on the battlefield, or something.
Boing Boing: 'Eve Ensler explains that Congolese militias use rape to enforce discipline among a slave workforce that mines columbite-tantalite ore, a common raw material for many devices... She is proposing that electronics manufacturers and their customers--us--began to concern themselves with the notion of "Rape-Free" products in which the raw, mineral components of consumer electronics are traced back to sources that can be verified to have procured them ethically. (She allows that "Rape-Free" is probably not a moniker that would be comfortable plastered on boxes and signs.)'
I think this is supposed to say that people wouldn't be comfortable with it; in which case I'm inclined to concur.
What it means: 'The public services ombudsman for Wales is investigating a Swansea councillor who claimed that some members of the council aged over 60 were "past it".'
Maybe people like that are scared future employers will discover their tastes for bilabial fricatives and self-descriptions as homonyms seeking autoantonyms.
Oooh, I just noticed that at some point John's fixed the weird list links, e.g. Meta is now reachable from /lists/meta again, rather than defaulting to /lists/metaphysics-buzz-words-2.
The Uncredible Hallq: 'If all goes well, next fall I will be taking a graduate class on “metaontology,�? which means the project of trying to answer questions about ontological questions. I decided to be a go-getter and buy the main textbook for the course (the anthology Metametaphysics) several months in advance...'
BibliOdyssey: 'Hands up anyone who knew what a watch-paper print was? Yeah, I thought so. Me neither... Originally designed as a simple protective insert, watch-papers came to be used as an advertising medium for the watchmakers in the second half of the 18th century and another means by which print artists could ply their trade. These types of "professional" or conservative watch-papers form the majority of the genre, but a popular "amateur" variety also emerged that were valued as keepsakes.'
John, what do the house rules say about thematic consistency like this? I'm not sure whether desum is trolling in search of a reaction or just deeply single-minded.
Some interesting " behaviour: there's a tag on Lucy reading aesop rock song "no regrets", but even once I've reconstructed a working URL by changing " to %22, I still get a 'nobody has used this tag' message.
Hmm. WeirdNet defines wriggling as 'moving in a twisting or snake-like or wormlike fashion', but its definitions for wormlike involve submissiveness rather than movement.
B.B.C.: '...more than 100 million years ago, in the early Cretaceous period, a major shift in the design of spiders' orb-shaped webs came about.
'Before then, spiders coated the spirals in their webs with puffs of dry adhesive. These dry spirals trapped insects by physically entangling around the tiny hairs known as setae on their bodies. A group of spiders living today, known as deinopoid spiders, still weave webs in this way.
'However, during the early Cretaceous, araneoid orb weaving spiders evolved which weaved a different type of web. These spiders replaced the dry adhesive with wet droplets of glue. These are much stickier.'
T.H.E.: 'Wilhelm von Humboldt created the template for contemporary Western universities when he organised his Berlin-based institution into schools and departments based on areas of knowledge. Previously, academic disciplines were integrated and professors rarely specialised. The reforms inspired by Humboldt have led to unparalleled progress in research and knowledge. Recently, however, this extreme specialisation has come in for criticism because of its undesirable consequence: "silo syndrome", in which academics deal only with colleagues in their subject and students gain only a narrow perspective on knowledge.'
on the tags/pos box when first viewed might be less taxing on my schedule.
Actually, in all seriousness it may be worth wondering whether the tags/pos box could have some short, explanatory wording added; I imagine people might be more likely to read it than to browse an entire FAQ page.
It just doesn't have separate defintions for plurals (although sometimes it does prioritise different definitions for plural forms, e.g. eye vs. eyes).
Comments on tags which no longer appear on any words also act as ghost comments of a sort: I can see on the recent comments page that bilby has commented on /tags/cyncism, but when I go there I find a 'nobody has used' page with no comments (and no comment entry box) visible.
I think I've previously mentioned this on either bugs or features.
telofy made a channel for Wordie at one point (four months ago?), but the comment on this page seems to have vanished. Maybe it didn't get enough of a reaction...
T.H.E.: 'We have plenty of nostalgic and ideologically loaded analyses of what new and graduating students can't do. There is precious little account taken of what today's 'screenagers' can do that many of their predecessors - and at least some of their teachers - can't," Sir David said, in a lecture titled "Students aren't what they used to be - and never were".'
WeirdNet defines this word and also employs it in its definition of deliciousness, but none of the other dictionary.reference.com sources lists it, and neither does the O.E.D....
Oddee uses this header apparently by mistake, since the article goes on to talk about underwater hockey. If underwater cycling didn't exist, they may have inadvertently invented it.
Swebounce: 'Powerisers are bouncy stilts that you strap yourself into. With some training you can run as fast as 20mph and jump 2 meters high. For many people it’s enough to just run around and bounce but there are many kind of tricks you can perform on powerisers. I would say that this is the extreme sport of the future.'
Oddee: 'Feeling jaded by garden-variety bungee jumping? You might consider imitating how these Aussies spice up the sport: bungee jumping into a body of water containing live crocodiles.'
LRB: 'In early modern England, tachygraphy, tachography, zeitography, zeiglography, semigraphy, semography all vied for the loyalty of court recorders, parliamentary reporters, diarists (think of Pepys), clergymen (who used it to rip off each other’s sermons) and theatregoers (who used it the way some filmgoers use a handicam). Dickens broke into parliamentary reporting by memorising Thomas Gurney’s book, Brachygraphy, or, an Easy and Compendious System of Shorthand.'
LRB: 'In the US, court reporters have abandoned stenotype machines, whose keyboards use chord-like combinations to represent sounds, for a technique called voice writing. The "writer" – really a speaker – repeats testimony into a microphone nestled in a hand-held mask that prevents her voice from being heard in court; the recording is later transcribed, usually with speech-recognition software.The Stenomask dates back to the 1940s, when an American court reporter encased a microphone first in a cigar-box, then in a tomato tin, and finally in an old coffeepot, but it didn’t become a standard fixture until the advent of speech recognition programs. It’s also cheaper: machine stenography takes three years to learn, voice writing six months.'
Modern Mechanix: 'Swami, by itself, reacts like any other object: supported at one end only—it falls. But, add a fairly heavy belt, as shown in the photo, and it will not only stay up but actually take quite a bit of extra pressure to make it tilt down, even slightly.'
Slate: 'As if that weren't complicated enough, Klingon also has a large set of suffixes... Klingon has 36 verb suffixes and 26 noun suffixes that express everything from negation to causality to possession to how willing a speaker is to vouch for the accuracy of what he says. By piling on these suffixes, one after the other, you can pack a lot of meaning on to a single word in Klingon—words like nuHegh'eghrupqa'moHlaHbe'law'lI'neS, which translates roughly to: They are apparently unable to cause us to prepare to resume honorable suicide (in progress).'
Science Daily: 'Millefiore is a glass-working technique created from glass rods with multi coloured patterns that are only visible at the cut ends – like a stick of rock with the writing only visible once cut. These rods are created by heating and melding lengths of different coloured glass to create an individual pattern. Here, a solid red cane is set at the core with blue and white canes set around it to produce the petal effect. The small cross sections of glass rod are then used to create bigger pieces. It is a very labour intensive – and hence very exclusive – craft.'
rampantgames.com: 'For example - in an adventure game, you've generally got one - usually convoluted and amusing - solution to a problem. A good RPG, on the other hand, should make that puzzle a goal condition and leave other options to achieve that goal available. Failure to do that leads to frustration, as in the "plot-driven door" problem (or as a friend of mine calls it, "objects made of the indestructable material plotonium"). In an adventure game, you expect it - but even then, it gets frustrating when you see what appears to be an obvious solution which doesn't work.'
Graphpaper.com: 'An elegant solution, designed and patented in 1901 by the German engineer A.A. Newman, is called the “watchclock�?. It’s an ingenious mechanical device, slung over the shoulder like a canteen and powered by a simple wind-up spring mechanism. It precisely tracks and records a night watchman’s position in both space and time for the duration of every evening. It also generates a detailed, permanent, and verifiable record of each night’s patrol.'
Allan Gibbard, Thinking How to Live: 'I can say "Hey, Bob!" to accost him, to attract his attention. "Hey!" of course isn't a predicate; the syntax of "Hey!" is not that of a predicate. Couldn't we, though, remedy this? Let's invent a predicate, and imagine that it is a standard part of our language: saying "Bob is hiyo in assertoric contexts, let's specify, accomplishes the speech act of accosting Bob—and likewise for saying that anyone else is hiyo.'
Did you want these definitions to go on word pages? People new to Wordie often add definitions to list pages by mistake, but you don't seem to have listed any words either...
Japan Times: 'Sumo is often called "kokugi" in the Japanese media and by the population at large, and kokugi is a phrase most dictionaries translate as "national sport." Likewise, sumo is performed at a stadium known as the Kokugikan — with "kan" meaning hall or stadium.
'However, few with an in-depth awareness of the professional game would ever refer to sumo as simply a sport. It's more of a "way," with sumodo a term often heard in professional circles. Also, unlike nine other nations, Canada (lacrosse in summer and ice-hockey in winter), Argentina (pato — a sport played on horseback similar to polo), and Mexico (charreria rodeo) included, Japan has no legally recognized national sport.'
Palaeos.com: 'Rows of cilia on Ciliophora. A more interesting question is whether this word is singular or plural. If plural, what the hell is the singular? Almost all sources scrupulously avoid using the singular by various circumlocutions and studied grammatical artifice. One source uses "kinety," an Anglo-Saxon truncation that seems implausible on a Greek root. The truth is probably that the correct singular has been long forgotten or was never mentioned in the original paper, whatever that might have been. Wonderful are the ways of science.'
Brad Skow, On the Meaning of the Question, 'How Fast Does Time Pass?' (PDF): 'There are philosophers who think that some views about the nature of time can be refuted just by asking this question (in the right tone of voice). Others think the question has an obvious and boring answer. I think we need to be clearer on what the question means before we can say either way.
'In this paper I will examine several different questions, all of which have some claim to be precisifications of the question, “How fast does time pass?�?'
Hobo-tech.com: 'As a musical style, hobotech is wide open. Sampling hobo songs, songs or storys about hobos, or songs that invoke the open spaces of a forgotten America are encouraged. A loping, rough hewn feel with spoons and guitar is a good thing.'
Oddee: 'These amazing ice spikes, generally known as penitentes due to their resemblance to processions of white-hooded monks, can be found on mountain glaciers and vary in size dramatically: from a few centimetres to 5 metres in height.'
Oddee: 'Also known as mammatocumulus, meaning "bumpy clouds", they are a cellular pattern of pouches hanging underneath the base of a cloud. Composed primarily of ice, Mammatus Clouds can extend for hundreds of miles in each direction, while individual formations can remain visibly static for ten to fifteen minutes at a time.'
Apparently this has been used as a verb meaning 'kill (animals) painlessly': the O.E.D. quotes newspapers from the Twenties talking about e.g. 'proper lethalling establishments where cats can be put to sleep free of charge'. It seems odd to me to use a word like that and then employ a euphemism a moment later.
Metro: 'In an embarrassing mistake, officials in Massachusetts have been forced to admit that some road signs pointing to Lake Chargoggagoggmanchauggagoggchaubunagungamaugg have spelling mistakes in them.
'The typos, which are completely baffling considering how easy it is to spell Lake Chargoggagoggmanchauggagoggchaubunagungamaugg, were revealed by a local newspaper, the Worcester Telegram & Gazette, which has been covering the misspelling scandal since 2003.
'Resolving the issue involved large amounts of research into the roughly two dozen spelling variants for the lake, in Webster, Massachusetts, which is widely credited as having the longest place name in the USA.'
Discussion on longest word ever suggests that Wordie does have a finite capacity: if seanahan's guess is correct, it's that of all possible UTF-8 character combinations up to 2^7 characters long.
T.H.E.: 'A collaboration, after all, is a temporary liaison entered into for reasons of expediency - two political parties, for instance, might enter a collaborative relationship in a situation where neither can secure an overall mandate. This is very different from the longer-term fusions and crossovers of disciplines that occur all the time in the humanities without prodding or grant bribery.'
T.H.E.: 'The third danger is incipient support of an audit culture that leads to a Gradgrinding of university departments. In Charles Dickens' Hard Times, a horse is famously defined as:
'"'Quadruped. Graminivorous. Forty teeth, namely twenty-four grinders, four eye-teeth, and twelve incisive. Sheds coat in the spring; in marshy countries sheds hoofs, too. Hoofs hard, but requiring to be shod with iron. Age known by marks in mouth.' Thus (and much more) ... 'Now girl number twenty,' said Mr. Gradgrind. 'You know what a horse is.'"'
T.H.E.: 'Is this a true trahison des clercs, a selling of the pass by an academic establishment too alienated from politics to care or too worried about their careers to take a risk? Or is it the death by a hundred cuts that has crept up on us when we weren't looking? It hardly matters, for the result is the same - power in the hands of those whose interests are driven not by the pursuit of knowledge but by the pursuit of wealth.'
T.H.E.: '...the representative of the professoriate on the board lost a subsequent election after managers decided that nominees should be elected by the deans and the professors rather than the professors alone.'
T.H.E.: 'Like Acton, Clapham believed in finding empty spaces in the past and dutifully filling them, so he was probably a connoisseur of tedium, and he is said to have died of boredom on a late train back from London as he shared the compartment with the wife of a college master famous for the sedative properties of her conversation. "Not a mark on his body," the medical report is rumoured to have said, "but with a terrible staring look in his eyes." The story is a tribute to the lady, for Clapham must have been a hard man to bore.'
Not the founder of DNA itself: 'The inventor of the genetic technology behind the national DNA database says it risks losing support because it holds the records of innocent people.'
'The code of conduct spells out the job description. They are employed as temporary civil servants but do not have to be politically impartial like their civil service colleagues.
'They link together the minister, the party and the department. They are also the bridge between the neutral civil service and the politicians.
'One former "spad" - as they are known around Westminster - from the Blair years told me that they bring a political antenna to proceedings that essentially protects the civil servants by maintaining their independence.'
Culture24: 'A rare fusion of the Germanic and Celtic art styles of early medieval Britain known as Insular art, the mount takes the form of an animal with splayed legs and a projecting head.'
Douglas Yeo: 'Ever since I was a young boy I have been fascinated by the buccin, the late 18th and early 19th century French form of trombone that had a bell ending in a zoomorphic head.'
B.B.C. News: 'Dharug was one of the dominant Aboriginal dialects in the Sydney region when British settlers arrived in 1788, but became extinct under the weight of colonisation.
'Details of its demise are sketchy but linguists believe the last of the traditional Dharug speakers died in the late 19th Century, and their unique tongue only survives because of written records.
'In a remarkable comeback, Dharug now breathes again - its revitalisation helped by the efforts of staff at Chifley College's Dunheved campus in Sydney...
'At Chifley College, where around a fifth of the students are Aboriginal, Dharug is taught twice a week with great energy through repetition and song.
Joshua's Blog: '...And the long-term archivability of the hyperlink now depends on the health of a third party. The shortener may decide a link is a Terms Of Service violation and delete it. If the shortener accidentally erases a database, forgets to renew its domain, or just disappears, the link will break. If a top-level domain changes its policy on commercial use, the link will break... The most likely outcome, of course, is that we don't do anything and that the great linkrot apocalypse causes all of modern culture to dissapear in a puff of smoke. Hopefully.'
Times Online: 'Philosophical arguments are characteristically enthymematic – that is to say, the premisses that would be necessary to make them conclusive are not spelled out.'
Usually, when '1 Wordie lists' a word and it appears on no lists, it'll be on a profile—but this one was 'first listed by greenapple', on whose profile it isn't. So who's got this one, then?
As an acronym, a Rigid Inflatable Boat. I wonder how many other people ribsforsale.com tricked into clicking on their advert, hoping to buy succulent meat online.
A chocolate-coated lollipop... Okay, according to this it actually means: 'to bear a burden on your shoulders, such as a sack of potatoes. The load would press against the back of your neck.'
Don't worry about it. I thought you might be taking phony umbrage, but I couldn't tell how serious you were being, and my response ended up somewhat brusque. No hard feelings.
Wired: 'Monopoly also fails with many adults because it requires almost no strategy. The only meaningful question in the game is: To buy or not to buy? Most of its interminable three- to four-hour average playing time (length being another maddening trait) is spent waiting for other players to roll the dice, move their pieces, build hotels, and collect rent. Board game enthusiasts disparagingly call this a "roll your dice, move your mice" format.'
Rock, Paper, Shotgun: '“Grand strategy�? is a sub-genre title that always amuses me. I can’t help but picture someone playing Command & Conquer whilst wearing a ceremonial robe and crown, or Dawn of War on a 300″ monitor. Slightly disappointingly, it’s a different kind of grandiose it refers to - playing as an entire nation, seeing only the big picture and rarely the individual soldiers.'
On a similar note, here's some inconsistent handling of whitespace characters: this tag contains %0A characters (new line, I think). Linked from the list of recent tags on the front page, its URL contains the %0A characters and the page displays correctly; linked from the tags page, however, it has the %0As stripped out so that it leads to the nonexistent /tags/cannibalismanthropos - humanbeingphagous - feedingon.
(By the way, I see trying to visit tags that don't exist no longer produces a common-or-garden 404, which is nice. Thanks, John.)
Asahi Shimbun: ' Urban dwellers, looking for something missing from the day-to-day grind of their working lives, are literally heading to the mountains to reconnect with nature and find spiritual fulfillment.
'They are devotees of Shugendo, a religion based on ancient Japanese mountain worship that incorporates aspects of Buddhism, Shinto and other faiths.'
Mysterious Britain & Ireland: 'The Baobhan Sith is a particularly evil and dangerous female vampire from the highlands of Scotland. They were supposed to prey on unwary travellers in the glens and mountains. The name suggests a form of Banshee.'
Mysterious Britain & Ireland: 'The Bean Nighe is an example of the ominous 'Washerwoman at the Ford' rendered in the Highland tradition. The tradition of 'The Washerwomen at the Ford' seems to have its roots in Celtic legend and myth. She appears in the Irish stories and can be identified as the crone aspect of the triple goddess.'
Peter Turchin: 'Cliodynamics (from Clio, the muse of history, and dynamics, the study of temporally varying processes) is the new transdisciplinary area of research at the intersection of historical macrosociology, economic history/cliometrics, mathematical modeling of long-term social processes, and the construction and analysis of historical databases. Mathematical approaches - modeling historical processes with differential equations or agent-based simulations; sophisticated statistical approaches to data analysis - are a key ingredient in the cliodynamic research program (see "Why do we need mathematical history?" in the side bar). But ultimately the aim is to discover general principles that explain the functioning and dynamics of actual historical societies.'
Design Crisis: 'The normally oh so civilized quiltosphere is abuzz with conflict regarding the latest issue of Quilter’s Home. According to this article in The Washington Post, Jo Ann’s Fabric Store refused to carry the scandalous March/April issue because it features pages of controversial quilts. Even though editor/owner Mark Lipinski ponied up extra cash to have the issues shrink wrapped in plastic sleeves a la Hustler magazine, the issue was deemed too shocking for Jo Ann’s customers, out of fear that they might accidentally look at the magazine.'
B.B.C. News: 'Achondritic meteorites were formed when the Solar System's planets were coming into being. The substances in such meteorites and the processes they have undergone can give clues about how the larger bodies were formed.
'By contrast, chondritic meteorites were formed during the the Solar System's early days before material had accreted into planets. They have not been altered by the melting and re-crystalisation that has utterly transformed the nature of, say, Earth rocks.'
B.B.C. News: 'Detailed analysis has shown that the sample, known as MM40, has a chemical composition unlike any other fragment of fallen space rock.
'This, say experts, raises questions about where it originated in the Solar System and how it was created.
'It also means that astrochemists must expand their list of the combinations of materials in planetary crusts.
'The detailed analysis of MM04 was led by Matthieu Gounelle from the Laboratory of Mineralogy and Cosmochemistry at the French Natural History Museum.'
WeirdNet's definition isn't that bad today, but I'd have thought the bird was a more obvious choice for first place.
According to the O.E.D. this can also be a verb: 'to make conceited or vain; to puff up with vanity; to dress up in finery', or to act ostentatiously. Also 'trans. Austral. To obtain the best portions of (a tract of land), esp. so as to make the remainder of little value to other people. See PEACOCKING n. 2. Now hist.'
Comments on tags attached to 0 words aren't displayed: there are comments on say what? but you can't see them now that the tag has been retired in favour of say what.
Larry Maddry: 'It seems the phrase originated with Joseph Flanders, then an employee for The Charlotte News. He had typed: “It was as if an occult hand had reached down from above and moved the players like pawns upon some giant chessboard.�?
'In the fall of 1965, Flanders’ friends at The Charlotte News, especially writer R. C. Smith, were so taken with Flanders’ phrase they formed a society—the Order of the Occult Hand—and vowed to get the words “it was as if an occult hand ... �? into print as soon as possible.'
This seems (judging by Google's cache) to have been born on a list called i scream for ice cream, by tagyoureit; both the person and the list appear to have ceased to be. Did someone with 400 words and 133 comments manage to do something to get nuked, or might this be a technical glitch...?
Independent: 'Phil Booth of the civil rights campaign group, NOID, said: "Inch by inch, the Government's plans to map and monitor everyone's communications are creeping into place. Today it's retention of data, soon it'll be a giant database to suck it all up. And unless we speak out and stop this, what used to be private – details of your relationships and personal interests – will end up in the ever-widening control of the stalker state."'
According to Wikipedia, 'some analysts distinguish among sub-types of Tom Swifties. Some call those in which the pun is carried by the verb "Croakers" (after the above listed example in which "Tom croaked"), or insist that only those examples in which the pun is carried by an adverb ending in -ly are "true" Tom Swifties (or Swiftlies), or make other distinctions.'
Where does one apply to become a Tom Swiftie analyst?
Sorry this isn't a nice message, but: johntgraham is trolling. I'm guessing you'll want either to nuke the posts or to add them to the 'mentions' page.
In fairness, I just had to check myself to confirm that the plural is goes rather than gos. dictionary.reference.com/browse/dos gives both dos and do's as plurals of do (n.), so maybe it was an attempted formation by analogy.
Is dingy an American spelling of dinghy, is it a typo, or has a pun flown over my head? (The O.E.D. does list it as a known spelling of dinghy, along with dingee, dinghee and dingey.)
Exactly two words, and including the whole of Kingdom Animalia? That's actually pretty restrictive (which is presumably why this list has already broken the two-word rule).
The Urban Elitist: 'But the time required for a full-length novexcel would be more than I’d care to invest in an experiment. Instead, I thought, how about a short storyspreadsheet?'
Boing Boing: 'Writing in the Atlantic, Simon Johnson, former chief economist of the IMF, takes a hard look at the econopocalypse and decides that the root of America's (and Europe's) economic woes is the cozy relationship between super-powerful bankers and government -- oligarchy.'
Contrasted with speaking technically/dispassionately: 'Or what was it Abraham did for the universal? Let me speak humanly about it, really humanly!' (Kierkegaard, Fear & Trembling, trans. Alastair Hannay).
May I gently point out that tagging ten words with a URL makes you liable to be suspected of spamming and therefore vulnerable to the Wordie Treatment?
The dictionary.reference.com version is longer, nd indicates that WordNet is referring to the printing sense: 'a quad with a square body; "since 'em quad' is hard to distinguish from 'en quad', printers sometimes called it a 'mutton quad'",' i.e. quad as in quadrat.
Maybe gender should be added to the parts of speech feature. (Then again, arguably the same holds for number, and we've made do so far with plural and occasionally singular tags.)
What it's actually about: 'Home improvements retailer Kingfisher has said profits dropped 75% as it lost money in China and closed Trade Depot in the UK.'
Boston Globe: 'It's knowledge of crosswordese that separates the hard-core puzzlers from the dilettantes. You may never, ever find an opportunity to bring Enyo (a Greek war goddess) into conversation, and, like those contestants, you may have never seen an etui before, but if it helps you fill in that last blank square of a puzzle, it will be burned into your brain forever.'
Crosswordese sounds little different from Wordiean.
New Scientist: 'Kelemen has documented the same kind of erroneous thinking - called promiscuous teleology - in young children. Seven and eight-year olds agree with teleological statements such as "Rocks are jagged so animals can scratch themselves" and "Birds exist to make nice music". These mistakes diminish as kids take more science classes and learn causal explanations for natural events.'
Der Spiegel: 'The Romans did have levels, a six-meter long design called a chorobate copied from the Persians. They also filled goat intestines with water to find a level around corners. But that alone does not explain the precision of this amazing aqueduct.'
Der Spiegel: 'The soldiers chiseled over 600,000 cubic meters of stone from the ground -- or the equivalent of one-quarter of the Great Pyramid of Cheops. This colossal waterworks project supplied the great cities of the "Decapolis" -- a league originally consisting of 10 ancient communities -- with spring water. The aqueduct ended in Gadara, a city with a population of approximately 50,000. According to the Bible, this is where Jesus exorcized demons and chased them into a herd of pigs.'
A.P.O.D.: 'The Great Comet of 1965, Ikeya-Seki, was also a member of the Sungrazer family, coming within about 650,000 kilometers of the Sun's surface. Passing so close to the Sun, Sungrazers are subjected to destructive tidal forces along with intense solar heat.'
Grey as in greylisting. That Grumpy BSD Guy: 'Regular readers will remember that I have a collection of known bad addresses in my domains that I use for my greytrapping, all generated elsewhere, that has come in handy at times. Run of the mill spam operators tend to just suck in anything that looks like email addresses, and keeping the list available on the web has served us extremely well here.'
A sock, apparently; citation on ganzey. This sense isn't in the O.E.D., but it does mention ammunition-boots, footwear supplied as part of soldiers' kit, so maybe there's a connection.
B.B.C.: 'The islanders were kindly, polite, shy. The older ones spoke in a curiously old-fashioned way. Lots of "thees" and "thous", unfamiliar words like "ganzeys" for sweaters and "ammunitions" for socks. I liked it and was happy there.
'So, evidently, was a young naval officer who was based in Tristan during the war...'
According to the O.E.D., ganzey is a dialect variant of Guernsey, as in 'a jersey'.
I know reporting a bug in WeirdNet is a little redundant and that on the whole we don't want it fixed, but this one may be keeping 'interesting' definitions from our sight: we've known for some time that a few words fail to have definitions displayed even though they can be found at http://wordnet.princeton.edu/perl/webwn, and I've noticed that this seems especially to affect words ending in -oof (goof, hoof, proof, aloof, roof...). Is there an -oof bug on Wordie's side, or is it 'just' a further dimension of WeirdNettery?
Edit: may I add -(o)ft to this? Loft and left I knew about, but I've also just found no definition on soft... (Raft and daft are normal, though. So is deft, so -eft isn't a guaranteed problem ending. Hmm.)
Another -oof word that's actually in the WordNet database but which WeirdNet fails to display here. As is proof. I think we have a pattern... and an odd-sounding bug report in the making.
For that matter, hoof, hooves and hoove (not as common, but actually a word: 'a disease of cattle', says the O.E.D.) are all missing WordNet definitions. Since I can find hoof on http://wordnetweb.princeton.edu/perl/webwn this may be a glitch in Wordie's implementation. Or some gremlin with a grudge against -oof words.
The carpet is not a prophet; it is associated with Muhammad. It's actually called the Pearl Carpet of Baroda, so presumably the quotation marks here are in recognition of the awkward phrasing.
Mark Edwards, 'A Brief History of Holons': 'The idea of hierarchy and of their constituent part-wholes, or holons, has, as Arthur Koestler points out in the opening quote, a long and distinguished history... While all these various threads of ideas included the consideration of hierarchical networks and levels and orders of development it was not until the work of writer-philosopher Arthur Koestler that a fully theory of holarchy and holons was proposed.'
Apparently the person who added the tags couldn't find out how to remove them. John knows about them, but he's eternally busy, so they haven't been nuked yet.
T.H.E.: '"In concrete terms, one might see the contemporary plethora of educational quangos as the means by which the state's educational orthodoxies are ... policed," Mr Lea said.
'Quangos establish such orthodoxies by consulting academics then ignoring their comments, he added... "At the end of a consultation, you often do not feel your view has been taken seriously, but you are told: 'We consulted with you.'"'
B.B.C. News: 'He described the filaments seen on the body of the new dinosaur, which the team has named Tianyulong confuciusi, as "protofeathers" - the precursors of modern feathers.'
I added simip to the Wordie Paradox list, and the list page says it 'has been listed 3 times with 55 comments', so it seems still to be associated with multiple lists as well as (ghost) comments; it's just the actual page that's been nuked.
W.S.J.: 'The environment also brings out what security experts call the "mama-bear instinct." A Chuck E. Cheese's can take on some of the dynamics of the animal kingdom, where beasts rush to protect their young when they sense a threat.'
Some of these seem more objectionable than others; I find taxonomy useful enough, admittedly in an academic setting, and measuring is a more general concept than benchmarking.
Hi. If you wanted those comments to be associated with the specific words, rather than appearing at the bottom of your list, you'll have to add them to the word pages: giclairune, ukku.
Regarding WeirdNet's agricultural interests: 'seeds sometimes considered poisonous'? Hasn't anyone got around to checking? (Or are they perhaps poisonous in the sense that potatoes are technically poisonous, i.e. that you'd have to eat an awful lot to get a fatal dose?)
Strange Maps: 'The aforementioned Atlas is a publication of Le Monde diplomatique, the French monthly magazine for world affairs. It might not be incidental to note that the editorial line of “Le Diplo�? (as it is often called) is altermondialiste.
'Altermondialism (or alter-globalisation) seeks to counteract the negative effects of an economic globalisation seen as too Anglo-Saxon and neo-liberal.'
B.B.C. News: 'The debaptism certificate started out as a kind of satirical comment on the idea that you could be enrolled in a church before you could talk, but it seems to have taken off from there.'
What it means: 'The number of new claims of sexual abuse made against US Roman Catholic priests rose by 16% to more than 800 last year, a Church report says.'
Spotted on Slashdot: 'Tom was able to stretch this worthless article to 26 pages by putting microscopic pictures on each page along with about a paragraph of text.
'Tom is the new king of AdSense manipulation. I guess we can call it AdSenseless now.'
B.B.C. News: 'Ministers are being urged to restrict the sale of "electronic" cigarettes amid fears they could be harmful... The 'e-cigarettes' look real, but are battery-powered and typically made of stainless steel.
'Inside is a cartridge of liquid nicotine. When it is heated, the user inhales vaporised droplets of the drug and breathes out a mist rather than smoke.'
The O.E.D. says the origin is uncertain, the meaning is perhaps 'a sheriff', and it's now used only in allusion to Shakespeare's 'great Oneyres'. However, it does seem to be sure that the -yer is the same as in lawyer; great oneyer is given as an example under the entry for the suffix.
T.H.E.: 'When a large number of departments in teaching-led universities were discovered by the 2008 research assessment exercise to be producing world-class work, a new phrase quickly entered the higher education lexicon.
'"Pockets of excellence" became a rallying cry for post-1992 universities keen to show that they could compete with the research elite. But a subtle rebranding of the "pockets" by the Higher Education Funding Council for England has raised eyebrows - and shown how politically sensitive the pockets have become.
'Last week, David Eastwood, chief executive of Hefce, confirmed that the funding body's preferred metaphor for the departments was now "islands of excellence", because it imbued them with a greater sense of isolation.'
WordNet lacks the sense 'resemble' (which the O.E.D. marks 'now colloq.'), as e.g. here: 'This girl kind of favored Kanako but it definitely wasn’t her'.
Spiked: 'Bored to death of the misery memoir, those endless books by adults claiming that their lives have been scarred by childhood abuse and neglect, normally at the hands of their parents? Well, now there’s a new, overgrown kid on the block. Welcome to the misery mum-oir, a book by a successful middle-class mother claiming that her life has been ruined by her abusive and unappreciative child.'
What it means: 'A number of UK and US media outlets, including the BBC, have called on Iran to allow independent access to detained American journalist Roxana Saberi.'
I wonder how it should be interpreted when people put definitions in the tag box (e.g. on tjuze). If it's because they want their definitions floating above the comments, that's a sign that some sort of dedicated definition-adding facility (with additions displayed under WordNet's?) might be useful; but if it's because they're new here and haven't worked out how it all works, having yet another way of adding data to word pages might confuse them further.
It sounds nicer than a storm/tempest in a teacup/teapot/other. 'There were a couple of scenes where there were these cross-like structures, and the whole thing was the most incredible temptress in a teapot, in that we were accused of censoring it. We even ran the screenshots side by side. But some random fan got hold of it and it turned into a firestorm. That to me served as a reminder of how sensitive the hardcore market is.'
B.B.C. News: 'Even these figures overstate the number of pirates that actually face trial because they include those handed over to the authorities in Puntland, the semi-autonomous region in the north-east of Somalia from which most pirates come.'
Telstar Logistics: 'Special Agent Oddwick recently enjoyed an Amphicar sighting in Florida, although he didn't fully realize it at the time. Instead, he reported seeing a "boat/car thingy" and noted that he didn't believe the propellers were functional.'
prolixpolymath managed to add this to the database as 'onomatopoeia that best describes prolixpolymath', but in spite of that the link from his/her profile breaks; you have to use %3f. I've added this to Wordie Paradox using that method, and the result is another entry that doesn't know it's on the list: 'appears in these lists' is empty. (Edit: ah, I realised this has already been done with blah ... does that count%3f. However, the profile links of the people who added them break differently: this one produces a 500 Application Error, whereas the other produces a 'nobody is listing' page.)
Sunday Herald: 'The US National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) "lost knowledge" of how to make a mysterious but very hazardous material codenamed Fogbank. As a result, the warhead refurbishment programme was put back by at least a year, and racked up an extra $69 million... Neither the NNSA nor the UK Ministry of Defence would say anything about the nature or function of Fogbank. But it is thought by some weapons experts to be a foam used between the fission and fusion stages of a thermonuclear bomb. US officials have said that manufacturing the material requires a solvent cleaning agent which is "extremely flammable" and "explosive". The process also involves dealing with "toxic materials" hazardous to workers.'
B.B.C. News: 'Another problem facing legitimate firms is the practice of false association. This is when a domain name - with similar, but not identical wording to a popular website - is registered (and often made to look like) the legitimate site in order to direct unsuspecting users to bogus or offensive pages... The report says that the majority of illegal sites involved in so-called "brandjacking" are hosted in the United States, Germany and the UK.'
Galileo Project: 'If the Europa Orbiter finds a submerged ocean, we could look for landing sites where instruments could descend to the surface, melt through the ice, and deploy "hydrobots" --- submarine robotic explorers.'
Languagehat: 'Among the delightful trivia Sauer mentions are the "rare Latin lemma... bradigabo (badrigabo) in Épinal-Erfurt 131, the meaning of which is unknown; it was glossed as felduuop (Ép) / felduus (Erf), the meaning of which is also unknown"...'
As regards viewing words by initial letter, see my comment from about a month ago regarding wildcarding, which would be still more versatile.
Maybe if alphabetical searches are implemented there should be additional filters for searches, e.g. 'beginning with a AND listed by $username'. (And while we're on the subject of search and search filters, I wonder whether a search function for tags might be useful.)
B.B.C. News: 'One of the last World War II taboos is being lifted in France.
'So-called "Boche babies" - the illegitimate offspring of occupying enemy troops - are speaking openly for the first time about their family secret and hunting for long-lost German fathers.'
What it means: 'A new survey claims regional breeds of sheep face a heightened risk of disease because of their tendency to remain together in one location' (emphasis added).
Strange Maps: 'A pene-enclave is almost an enclave in the same way that a peninsulaalmost is an island. But only on a strictly lexical level. If we descend from the abstraction of definition to particular examples, things get messy — in an almost clintonesque way: all depends on what your definition of almost is.'
'Our analysts speak polysyllabically and in turn of five new processes: "deterritorialization" (culture as torn out of its geography and made homeless); "hybridity" (cultures as mixed up together); "liminality" (poor cultures shoved off the edge by rish ones); "diasporization" (cultures scattered worldwide but persisting in a mutant form); above all, analysts speak of "mediatization" (the stories of culture detached from their local habitations and carried largely abroad by the electronic media).'
~ Fred Inglis, Culture (Key Concepts series), p. 146
If you're now saying you're back on the bike, dare I ask what happened to the horse...? Please tell me it's living out its retirement in a pasture somewhere, or something--
Regarding list URLs based on the wrong titles: is it my imagination, or did http://wordie.org/lists/meta use to be a working URL? You can see me using it on this page, about four months ago. It's now got to be http://wordie.org/lists/metaphysics-buzz-words-2, so it seems this bug can actually cause previously existing links to break.
Times: 'It sounds like science fiction, but politicians, lawyers and advertisers are falling over themselves to buy into the latest scientific discovery: brainjacking. Soon our secret desires and not so innocent thoughts could become public knowledge.'
Spiked: 'Fish calls this process of intellectual interrogation “academicising�?, which he describes thus: "To academicise a topic is to detach it from the context of its real world urgency, where there is a vote to be taken or an agenda to be embraced, and insert it into a context of academic urgency, where there is an account to be offered or an analysis to be performed."'
Scientific American: 'February 28th is International Sword Swallower’s Awareness Day, according to practitioner Dan Meyer, who recently demonstrated the technique at the AAAS meeting in Chicago.'
The Escapist: 'In reverence of the wonderfully dark stories, the H. P. Lovecraft Historical Society created its anti-Christmas album A Very Scary Solstice... Three years on, and George Taylor helps to add a little "Fred Astaire" charm, and a lot of CGI, to this anti-carol based on the book "The Shadow Over Innsmouth".'
B.B.C. News: 'A proposal to name the marionberry as the official berry of the US west coast state of Oregon has been scuppered by a grower of a rival berry type.
'The Oregonian newspaper said the resolution was removed from the state legislature's agenda at the request of a blackberry farmer, Larry Duyck.
D.R.B.: 'The "natural" theory of nature being responsible for the Majorly Mysterious Mima Mounds starts to crumble upon further investigation. Sure there’s plenty of things we don’t yet understand about how our native world behaves scientists do know enough to be able to say what it can’t do – and it’s looking pretty certain it can’t be as precise, orderly, or meticulous as the mounds.'
The Escapist: 'The UK government is advertising for a 'Director of Digital Engagement'. The job description? To create strategies for communicating over social networking sites... The job advertisement has understandably come under fire from the government's rivals. Susie Squire, the TaxPayers' Alliance campaign manager, said: "The Government should not be spending money on a Twittercrat during a recession..."'
Scarthin Books: 'In the absence of slug-pellets, old wives masquerading as gurus crowd in -beer traps, milk traps (for those who don't like wasting beer) or barriers of soot, sand, lime, crushed egg-shells or double-whammy combinations of the above are advocated but are tedious to install, can vanish in a night's heavy rain and are at best only partially effective. My preferred solution requires capital expenditure but is then almost maintenance-free and has a working lifetime of years, perhaps decades. It is the SCARTHIN SLUG-MOAT (or for Google's Sake SLUGMOAT).'
B.B.C. News: 'Mike Myers' comedy flop The Love Guru has dominated the Golden Raspberries, the spoof prizes awarded to the worst Hollywood movies of the year.
'The film won Razzies for worst picture, worst actor - for Myers in the title role - and worst screenplay, in the annual eve-of-Oscars mock-ceremony.'
Fireworks Glossary: 'A composition giving off hardly any light when it burns. It is used in stars to give a winking effect, or to separate colour changes.'
World Wide Words: 'This has appeared, like a dusty fly speck dotted across the review pages of the more upmarket British newspapers this month, because Altermodern is the name given to Tate Britain’s Triennial 2009 exhibition. The term was coined by the exhibition’s curator, the French cultural theorist Nicolas Bourriaud.'
Theis is already in the O.E.D. with the meaning thus (19th C.). It's apparently a nautical term, so I can't guarantee it's what the spammer had in mind.
The O.E.D. says an acquirement in the sense of 'that which is acquired' is 'usually a personal attainment of body or mind, as distinct from an acquisition or material and external gain, and opposed to a natural gift or talent'. So maybe something like accomplishment would be a better alternative, depending on the context.
B.B.C.: 'It was discovered that the man every member of the Irish police's rank and file had been looking for - a Mr Prawo Jazdy - wasn't exactly the sort of prized villain whose apprehension leads to an officer winning an award.
'In fact he wasn't even human.
'"Prawo Jazdy is actually the Polish for driving licence and not the first and surname on the licence," read a letter from June 2007 from an officer working within the Garda's traffic division.'
From some new educational proposals: 'The domains would be: arts and creativity; citizenship and ethics; faith and belief; language, oracy and literacy; mathematics; physical and emotional health; place and time (geography and history); science and technology.'
Culture24: 'The organisation that oversees the reporting of archaeological finds by members of the public in England and Wales, the Portable Antiquities Scheme (PAS), has moved to allay fears following media reports highlighting the rise of illegal metal detecting or ‘nighthawking’.'
Times: 'Summer is coming and the strolling season beckons. Or rather it does to those Italians, Bulgarians and Spanish who enjoy, respectively, the pleasures of the passegiattag; see bilby's comment on it'>edit: missing a g; see bilby's comment on it, the korso, and the paseo — which have been a part of European life for centuries.
'Summer? The paseo? Well, think of a favoured spot — square, garden, avenue — where people meet after work or at weekends to walk up and down. Men and women walk up and down, young and old walk up and down, rich and poor walk up and down. The activity is instinctive and inclusive. It has always had significance.'
You can get that feature easily enough by using a flat text file. After all, a Wordie list is just an ordered set of links to Wordie pages; if you don't want to share it or let people comment on it, all you need to do is write down some URLs in order.
As a verb: 'The conceit of death by laughter is a curious one and not restricted to the ancient world. Anthony Trollope, for example, is reputed to have “corpsed�? during a reading of F. Anstey’s comic novel Vice Versa.'
T.L.S.: 'It was, in fact, a firm rule of ancient “gelastics�? – to borrow a term (from the Greek gelan, to laugh) from Stephen Halliwell’s weighty new study of Greek laughter – that the joker was never far from being the butt of his own jokes.'
The Onion mocking the WordNet #1 sense: 'The holy and sacrosanct miracle of birth, long revered by human civilization as the most mysterious and magical of all phenomena, took place for what experts are estimating "must be at least the 83 billionth time" Tuesday with the successful delivery of eight-pound, four-ounce baby boy Darryl Brandon Severson at Holy Mary Mother Of God Hospital.'
'So why did Moses say things like, "And the leper in whom the plague is, his clothes shall be rent, and his head bare, and he shall put a covering upon his upper lip, and shall cry, Unclean, unclean..." and, "Command the children of Israel, that they shall put out of the camp every leper..."? On top of everything else, it seems leprosy sufferers are the victims of mistranslation. The Hebrew word tsara'ath, translated as lepra in Latin and Greek, conveys the notion of one who is stricken or defiled, insofar as the concept is at all translatable into a modern idiom; it certainly does not mean leprosy, as we understand it. It is generally taken to be a generic term covering a range of dermatological diseases: leukoderma, vitiligo and psoriasis are among the most frequently cited.'
Tony Gould, Don't Fence Me In: From Curse to Cure: Leprosy In Modern Times, p. 3
B.B.C. News: '"They use abominable jargon - pupils have to be called apprenants or learners - and they promote this pedago-demago philosophy in which the teacher is supposed to be best mates with his class," she says.'
It would be nice to have some easy way of tracking which bugs are still open. Maybe I should extend the length of the features page with that suggestion.
Slashdot: 'The Harvard Law students defending accused file-swapper Joel Tenenbaum are doing their best to turn his upcoming trial into a media event. But when it comes to pure spectacle, they have nothing on The Pirate Bay. TPB is referring to the event as a 'spectrial,' a cross between a spectacle and a trial.'
Spiked: 'Hysteria over reclassification reached a fever pitch earlier this week, when the government’s chief drugs adviser, Professor David Nutt, claimed that taking Ecstasy is about as dangerous as ‘Equasy’ – a condition he has made up to describe horse-riding. The number of deaths caused by the drug annually, Nutt asserts, is roughly equivalent to the number of those killed or injured riding.'
T.H.E.: 'While we were marching with lit torches across the croquet lawn to occupy the administrative building, we were led by a 'Tankist' (someone who joined the Communist Party when the Russian tanks rolled into Prague in 1968). The rest of us were all fooling around, having a laugh, half-pissed and asking who had the spliff, and suddenly he turned round and shouted "To the Winter Palace!" It was to the credit of most of the students that they fell about laughing.'
It's the " character messing things up. If you enter http://wordie.org/words/i thought you'd lost it when you added "haar".... *gg into your browser location bar you can enter through the back door and join in the fun.
Ian Creasey: 'Because I thought the story had a very British tone, I didn't bother sending it to any American magazines... First, I tried Interzone, who rejected it for being too funny. (In the David Pringle era, Interzone's steady diet of grey, depressing fiction earned it the affectionate nickname of Wrist-Slitters' Monthly.)'
Now there must be a list somewhere on which a name like this belongs...
Presumably a game suitable for fans of extreme ironing. Bradshaw of the Future: 'I really hope today's extreme etymology is true, because it's awesome.'
The Escapist: 'The problem, according to Stony Brook University Professor Dr. Joanne Davila, is that easy access to email, social networks and other forms of always-on communications leads to excessive and repetitive discussions of the same problem, also known as "co-rumination," which can worsen the mood of teenage girls and create negative emotions.'
Not a command: 'The Northern Island Assembly is set to debate a DUP motion calling for public representatives to be protected against having to name sources.'
B.B.C. News: 'A spokeswoman for the group, Nisha Susan, told the BBC it was giving chaddis (Hindi colloquial for underwear) as they alluded to a prominent Hindu right-wing group whose khaki-shorts-wearing cadres were often derisively called "chaddi wallahs" (chaddi wearers).'
Néojaponisme: 'By “haiku�? throughout this post I mean “haikoid works from both before and after the word haiku was invented�? in accordance with standard English usage.'
'Rose is famous for its unusual fauna. The balleron has a wooden spine. The dignipomp looks incredibly solemn. The musterach is very sensitive and sullen. The guggaflop is very, very, indeed very lazy.'
A Dictionary of Imaginary Places, entry on Rose (from Mervyn Peake's Captain Slaughterboard Drops Anchor)
'Among the bird species, the best-known are the gladdy-whingers, which lay their spotted eggs in basket nests in the booblow tree, and the flummywisters, a type of songbird usually seen in elm trees. In winter the young flummywisters wear warm underwear; to hear them singing as their mothers loosen their buttons in spring is a very good omen.'
A Dictionary of Imaginary Places, entry on Rootabaga County (from Carl Sandburg's Rootabaga Stories).
Spiked: 'Insofar as there is any hint of a strategy in relation to tackling radicalisation, it always has a fantasy-like character. Often, the official discourse on radicalisation has much in common with attitudes that underpin the child protection industry. It warns that ‘vulnerable’ and ‘impressionable’ young people may be targeted on websites, campuses and at social venues, and ‘groomed’ by cynical operators. In November 2007, it was reported that the UK government’s Research, Information and Communication Unit would draw up ‘counter-narratives’ to the anti-Western messages on websites ‘designed to influence vulnerable and impressionable audiences here in the UK’.'
Just idly wondering: does anyone remember exactly what the banner text was for advertising on Tuesdays, before every day became Tuesday? It was something like: It's Tuesday, and we all know what that means: advertisements! Huzzah! Google's giant mechanical brain has decided that you, the consumer, might be interested in these fine products:
Improbable Research: 'In the June 28, 2008 issue of BMJ (the publication formerly known as the British Medical Journal) Barrie Smith, a retired physician from Birmingham, describes—though he does not name—a new form of the grand British tradition of otting. The proper name for it is obvious to anyone who reads Dr. Smith’s description: windowspotting.
'The best known of otting traditions is trainspotting. Some British citizens also practice planespotting, busspotting (a practice that now draws disapproval from the British Government, which views bus spotters as being possible terrorist spies) and other varieties of otting. These may all be descended from the ancient practice of bird spotting, also known as bird watching.'
'The LRC is an educational disaster. Here, where books are merely “learning resources�?, reading is about functional literacy instead of pleasure. A paperclip is a learning resource. Google Earth is a learning resource. But a book is “the distilled essence of a human soul�?. A book is something you take to bed with you. It is not a learning resource any more than a kiss is a coordinated interpersonal labial spasm.'
The O.E.D. defines stoled as 'wearing a stole'; stole as a verb in its own right, meanwhile, is listed with two senses, 'to provide (an altar, a church) with altar-stoles' and 'of a plant: to develop stolons'.
As a verb: 'All went well at first, with inflation, and therefore rent rises, staying low. Over the past year, however, the RPI has yo-yoed. In 2008 it rose steadily, hitting 5 percent in September before falling back to 0.9 percent by the end of the year.' (Private Eye #1229, p.6)
'A plan by the BBC, ITV and Channel 4 to launch an on-demand video service has been blocked because it posed "too much of a threat to competition".
'The Competition Commission said Project Kangaroo "has to be stopped" and that viewers would benefit if the three were "close competitors" rather than allies.'
This is actually a story about the possible use of legal restrictions called control orders on people removed from Guantanamo Bay and brought to Britain.
Telegraph: 'Turritopsis Nutricula is technically known as a hydrozoan and is the only known animal that is capable of reverting completely to its younger self.
Perhaps there's an attempt to offer ambiguous interplay through avoiding grammatical cues. 'Italy sent a woman...'? 'A woman sent Italy...'? 'In Italy, a woman sent...'? 'Italy is a woman sent...'? Or maybe the intention is to imply a subtext about the role of Woman in modern society, contrasting feminine-as-lifegiver-and-nurturer with the bluntness of clinical death.
Italy
Woman sent
To clinic
To die.
At a guess, though, someone used to writing things like 'Manchester man wins lottery' just took the form too far.
Given that Facebook status updates can be made externally accessible via an RSS feed, wouldn't it be easier to use something like a Google Reader shared tag, so as to automate the process?
The actual story: 'A woman at the centre of the right-to-die debate in Italy has been moved to a clinic where she will be allowed to die after 17 years in a vegetative state.'
HG101: 'The word zazz has being going around for a while on this site now, and that's probably exactly the "quality" the game lacks. No character ever spills out their entire angsty life story. There are no funky hairdos and over-the-top character designs. Nobody ever turns into an angel in a post-cataclysmic final battle in space while flying around in a wormhole (with a choir singing orgasmically in the background, no less). Just a boy and his dog going on an adventure. This is as close as it gets to zazz level 0. The zazz basement, if you will.'
Jargon File on brick: 'This term usually implies irreversibility, but equipment can sometimes be unbricked by performing a hard reset or some other drastic operation.'
Concurring Opinions: 'What strange confluence of laws and economic incentives produce all of this hyperpackaging of inexpensive goods? Do appliances break unless transported in a foot of protection? Do consumers injure themselves if they get the box home and the flatware is right at the surface and unsecured? Do labels deter theft of open-stock items (“We know that this isn’t your cereal bowl you have under your sweater because it has our label on it.�?)? Or ensure that things don’t get misplaced on store shelves?'
Cory Doctorow: 'Last December, Forbes published my latest article on Darren Atkinson, hands down the most exciting, thoughtful and skilled garbologist and dumpster diver I’ve ever heard of... Darren’s got the perfect zero-capital, socially conscious enterprise — drive around the industrial suburbs, collecting the scat of the wily corporation as it progresses through the twists and turns of its life-cycle, and panning out major cash in those fewmets.'
Quoted from David Stanley: '…Another unique Samoan characteristic is musu, to be sullen. A previously communicative individual will suddenly become silent and moody. This often bears no relation to what’s happening at the time, and when a Samoan becomes musu, the best approach is just to sit back and wait until they get a grip…'
Speaking of /lists/, why does it seem never to change, if it has the last 500 lists on the site? Every time I end up there I see my Cryptolects list at the top.
I'd forgotten about this beauty: it seems no longer to break my favourites list, which is nice, and of course we now have tags appropriate to its stature...
Edit: I see it still doesn't work properly on the comment feed...
Dwight Rodgers: 'Although German is not one of the languages I can speak, and I'm probably repeating urban legend, I once heard that the German word for "Tank" early in the 1900s was something like "Schützengrabenvernichtungsautomobil", perhaps meaning "automobile that shoots and moves in trenches". The time required to yell this phrase upon seeing a tank, was, of course, presented as the primary reason for Germany losing the war.'
Omniglot: 'The Batak are a negrito people, with kinky (curly) hair and dark skin. Their mother-tongue is called Binatak and is related to other regional languages of Malayic origin. While the Palawan and the Tagbanua tribes developed a unique alphabet, the Batak have never had a writing system. Anthropologists believe the Batak to be related to the Aeta people, found in other parts of the Philippines.'
Derick Pinto: 'The other day, a Maharashtrain friend of mine remarked, "Konkani is a dialect of Marathi. That is why Konkani does not have its own script." This set me thinking. I am a linguist and I am interested in language and linguistics. So I found me asking myself as to whether Konkani is a dialect of Marathi or an independent language by itself.'
Raymond Tallis: 'New technologies permitting imaging of the waking brain in humans have prompted increasingly extravagant claims about the extent to which advances in neurocience are casting light on human nature. The proliferation of new disciplines, such as neuro-aesthetics, neuro-ethics, neuro-law and neuro-economics, is a symptom of the widespread belief that the activity of the stand-alone brain explains our subjective experiences and our objectively observed behaviour.
'The talk will critically examine this central notion of neuromythology, demonstrate the inadequacy of neural accounts of human nature, discuss the reasons they command such wide support, and spell out the dire consequences they might have if they were truly believed.'
What it means: 'Assembly members sc. in Northern Ireland are to debate a controversial proposal to give the families of all those killed during the Troubles £12,000.'
Comments by vanishedone
Show previous 200 comments...
vanishedone commented on the word howler
T.H.E.: 'Remember the economics student who attributed the run on Northern Rock to the "laxative enforcement policies" of the Financial Services Authority?
'Or last year's winning insight into the work of author Margaret Atwood: "The Handmaid's Tale shows how patriarchy treats women as escape goats"?
'Yes, it is that time of the year again. Times Higher Education is inviting entries to its annual "exam howlers" competition - the chance for scholars to share this year's most off-the-wall offerings.'
July 16, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word paramotoring
T.H.E.: 'Fancy the matchless freedom of paragliding - but any time, any place, anywhere? Paul Chapman does, that's why he took to paramotoring.'
July 16, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word bugs
/people/comments/emilywalkin says 'emilywalkin has made 4 comments and citations', but only one is displayed. Meanwhile, people/comments/VanishedOne is giving me a 500 Application Error.
Edit: progress? Today it's giving me a 404.
July 16, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word e-nnui
You'd think refreshing would be more refreshing.
July 14, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word demake
Rock, Paper, Shotgun: 'There’s something about the idea of creating an FPS that is lower-res than Wolfenstein that seems brilliantly perverse. Demakes often don’t follow the exact principles of the game they’re based on, but in this case it’s a fully-functional FPS, albeit in four colours.'
July 14, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word supersonic acrobatic rocket-powered battle-cars
Plucked from a list of 'the longest game names of all time'.
July 14, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word brigandish
B.B.C. News:
July 14, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word modal counterpart
'My other car is a modal counterpart.' 'Show drivers behind you that your car does not have trans-world identity, but has counterparts in other possible worlds.'
July 14, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word deaths not halting success - pm
The overall success of British troops in Afghanistan, not the success of the deceased.
July 12, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word ineffable
See also the OCSJTS tag.
July 12, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word 'leak' claims candidate removed
You might imagine this means that a 'leak' claims that a candidate was removed from something, but in fact it means that a candidate who it's claimed leaked information was removed from a party shortlist.
July 12, 2009
vanishedone commented on the user jeaniepixie
As sionnach pointed out, pixiebaby doesn't look like a word of two syllables, which your second comment apparently says it is.
July 11, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word medicalisation
Ben Goldacre: 'Regular readers with be familiar with the intellectual land-grab of “medicalisation�?. Sometimes it’s about transforming a subjective moral objection into an objective, sciencey problem, as we saw with homosexuality and psychiatry. Sometimes it’s about reframing a problem to sell a solution: drug companies foster a belief that depression is down to serotonin, even though the evidence is hugely contradictory, to a public eager for simple, molecular answers. Bad school performance is related to omega-3, imply the supplement peddlers: so buy an omega-3 fish oil pill. Clomicalm, say the adverts, is “the first medication approved for the treatment of separation anxiety in dogs�?.'
July 11, 2009
vanishedone commented on the user jeaniepixie
Maybe it's one of those names with a surprising pronunciation, like Cholmondeley ('Chumly'). Edit: ah, here's the list.
July 11, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word first 'healthy' swine flu death
At least they used inverted commas.
July 11, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word lack of swing mystifies england
An entire nation is perplexed by modern playground design.
(Okay, it's actually about cricket.)
July 11, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word video game archaeologist
Press The Buttons:
July 10, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word bugs
Apostrophes in tags don't produce 404 pages like full stops, but they do seem to produce 'nobody has used' pages even if the tag is in use somewhere.
Edit: hang on, I think it's double apostrophes that do this. Contrast /tags/dinosaurs 'r us (fully functional) with /tags/ghouls 'n' ghosts (not, although it appears on firebrand).
Later edit: oddly enough though, /tags/ghouls 'n' ghosts?u=VanishedOne works normally.
July 5, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word bee ball
B.B.C. News: 'Honeybee hordes use two weapons - heat and carbon dioxide - to kill their natural enemies, giant hornets.
'Japanese honeybees form "bee balls" - mobbing and smothering the predators.
'This has previously been referred to as "heat-balling", but a study has now shown that carbon dioxide also plays a role in its lethal effectiveness.'
July 4, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word denormalisation
Spiked: 'As employed by the government and the anti-obesity industry, denormalisation is a made-up word that functions as both a noun and as a verb to describe both a state in which the obese are perceived to be abnormal, aberrant, even deviant, and a series of activities designed to achieve this end.
'In practice, denormalisation means that the government attempts to shame adults into changing their behaviour.'
July 1, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word man
'The story of man is told in headlines around the world.'
July 1, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word mayawati statues spree challenged
A spending spree, that is: 'The politician Mayawati has been accused of wrongly using public cash to make statues of herself and her allies, in a case at India's Supreme Court.'
June 30, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word iran frees five from uk embassy
If you're not already familiar with this story, you won't know whether it refers to the British embassy in Iran or an embassy in the U.K., and you won't know whether five people from the embassy were freed or whether five people were freed from the embassy.
June 30, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word stealth research
T.H.E.: 'Researchers have become experts in "stealth research" - taking money with the promise of a specific goal and then using it to support a wider "space of play".'
June 26, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word squelette
Ruins of the Present: 'Another version is the abandoned, incomplete high-rise. Commonly a steel and cement framework is erected (because that’s pretty easy), and then there’s some legal or economic brouhaha and the builders just down tools and walk off. In Brazil a skeleton framework of this kind is called a “squelette.�?'
June 25, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word stranger kidney donations rising
Donations to strangers, not by them. I'd hoped it was the strangeness of the donations or the kidneys that was rising.
June 25, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word !-- --
Edit: and my attempt to create a comment readable only by viewing the page source has been foiled... John must have set Wordie up to block such tricks.
June 24, 2009
vanishedone commented on the list the-oddympics
I imagine they are. Any game called something like Thrust Out the Harlot has at least one odd aspect, though it would be nice to know whether it actually does involve harlot-thrusting.
June 23, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word parades need dealt with: sf mp
Supposedly meaning: 'Martin McGuinness has warned the Orange Order that Sinn Fein stewarding of protests at controversial parades "cannot last forever".'
June 23, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word bugs
I'm using Firefox 3.0.10, and haven't encountered that problem myself.
June 21, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word milipede
Maybe a particularly militant variety.
June 19, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word interdisciplinarian
T.H.E: '"Interdisciplinarians" may reply that this trend towards ever more specialisation is exactly what they are striving to counter, but how do they intend to do so?'
June 18, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word interdisciplinarity
T.H.E.: '"Interdisciplinarity." The word has become a mantra. The concept has become a human right. The US Constitution needs to be amended to add it to the original Bill of Rights. The French Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen must be updated to include it. Any curtailment of the interdisciplinary impulse warrants a hearing at The Hague.
'But just what is interdisciplinarity, and why is it touted as the intellectual equivalent of penicillin? Taken tamely, interdisciplinarity means venturing beyond one's own discipline to another. The expectation is that something in the other discipline - a fact, a theory, an approach - will abet the practitioner of the home discipline... Taken boldly, interdisciplinarity means more than acquaintance with another discipline. It means the beholdenness of one discipline to another. Here interdisciplinarity is not merely an option but a requirement. Here progress within a discipline can be found only by looking beyond one's native land. To stay within one's discipline is to guarantee parochialism and stagnation. Disciplinary boundaries must be crossed, perhaps even effaced.'
June 18, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word witch's brew
Presumably Wordie retrieves only single-word entries from WordNet, since there isn't an automatic one on this page.
June 18, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word unconference
A not altogether explanatory citation: 'After 250 written responses, 12 "unconferences" (whatever they are) and "more than 500 bilateral engagements between stakeholders ... and the core team", yesterday saw the release of the government's Digital Britain report.'
June 18, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word denormalise
Spiked: 'Goerlitz’s empathy with smokers is one reason why he finds himself out of line with a movement that has become preoccupied with ‘denormalising’ smoking to the point where it is denormalising human beings. Groups like Action on Smoking on Health (USA) have called for smokers to be banned from fostering children and has suggested businesses should not employ smokers.'
June 17, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word buckywire
Technology Review: 'Finally! Something useful from buckyballs.
'Junfeng Geng at the University of Cambridge, in the U.K., and buddies have found a way to polymerize these microballs so that they line up into buckywires.
'The trick that Geng and co have found is a way to connect two buckyballs together using a molecule of 1,2,4-trimethylbenzene--a colorless aromatic hydrocarbon. Repeat that and you've got a way to connect any number of buckyballs. And to prove it, the researchers have created and studied these buckywires in their lab, saying that the wires are highly stable.'
June 17, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word bugs
I keep seeing old posts with no body text: on syllogism, for example. I wonder whether they were entered with no content, whether they're failing to load properly, or whether maybe the content was in the title field and this is a manifestation of the vanishing comment title bug.
June 16, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word mince pie syllogism
Elizabeth Anscombe's retort to the idea of a practical syllogism: that if there was a special kind of syllogism for reasoning about what one ought to do, we might as well speak of a distinct kind of syllogism for any topic, such as mince pies. 'The peculiarity of this would be that it was about mince pies, and an example would be "All mince pies have suet in them – this is a mince pie – therefore etc."'
June 16, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word yoghurting
B.B.C.: 'Even in your own language, it is difficult to catch accurately the words of a song if they are not written down in front of you, and in France, which imports most of its music from the US or UK, there is even a word for the appropriation of lyrics.
'It is "yaourt", or "to yoghurt".
'You start singing confidently... and then trail off into inarticulate "yoghurting" when your lexicon runs dry.
'As far as I understand it, so long as you look slightly pained and shut your eyes while you yoghurt, you seem to get away with it.'
June 15, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word noumenal
See noumenon, about one year ago.
And so the Great Cycle of Wordie continues: 'tis the season to be perplexed by Kant.
June 14, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word ۩
Thanks to Google's autosuggester we know that popular searches beginning with this character are:
۩۞۩๑
۩ orkut v.i.p. account ۩
۩๑
In spite of which ۩ itself returns no results. According to decodeunicode.org it's the Qur'anic Place of Sadjah Sajdah (and the Wikipedia link above does work accordingly).
June 14, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word dunsanian
Dunsany.net: 'Lord Dunsany is cited as a major influence by many writers and artists and as an important figure in the development of fantastic literature by editors, academics and critics. His work formed part of the foundation of fantasy, along with that of Poe, Morris and Rider Haggard, and fed into later work such as that of Tolkien, Lewis and Lovecraft. The reference Dunsanian evokes a particular style and atmosphere which has, in the words of more than one commentator, been much imitated but never duplicated.'
Some words from his fantasies may be perused on this list.
June 13, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word you can borrow all 5,485 of my books
If other people do, I imagine they round to at least the nearest ten.
June 12, 2009
vanishedone commented on the list heaveno-s-list
The way this ends with a copyright declaration is particularly striking.
June 12, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word lemming
Coined as a philosophical term of art by Brian Weatherson: 'The best suggestions seemed to be that I have a purely disjunctive label. But “Language, Epistemology, Metaphysics and Mind�? seemed to be too long. What we needed was a shortening. Maybe an acronym. But LEMM seemed boring. If we just add a suffix we could have a name. I know… LEMMINGS!'
June 12, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word shopsoiled
'So why ride that swaybacked steed, weighed down with its multifarious semantic baggage, in the first place? ... Because all our political terms are shopsoiled by history; to talk about autonomy or toleration or dignity is to join a conversation that has been ongoing long before you arrived and will continue long after you've departed.'
Kwame Anthony Appiah, The Ethics of Identity, p. xi.
June 11, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word reetsa
Citation on reesta, thanks to a slip of the keyboard.
June 11, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word reesta
Oops.
June 11, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word edu-babble
T.H.E.: '"Edu-babble" has been identified as a threat to the British education system by a University of Oxford study. The Nuffield Review into education for 14-19-year-olds warns that teachers' efforts are being stymied by "Orwellian language seeping through government documents" that is dominating educational planning. Mary Bousted, general secretary of the Association of Teachers and Lecturers, said on 9 June: "We call it 'edu-babble'. It completely denudes education."'
June 11, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word reesta
Museum of Hoaxes (which concludes that this story is probably apocryphal): 'Hughes told the media that he had financed an expedition to search for a rare South American creature, the Reetsa. For a year he supplied them with updates about the expedition. Then, finally, he announced that a Reetsa had been caught and would be shipped to New York City. On the day of its arrival, reporters were gathered at the pier as Hughes proudly led a mangy bull down the gangway. Reetsa was "a steer" spelled backwards.'
June 11, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word bugs
http://wordie.org/words/coquettish displays for me; /words/http://wordie.org/words/coquettish doesn't, of course, but if that was what was in your browser address bar you shouldn't have seen a Wordie 404 page at all, since /words isn't a recognisable protocol...
June 11, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word securicrat
Guardian: 'The unknown enemy is cast, very much like the ill-defined threat presented to Oceania in Nineteen Eighty-Four, as a pervasive, cunning and unseen foe that requires total watchfulness and, it follows, the sacrifice of the essential right of privacy. In the programme, Pepper explains the challenges that face his former colleagues at GCHQ with a diagram that shows how information is carried in discreet packets across the internet, a development which he implies must be met by granting the agency total access to all our communications.
'You can see GCHQ's problem, but we should not take the word of a securicrat with a narrow view of how a free society works to be the only voice in this debate.'
June 11, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word psikharpax
Physorg: 'Psikharpax -- named after a cunning king of the rats, according to a tale attributed to Homer -- is the brainchild of European researchers who believe it may push back a frontier in artificial intelligence.'
June 10, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word cauliferous
Are you sure, tagger? The O.E.D. definition is 'producing or having a stem or stalk'.
June 10, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word bother
You don't say: 'Both his mother and sister had hanged themselves five years ago and this had always bothered Ligesh.'
Is this word taken to have a stronger sense in India, or is this sheer understatement?
June 9, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word interest in property 'up again'
Interest in Proudhon correspondingly waning. No, wait: it's about real estate.
(Why do we call it the property market, anyway?)
June 9, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word putik
Intoxicated, perchance...?
June 9, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word carnalpedia
The Register: 'The theory implied by their PR is that Wikipedia is a stuffy, respectable resource which provides very little information on topics of an adult nature – and that Carnalpedia will therefore fill in the gaps for all those interested in exploring their personal sexual fantasy through the medium of an online index (encyclopedophiles?).
'Unfortunately for the theory, a short browse through Wikipedia reveals perfectly good, descriptive articles on practices such as "cunnilingus" and "fellatio", as well as a variety of articles on practices previously unheard of at El Reg, including "dacryphilia" and "autogynephilia" – which appears to have nothing at all to do with cars.
'More seriously for the publishers of Carnalpedia, their work appears never to have heard of these terms either.'
June 9, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word wordnik
And now in open beta. Judging by wordnik.com/words/eyes, they've got WeirdNet too.
June 9, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word god damnit
A holy ghost!
June 7, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word afloat
WeirdNet and its thesaurus aspirations...
June 6, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word tos-er
I feel this would be a suitable term for a writer of lengthy and impenetrable Terms of Service documents stating that by using the site on which they're located you agree to sign away the soul of your firstborn child, etc.
Although I did like John's anecdote on ToS.
June 6, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word pétomain
Did someone need a hand in spelling pétomane? This one seems anatomically worrying.
June 6, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word obstain
A stain that stubbornly refuses to be washed away.
June 6, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word oliphant
Culture24: 'Culture Minister Barbara Follett has placed a temporary export bar on a medieval carved ivory oliphant or hunting horn valued at £3.35million.'
June 6, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word empty-boxing
According to a comment here, this 'refers to a (possibly apocryphal) story of IBM sending a customer an empty tape box, then explaining when it arrived that it must have been screwed up in the shipping department. This bought the necessary time for the software to be completed.'
June 6, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word google squared
Named after Sir James Wordie, apparently. So it turns out some people are Wordies from birth...
June 6, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word lash
I haven't heard it, but that doesn't mean much.
June 5, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word re-victualate
See link on victualate.
June 5, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word victualate
The only usage of this Google knows about is re-victualate in Darwin—A Novel.
June 5, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word shpandoinkle?
I see it's still possible to land on a page ending in ? via Random Word and be persented with a 'nobody is listing' screen.
June 5, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word quasiperiodic
Citation on quasicrystal.
June 5, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word quasicrystal
Scientific American: 'A team of researchers says they have found in a Russian mineral sample the first natural example of a quasicrystal, an unusual material that displays some of the properties of a crystal but boasts a more intricate and complex structure. Since quasicrystals were characterized 25 years ago, numerous versions have been cooked up in the laboratory, but a natural example would indicate that nature's products are more diverse than previously thought.
'Quasicrystals display ordered arrangements and symmetries but are not periodic—that is, they are not defined by a single unit cell (such as a cube) that simply repeats itself in three dimensions. The term "quasicrystal" was coined by physicists Dov Levine and Paul Steinhardt, both then at the University of Pennsylvania, to describe the class of quasiperiodic crystals in 1984, shortly after another group published observational evidence for such a material.'
June 5, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word nephrangibility
I imagine this is a kidney-based pun on refrangibility, but I'm at a loss to guess at the intended meaning.
June 5, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word screw like rabbits
I wonder whether screw-like rabbits would burrow more efficiently.
June 5, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word sep
I think Douglas Adams got there before Urban Dictionary.
June 5, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word lash
Your local students' union may offer both university-branded merchandise for sale during the day and opportunities to get drunk at night. (In collegiate university towns it's not unusual to see people wearing college colours.)
June 5, 2009
vanishedone commented on the list wanted-comic-strip-name
So was there a winner?
June 5, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word lash
I see WordNet doesn't know about the boozing sense. A few years back 'stash =branded merchandise and lash' was a standard coupling around my university; I don't think I've seen it recently, but that may be a result of spending less time around undergrads.
June 5, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word lager
WeirdNet's preferred sense is absent from the O.E.D., although it does turn up on dictionary.com (credited to the Random House Dictionary) as an alternative spelling of laager.
June 5, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word levidity
A song about jeans.
June 5, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word hedgehog
I love the way WeirdNet calls hedgehogs both 'relatively large rodents' and 'relatively small placental mammals', and then uses plain 'small' in the other definitions. What's the average volume of an adult placental mammal?
June 5, 2009
vanishedone commented on the user john
Thanks for killing off globalapostilleservice. Is it even worth giving a warning to this one, given that the style looks familiar?
June 4, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word netbook
Not 'netbooks'. Low cost small notebook PCs.
Bound to catch on...
June 3, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word frislant
From citation on phantom island; I removed it from the Phantom Islands list on realising that it was probably either a misspelling or a variation on Frisland.
June 3, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word hy-brasil
Citation on Antillia.
June 3, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word antillia
Strange Maps: '...many of the islands pictured here in the western Atlantic Ocean are quite clearly some of the many phantom islands that for a long time were recorded on maps, but were never more than legends. One such example is Hy-Brasil, probably one of the islands pictured closest to Ireland.
Another phantom island, mentioned on this map, is Antillia, also known as the Island of Seven Cities or St Brendan’s Island, and often used as a synonym for the Isles of the Blessed or the Fortunate Islands. The muddled legends of Antillia have been around since at least Plutarch’s time (ca. 74 AD). Its name might be a corruption of Atlantis; or a derivation of anterioris insula, Latin for an island located ‘before’ Cipangu; or a transformation of Jazeerat at-Tennyn, Arabic for ‘Island of the Dragon’. Toscanelli on his map uses Antillia as the main marker for measuring distance between Portugal and Cipangu.
The reference to Sete Ciudades (‘Seven Cities’) is reminiscent of an Iberian legend of seven bishops fleeing the Arab conquest of the peninsula and founding a city each on the island, which became a sort of Utopian commonwealth. Some claim the legend of Antillia represents an earlier discovery of the islands that eventually became known as… the Antilles. Improving nautical knowledge eventually led Antillia to disappear from maps, but the legends surrounding it continued to inspire explorers for a long time – e.g. the ‘Seven Cities’, that were sought in the Southwest of the US or even posited on Cape Breton Island in Canada.'
June 3, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word sannikov land
Strange Maps: 'In 1811, the Russian merchant and explorer Yakov Sannikov reported seeing a ‘bluish fog’ to the northeast of the New Siberian Islands. In 1886 and 1893, fellow Russian explorer Eduard Toll also sighted what many by then presumed to be an as yet undiscovered island, provisionally named ‘Sannikov Land’. Intensive searches couldn’t locate it, but Sannikov Land appeared on maps well into the first half of the 20th century.
'Only then could scientists prove beyond doubt that Sannikov Land did not exist. In fact, it might be considered something of a modern version of Frisland...'
June 3, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word frisland
Strange Maps: 'In 1569, Gerhard Mercator copied the Zeno map into his influential World Map. Abraham Ortelius did the same for his renowned map of the Northern Atlantic in 1573. In 1595, Mercator included Frisland (not to be confused with Friesland, which does exist on the North Sea coast of the Netherlands and Germany) in a separate inset on his 1595 map of the North Pole. Thus Frisland, and the other fanciful lands fabricated by the 16th century Zeno (most likely), came to be known as ‘fact’, and were copied by other cartographers, often with variations on the name such as Fixland, Freezeland or Frischlant. Only much later did it become clear they were imaginary.'
June 3, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word phantom island
The geographical version of Lieutenant Kizhe. Strange Maps: 'I had never heard of Fagunda. A 17th-century map places it in the North Atlantic, not far from Estotiland, Bus and Frislant. These and other so-called phantom islands were a by-product of the Age of Discovery. They started out as errors of nautical observation, and lived on as cartographic misconceptions – sometimes for centuries...'
Edit: in fact, I feel a list coming on.
June 3, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word bugs
Working normally for me, two hours later.
There used to be a bug that produced a 500 Application Error (see comment 9 months ago by oroboros), but it was fixed. (I don't know exactly when John fixed it.)
June 3, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word kitsch > deseo de aparentar ser
Arrowneous.
June 1, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word drapetomania
Strange in what way?
June 1, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word astrometry
B.B.C. News: 'The discovery of a Jupiter-like "exoplanet" orbiting the star VB 10 is the first to be made using the astrometry method. Astrometry is based on measuring small changes in a star's position.'
June 1, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word delete
The Wordie Paradox strikes again: fittingly, delete is 404'd.
June 1, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word bugs
It isn't just the subject lines either; the delete option that appears when you edit a comment is also vanishing after a page refresh.
June 1, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word lituus
B.B.C. News: 'New software has enabled researchers to recreate a long forgotten musical instrument called the Lituus. The 2.4m (8ft) -long trumpet-like instrument was played in Ancient Rome but fell out of use some 300 years ago. '
May 30, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word felinatio
Private Eye: 'Wally begins to describe a secret night life in which he creeps out into Manhattan and has sex with cats... Wally exhaustingly catalogues sexual possibilities that even the most sophisticated member of the audience can rarely have contemplated: felinatio, moggylingus.'
May 30, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word unwelcome
I added it to the spammer's list along with spam, abuse, etc., then noticed it had been listed 1 time with 0 comments. So it's on the side of Right, but nevertheless was born on the battlefield, or something.
May 30, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word unwelcome
Poor unwelcome: its only Wordie listing is on a spammer's list, albeit on the side of Right.
May 29, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word soronous
Wailing sorrowfully?
May 29, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word rape-free
Boing Boing: 'Eve Ensler explains that Congolese militias use rape to enforce discipline among a slave workforce that mines columbite-tantalite ore, a common raw material for many devices... She is proposing that electronics manufacturers and their customers--us--began to concern themselves with the notion of "Rape-Free" products in which the raw, mineral components of consumer electronics are traced back to sources that can be verified to have procured them ethically. (She allows that "Rape-Free" is probably not a moniker that would be comfortable plastered on boxes and signs.)'
I think this is supposed to say that people wouldn't be comfortable with it; in which case I'm inclined to concur.
May 29, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word councillors 'past it' row inquiry
What it means: 'The public services ombudsman for Wales is investigating a Swansea councillor who claimed that some members of the council aged over 60 were "past it".'
May 28, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word features
Maybe people like that are scared future employers will discover their tastes for bilabial fricatives and self-descriptions as homonyms seeking autoantonyms.
Oooh, I just noticed that at some point John's fixed the weird list links, e.g. Meta is now reachable from /lists/meta again, rather than defaulting to /lists/metaphysics-buzz-words-2.
May 28, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word features
Apparently so, since an hour later /people/profile/palindromica is 404'd.
May 28, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word scots mortgage market 'behind uk'
No, you haven't missed a change in political geography: 'Scotland's mortgage market appears to be lagging behind the rest of the UK, the latest lending figures have shown.'
May 27, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word metametaphysics
Citation on metaontology.
May 27, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word metaontology
The Uncredible Hallq: 'If all goes well, next fall I will be taking a graduate class on “metaontology,�? which means the project of trying to answer questions about ontological questions. I decided to be a go-getter and buy the main textbook for the course (the anthology Metametaphysics) several months in advance...'
May 27, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word curios
Are you thinking of curiosity?
May 27, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word tetricitie
Is this what slow-falling blocks are carved out of?
May 27, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word darqueau
Ghosted but clearly not exorcised.
May 27, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word dozenal
The Dozenal Society of America advocates counting in base twelve.
May 27, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word bugs
There's some inconsistent escaping in tags that contain /
hindi/urdu viewed on ghungroo points to /tags/hindi\/urdu
However, the same tag appearing on the tags page points to /tags/hindi/urdu
Either way, it's 404'd and changing the / to a %2f doesn't help with this one.
May 26, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word chris' head weighs a ton
Worrying.
May 26, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word watch-paper
BibliOdyssey: 'Hands up anyone who knew what a watch-paper print was? Yeah, I thought so. Me neither... Originally designed as a simple protective insert, watch-papers came to be used as an advertising medium for the watchmakers in the second half of the 18th century and another means by which print artists could ply their trade. These types of "professional" or conservative watch-papers form the majority of the genre, but a popular "amateur" variety also emerged that were valued as keepsakes.'
May 26, 2009
vanishedone commented on the user john
John, what do the house rules say about thematic consistency like this? I'm not sure whether desum is trolling in search of a reaction or just deeply single-minded.
May 26, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word babirusas
Image Search includes some pictures of big cats and polar bears to make up the numbers.
May 24, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word sacroscant
Adj. Not very sacred.
May 24, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word dungeon
I think WeirdNet means the keep.
May 24, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word stretcher
How familiar does WeirdNet #1 sound to other people? Stretcher makes me think of medical assistance...
May 24, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word duck island mp 'feels humiliated'
Not the Hon. Member for Duck Island, wherever that might be, but an M.P. who tried to claim expenses for a floating island to house his ducks.
May 23, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word enervating breath
With this and Absorb Weapon ghosted, I get the impression someone compiled and deleted a tabletop RPG ability list.
Sure enough, Magic Missile and Turn Undead are ghosted too...
May 23, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word bugs
Some interesting " behaviour: there's a tag on Lucy reading aesop rock song "no regrets", but even once I've reconstructed a working URL by changing " to %22, I still get a 'nobody has used this tag' message.
May 23, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word gÖdel's theorem
Oops. See Gödel's theorem. I wonder whether OCSJTS should cover these...
May 23, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word wormlike
Hmm. WeirdNet defines wriggling as 'moving in a twisting or snake-like or wormlike fashion', but its definitions for wormlike involve submissiveness rather than movement.
May 23, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word deinopoid
B.B.C.: '...more than 100 million years ago, in the early Cretaceous period, a major shift in the design of spiders' orb-shaped webs came about.
'Before then, spiders coated the spirals in their webs with puffs of dry adhesive. These dry spirals trapped insects by physically entangling around the tiny hairs known as setae on their bodies. A group of spiders living today, known as deinopoid spiders, still weave webs in this way.
'However, during the early Cretaceous, araneoid orb weaving spiders evolved which weaved a different type of web. These spiders replaced the dry adhesive with wet droplets of glue. These are much stickier.'
May 22, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word chicken soup
Duly detagged.
May 22, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word chicken soup
Twelve hours later, John has clearly done his good work: bonniebonniebonnie is 404'd. (bonniebonnie still exists but is thus far inactive.)
Does anyone feel like adopting chicken soup?
May 22, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word silo syndrome
T.H.E.: 'Wilhelm von Humboldt created the template for contemporary Western universities when he organised his Berlin-based institution into schools and departments based on areas of knowledge. Previously, academic disciplines were integrated and professors rarely specialised. The reforms inspired by Humboldt have led to unparalleled progress in research and knowledge. Recently, however, this extreme specialisation has come in for criticism because of its undesirable consequence: "silo syndrome", in which academics deal only with colleagues in their subject and students gain only a narrow perspective on knowledge.'
May 21, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word crazy rasberry ant
ken5.com: 'The crazy Rasberry ant is named after exterminator Tom Rasberry, who first discovered it in 2002.'
May 21, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word features
<div style="color: red; font-size: 30pt; text-transform: uppercase;">
<blink>
Tags are not the same as definitions
</blink>
</div>
on the tags/pos box when first viewed might be less taxing on my schedule.
Actually, in all seriousness it may be worth wondering whether the tags/pos box could have some short, explanatory wording added; I imagine people might be more likely to read it than to browse an entire FAQ page.
May 21, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word mascot
See /tags/candidate for wordie mascot, with the winner tagged /tags/official wordie mascot.
There's also /tags/candidate for wordie mascot 2009, but thus far it's been used only once.
May 20, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word palatals
It just doesn't have separate defintions for plurals (although sometimes it does prioritise different definitions for plural forms, e.g. eye vs. eyes).
May 20, 2009
vanishedone commented on the list estevens-s-list
Were you by any chance intending to add those words to the list? Other box, one by one.
Welcome to Wordie.
May 19, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word ghost comments
Comments on tags which no longer appear on any words also act as ghost comments of a sort: I can see on the recent comments page that bilby has commented on /tags/cyncism, but when I go there I find a 'nobody has used' page with no comments (and no comment entry box) visible.
I think I've previously mentioned this on either bugs or features.
May 19, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word aphasia
A.k.a. WeirdNet. You haven't seen the worst of it...
May 19, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word study ball
curiosite.com presumably intends it as a spoof item; I wouldn't put it past some parents to take the idea seriously, though.
May 19, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word study ball
Telegraph: 'Concerned mums and dads set the desired study time on the Study Ball and attach it to their child's ankle.
'A red digital display counts down the "Study Time Left" and the device beeps and unlocks when the time expires.
'The prison-style device weighs 9.5 kg (21 pounds), making it difficult to move while wearing it.'
See also ball and chain.
May 19, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word features
Absurd lists on Wordie? Unthinkable.
May 19, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word Å
This one seems to be working nowadays, although å still isn't.
May 17, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word private note
See private notes.
May 15, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word copyleft
How about ↄ?
May 15, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word admire
Has someone been feeding it blood...?
May 15, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word irc
Sorry, wrong link. Try this.
May 15, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word irc
telofy made a channel for Wordie at one point (four months ago?), but the comment on this page seems to have vanished. Maybe it didn't get enough of a reaction...
May 14, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word bugs
Where housekeeping is concerned, we're waiting for John's posse to saddle up (see features, 3 months ago).
May 14, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word admire
Judging by the usernames, I suspect English is not their first language.
May 14, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word screenager
T.H.E.: 'We have plenty of nostalgic and ideologically loaded analyses of what new and graduating students can't do. There is precious little account taken of what today's 'screenagers' can do that many of their predecessors - and at least some of their teachers - can't," Sir David said, in a lecture titled "Students aren't what they used to be - and never were".'
May 14, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word admire
That was erich13; apparently he couldn't work out how to remove the tags again, and John may get around to doing it someday.
May 14, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word bonus secondary head suspended
What it means: 'A London head teacher has been suspended following "serious" allegations about pay and bonuses.'
May 13, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word absorb weapon
This seems to be a tabletop RPG ability.
May 13, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word appetizingness
WeirdNet defines this word and also employs it in its definition of deliciousness, but none of the other dictionary.reference.com sources lists it, and neither does the O.E.D....
May 13, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word circumhorizontal
A.P.O.D.: '...circumhorizontal arcs are quite unusual to see. This circumhorizon display was photographed...'
May 13, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word postive
Pertaining to postage?
May 13, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word over my dead body
Perhaps it had to be prised out of its list.
May 13, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word earlings
A wonderful O.E.D. definition for this: 'Possibly a transl. of Fr. oreillettes ‘wires about a woman's head’ (Miège Fr. Dict. 1701); cf. ear-wires.'
May 13, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word earling
If memory serves Titus Groan uses this to denote a ceremony installing a new earl; it's not in the O.E.D., so presumably Peake coined it.
May 13, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word chronologically misplaced
WeirdNet's euphemism for anachronistic.
May 13, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word anachronistic
This WeirdNet definition makes me think of time travel: "We're not lost in the past... we're merely chronologically misplaced."
May 13, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word hallux
A veritable bouquet of superlatives, WeirdNet.
May 13, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word slackline
Slacklining is like tightrope walking, but without the tightness.
May 12, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word airkicking
Oddee: 'In this strange extreme sport, a human catapult launches individuals over 26 feet in the air into a swimming pool or foam pit.'
May 12, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word underwater cycling
Oddee uses this header apparently by mistake, since the article goes on to talk about underwater hockey. If underwater cycling didn't exist, they may have inadvertently invented it.
May 12, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word poweriser
Swebounce: 'Powerisers are bouncy stilts that you strap yourself into. With some training you can run as fast as 20mph and jump 2 meters high. For many people it’s enough to just run around and bounce but there are many kind of tricks you can perform on powerisers. I would say that this is the extreme sport of the future.'
May 12, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word cliff diving
Maybe not strange enough for the Oddympics list, but it certainly sounds risky.
May 12, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word crocodile bungee
Oddee: 'Feeling jaded by garden-variety bungee jumping? You might consider imitating how these Aussies spice up the sport: bungee jumping into a body of water containing live crocodiles.'
May 12, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word train surfing
Oddee: 'Usually an illegal sport, train surfing involves riders climbing or "surfing" on the outside of a moving train or subway.'
May 12, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word limbo skating
Oddee: 'For what may appear to be near-impossible, limbo-skating — roller skating under cars — is the latest rage in India...'
May 12, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word volcano boarding
Via Oddee.
May 12, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word ever-circulator
LRB: '...later, chain letters called ‘ever-circulators’, composed in shorthand, were sent through the imperial mail.'
May 12, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word tachygraphy
LRB: 'In early modern England, tachygraphy, tachography, zeitography, zeiglography, semigraphy, semography all vied for the loyalty of court recorders, parliamentary reporters, diarists (think of Pepys), clergymen (who used it to rip off each other’s sermons) and theatregoers (who used it the way some filmgoers use a handicam). Dickens broke into parliamentary reporting by memorising Thomas Gurney’s book, Brachygraphy, or, an Easy and Compendious System of Shorthand.'
May 12, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word stenomask
LRB: 'In the US, court reporters have abandoned stenotype machines, whose keyboards use chord-like combinations to represent sounds, for a technique called voice writing. The "writer" – really a speaker – repeats testimony into a microphone nestled in a hand-held mask that prevents her voice from being heard in court; the recording is later transcribed, usually with speech-recognition software.The Stenomask dates back to the 1940s, when an American court reporter encased a microphone first in a cigar-box, then in a tomato tin, and finally in an old coffeepot, but it didn’t become a standard fixture until the advent of speech recognition programs. It’s also cheaper: machine stenography takes three years to learn, voice writing six months.'
May 12, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word children sanitation alert issued
With just an extra 's it could have sounded less as though the words were in a random order.
May 12, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word amiga
WordNet lists amigo but not this, even though it's this one that's the name of a famous series of computers.
May 12, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word definished
No objections on terpsichorean - pertaining to dance (terpsichorean circumvention), so I'm going to introduce this to OCSJTS. It should also serve for words tagged with definitions like /tags/occurring in or being a third stage: as a: being or relating to the recovery of oil and gas from old wells by means of the underground application of heat and chemicals b: being or relating to the purification of wastewater by removal of fine particles.
See tag.
May 11, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word 'major failings' at abuse school
Not enough people passing their abuse exams?
May 11, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word copyleft
Can you see a reversed c here? → Ↄ
I got it from here, but I can't view it on my machine.
There's been some discussion about the possibility of adding the symbol here.
May 11, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word swami
Modern Mechanix: 'Swami, by itself, reacts like any other object: supported at one end only—it falls. But, add a fairly heavy belt, as shown in the photo, and it will not only stay up but actually take quite a bit of extra pressure to make it tilt down, even slightly.'
May 10, 2009
vanishedone commented on the list vince12-s-list
What leads you to believe it has one?
May 9, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word nuhegh'eghrupqa'mohlahbe'law'li'nes
Slate: 'As if that weren't complicated enough, Klingon also has a large set of suffixes... Klingon has 36 verb suffixes and 26 noun suffixes that express everything from negation to causality to possession to how willing a speaker is to vouch for the accuracy of what he says. By piling on these suffixes, one after the other, you can pack a lot of meaning on to a single word in Klingon—words like nuHegh'eghrupqa'moHlaHbe'law'lI'neS, which translates roughly to: They are apparently unable to cause us to prepare to resume honorable suicide (in progress).'
May 8, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word millefiore
Science Daily: 'Millefiore is a glass-working technique created from glass rods with multi coloured patterns that are only visible at the cut ends – like a stick of rock with the writing only visible once cut. These rods are created by heating and melding lengths of different coloured glass to create an individual pattern. Here, a solid red cane is set at the core with blue and white canes set around it to produce the petal effect. The small cross sections of glass rod are then used to create bigger pieces. It is a very labour intensive – and hence very exclusive – craft.'
See also millefiori.
May 8, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word bugs
Judging by this it's probably associated with the AddThis widget at the bottom of the page.
May 7, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word plotonium
rampantgames.com: 'For example - in an adventure game, you've generally got one - usually convoluted and amusing - solution to a problem. A good RPG, on the other hand, should make that puzzle a goal condition and leave other options to achieve that goal available. Failure to do that leads to frustration, as in the "plot-driven door" problem (or as a friend of mine calls it, "objects made of the indestructable material plotonium"). In an adventure game, you expect it - but even then, it gets frustrating when you see what appears to be an obvious solution which doesn't work.'
May 7, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word it makes a loud noise all the time over there
A.k.a. Malibu.
May 7, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word guilt experienced while engaging in "normal" social activities that the time would be better served devoted to wordie
It was presumably replaced by remorse over having created another Wordie page that needs a work-around to access.
May 6, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word neo-victorian
Zeitgeisted?
May 5, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word watchclock
Graphpaper.com: 'An elegant solution, designed and patented in 1901 by the German engineer A.A. Newman, is called the “watchclock�?. It’s an ingenious mechanical device, slung over the shoulder like a canteen and powered by a simple wind-up spring mechanism. It precisely tracks and records a night watchman’s position in both space and time for the duration of every evening. It also generates a detailed, permanent, and verifiable record of each night’s patrol.'
May 5, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word hiyo
Allan Gibbard, Thinking How to Live: 'I can say "Hey, Bob!" to accost him, to attract his attention. "Hey!" of course isn't a predicate; the syntax of "Hey!" is not that of a predicate. Couldn't we, though, remedy this? Let's invent a predicate, and imagine that it is a standard part of our language: saying "Bob is hiyo in assertoric contexts, let's specify, accomplishes the speech act of accosting Bob—and likewise for saying that anyone else is hiyo.'
May 5, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word malodonus
Err... an unwanted gift?
May 3, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word edible
It can be a noun - the O.E.D. has examples from 1611 to 1884 - but n. above adj., WeirdNet?
May 3, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word circumlocation
This seems to be in (minor) use, though it's hard to find out exactly where.
May 3, 2009
vanishedone commented on the list runeswriter-s-list
Did you want these definitions to go on word pages? People new to Wordie often add definitions to list pages by mistake, but you don't seem to have listed any words either...
May 3, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word graphook
I'm not sure whether this was a typo or not; Googling produces a few caes of grap hook or grap-hook.
May 3, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word try yappa dingdingding on your coworkers :)
How does one do that?
May 2, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word terpsichorean - pertaining to dance (terpsichorean circumvention)
So what's the tagging protocol for cases like this? Definished?
May 2, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word powdered water
The punchline is 'just add water', isn't it?
May 2, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word charreria rodeo
Citation on sumodo.
May 2, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word pato
Citation on sumodo.
May 2, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word sumodo
Japan Times: 'Sumo is often called "kokugi" in the Japanese media and by the population at large, and kokugi is a phrase most dictionaries translate as "national sport." Likewise, sumo is performed at a stadium known as the Kokugikan — with "kan" meaning hall or stadium.
'However, few with an in-depth awareness of the professional game would ever refer to sumo as simply a sport. It's more of a "way," with sumodo a term often heard in professional circles. Also, unlike nine other nations, Canada (lacrosse in summer and ice-hockey in winter), Argentina (pato — a sport played on horseback similar to polo), and Mexico (charreria rodeo) included, Japan has no legally recognized national sport.'
May 2, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word parasitophorous vacuole
I must remember this one the next time I want to insult someone...
May 2, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word kinety
See kineties.
May 2, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word kineties
Palaeos.com: 'Rows of cilia on Ciliophora. A more interesting question is whether this word is singular or plural. If plural, what the hell is the singular? Almost all sources scrupulously avoid using the singular by various circumlocutions and studied grammatical artifice. One source uses "kinety," an Anglo-Saxon truncation that seems implausible on a Greek root. The truth is probably that the correct singular has been long forgotten or was never mentioned in the original paper, whatever that might have been. Wonderful are the ways of science.'
May 2, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word gamogony
Palaeos.com: 'the process by which a gamont gives rise to many... gametes'.
May 2, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word integrative
Not integrated into any lists...
May 2, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word curly-haired
Covered, WeirdNet? So if I call a person curly-haired, I'm claiming that this person's whole body is hirsute?
May 2, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word precisification
Brad Skow, On the Meaning of the Question, 'How Fast Does Time Pass?' (PDF): 'There are philosophers who think that some views about the nature of time can be refuted just by asking this question (in the right tone of voice). Others think the question has an obvious and boring answer. I think we need to be clearer on what the question means before we can say either way.
'In this paper I will examine several different questions, all of which have some claim to be precisifications of the question, “How fast does time pass?�?'
May 2, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word last page
I'd forgotten that in fact Wordie may be gradually contracting; see the discussion on ghost comments.
May 2, 2009
vanishedone commented on the list meta-squared
Shouldn't this list include itself?
May 2, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word keech
Only until someone starts do—
BRACKETS!
—ing it randomly.
May 2, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word findguru
Teacup, not teapot or tea-pot or even peatot? He'll be turning into a saucer next...
May 2, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word deadbeef
Computerworld.com: 'Expert programmers learned the debugging technique of filling memory with DEADBEEF (a "readable" hexadecimal value) to help them find a core-walker (the mainframe equivalent of a memory leak).'
May 2, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word hobotech
Hobo-tech.com: 'As a musical style, hobotech is wide open. Sampling hobo songs, songs or storys about hobos, or songs that invoke the open spaces of a forgotten America are encouraged. A loping, rough hewn feel with spoons and guitar is a good thing.'
May 1, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word bird convicted over glass attack
Tough justice for avians who recklessly fly into windows—or not...
May 1, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word supercell
Oddee: 'Supercell is the name given to a continuously rotating updraft deep within a severe thunderstorm (a mesocyclone) and looks downright scary.'
April 30, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word penitente
Oddee: 'These amazing ice spikes, generally known as penitentes due to their resemblance to processions of white-hooded monks, can be found on mountain glaciers and vary in size dramatically: from a few centimetres to 5 metres in height.'
April 30, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word mammatocumulus
Oddee: 'Also known as mammatocumulus, meaning "bumpy clouds", they are a cellular pattern of pouches hanging underneath the base of a cloud. Composed primarily of ice, Mammatus Clouds can extend for hundreds of miles in each direction, while individual formations can remain visibly static for ten to fifteen minutes at a time.'
April 30, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word brazil
Contrary not only to WeirdNet #2 but also to WordNet #1, Brazil, if it exists at all, is to be found in the north Atlantic.
April 28, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word lethalling
Citation on lethal.
April 28, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word lethal
Apparently this has been used as a verb meaning 'kill (animals) painlessly': the O.E.D. quotes newspapers from the Twenties talking about e.g. 'proper lethalling establishments where cats can be put to sleep free of charge'. It seems odd to me to use a word like that and then employ a euphemism a moment later.
April 28, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word features
Or maybe double-brackets, like LibraryThing uses for authors' names.
April 27, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word elastic loaf
The official Iranian term for a pizza, according to a mid-2006 news story.
Edit: to clarify, the actual term is Persian; elastic loaf is a translation.
April 27, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word features
I imagine the some people would find such a feature more usable than others: recall she, for example.
April 26, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word my first dictionary
Suitable for children. Or not...?
April 26, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word chargoggagoggmanchauggagoggchaubunagungamaugg
Metro: 'In an embarrassing mistake, officials in Massachusetts have been forced to admit that some road signs pointing to Lake Chargoggagoggmanchauggagoggchaubunagungamaugg have spelling mistakes in them.
'The typos, which are completely baffling considering how easy it is to spell Lake Chargoggagoggmanchauggagoggchaubunagungamaugg, were revealed by a local newspaper, the Worcester Telegram & Gazette, which has been covering the misspelling scandal since 2003.
'Resolving the issue involved large amounts of research into the roughly two dozen spelling variants for the lake, in Webster, Massachusetts, which is widely credited as having the longest place name in the USA.'
April 23, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word last page
Discussion on longest word ever suggests that Wordie does have a finite capacity: if seanahan's guess is correct, it's that of all possible UTF-8 character combinations up to 2^7 characters long.
April 21, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word collaboration
T.H.E.: 'A collaboration, after all, is a temporary liaison entered into for reasons of expediency - two political parties, for instance, might enter a collaborative relationship in a situation where neither can secure an overall mandate. This is very different from the longer-term fusions and crossovers of disciplines that occur all the time in the humanities without prodding or grant bribery.'
April 16, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word gradgrind
T.H.E.: 'The third danger is incipient support of an audit culture that leads to a Gradgrinding of university departments. In Charles Dickens' Hard Times, a horse is famously defined as:
'"'Quadruped. Graminivorous. Forty teeth, namely twenty-four grinders, four eye-teeth, and twelve incisive. Sheds coat in the spring; in marshy countries sheds hoofs, too. Hoofs hard, but requiring to be shod with iron. Age known by marks in mouth.' Thus (and much more) ... 'Now girl number twenty,' said Mr. Gradgrind. 'You know what a horse is.'"'
April 16, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word trahison des clercs
T.H.E.: 'Is this a true trahison des clercs, a selling of the pass by an academic establishment too alienated from politics to care or too worried about their careers to take a risk? Or is it the death by a hundred cuts that has crept up on us when we weren't looking? It hardly matters, for the result is the same - power in the hands of those whose interests are driven not by the pursuit of knowledge but by the pursuit of wealth.'
April 16, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word professoriate
T.H.E.: '...the representative of the professoriate on the board lost a subsequent election after managers decided that nominees should be elected by the deans and the professors rather than the professors alone.'
April 16, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word sedative
T.H.E.: 'Like Acton, Clapham believed in finding empty spaces in the past and dutifully filling them, so he was probably a connoisseur of tedium, and he is said to have died of boredom on a late train back from London as he shared the compartment with the wife of a college master famous for the sedative properties of her conversation. "Not a mark on his body," the medical report is rumoured to have said, "but with a terrible staring look in his eyes." The story is a tribute to the lady, for Clapham must have been a hard man to bore.'
April 16, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word drower
It seems to be a surname.
April 16, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word drower
I don't think that's the sense of paradox Asativum had in mind; but that's for the listmaster to decide upon.
April 16, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word ⌦
By the logic of ⌂, this means 'A house has been knocked over and destroyed'.
April 16, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word ⌂
This is supposed to be a house, although I've yet to see a font in which it looks like anything more than an irregular pentagon.
April 16, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word dna founder attacks database
Not the founder of DNA itself: 'The inventor of the genetic technology behind the national DNA database says it risks losing support because it holds the records of innocent people.'
April 15, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word cardapult
'The business card catapult.'
April 15, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word ☃
Different installed fonts, presumably. I'm on WinXP and can see both snowman and hat.
April 15, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word spad
B.B.C. News: 'So what do special advisers do and is the characterisation fair?
'The code of conduct spells out the job description. They are employed as temporary civil servants but do not have to be politically impartial like their civil service colleagues.
'They link together the minister, the party and the department. They are also the bridge between the neutral civil service and the politicians.
'One former "spad" - as they are known around Westminster - from the Blair years told me that they bring a political antenna to proceedings that essentially protects the civil servants by maintaining their independence.'
April 15, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word insular art
Culture24: 'A rare fusion of the Germanic and Celtic art styles of early medieval Britain known as Insular art, the mount takes the form of an animal with splayed legs and a projecting head.'
April 15, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word buccin
Douglas Yeo: 'Ever since I was a young boy I have been fascinated by the buccin, the late 18th and early 19th century French form of trombone that had a bell ending in a zoomorphic head.'
April 15, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word buntot ng pagi
According to this jolly glossary (may be NSFW): '(lit. ray's tail. Pagi or Pagi-pagui is the name of the animal) Also buntot pagi. A Philippine whip made with a dried ray's tail.'
April 14, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word understan
South of Pakistan.
April 14, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word dharug
B.B.C. News: 'Dharug was one of the dominant Aboriginal dialects in the Sydney region when British settlers arrived in 1788, but became extinct under the weight of colonisation.
'Details of its demise are sketchy but linguists believe the last of the traditional Dharug speakers died in the late 19th Century, and their unique tongue only survives because of written records.
'In a remarkable comeback, Dharug now breathes again - its revitalisation helped by the efforts of staff at Chifley College's Dunheved campus in Sydney...
'At Chifley College, where around a fifth of the students are Aboriginal, Dharug is taught twice a week with great energy through repetition and song.
'"Badagarang!" shouts the class when asked the word for kangaroo. Dingo, wallaby and koala are derived from Dharug.'
April 14, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word mikiphone
A kind of miniature gramophone.
April 13, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word linkrot
Joshua's Blog: '...And the long-term archivability of the hyperlink now depends on the health of a third party. The shortener may decide a link is a Terms Of Service violation and delete it. If the shortener accidentally erases a database, forgets to renew its domain, or just disappears, the link will break. If a top-level domain changes its policy on commercial use, the link will break... The most likely outcome, of course, is that we don't do anything and that the great linkrot apocalypse causes all of modern culture to dissapear in a puff of smoke. Hopefully.'
April 13, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word enthymematic
Times Online: 'Philosophical arguments are characteristically enthymematic – that is to say, the premisses that would be necessary to make them conclusive are not spelled out.'
April 13, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word nailed down by his own ribs
Usually, when '1 Wordie lists' a word and it appears on no lists, it'll be on a profile—but this one was 'first listed by greenapple', on whose profile it isn't. So who's got this one, then?
April 13, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word rib
As an acronym, a Rigid Inflatable Boat. I wonder how many other people ribsforsale.com tricked into clicking on their advert, hoping to buy succulent meat online.
April 13, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word orlorn
BerFt.
April 12, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word imprimantur
Plural of imprimatur based on its Latin meaning; Wiktionary has some citations.
April 12, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word imprimateur
One who gives his imprimatur for the love of it.
April 12, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word ÿØÿà
'My attempt to attach a graphic didn't work.'
April 12, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word lillipop
A very small lollipop.
April 12, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word succolate
A chocolate-coated lollipop... Okay, according to this it actually means: 'to bear a burden on your shoulders, such as a sack of potatoes. The load would press against the back of your neck.'
Edit: link now unbroken.
April 12, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word dumpy
WeirdNet #1 is new to me (and the O.E.D.), although the American Heritage Dictionary lists it at #2.
April 12, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word recontextualize
v. What will happen to this ghosted word if anyone ever lists it.
April 12, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word awesuuume
Unununium was an awesome name.
April 12, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word cynacism
A disparaging attitude towards Natashquan Airport.
April 12, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word rollo may
May what?
(Okay, it's his surname.)
April 12, 2009
vanishedone commented on the user sionnach
Don't worry about it. I thought you might be taking phony umbrage, but I couldn't tell how serious you were being, and my response ended up somewhat brusque. No hard feelings.
April 11, 2009
vanishedone commented on the list obsessive-compulsive-slightly-judgmental-tagging-syndrome
Why not put the note on OCSJTS itself, to which the list summary refers people? Of course, that in turn refers them to tree- anyway.
I've added a credit to the list summary for the edification of people who can't be bothered to click through. And you can keep the umbrage.
April 11, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word roll your dice, move your mice
Wired: 'Monopoly also fails with many adults because it requires almost no strategy. The only meaningful question in the game is: To buy or not to buy? Most of its interminable three- to four-hour average playing time (length being another maddening trait) is spent waiting for other players to roll the dice, move their pieces, build hotels, and collect rent. Board game enthusiasts disparagingly call this a "roll your dice, move your mice" format.'
April 11, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word ploth
@ploth: if you have a relevant page you'd do better to link directly to it, otherwise you may just get suspected of spamming.
April 11, 2009
vanishedone commented on the list british-broadcasting-concision
I get the feeling you'd like this to be an open list, so now it is.
April 11, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word grand strategy
Rock, Paper, Shotgun: '“Grand strategy�? is a sub-genre title that always amuses me. I can’t help but picture someone playing Command & Conquer whilst wearing a ceremonial robe and crown, or Dawn of War on a 300″ monitor. Slightly disappointingly, it’s a different kind of grandiose it refers to - playing as an entire nation, seeing only the big picture and rarely the individual soldiers.'
April 10, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word retrospective falsification
Just click on the 'Some HTML is allowed' link above the comment box.
April 10, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word retrospective falsification
That link won't work; if you use square brackets, Wordie tries to link to a corresponding word page. You have to use HTML for external links, <a href="http://medical-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/retrospective+falsification">like this</a>.
April 9, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word bookaneer
T.H.E.: 'Publishers see every download of a pirate copy of a textbook as a sale lost. Now they are fighting back against the bookaneers...'
April 9, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word bugs
On a similar note, here's some inconsistent handling of whitespace characters: this tag contains %0A characters (new line, I think). Linked from the list of recent tags on the front page, its URL contains the %0A characters and the page displays correctly; linked from the tags page, however, it has the %0As stripped out so that it leads to the nonexistent /tags/cannibalismanthropos - humanbeingphagous - feedingon.
(By the way, I see trying to visit tags that don't exist no longer produces a common-or-garden 404, which is nice. Thanks, John.)
April 9, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word shugendo
Asahi Shimbun: ' Urban dwellers, looking for something missing from the day-to-day grind of their working lives, are literally heading to the mountains to reconnect with nature and find spiritual fulfillment.
'They are devotees of Shugendo, a religion based on ancient Japanese mountain worship that incorporates aspects of Buddhism, Shinto and other faiths.'
April 9, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word peritus
T.L.S.: 'He served as a peritus, or theological expert, at Vatican II...'
April 8, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word the 2009-2014 world outlook for 60-milligram containers of fromage frais
And now the winner.
April 8, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word boabhan sith
Mysterious Britain & Ireland: 'The Baobhan Sith is a particularly evil and dangerous female vampire from the highlands of Scotland. They were supposed to prey on unwary travellers in the glens and mountains. The name suggests a form of Banshee.'
April 8, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word bean nighe
Mysterious Britain & Ireland: 'The Bean Nighe is an example of the ominous 'Washerwoman at the Ford' rendered in the Highland tradition. The tradition of 'The Washerwomen at the Ford' seems to have its roots in Celtic legend and myth. She appears in the Irish stories and can be identified as the crone aspect of the triple goddess.'
April 8, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word pisos justice
Piso's justice, right?
April 8, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word cliodynamics
Peter Turchin: 'Cliodynamics (from Clio, the muse of history, and dynamics, the study of temporally varying processes) is the new transdisciplinary area of research at the intersection of historical macrosociology, economic history/cliometrics, mathematical modeling of long-term social processes, and the construction and analysis of historical databases. Mathematical approaches - modeling historical processes with differential equations or agent-based simulations; sophisticated statistical approaches to data analysis - are a key ingredient in the cliodynamic research program (see "Why do we need mathematical history?" in the side bar). But ultimately the aim is to discover general principles that explain the functioning and dynamics of actual historical societies.'
April 8, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word koncept steel pvt ltd, balustrade, fabrication, handrail bracket, stone cladding,ball hollow
My shopping lists never looked like this.
April 7, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word quiltosphere
Design Crisis: 'The normally oh so civilized quiltosphere is abuzz with conflict regarding the latest issue of Quilter’s Home. According to this article in The Washington Post, Jo Ann’s Fabric Store refused to carry the scandalous March/April issue because it features pages of controversial quilts. Even though editor/owner Mark Lipinski ponied up extra cash to have the issues shrink wrapped in plastic sleeves a la Hustler magazine, the issue was deemed too shocking for Jo Ann’s customers, out of fear that they might accidentally look at the magazine.'
April 7, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word chondritic
Citation on achondritic.
April 7, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word achondritic
B.B.C. News: 'Achondritic meteorites were formed when the Solar System's planets were coming into being. The substances in such meteorites and the processes they have undergone can give clues about how the larger bodies were formed.
'By contrast, chondritic meteorites were formed during the the Solar System's early days before material had accreted into planets. They have not been altered by the melting and re-crystalisation that has utterly transformed the nature of, say, Earth rocks.'
April 7, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word astrochemist
B.B.C. News: 'Detailed analysis has shown that the sample, known as MM40, has a chemical composition unlike any other fragment of fallen space rock.
'This, say experts, raises questions about where it originated in the Solar System and how it was created.
'It also means that astrochemists must expand their list of the combinations of materials in planetary crusts.
'The detailed analysis of MM04 was led by Matthieu Gounelle from the Laboratory of Mineralogy and Cosmochemistry at the French Natural History Museum.'
April 7, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word fly-fornication
From a list of Puritan names. This one confused me until I realised it was fly as in flee. Fly-debate is there too.
April 7, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word peacock
WeirdNet's definition isn't that bad today, but I'd have thought the bird was a more obvious choice for first place.
According to the O.E.D. this can also be a verb: 'to make conceited or vain; to puff up with vanity; to dress up in finery', or to act ostentatiously. Also 'trans. Austral. To obtain the best portions of (a tract of land), esp. so as to make the remainder of little value to other people. See PEACOCKING n. 2. Now hist.'
April 7, 2009
vanishedone commented on the list imagical-words-you-should-be-falling-over-yourself-to-use-image-search-on
I'm trying to decide whether wonneproppen and törpök belong on this list or that other one.
April 7, 2009
vanishedone commented on the list morbid-curiosity-words-you-should-be-very-hesitant-to-use-image-search-on
And for when you really need a warning about something, there's the hork alert tag.
April 7, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word bugs
Comments on tags attached to 0 words aren't displayed: there are comments on say what? but you can't see them now that the tag has been retired in favour of say what.
April 7, 2009
vanishedone commented on the list morbid-curiosity-words-you-should-be-very-hesitant-to-use-image-search-on
Blood is even worse than when I commented on it, although the porn/horror film still has slipped to third place...
This list is going to be useful largely for morbid curiosity, isn't it?
April 7, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word wage
WeirdNet is accurate enough, I suppose, but what an opaque way of putting it.
April 7, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word order of the occult hand
Larry Maddry: 'It seems the phrase originated with Joseph Flanders, then an employee for The Charlotte News. He had typed: “It was as if an occult hand had reached down from above and moved the players like pawns upon some giant chessboard.�?
'In the fall of 1965, Flanders’ friends at The Charlotte News, especially writer R. C. Smith, were so taken with Flanders’ phrase they formed a society—the Order of the Occult Hand—and vowed to get the words “it was as if an occult hand ... �? into print as soon as possible.'
April 7, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word security cameras clue to fireball
What it means: 'Security cameras in Northern Ireland may shed some light on the cause of a massive fireball in the sky on Sunday.'
April 6, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word survivor guilt
As demonstrated here.
April 6, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word deep space
Apparently coined in 1934 by E.E. 'Doc' Smith, according to OUPblog's 'Nine Words You Might Think Came from Science but Which Are Really from Science Fiction '.
April 6, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word constructivism
Besides the art movement, and indeed other philosophical constructivisms, there's also metaethical constructivism.
April 6, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word fwoosh! i don't know if that best describes me, but it was the first thing that came to mind.
Very Zen.
April 6, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word umm...
Is there an OCSJTS tag for this, or is it just triple-punkt?
April 6, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word boom choco-laka
This seems (judging by Google's cache) to have been born on a list called i scream for ice cream, by tagyoureit; both the person and the list appear to have ceased to be. Did someone with 400 words and 133 comments manage to do something to get nuked, or might this be a technical glitch...?
April 6, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word dorking
What if the residents flee into the Dorking Caves beneath?
April 6, 2009
vanishedone commented on the list spam--2
Some more examples are here.
April 6, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word dorking
I'm sure the good people of Dorking, Surrey will be delighted to hear that.
April 6, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word features
Am I right in thinking the spinner image used when adding words on a list page is also new?
April 6, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word recto v verso
A word-off? Mostly I see these two sticking close together.
April 5, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word grandoise
A Galápagos giant tortoise, perhaps?
April 5, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word victualz
Now, does this kind of monstrosity warrant a special OCSJTS tag, or is misspelling good enough for its kind?
April 5, 2009
vanishedone commented on the list efl-university-s-list
Don't worry; we just get occasional spammers trying to post adverts, so occasionally we check on people to make sure they're above board.
There is a FAQ page, although it's a bit ad hoc; there's also a list called Wordie for Dummies.
(Incidentally: I expect you meant karaoke.)
April 5, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word deepleap
Another time sink involving words.
Try to make words with the letters you're given (like Scrabble), against the clock; words gain points, unused letters lose them.
April 5, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word features
Oooh! A 'recent tags' section has appeared on the home page!
April 5, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word trolls
There's a previous discussion on troll.
April 5, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word bugs
For some reason, when I got asked to log in just now, I subsequently got sent to Wordie Mobile.
April 5, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word aglet
Fortunately practice in tying laces makes one do it dextrously.
April 5, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word arachnomancy
This sounds scary enough without being ghosted too.
April 5, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word stalker state
Independent: 'Phil Booth of the civil rights campaign group, NOID, said: "Inch by inch, the Government's plans to map and monitor everyone's communications are creeping into place. Today it's retention of data, soon it'll be a giant database to suck it all up. And unless we speak out and stop this, what used to be private – details of your relationships and personal interests – will end up in the ever-widening control of the stalker state."'
April 5, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word austentatious
Not a plain Jane.
April 5, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word irascrible
To write angry letters.
April 5, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word sike
So did we ever get that list of 'words that sound like frogs croaking'?
April 5, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word boy-girl party
Is this some kind of euphemism?
April 5, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word genicide
What happens when you break the wrong lamp.
April 5, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word tom swifty
Also Tom Swiftie, but this is the spelling used by tomswifty.com.
April 5, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word croaker
According to Wikipedia, 'some analysts distinguish among sub-types of Tom Swifties. Some call those in which the pun is carried by the verb "Croakers" (after the above listed example in which "Tom croaked"), or insist that only those examples in which the pun is carried by an adverb ending in -ly are "true" Tom Swifties (or Swiftlies), or make other distinctions.'
Where does one apply to become a Tom Swiftie analyst?
April 5, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word compassionate ocean
Judging by a Web search, this is a Buddhist centre in Minnesota.
April 5, 2009
vanishedone commented on the user john
Sorry this isn't a nice message, but: johntgraham is trolling. I'm guessing you'll want either to nuke the posts or to add them to the 'mentions' page.
April 5, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word flâ·neur
/tags/polka-dots
April 5, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word pillow fight
It's International Pillow Fight Day today.
April 4, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word watershed
WordNet omits a specific broadcasting sense: the time in the evening after which material not considered suitable for children gets shown.
April 4, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word pitty
I expected this to mean something akin to pitted, but the O.E.D. says pretty, 'nursery and colloq.'
April 4, 2009
vanishedone commented on the list guano
In fairness, I just had to check myself to confirm that the plural is goes rather than gos. dictionary.reference.com/browse/dos gives both dos and do's as plurals of do (n.), so maybe it was an attempted formation by analogy.
*Ducks*
April 4, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word bugs
I see /lists/ has been fixed at some point: it no longer has my Cryptolects list at the top every time I visit.
April 4, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word guano
Is dingy an American spelling of dinghy, is it a typo, or has a pun flown over my head? (The O.E.D. does list it as a known spelling of dinghy, along with dingee, dinghee and dingey.)
Edit: oh, now I see the list about misspellings...
April 4, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word enantiosis
Now I'm wondering whether you really mean that...
(O.E.D. definition for this word: 'a figure of speech in which the opposite is meant to what is said; irony.')
April 3, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word crogglement
Croggle gets some discussion here based on the guess that it's a portmanteau, but nothing conclusive: maybe cringe with goggle or boggle.
April 3, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word crogglement
Spotted here; according to this rather diverting page, it's 'a word invented by Dean Grennell to denote extreme astonishment'.
April 3, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word 'loyalists closer to guns move'
Not actually said by Yoda. 'Loyalist paramilitaries could be moving towards decommissioning their weapons, according to Shaun Woodward.'
April 3, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word ark for ark's sake
Unfortunately, this one relies on people's recognising Ars Gratia Artis from the M.G.M. logo.
April 2, 2009
vanishedone commented on the list wanted-comic-strip-name
Exactly two words, and including the whole of Kingdom Animalia? That's actually pretty restrictive (which is presumably why this list has already broken the two-word rule).
April 2, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word novexcel
The Urban Elitist: 'But the time required for a full-length novexcel would be more than I’d care to invest in an experiment. Instead, I thought, how about a short storyspreadsheet?'
Worse than wovel...?
April 1, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word distain
A stain or tint, when not a typo for disdain.
March 31, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word econopocalypse
Boing Boing: 'Writing in the Atlantic, Simon Johnson, former chief economist of the IMF, takes a hard look at the econopocalypse and decides that the root of America's (and Europe's) economic woes is the cozy relationship between super-powerful bankers and government -- oligarchy.'
March 31, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word humanly
Contrasted with speaking technically/dispassionately: 'Or what was it Abraham did for the universal? Let me speak humanly about it, really humanly!' (Kierkegaard, Fear & Trembling, trans. Alastair Hannay).
March 30, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word features
May I propose an amendment to 'as well as' instead of 'instead of'? I like looking for new open lists to investigate.
March 30, 2009
vanishedone commented on the user katharina
May I gently point out that tagging ten words with a URL makes you liable to be suspected of spamming and therefore vulnerable to the Wordie Treatment?
March 30, 2009
vanishedone commented on the list lost-for-word
That would be the Power of Wordie.
March 29, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word em
The dictionary.reference.com version is longer, nd indicates that WordNet is referring to the printing sense: 'a quad with a square body; "since 'em quad' is hard to distinguish from 'en quad', printers sometimes called it a 'mutton quad'",' i.e. quad as in quadrat.
March 29, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word sprackly
So how's progress?
March 28, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word protozoa
I can't find dictionary support for the singular tag...
March 28, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word el quingombó
Maybe gender should be added to the parts of speech feature. (Then again, arguably the same holds for number, and we've made do so far with plural and occasionally singular tags.)
March 28, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word aptronym
More examples in this article.
March 28, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word trap street
Angloe was a trap town until it became actual.
March 27, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word vote set for 'disqualified' seat
It's actually the incumbent who's disqualified.
March 27, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word kingfisher hit by china weakness
What it's actually about: 'Home improvements retailer Kingfisher has said profits dropped 75% as it lost money in China and closed Trade Depot in the UK.'
March 27, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word phantom of heilbronn
The dangerous criminal mastermind who may in fact be an illusion created by contaminated cotton swabs.
March 26, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word aspire
A vampire snake.
March 25, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word umpire
Hang on: why is WeirdNet #1 specifically about baseball, when #2 quite adequately covers sports in general?
March 25, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word spire
This vampire keeps things short and to the point.
March 25, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word vegetables
I can cope with WeirdNet #1 and #3's love of disjunction, but 'numerous herbaceous plant'? Who else uses plant as a mass noun?
March 25, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word umpire
This variety of vampire is rumoured to exist, but nothing about it is known for certain.
March 25, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word empire
A vampire that's always dashing.
March 25, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word transpire
Okay, a list there shall be.
March 25, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word transpire
n. 'A male vampire who dresses like a female vampire.' (Spotted here)
March 25, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word bugs
That's the . character breaking tags.
March 25, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word crosswordese
Boston Globe: 'It's knowledge of crosswordese that separates the hard-core puzzlers from the dilettantes. You may never, ever find an opportunity to bring Enyo (a Greek war goddess) into conversation, and, like those contestants, you may have never seen an etui before, but if it helps you fill in that last blank square of a puzzle, it will be burned into your brain forever.'
Crosswordese sounds little different from Wordiean.
March 25, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word epee
WordNet has a definition for this form but not for épée...
March 25, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word promiscuous teleology
New Scientist: 'Kelemen has documented the same kind of erroneous thinking - called promiscuous teleology - in young children. Seven and eight-year olds agree with teleological statements such as "Rocks are jagged so animals can scratch themselves" and "Birds exist to make nice music". These mistakes diminish as kids take more science classes and learn causal explanations for natural events.'
March 24, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word chorobate
Der Spiegel: 'The Romans did have levels, a six-meter long design called a chorobate copied from the Persians. They also filled goat intestines with water to find a level around corners. But that alone does not explain the precision of this amazing aqueduct.'
March 24, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word gadara
Citation on Decapolis.
March 24, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word decapolis
Der Spiegel: 'The soldiers chiseled over 600,000 cubic meters of stone from the ground -- or the equivalent of one-quarter of the Great Pyramid of Cheops. This colossal waterworks project supplied the great cities of the "Decapolis" -- a league originally consisting of 10 ancient communities -- with spring water. The aqueduct ended in Gadara, a city with a population of approximately 50,000. According to the Bible, this is where Jesus exorcized demons and chased them into a herd of pigs.'
March 24, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word sungrazer
A.P.O.D.: 'The Great Comet of 1965, Ikeya-Seki, was also a member of the Sungrazer family, coming within about 650,000 kilometers of the Sun's surface. Passing so close to the Sun, Sungrazers are subjected to destructive tidal forces along with intense solar heat.'
March 23, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word features
We had an Oddocomplete once, but it was put out to pasture.
March 23, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word rihanna's i.q. is what, exactly
Maybe it cycles through the results of different kinds of I.Q. test.
March 23, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word greytrapping
Grey as in greylisting. That Grumpy BSD Guy: 'Regular readers will remember that I have a collection of known bad addresses in my domains that I use for my greytrapping, all generated elsewhere, that has come in handy at times. Run of the mill spam operators tend to just suck in anything that looks like email addresses, and keeping the list available on the web has served us extremely well here.'
March 23, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word ammunition
A sock, apparently; citation on ganzey. This sense isn't in the O.E.D., but it does mention ammunition-boots, footwear supplied as part of soldiers' kit, so maybe there's a connection.
March 21, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word ganzey
B.B.C.: 'The islanders were kindly, polite, shy. The older ones spoke in a curiously old-fashioned way. Lots of "thees" and "thous", unfamiliar words like "ganzeys" for sweaters and "ammunitions" for socks. I liked it and was happy there.
'So, evidently, was a young naval officer who was based in Tristan during the war...'
According to the O.E.D., ganzey is a dialect variant of Guernsey, as in 'a jersey'.
March 21, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word bugs
I know reporting a bug in WeirdNet is a little redundant and that on the whole we don't want it fixed, but this one may be keeping 'interesting' definitions from our sight: we've known for some time that a few words fail to have definitions displayed even though they can be found at http://wordnet.princeton.edu/perl/webwn, and I've noticed that this seems especially to affect words ending in -oof (goof, hoof, proof, aloof, roof...). Is there an -oof bug on Wordie's side, or is it 'just' a further dimension of WeirdNettery?
Edit: may I add -(o)ft to this? Loft and left I knew about, but I've also just found no definition on soft... (Raft and daft are normal, though. So is deft, so -eft isn't a guaranteed problem ending. Hmm.)
March 21, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word goof
Another -oof word that's actually in the WordNet database but which WeirdNet fails to display here. As is proof. I think we have a pattern... and an odd-sounding bug report in the making.
March 21, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word weirdnet
See also, not only WeirdNet's very own tag, but also The WeirdNet Paradox and WeirdNot.
March 21, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word poof
For that matter, hoof, hooves and hoove (not as common, but actually a word: 'a disease of cattle', says the O.E.D.) are all missing WordNet definitions. Since I can find hoof on http://wordnetweb.princeton.edu/perl/webwn this may be a glitch in Wordie's implementation. Or some gremlin with a grudge against -oof words.
March 21, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word 'prophet carpet' goes for $5.5m
The carpet is not a prophet; it is associated with Muhammad. It's actually called the Pearl Carpet of Baroda, so presumably the quotation marks here are in recognition of the awkward phrasing.
March 20, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word holon
Mark Edwards, 'A Brief History of Holons': 'The idea of hierarchy and of their constituent part-wholes, or holons, has, as Arthur Koestler points out in the opening quote, a long and distinguished history... While all these various threads of ideas included the consideration of hierarchical networks and levels and orders of development it was not until the work of writer-philosopher Arthur Koestler that a fully theory of holarchy and holons was proposed.'
March 20, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word adobeair
Apparently the person who added the tags couldn't find out how to remove them. John knows about them, but he's eternally busy, so they haven't been nuked yet.
March 20, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word consultation
T.H.E.: '"In concrete terms, one might see the contemporary plethora of educational quangos as the means by which the state's educational orthodoxies are ... policed," Mr Lea said.
'Quangos establish such orthodoxies by consulting academics then ignoring their comments, he added... "At the end of a consultation, you often do not feel your view has been taken seriously, but you are told: 'We consulted with you.'"'
March 19, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word douchetard
Wordlustitude doesn't even bother giving it a page of its own, simply associating it with some other words. Whether that's an endorsement I've no idea.
Edit: or were you asking whether the entire quotation is in English? It's a fair question...
March 19, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word protofeather
B.B.C. News: 'He described the filaments seen on the body of the new dinosaur, which the team has named Tianyulong confuciusi, as "protofeathers" - the precursors of modern feathers.'
March 19, 2009
vanishedone commented on the list wordie-paradox
For the mysteries of simip see ghost comments.
March 18, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word ghost comments
I added simip to the Wordie Paradox list, and the list page says it 'has been listed 3 times with 55 comments', so it seems still to be associated with multiple lists as well as (ghost) comments; it's just the actual page that's been nuked.
March 18, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word mama-bear instinct
W.S.J.: 'The environment also brings out what security experts call the "mama-bear instinct." A Chuck E. Cheese's can take on some of the dynamics of the animal kingdom, where beasts rush to protect their young when they sense a threat.'
March 18, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word constantinople
For italics, etc. you need to use HTML, not BBCode: <i>A Confederacy of Dunces</i> → A Confederacy of Dunces.
March 18, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word ghost comments
Actually, doesn't it qualify as a bug that simip is 404'd? A word not in the database ought to produce a 'Nobody is listing...' page.
March 18, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word predictors of beaconicity
B.B.C. News: 'Council leaders have compiled a banned list of the 200 worst uses of jargon, with "predictors of beaconicity" and "taxonomy" among the worst horrors... Cliches such as "level playing field" and inscrutable terms like "re-baselining" have been prohibited... The LGA's list includes suggested translations of some terms, such as "measuring" for the civil servant's favourite "benchmarking", "idea" for "seedbed", "delay" for "slippage" and "buy" for "procure"... Town hall workers are urged not to use the words "mainstreaming", "holistic", "contestability" and "synergies"... Ms Eaton said: "Why do we have to have 'coterminous, stakeholder engagement' when we could just 'talk to people' instead?'
Some of these seem more objectionable than others; I find taxonomy useful enough, admittedly in an academic setting, and measuring is a more general concept than benchmarking.
March 18, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word ministers back blind benefit rise
It's about disability allowances for blind people.
March 18, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word ᴕ
A cloaking device? Do I just not have the right fonts installed or do you see a blank space too?
March 18, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word duneverse
In which the Dune novels are set. The SF Site: 'Heretics of Dune presents yet another perspective of the "Duneverse"...'
March 16, 2009
vanishedone commented on the list leev2s-list
Hi. If you wanted those comments to be associated with the specific words, rather than appearing at the bottom of your list, you'll have to add them to the word pages: giclairune, ukku.
March 16, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word cheat
Regarding WeirdNet's agricultural interests: 'seeds sometimes considered poisonous'? Hasn't anyone got around to checking? (Or are they perhaps poisonous in the sense that potatoes are technically poisonous, i.e. that you'd have to eat an awful lot to get a fatal dose?)
March 16, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word health gap drive 'wasted money'
What it means: 'Ministers have wasted public money in their attempts to tackle health inequalities, MPs say.'
March 15, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word altermondialism
Strange Maps: 'The aforementioned Atlas is a publication of Le Monde diplomatique, the French monthly magazine for world affairs. It might not be incidental to note that the editorial line of “Le Diplo�? (as it is often called) is altermondialiste.
'Altermondialism (or alter-globalisation) seeks to counteract the negative effects of an economic globalisation seen as too Anglo-Saxon and neo-liberal.'
March 14, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word debaptism
B.B.C. News: 'The debaptism certificate started out as a kind of satirical comment on the idea that you could be enrolled in a church before you could talk, but it seems to have taken off from there.'
March 14, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word australia spill '10 times worse'
Meaning, 'worse than originally thought'.
March 14, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word more taxi sex victims 'to emerge'
Meaning they'll come forward as accusers, not that they'll emerge from the taxi.
March 14, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word sex claims against us church rise
What it means: 'The number of new claims of sexual abuse made against US Roman Catholic priests rose by 16% to more than 800 last year, a Church report says.'
March 14, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word adsenseless
Spotted on Slashdot: 'Tom was able to stretch this worthless article to 26 pages by putting microscopic pictures on each page along with about a paragraph of text.
'Tom is the new king of AdSense manipulation. I guess we can call it AdSenseless now.'
March 14, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word e-cigarette
B.B.C. News: 'Ministers are being urged to restrict the sale of "electronic" cigarettes amid fears they could be harmful... The 'e-cigarettes' look real, but are battery-powered and typically made of stainless steel.
'Inside is a cartridge of liquid nicotine. When it is heated, the user inhales vaporised droplets of the drug and breathes out a mist rather than smoke.'
March 13, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word jargon
Boing Boing: 'Perhaps print journalism foreshadowed its fledgling future long ago with its morbid jargon. Morgue. Gutter. Beat. Deadline. Dummy. Kill. Widow. Orphan.'
March 13, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word bugs
Perhaps it means, 'The "random" misappropriation of it's still aggrieves me somewhat.'
March 13, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word stuccoyer
Also stuccoer, q.v.
March 12, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word oneyer
The O.E.D. says the origin is uncertain, the meaning is perhaps 'a sheriff', and it's now used only in allusion to Shakespeare's 'great Oneyres'. However, it does seem to be sure that the -yer is the same as in lawyer; great oneyer is given as an example under the entry for the suffix.
March 12, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word stuccoer
Also spelt stuccoyer: 'a modeller in stucco', says the O.E.D..
March 12, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word bugs
Nobody is listing "random" it's misappropriation still aggrieves me somewhat. perhaps unoriginally but genuinely. djsalinger nevertheless managed to make it the 'least favourite' on his/her profile, where it links to http://wordie.org/words/ — probably an upshot of the " characters. Since we know adding word pages containing " is possible even though links to them break, this one 'should' be in the database as a word page somewhere, but it seems not to have been added. (At least, until I add it and tag it accidental profundity.)
March 12, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word island of excellence
Citation on pocket of excellence.
March 12, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word pocket of excellence
T.H.E.: 'When a large number of departments in teaching-led universities were discovered by the 2008 research assessment exercise to be producing world-class work, a new phrase quickly entered the higher education lexicon.
'"Pockets of excellence" became a rallying cry for post-1992 universities keen to show that they could compete with the research elite. But a subtle rebranding of the "pockets" by the Higher Education Funding Council for England has raised eyebrows - and shown how politically sensitive the pockets have become.
'Last week, David Eastwood, chief executive of Hefce, confirmed that the funding body's preferred metaphor for the departments was now "islands of excellence", because it imbued them with a greater sense of isolation.'
March 12, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word slopping out
B.B.C. News: 'Slopping out was the practice of using buckets as toilets in prison cells.'
March 11, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word favour
WordNet lacks the sense 'resemble' (which the O.E.D. marks 'now colloq.'), as e.g. here: 'This girl kind of favored Kanako but it definitely wasn’t her'.
March 11, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word misery memoir
Citation on mum-oir.
March 11, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word mum-oir
Spiked: 'Bored to death of the misery memoir, those endless books by adults claiming that their lives have been scarred by childhood abuse and neglect, normally at the hands of their parents? Well, now there’s a new, overgrown kid on the block. Welcome to the misery mum-oir, a book by a successful middle-class mother claiming that her life has been ruined by her abusive and unappreciative child.'
March 11, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word broadcasters urge saberi access
What it means: 'A number of UK and US media outlets, including the BBC, have called on Iran to allow independent access to detained American journalist Roxana Saberi.'
March 11, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word features
I wonder how it should be interpreted when people put definitions in the tag box (e.g. on tjuze). If it's because they want their definitions floating above the comments, that's a sign that some sort of dedicated definition-adding facility (with additions displayed under WordNet's?) might be useful; but if it's because they're new here and haven't worked out how it all works, having yet another way of adding data to word pages might confuse them further.
March 11, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word temptress in a teapot
It sounds nicer than a storm/tempest in a teacup/teapot/other. 'There were a couple of scenes where there were these cross-like structures, and the whole thing was the most incredible temptress in a teapot, in that we were accused of censoring it. We even ran the screenshots side by side. But some random fan got hold of it and it turned into a firestorm. That to me served as a reminder of how sensitive the hardcore market is.'
March 11, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word antidisestablishmentarianism
Hippopotomonstrosesquipedalianism (although the OUP Blog rather unkindly calls it a mere 'stunt word').
March 10, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word puntland
B.B.C. News: 'Even these figures overstate the number of pirates that actually face trial because they include those handed over to the authorities in Puntland, the semi-autonomous region in the north-east of Somalia from which most pirates come.'
March 10, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word amphicar
Telstar Logistics: 'Special Agent Oddwick recently enjoyed an Amphicar sighting in Florida, although he didn't fully realize it at the time. Instead, he reported seeing a "boat/car thingy" and noted that he didn't believe the propellers were functional.'
March 10, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word ?
prolixpolymath managed to add this to the database as 'onomatopoeia that best describes prolixpolymath', but in spite of that the link from his/her profile breaks; you have to use %3f. I've added this to Wordie Paradox using that method, and the result is another entry that doesn't know it's on the list: 'appears in these lists' is empty. (Edit: ah, I realised this has already been done with blah ... does that count%3f. However, the profile links of the people who added them break differently: this one produces a 500 Application Error, whereas the other produces a 'nobody is listing' page.)
March 10, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word eu workers 'no impact' on uk jobs
The missing bit is 'have had'.
March 10, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word fogbank
Sunday Herald: 'The US National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) "lost knowledge" of how to make a mysterious but very hazardous material codenamed Fogbank. As a result, the warhead refurbishment programme was put back by at least a year, and racked up an extra $69 million... Neither the NNSA nor the UK Ministry of Defence would say anything about the nature or function of Fogbank. But it is thought by some weapons experts to be a foam used between the fission and fusion stages of a thermonuclear bomb. US officials have said that manufacturing the material requires a solvent cleaning agent which is "extremely flammable" and "explosive". The process also involves dealing with "toxic materials" hazardous to workers.'
March 10, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word brandjacking
B.B.C. News: 'Another problem facing legitimate firms is the practice of false association. This is when a domain name - with similar, but not identical wording to a popular website - is registered (and often made to look like) the legitimate site in order to direct unsuspecting users to bogus or offensive pages... The report says that the majority of illegal sites involved in so-called "brandjacking" are hosted in the United States, Germany and the UK.'
See also phishing, then.
March 10, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word brand abuse
A rather peculiar way of putting it: this seems to be a rather general term, so maybe 'trademark infringement' just didn't capture everything.
March 10, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word hydrobot
Galileo Project: 'If the Europa Orbiter finds a submerged ocean, we could look for landing sites where instruments could descend to the surface, melt through the ice, and deploy "hydrobots" --- submarine robotic explorers.'
March 9, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word bradigabo
Languagehat: 'Among the delightful trivia Sauer mentions are the "rare Latin lemma... bradigabo (badrigabo) in Épinal-Erfurt 131, the meaning of which is unknown; it was glossed as felduuop (Ép) / felduus (Erf), the meaning of which is also unknown"...'
March 9, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word what are you jumping about
Actually you can have question marks, but hexadecimal trickery is required: see %3f.
March 9, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word features
As regards viewing words by initial letter, see my comment from about a month ago regarding wildcarding, which would be still more versatile.
Maybe if alphabetical searches are implemented there should be additional filters for searches, e.g. 'beginning with a AND listed by $username'. (And while we're on the subject of search and search filters, I wonder whether a search function for tags might be useful.)
March 8, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word bugs
They're working for me.
March 6, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word new target for police confidence
Public confidence in the police, that is.
March 6, 2009
vanishedone commented on the list a-dummary-of-words
You might enjoy this list.
March 6, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word 'substantial doubt' for gm future
General Motors, not genetic modification.
March 6, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word boche baby
B.B.C. News: 'One of the last World War II taboos is being lifted in France.
'So-called "Boche babies" - the illegitimate offspring of occupying enemy troops - are speaking openly for the first time about their family secret and hunting for long-lost German fathers.'
March 6, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word regional sheep 'more vulnerable'
What it means: 'A new survey claims regional breeds of sheep face a heightened risk of disease because of their tendency to remain together in one location' (emphasis added).
March 4, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word pene-enclave
Strange Maps: 'A pene-enclave is almost an enclave in the same way that a peninsula almost is an island. But only on a strictly lexical level. If we descend from the abstraction of definition to particular examples, things get messy — in an almost clintonesque way: all depends on what your definition of almost is.'
March 4, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word bugs
A problem with Niteowl's 'steampunk steam punk' tag (I mentioned it here a month ago) has turned up again with a tag on doodacky: the tag 'thingamebob whatsit doodah whatsitname' is linking to http://wordie.org/tags/thingamebobwhatsitdoodahwhatsitname, which produces a 500 Application Error.
March 4, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word mole clinic
For moles of the kind you get on skin. I had visions of highly specialised vets.
March 4, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word data plans 'medical records risk'
A lost Star Trek plot, no doubt.
March 3, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word diasporization
Citation on mediatization.
March 3, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word deterritorialization
Citation on mediatization.
March 3, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word mediatization
'Our analysts speak polysyllabically and in turn of five new processes: "deterritorialization" (culture as torn out of its geography and made homeless); "hybridity" (cultures as mixed up together); "liminality" (poor cultures shoved off the edge by rish ones); "diasporization" (cultures scattered worldwide but persisting in a mutant form); above all, analysts speak of "mediatization" (the stories of culture detached from their local habitations and carried largely abroad by the electronic media).'
~ Fred Inglis, Culture (Key Concepts series), p. 146
March 3, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word broken link
Probably not.
March 3, 2009
vanishedone commented on the user john
If you're now saying you're back on the bike, dare I ask what happened to the horse...? Please tell me it's living out its retirement in a pasture somewhere, or something--
March 3, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word bugs
Regarding list URLs based on the wrong titles: is it my imagination, or did http://wordie.org/lists/meta use to be a working URL? You can see me using it on this page, about four months ago. It's now got to be http://wordie.org/lists/metaphysics-buzz-words-2, so it seems this bug can actually cause previously existing links to break.
March 3, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word errata
Now the 'it lives' tag is already taken...
March 3, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word brainjacking
Times: 'It sounds like science fiction, but politicians, lawyers and advertisers are falling over themselves to buy into the latest scientific discovery: brainjacking. Soon our secret desires and not so innocent thoughts could become public knowledge.'
March 2, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word group disorder
Apparently there's now a policing term for 'any form of violence committed by people acting together, be that in an organised or spontaneous manner'.
March 2, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word firefox
It's been one of our requested features for about a year.
February 28, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word marketecture
The Dilbert usage is apparently: 'preventing customers from realising what they're buying'.
February 28, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word academicise
Spiked: 'Fish calls this process of intellectual interrogation “academicising�?, which he describes thus: "To academicise a topic is to detach it from the context of its real world urgency, where there is a vote to be taken or an agenda to be embraced, and insert it into a context of academic urgency, where there is an account to be offered or an analysis to be performed."'
February 28, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word international sword swallower's awareness day
Scientific American: 'February 28th is International Sword Swallower’s Awareness Day, according to practitioner Dan Meyer, who recently demonstrated the technique at the AAAS meeting in Chicago.'
February 27, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word anti-carol
The Escapist: 'In reverence of the wonderfully dark stories, the H. P. Lovecraft Historical Society created its anti-Christmas album A Very Scary Solstice... Three years on, and George Taylor helps to add a little "Fred Astaire" charm, and a lot of CGI, to this anti-carol based on the book "The Shadow Over Innsmouth".'
February 27, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word marionberry
B.B.C. News: 'A proposal to name the marionberry as the official berry of the US west coast state of Oregon has been scuppered by a grower of a rival berry type.
'The Oregonian newspaper said the resolution was removed from the state legislature's agenda at the request of a blackberry farmer, Larry Duyck.
'Raspberry, blueberry and strawberry growers had all supported the proposal.
'But Mr Duyck was worried that the marionberry would be given an unfair edge over his type of blackberries.
'Oregon's Marion County accounts for 90% of the world's marionberry crop, the Oregonian reported.'
The article also notes that a marionberry is a 'hybrid blackberry', and quotes someone discussing 'internal disputes in the berry community'.
February 25, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word comp
Checking WordNet's contribution to dictionary.reference.com/browse/comp, I see bilby has it right.
February 25, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word comp
The O.E.D. does give comp as an abbreviation of competition, as well as company, compositor and accompaniment.
February 25, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word hospital drink cases hit new high
Cases of alcohol-related hospitalisation, not tall drinks cabinets.
February 24, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word mima mounds
D.R.B.: 'The "natural" theory of nature being responsible for the Majorly Mysterious Mima Mounds starts to crumble upon further investigation. Sure there’s plenty of things we don’t yet understand about how our native world behaves scientists do know enough to be able to say what it can’t do – and it’s looking pretty certain it can’t be as precise, orderly, or meticulous as the mounds.'
February 24, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word twittercrat
The Escapist: 'The UK government is advertising for a 'Director of Digital Engagement'. The job description? To create strategies for communicating over social networking sites... The job advertisement has understandably come under fire from the government's rivals. Susie Squire, the TaxPayers' Alliance campaign manager, said: "The Government should not be spending money on a Twittercrat during a recession..."'
February 24, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word slug-moat
Scarthin Books: 'In the absence of slug-pellets, old wives masquerading as gurus crowd in -beer traps, milk traps (for those who don't like wasting beer) or barriers of soot, sand, lime, crushed egg-shells or double-whammy combinations of the above are advocated but are tedious to install, can vanish in a night's heavy rain and are at best only partially effective. My preferred solution requires capital expenditure but is then almost maintenance-free and has a working lifetime of years, perhaps decades. It is the SCARTHIN SLUG-MOAT (or for Google's Sake SLUGMOAT).'
February 22, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word golden raspberries
B.B.C. News: 'Mike Myers' comedy flop The Love Guru has dominated the Golden Raspberries, the spoof prizes awarded to the worst Hollywood movies of the year.
'The film won Razzies for worst picture, worst actor - for Myers in the title role - and worst screenplay, in the annual eve-of-Oscars mock-ceremony.'
February 22, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word parson bird
If you're saying she just now posted there, you must be misreading '6 months'. she hasn't been around for four months now.
February 22, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word dark fire
Fireworks Glossary: 'A composition giving off hardly any light when it burns. It is used in stars to give a winking effect, or to separate colour changes.'
February 22, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word palinize
Good.is: 'verb. To be treated (and marginalized) in a way reminiscent of Sarah Palin.'
February 22, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word pluto
Usage as a verb ('to be plutoed') here.
February 22, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word lohaned
Good.is: 'adj. To be Lohaned—or Ms. Lindsay Lohaned, for the formal among us—is to get blitzed, bombed, shellacked, marinated, insert your own drunken euphemism here.'
February 22, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word kinnear
Good.is: 'verb. Named for the actor Greg Kinnear, this describes the sneaky method of taking a picture of someone who isn’t aware of it.'
February 22, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word belichick
Good.is: 'verb. To commit the NFL no-no of illegal videotaping, like New England Patriots head coach and sweatshirt enthusiast Bill Belichick.'
February 22, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word phelpsian
Good.is: 'adj. Extraordinarily successful, even beyond Michael Jordanesque and Tiger Woodsy—or just a hell of a swimmer.'
February 22, 2009
vanishedone commented on the list oddest-book-title-of-the-year
This year's shortlist is out.
Edit: there's also some further commentary here.
February 22, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word altermodernism
World Wide Words: 'This has appeared, like a dusty fly speck dotted across the review pages of the more upmarket British newspapers this month, because Altermodern is the name given to Tate Britain’s Triennial 2009 exhibition. The term was coined by the exhibition’s curator, the French cultural theorist Nicolas Bourriaud.'
February 21, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word theis
See discussion on oofay.
February 21, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word oofay
Theis is already in the O.E.D. with the meaning thus (19th C.). It's apparently a nautical term, so I can't guarantee it's what the spammer had in mind.
February 21, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word acquirement
The O.E.D. says an acquirement in the sense of 'that which is acquired' is 'usually a personal attainment of body or mind, as distinct from an acquisition or material and external gain, and opposed to a natural gift or talent'. So maybe something like accomplishment would be a better alternative, depending on the context.
February 21, 2009
vanishedone commented on the list meta
Duly listed.
February 21, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word marfan syndrome
He's one of the standard famous maybes, along with Tutankhamun and Rachmaninoff. Happily, life expectancy is now improved.
February 21, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word prawo jazdy
B.B.C.: 'It was discovered that the man every member of the Irish police's rank and file had been looking for - a Mr Prawo Jazdy - wasn't exactly the sort of prized villain whose apprehension leads to an officer winning an award.
'In fact he wasn't even human.
'"Prawo Jazdy is actually the Polish for driving licence and not the first and surname on the licence," read a letter from June 2007 from an officer working within the Garda's traffic division.'
February 20, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word oracy
From some new educational proposals: 'The domains would be: arts and creativity; citizenship and ethics; faith and belief; language, oracy and literacy; mathematics; physical and emotional health; place and time (geography and history); science and technology.'
February 20, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word gabba
Néojaponisme: 'The power-drill pulse of gabba music, for example, would surely overshadow the wildest ambitions of Russolo’s intonarumori.'
February 20, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word nighthawking
Culture24: 'The organisation that oversees the reporting of archaeological finds by members of the public in England and Wales, the Portable Antiquities Scheme (PAS), has moved to allay fears following media reports highlighting the rise of illegal metal detecting or ‘nighthawking’.'
February 20, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word individuate
Er... you do know WordNet is the source for the definition next to the word above, right?
February 20, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word passegiatta
Citation on paseo.
February 19, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word korso
Citation on paseo.
February 19, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word paseo
Times: 'Summer is coming and the strolling season beckons. Or rather it does to those Italians, Bulgarians and Spanish who enjoy, respectively, the pleasures of the passegiatta g; see bilby's comment on it'>edit: missing a g; see bilby's comment on it, the korso, and the paseo — which have been a part of European life for centuries.
'Summer? The paseo? Well, think of a favoured spot — square, garden, avenue — where people meet after work or at weekends to walk up and down. Men and women walk up and down, young and old walk up and down, rich and poor walk up and down. The activity is instinctive and inclusive. It has always had significance.'
February 19, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word leper
Good stuff so far; I haven't got further than the introduction yet.
February 19, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word features
You can get that feature easily enough by using a flat text file. After all, a Wordie list is just an ordered set of links to Wordie pages; if you don't want to share it or let people comment on it, all you need to do is write down some URLs in order.
February 19, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word corpse
As a verb: 'The conceit of death by laughter is a curious one and not restricted to the ancient world. Anthony Trollope, for example, is reputed to have “corpsed�? during a reading of F. Anstey’s comic novel Vice Versa.'
February 19, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word gelastics
T.L.S.: 'It was, in fact, a firm rule of ancient “gelastics�? – to borrow a term (from the Greek gelan, to laugh) from Stephen Halliwell’s weighty new study of Greek laughter – that the joker was never far from being the butt of his own jokes.'
February 19, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word miracle
The Onion mocking the WordNet #1 sense: 'The holy and sacrosanct miracle of birth, long revered by human civilization as the most mysterious and magical of all phenomena, took place for what experts are estimating "must be at least the 83 billionth time" Tuesday with the successful delivery of eight-pound, four-ounce baby boy Darryl Brandon Severson at Holy Mary Mother Of God Hospital.'
February 19, 2009
vanishedone commented on the user vanish
I feel I ought to offer my salutations on grounds of nomenclature...
February 19, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word chaulmoogra
Am I misreading it, or is this WeirdNet definition not even grammatical?
February 19, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word leper
'So why did Moses say things like, "And the leper in whom the plague is, his clothes shall be rent, and his head bare, and he shall put a covering upon his upper lip, and shall cry, Unclean, unclean..." and, "Command the children of Israel, that they shall put out of the camp every leper..."? On top of everything else, it seems leprosy sufferers are the victims of mistranslation. The Hebrew word tsara'ath, translated as lepra in Latin and Greek, conveys the notion of one who is stricken or defiled, insofar as the concept is at all translatable into a modern idiom; it certainly does not mean leprosy, as we understand it. It is generally taken to be a generic term covering a range of dermatological diseases: leukoderma, vitiligo and psoriasis are among the most frequently cited.'
Tony Gould, Don't Fence Me In: From Curse to Cure: Leprosy In Modern Times, p. 3
February 19, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word deified
Thanks to deified, this is a palindrome containing palindromes.
February 18, 2009
vanishedone commented on the list bigbrothers-list
Wordie image? Just to check: you're not mixing us up with Wordle, by any chance...?
February 18, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word pedago-demago
B.B.C. News: '"They use abominable jargon - pupils have to be called apprenants or learners - and they promote this pedago-demago philosophy in which the teacher is supposed to be best mates with his class," she says.'
February 18, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word convincible
Corrected; thanks.
February 17, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word convincible
Discussion on convinceable; WeirdNet #2 seems to be mixing this up with susceptible.
February 17, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word carnival
This being Wordie, naturally the etymological discussion of carnival is on shrovetide.
February 17, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word bugs
It would be nice to have some easy way of tracking which bugs are still open. Maybe I should extend the length of the features page with that suggestion.
February 16, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word bugs
Is this what it looks like? I mentioned that bug here three months ago: it seems to affect only some lists, for some reason...
February 16, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word spectrial
Slashdot: 'The Harvard Law students defending accused file-swapper Joel Tenenbaum are doing their best to turn his upcoming trial into a media event. But when it comes to pure spectacle, they have nothing on The Pirate Bay. TPB is referring to the event as a 'spectrial,' a cross between a spectacle and a trial.'
February 15, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word caption time
Maybe: "Just because I'm a baby, it doesn't mean I'll fall for the look behind you trick..."
Or: 'You could hide Damien's number of the beast with a hat, but his deathly stare and habit of calling up demonic fiends were harder to conceal.'
February 15, 2009
vanishedone commented on the list the-incredible-shrinking-list
I'd guess so, but nuked accounts usually appear as 404s. Perhaps John used conventional weaponry against Helga.
February 15, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word filther
A nickname for profanity filtering software.
February 15, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word siftable
A kind of 'building block' as the basis for a human-computer interface.
February 14, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word equasy
Spiked: 'Hysteria over reclassification reached a fever pitch earlier this week, when the government’s chief drugs adviser, Professor David Nutt, claimed that taking Ecstasy is about as dangerous as ‘Equasy’ – a condition he has made up to describe horse-riding. The number of deaths caused by the drug annually, Nutt asserts, is roughly equivalent to the number of those killed or injured riding.'
February 13, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word world war wild
World War One: why not just use square brackets to link to another Wordie page?
February 13, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word china milk scandal firm bankrupt
One of the easier ones: a Chinese firm involved in a scandal over its milk has gone bankrupt.
February 13, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word tankist
T.H.E.: 'While we were marching with lit torches across the croquet lawn to occupy the administrative building, we were led by a 'Tankist' (someone who joined the Communist Party when the Russian tanks rolled into Prague in 1968). The rest of us were all fooling around, having a laugh, half-pissed and asking who had the spliff, and suddenly he turned round and shouted "To the Winter Palace!" It was to the credit of most of the students that they fell about laughing.'
February 13, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word the stained finger
In fairness, this isn't a bad title once you already know about the Society of Inkwell Collectors.
February 12, 2009
vanishedone commented on the list peri-odd-icals
Happily, I've found an online list of Have I Got News for You? guest publications; less happily, it only goes as far as 2006.
February 12, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word wrist-slitters' monthly
Let it be.
February 12, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word callipigeon
Having beautifully proportioned pigeons.
February 12, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word drower
Why is this word on the Wordie Paradox list? It seems free of glitches and bizarre behaviour.
February 12, 2009
vanishedone commented on the list wordie-paradox
It's the " character messing things up. If you enter http://wordie.org/words/i thought you'd lost it when you added "haar".... *gg into your browser location bar you can enter through the back door and join in the fun.
February 12, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word wrist-slitters' monthly
Ian Creasey: 'Because I thought the story had a very British tone, I didn't bother sending it to any American magazines... First, I tried Interzone, who rejected it for being too funny. (In the David Pringle era, Interzone's steady diet of grey, depressing fiction earned it the affectionate nickname of Wrist-Slitters' Monthly.)'
Now there must be a list somewhere on which a name like this belongs...
February 12, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word i thought you'd lost it when you added "haar".... *gg
Six people including bilby have added haar; perhaps one of the other five knows what this is all about.
February 12, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word extreme etymology
Presumably a game suitable for fans of extreme ironing. Bradshaw of the Future: 'I really hope today's extreme etymology is true, because it's awesome.'
February 11, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word hell manual
For the demons, or for the damned? I wonder what sort of list this was on...
February 11, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word co-rumination
The Escapist: 'The problem, according to Stony Brook University Professor Dr. Joanne Davila, is that easy access to email, social networks and other forms of always-on communications leads to excessive and repetitive discussions of the same problem, also known as "co-rumination," which can worsen the mood of teenage girls and create negative emotions.'
February 11, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word debate call for source protection
Not a command: 'The Northern Island Assembly is set to debate a DUP motion calling for public representatives to be protected against having to name sources.'
February 11, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word teapot
New update: his profile now says he's a tea-pot, but it still links to this unhyphenated page.
February 11, 2009
vanishedone commented on the list englishfolkfans-list
It's they who are the ominous ones. They use arcane, scary tags like stabby (sounds violent) and even hate hate hate.
We are just your friendly neighbourhood taggers, and everyone is invited to become one of Us. (One of us... One of us... One of us... One of us...)
February 11, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word winter deaths 'may double' worry
I think this means there's a worry that deaths in Winter may double, not that the level of worry may be doubled by them.
February 10, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word chaddi
B.B.C. News: 'A spokeswoman for the group, Nisha Susan, told the BBC it was giving chaddis (Hindi colloquial for underwear) as they alluded to a prominent Hindu right-wing group whose khaki-shorts-wearing cadres were often derisively called "chaddi wallahs" (chaddi wearers).'
February 10, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word haikoid
Néojaponisme: 'By “haiku�? throughout this post I mean “haikoid works from both before and after the word haiku was invented�? in accordance with standard English usage.'
February 10, 2009
vanishedone commented on the list englishfolkfans-list
Right. Misspelt words float around in the Wordie aether for eternity, and get tagged misspelling or typo when we come across them.
February 10, 2009
vanishedone commented on the list englishfolkfans-list
Not mellifluous?
Welcome to Wordie, nevertheless.
February 10, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word city 'has no-go areas for women'
As in 'the City', not city as in 'urban area'.
February 10, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word guggaflop
'Rose is famous for its unusual fauna. The balleron has a wooden spine. The dignipomp looks incredibly solemn. The musterach is very sensitive and sullen. The guggaflop is very, very, indeed very lazy.'
A Dictionary of Imaginary Places, entry on Rose (from Mervyn Peake's Captain Slaughterboard Drops Anchor)
February 10, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word flummywister
'Among the bird species, the best-known are the gladdy-whingers, which lay their spotted eggs in basket nests in the booblow tree, and the flummywisters, a type of songbird usually seen in elm trees. In winter the young flummywisters wear warm underwear; to hear them singing as their mothers loosen their buttons in spring is a very good omen.'
A Dictionary of Imaginary Places, entry on Rootabaga County (from Carl Sandburg's Rootabaga Stories).
February 10, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word counter-narrative
Spiked: 'Insofar as there is any hint of a strategy in relation to tackling radicalisation, it always has a fantasy-like character. Often, the official discourse on radicalisation has much in common with attitudes that underpin the child protection industry. It warns that ‘vulnerable’ and ‘impressionable’ young people may be targeted on websites, campuses and at social venues, and ‘groomed’ by cynical operators. In November 2007, it was reported that the UK government’s Research, Information and Communication Unit would draw up ‘counter-narratives’ to the anti-Western messages on websites ‘designed to influence vulnerable and impressionable audiences here in the UK’.'
February 9, 2009
vanishedone commented on the list reversible-words
How about upset/setup?
February 9, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word fishing
Why does WeirdNet have distinct definitions for fishing as recreation and as a job, but no general definition along the lines of 'catching fish'...?
February 9, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word cathode
Where on Earth is WeirdNet #4 coming from? Taking terminal as a synonym, maybe?
February 9, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word approbrium
One's own opprobrium?
February 9, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word advertising
Just idly wondering: does anyone remember exactly what the banner text was for advertising on Tuesdays, before every day became Tuesday? It was something like: It's Tuesday, and we all know what that means: advertisements! Huzzah! Google's giant mechanical brain has decided that you, the consumer, might be interested in these fine products:
February 9, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word synizesis
WordNet overlooks a linguistic sense.
The O.E.D. also notes: 'Path. Closure of the pupil of the eye.'
February 9, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word windowspotting
Improbable Research: 'In the June 28, 2008 issue of BMJ (the publication formerly known as the British Medical Journal) Barrie Smith, a retired physician from Birmingham, describes—though he does not name—a new form of the grand British tradition of otting. The proper name for it is obvious to anyone who reads Dr. Smith’s description: windowspotting.
'The best known of otting traditions is trainspotting. Some British citizens also practice planespotting, busspotting (a practice that now draws disapproval from the British Government, which views bus spotters as being possible terrorist spies) and other varieties of otting. These may all be descended from the ancient practice of bird spotting, also known as bird watching.'
February 8, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word coordinated interpersonal labial spasm
Frank Cottrell Boyce: 'Schools are not only not buying books, they’re chucking them out to make room for computers to convert libraries into learning resource centres (LRCs).
'The LRC is an educational disaster. Here, where books are merely “learning resources�?, reading is about functional literacy instead of pleasure. A paperclip is a learning resource. Google Earth is a learning resource. But a book is “the distilled essence of a human soul�?. A book is something you take to bed with you. It is not a learning resource any more than a kiss is a coordinated interpersonal labial spasm.'
February 8, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word agrimensorial
Having to do with land surveying. It seems fairly obscure, but the O.E.D. has it.
February 8, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word bugs
I tried to follow the links to /people/randy-meier?wl=19357 which (thanks to sionnach's spam-related pictures) are currently adorning the comment feed, but I got a 404. However, /lists/randy-meiers-list works fine, and /lists/19357 correctly redirects to it...
February 8, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word stone toad
Some quotations via Improbable Research:
“That really grinds my goat.�?
“I wouldn’t open that can of worms even with ten feet.�?
“Tiptoeing around like a well-oiled balloon.�?
“The students are all acting like stone toads.�?
I'm not sure whether the last one is meant to be a Metroid reference. (Any link to Toadstone?)
February 7, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word stoled
The O.E.D. defines stoled as 'wearing a stole'; stole as a verb in its own right, meanwhile, is listed with two senses, 'to provide (an altar, a church) with altar-stoles' and 'of a plant: to develop stolons'.
February 7, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word yo-yo
As a verb: 'All went well at first, with inflation, and therefore rent rises, staying low. Over the past year, however, the RPI has yo-yoed. In 2008 it rose steadily, hitting 5 percent in September before falling back to 0.9 percent by the end of the year.' (Private Eye #1229, p.6)
February 5, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word broadcasters' kangaroo tied down
Now they've just given up and started making Rolf Harris references.
'A plan by the BBC, ITV and Channel 4 to launch an on-demand video service has been blocked because it posed "too much of a threat to competition".
'The Competition Commission said Project Kangaroo "has to be stopped" and that viewers would benefit if the three were "close competitors" rather than allies.'
February 4, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word what what is this
What? What what might that what be but that what which 'what' in 'Which what?' was?
February 4, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word tabloid
404 Not Found, a mere eleven hours later.
February 4, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word what what is this
Which what?
February 4, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word guantanamo inmate control warning
This is actually a story about the possible use of legal restrictions called control orders on people removed from Guantanamo Bay and brought to Britain.
February 4, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word transdifferentiation
Telegraph: 'Turritopsis Nutricula is technically known as a hydrozoan and is the only known animal that is capable of reverting completely to its younger self.
'It does this through the cell development process of transdifferentiation.
'Scientists believe the cycle can repeat indefinitely, rendering it potentially immortal.'
February 4, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word italy woman sent to clinic to die
Perhaps there's an attempt to offer ambiguous interplay through avoiding grammatical cues. 'Italy sent a woman...'? 'A woman sent Italy...'? 'In Italy, a woman sent...'? 'Italy is a woman sent...'? Or maybe the intention is to imply a subtext about the role of Woman in modern society, contrasting feminine-as-lifegiver-and-nurturer with the bluntness of clinical death.
Italy
Woman sent
To clinic
To die.
At a guess, though, someone used to writing things like 'Manchester man wins lottery' just took the form too far.
February 3, 2009
vanishedone commented on the user jmjarmstrong
Given that Facebook status updates can be made externally accessible via an RSS feed, wouldn't it be easier to use something like a Google Reader shared tag, so as to automate the process?
February 3, 2009
vanishedone commented on the list how-to-write-seo-friendly-articles
It is indeed.
February 3, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word italy woman sent to clinic to die
The actual story: 'A woman at the centre of the right-to-die debate in Italy has been moved to a clinic where she will be allowed to die after 17 years in a vegetative state.'
February 3, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word askance
I don't know whether to add it to the 'Wordie Paradox' list, or tag it 'misspelling', or dream up some new OCSJTS tag for it...
February 3, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word zazz
HG101: 'The word zazz has being going around for a while on this site now, and that's probably exactly the "quality" the game lacks. No character ever spills out their entire angsty life story. There are no funky hairdos and over-the-top character designs. Nobody ever turns into an angel in a post-cataclysmic final battle in space while flying around in a wormhole (with a choir singing orgasmically in the background, no less). Just a boy and his dog going on an adventure. This is as close as it gets to zazz level 0. The zazz basement, if you will.'
February 3, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word unbrick
Jargon File on brick: 'This term usually implies irreversibility, but equipment can sometimes be unbricked by performing a hard reset or some other drastic operation.'
February 3, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word egregarious
Egregious and gregarious, or just a typo...?
February 3, 2009
vanishedone commented on the list samme-s-words
No answer...
Is the 'no double listing' rule still supposed to be in force? I've never noticed any automatic checks and balances restricting my listing...
February 3, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word hyperpackaging
Concurring Opinions: 'What strange confluence of laws and economic incentives produce all of this hyperpackaging of inexpensive goods? Do appliances break unless transported in a foot of protection? Do consumers injure themselves if they get the box home and the flatware is right at the surface and unsecured? Do labels deter theft of open-stock items (“We know that this isn’t your cereal bowl you have under your sweater because it has our label on it.�?)? Or ensure that things don’t get misplaced on store shelves?'
February 2, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word elver
WeirdNet is eager to give culinary advice.
February 2, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word lesbian sadomasochism safety manual
Why is this considered an odd book title? It strikes me as pretty prosaic.
February 2, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word naked came the manatee
Named in 'honour' of Naked Came the Stranger, apparently.
February 2, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word evitative
There's got to be a 'Don't Cry for Me, Argentina' joke in here somewhere...
February 2, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word solipsistically
Solipsistically, it appears on no lists.
February 2, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word beyelp
'To talk loudly of, boast of, glory in' (O.E.D.). Marked obs., attested in the 1300s and too little beyelped since then.
February 2, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word garbologist
Cory Doctorow: 'Last December, Forbes published my latest article on Darren Atkinson, hands down the most exciting, thoughtful and skilled garbologist and dumpster diver I’ve ever heard of... Darren’s got the perfect zero-capital, socially conscious enterprise — drive around the industrial suburbs, collecting the scat of the wily corporation as it progresses through the twists and turns of its life-cycle, and panning out major cash in those fewmets.'
February 2, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word features
Don't forget the people who try to leave definitions in the tag box.
February 2, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word musu
Quoted from David Stanley: '…Another unique Samoan characteristic is musu, to be sullen. A previously communicative individual will suddenly become silent and moody. This often bears no relation to what’s happening at the time, and when a Samoan becomes musu, the best approach is just to sit back and wait until they get a grip…'
February 1, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word blunderscore
See tag.
February 1, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word jan_ceulemans
Fair enough.
February 1, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word jan_ceulemans
Nominations are now open, then. Undersprawl? Underspawn? Blunderscore?
Incidentally, Wordie seems to have stripped the underscore out of the page <title>: at the top of my browser window it's JanCeulemans.
February 1, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word lurking
Monarch of the Lurs?
February 1, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word bugs
I expect this is a form of the problem with the . character in URLs: ordinary.madness is apparently a legitimate user name, but /people/lists/ordinary.madness redirects to /lists/.
Speaking of /lists/, why does it seem never to change, if it has the last 500 lists on the site? Every time I end up there I see my Cryptolects list at the top.
February 1, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word penghulu
In early drafts of At the Mountains of Madness, Lovecraft planned...
Okay, it's actually a word for chief from Malaysia and Indonesia.
February 1, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word penguin
The great auk, now extinct.
Also, says the O.E.D., a rare verb meaning 'to publish as a Penguin book'.
February 1, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word water-burial"
Not as broken as the kind with a " before the end, but when I clicked on this one I got taken to water-burial.
February 1, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word 55folcum gefræge
Googling suggests this is from Beowulf, but the line number has got caught up in it. Ennumbered, or just a one-off curiosity?
February 1, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word jan_ceulemans
Do underscores fall into the domain of OCSJTS...?
February 1, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word nightmare clown
The nightmare clown would be ghosted, of course...
February 1, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word gue
A Shetland stringed instrument, but also an obsolete word meaning rogue.
February 1, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word "befuddlement and swearing" questionmark
I'd forgotten about this beauty: it seems no longer to break my favourites list, which is nice, and of course we now have tags appropriate to its stature...
Edit: I see it still doesn't work properly on the comment feed...
February 1, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word funky gibbon
By The Goodies; see link and appreciative comments on New Caledonian bumpy gecko.
February 1, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word schützengrabenvernichtungsautomobil
Dwight Rodgers: 'Although German is not one of the languages I can speak, and I'm probably repeating urban legend, I once heard that the German word for "Tank" early in the 1900s was something like "Schützengrabenvernichtungsautomobil", perhaps meaning "automobile that shoots and moves in trenches". The time required to yell this phrase upon seeing a tank, was, of course, presented as the primary reason for Germany losing the war.'
February 1, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word batak
Omniglot: 'The Batak are a negrito people, with kinky (curly) hair and dark skin. Their mother-tongue is called Binatak and is related to other regional languages of Malayic origin. While the Palawan and the Tagbanua tribes developed a unique alphabet, the Batak have never had a writing system. Anthropologists believe the Batak to be related to the Aeta people, found in other parts of the Philippines.'
February 1, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word government abuse chicken
Another of those Chinese delicacies.
February 1, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word konkani
Derick Pinto: 'The other day, a Maharashtrain friend of mine remarked, "Konkani is a dialect of Marathi. That is why Konkani does not have its own script." This set me thinking. I am a linguist and I am interested in language and linguistics. So I found me asking myself as to whether Konkani is a dialect of Marathi or an independent language by itself.'
February 1, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa
As in AaaaaAAaaaAAAaaAAAAaAAAAA!!! - A Reckless Disregard for Gravity.
February 1, 2009
vanishedone commented on the user vanishedone
I think I'm going to join in, this being my profile and all. (Who wants to be listmaster for 'What Wordies Like'?)
VanishedOne likes philosophy and conlangs he'll never find time to learn. Oh, and as chained_bear said, tags.
January 31, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word new caledonian bumpy gecko
'A faddish new dance'? Maybe the Bumpy Gecko is a follow-up to the Funky Gibbon...
January 31, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word murse
Somewhere in here there's scope for a pun on immersion therapy, but... well, I agree: ugh.
January 31, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word acanthocladous
'Having spiny branches' (O.E.D.). Suitable for those seeking an obscure yet... barbed insult.
January 31, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word new caledonian bumpy gecko
Otherwise known as the gargoyle gecko, and clearly at the front of the queue when striking gecko names were being handed out.
January 31, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word dumdum
Why is this tagged 'WeirdNet'; was someone thinking of DumDums?
January 31, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word disloyal
I thought WeirdNet #1 was oddly specific until I saw WeirdNet #2...
January 31, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word neuromythology
Raymond Tallis: 'New technologies permitting imaging of the waking brain in humans have prompted increasingly extravagant claims about the extent to which advances in neurocience are casting light on human nature. The proliferation of new disciplines, such as neuro-aesthetics, neuro-ethics, neuro-law and neuro-economics, is a symptom of the widespread belief that the activity of the stand-alone brain explains our subjective experiences and our objectively observed behaviour.
'The talk will critically examine this central notion of neuromythology, demonstrate the inadequacy of neural accounts of human nature, discuss the reasons they command such wide support, and spell out the dire consequences they might have if they were truly believed.'
January 31, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word geissler tube
Seen here, along with a mercury arc rectifier.
January 31, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word bugs
Niteowl has a tag that seems to be broken in an exciting new way: it appears on /people/tags/Niteowl as 'steampunk steam punk', but the link is to /tags/steampunksteam punk, which produces a 500 Application Error. (/tags/steampunk steam punk doesn't work either.)
January 30, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word £12,000 proposal to be debated
What it means: 'Assembly members sc. in Northern Ireland are to debate a controversial proposal to give the families of all those killed during the Troubles £12,000.'
January 30, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word pazzaz
Passes with a strong accent?
January 30, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word somancer
That's some answer...
January 30, 2009
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