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I'm in need of a word or words that encapsulates the idea of a qualitative judgment or measurement that has both subjective and objective cases.
For example, describing an object as "feels a little too hot to hold" is subjective, and describing another as "it's hot enough to melt skin" is objective. In other words, a qualitative measurement that at the lower end (or middle, depending on what's measured) of the spectrum, is subjective, but as you get further out, becomes more and more objective. Thanks, Luc "Somethingorother" French 00:32, 14 April 2009 (UTC)
In the film Lord Jim, Jim is called twan (lord) by one of the natives he rescues. Is this a real word in Southeast Asia? Clarityfiend ( talk) 01:51, 14 April 2009 (UTC)
Okay, as far as I know, the Swedish word for card, "kort", can also mean "photograph" (at least colloquially). What puzzles (and amuses) me, is that in contemporary usage it may refer to any type of photo, not just paper photographs, even in the context of taking photos ("ta kort"). Is my understanding correct?
For instance, would these sentences be okay in formal or semi-formal Swedish, or are they considered colloquialisms?
decltype ( talk) 09:01, 14 April 2009 (UTC)
How does Boutros Boutros-Ghali pronounce his name? Does he normally use French or Arabic or what language? Which part of his name is used by his friends when calling him? Why is Boutros-Ghali hyphenated?-- Sonjaaa ( talk) 14:43, 14 April 2009 (UTC)
Is swordsmistress an acceptable spelling for the feminine form of swordmaster? So far, I've had no luck with dictionaries or other authoritative sources. 60.48.212.154 ( talk) 14:57, 14 April 2009 (UTC)
I was just idly idling over my daily newspaper word challenge, and it occurred to me that certain words can be constructed by combining two other words and rearranging the letters. But often, more than one pair of words will combine to make the same word. The two words in each pair, generally speaking, would be completely unrelated, either to the large word or to each other.
For example, "glandular" could be derived by adding:
Does this sort of thing have a particular name? Which word would have the greatest number of different component pairs? -- JackofOz ( talk) 21:50, 14 April 2009 (UTC)
Anyone got any vague ideas about my second question? I suppose the longer the main word, the better chance it will have different pairs of component words, but that hardly narrows it down very much. The fewer odd consonants like x, q and z etc, the better chance it will have any pairs at all, but again that doesn't help very much. Anyone with kick-ass word skills and kick-ass computing skills and interest enough in doing some kind of search? I'm not bothered about foreign words or proper nouns, but there can't be any letters left over. And I'm only interested in pairs, not triples etc. -- JackofOz ( talk) 20:31, 16 April 2009 (UTC)
This is my gentle suggestion to the original poster that the heading of this section could be changed from "Glandular" to "Letters of word rearranged to form 2 words: (Q1) name of word play, (Q2) word with most pairs" or just "Letters of word shuffled to form two words" or something else more meaningful than "Glandular", which sounds like a heading for a topic on the Science Reference Desk. An improved heading can facilitate searches in the Archives. -- Wavelength ( talk) 00:45, 18 April 2009 (UTC)
Language desk | ||
---|---|---|
< April 13 | << Mar | April | May >> | April 15 > |
Welcome to the Wikipedia Language Reference Desk Archives |
---|
The page you are currently viewing is an archive page. While you can leave answers for any questions shown below, please ask new questions on one of the current reference desk pages. |
I'm in need of a word or words that encapsulates the idea of a qualitative judgment or measurement that has both subjective and objective cases.
For example, describing an object as "feels a little too hot to hold" is subjective, and describing another as "it's hot enough to melt skin" is objective. In other words, a qualitative measurement that at the lower end (or middle, depending on what's measured) of the spectrum, is subjective, but as you get further out, becomes more and more objective. Thanks, Luc "Somethingorother" French 00:32, 14 April 2009 (UTC)
In the film Lord Jim, Jim is called twan (lord) by one of the natives he rescues. Is this a real word in Southeast Asia? Clarityfiend ( talk) 01:51, 14 April 2009 (UTC)
Okay, as far as I know, the Swedish word for card, "kort", can also mean "photograph" (at least colloquially). What puzzles (and amuses) me, is that in contemporary usage it may refer to any type of photo, not just paper photographs, even in the context of taking photos ("ta kort"). Is my understanding correct?
For instance, would these sentences be okay in formal or semi-formal Swedish, or are they considered colloquialisms?
decltype ( talk) 09:01, 14 April 2009 (UTC)
How does Boutros Boutros-Ghali pronounce his name? Does he normally use French or Arabic or what language? Which part of his name is used by his friends when calling him? Why is Boutros-Ghali hyphenated?-- Sonjaaa ( talk) 14:43, 14 April 2009 (UTC)
Is swordsmistress an acceptable spelling for the feminine form of swordmaster? So far, I've had no luck with dictionaries or other authoritative sources. 60.48.212.154 ( talk) 14:57, 14 April 2009 (UTC)
I was just idly idling over my daily newspaper word challenge, and it occurred to me that certain words can be constructed by combining two other words and rearranging the letters. But often, more than one pair of words will combine to make the same word. The two words in each pair, generally speaking, would be completely unrelated, either to the large word or to each other.
For example, "glandular" could be derived by adding:
Does this sort of thing have a particular name? Which word would have the greatest number of different component pairs? -- JackofOz ( talk) 21:50, 14 April 2009 (UTC)
Anyone got any vague ideas about my second question? I suppose the longer the main word, the better chance it will have different pairs of component words, but that hardly narrows it down very much. The fewer odd consonants like x, q and z etc, the better chance it will have any pairs at all, but again that doesn't help very much. Anyone with kick-ass word skills and kick-ass computing skills and interest enough in doing some kind of search? I'm not bothered about foreign words or proper nouns, but there can't be any letters left over. And I'm only interested in pairs, not triples etc. -- JackofOz ( talk) 20:31, 16 April 2009 (UTC)
This is my gentle suggestion to the original poster that the heading of this section could be changed from "Glandular" to "Letters of word rearranged to form 2 words: (Q1) name of word play, (Q2) word with most pairs" or just "Letters of word shuffled to form two words" or something else more meaningful than "Glandular", which sounds like a heading for a topic on the Science Reference Desk. An improved heading can facilitate searches in the Archives. -- Wavelength ( talk) 00:45, 18 April 2009 (UTC)