What new words have you learned recently?

[Fyraltari]

Yes, among

[Willie the Duck]

Among?56789

Yes, among.

[Fyraltari]

Yes, among.

[Mister Tom]

Not exactly one word, but this past week I learned what "with prejudice" means

[Scarlet Knight]

Now I want to open a cheese shop...

Zinken: a symbol used by itinerant travelers who spoke Rotwelsch, which was a beggar's language.

"This zinken told passersby that the owner of the house would give you cheese if you asked."

[Peelee]

Now I want to open a cheese shop...

You would like to be a cheesemonger in a fromagerie, eh?

WHAT NOW, NEW WORD LEARNING THREAD?

[Rockphed]

Now I want to open a cheese shop...

Will you actually stock cheese?

[Scarlet Knight]

Will you actually stock cheese?

"Of course, sir! It is a cheese shop."


@v "I think we're drifting into a different skit , sir."

[Eldan]

"Of course, sir! It is a cheese shop."

But do you have a glaive-glaive-guisarme-glaive?

[Fyraltari]

But do you have a glaive-glaive-guisarme-glaive?

Sorry, they only deal in biological weapons.

[Ajustusdaniel]

Now I want to open a cheese shop...

Zinken: a symbol used by itinerant travelers who spoke Rotwelsch, which was a beggar's language.

"This zinken told passersby that the owner of the house would give you cheese if you asked."

Thank you! I was looking the other day for European equivalents of (possibly apocryphal) hobo sign.

[Mister Tom]

Is this the right thread for an argument?

[Peelee]

Is this the right thread for an argument?

Depends. Is the argument about cheese?

[Fyraltari]

Are there wrong threads for arguments?

[Rockphed]

Are there wrong threads for arguments?

At some point Roland turns on the ... there is no mind control. I will go back to my fun.

[Peelee]

All glory to the hypnotoad Roland.

[Wraith]

Carcinisation (Or Carcinization for the Americans).

From reading it you might think it was related to 'carcinogen', a substance which promotes the growth of cancerous cells.... And you'd only be half right.

"Carcin-" and "cancer" are in this case linked not by chemistry, but by astrology. Carcinisation is a process of convergent evolution (that is, animals evolving independently of each other and not otherwise being genetically related) to eventually come to resemble a crab-like creature.
Apparently it's something that has happened 5 or 6 times throughout history - nature really, really likes crabs and keeps trying to get things to evolve into them from several different sources, so much so that the process has its own name.

[Fyraltari]

Carcinisation (Or Carcinization for the Americans).

From reading it you might think it was related to 'carcinogen', a substance which promotes the growth of cancerous cells.... And you'd only be half right.

"Carcin-" and "cancer" are in this case linked not by chemistry, but by astrology. Carcinisation is a process of convergent evolution (that is, animals evolving independently of each other and not otherwise being genetically related) to eventually come to resemble a crab-like creature.
Apparently it's something that has happened 5 or 6 times throughout history - nature really, really likes crabs and keeps trying to get things to evolve into them from several different sources, so much so that the process has its own name.

That has nothing to do with astrology. "Cancer" is latin for crab. The constellation looks like a crab and the ancient Greek doctors compared tumors to crabs.

[Wraith]

nothing to do with astrology...

...The constellation

I concede that I could have also used 'astronomy' interchangeably, but this stupid pun is the hill upon which I am prepared to die.

[Fyraltari]

What pun?.

[Razade]

Apparently it's something that has happened 5 or 6 times throughout history - nature really, really likes crabs and keeps trying to get things to evolve into them from several different sources, so much so that the process has its own name.

It should be noted that it is specific, as far as we know currently, to crustaceans. Lemurs are not evolving into crablike things. Carcinisation is when a crustacean that did not appear as a "crab" evolves into something that has the appearance of a "crab".

[Scarlet Knight]

It should be noted that it is specific, as far as we know currently, to crustaceans. Lemurs are not evolving into crablike things. Carcinisation is when a crustacean that did not appear as a "crab" evolves into something that has the appearance of a "crab".

Maybe not lemurs but it seems as if people are getting crabbier....


Ratiocination : Reasoning, conscious deliberate inference; the activity or process of reasoning

"Poe stirred Lincoln with his tales of elaborate ratiocination."

[Vinyadan]

For me a new one is "canker sores", those little painful wounds in your mouth.

[Peelee]

Maybe not lemurs but it seems as if people are getting crabbier....


Ratiocination : Reasoning, conscious deliberate inference; the activity or process of reasoning

"Poe stirred Lincoln with his tales of elaborate ratiocination."

For reasons I won't go into, this reminds me of a phrase that some may not know - the Clbuttic issue, which is a specific subset of the Scunthorpe problem. Specifically, website profanity filters that both replace offending words with tamer versions and also tend to be somewhat overzealous. Which leads to words like "assassinate" and "constitution" being changed to "buttbuttinate" and "consbreastution".

[Wraith]

It should be noted that it is specific, as far as we know currently, to crustaceans. Lemurs are not evolving into crablike things. Carcinisation is when a crustacean that did not appear as a "crab" evolves into something that has the appearance of a "crab".

I mean, I concede - to be perfectly accurate it refers to non-crab crustaceans evolving into crab-like creatures, since genetically they are unrelated to actual crabs and only resemble them. I was paraphrasing for what I thought was comedic effect, but it looks like I didn't go deep enough.

It's still a good word though, and evokes some very strange images about what the anthromorphic version of 'nature' or 'evolution' would be like - just utterly obsessed with crabs and beetles, apparently.

[Rynjin]

Maybe not lemurs but it seems as if people are getting crabbier....


Ratiocination : Reasoning, conscious deliberate inference; the activity or process of reasoning

"Poe stirred Lincoln with his tales of elaborate ratiocination."

This is one I'd meant to post months ago, when I came across it in one of Brent Weeks' novels. I'd never seen it before.

[Altair_the_Vexed]

Is this the right thread for an argument?

I told you once.

---

Have we had "Pusillanimous" yet?
I've seen it around plenty of times, can tell from context that it's derogatory - but I only recently found out it's actual meaning: cowardly, especially in a contemptible way.

[understatement]

shibboleth (n): a custom/principle/belief distinguishing a group of people

gulaman (n): a Filipino bar or powder of dried agar used for jellylike desserts

hāngi (n): a traditional New Zealand / Maori cooking method using heated rocks buried in a pit oven

[Rockphed]

shibboleth (n): a custom/principle/belief distinguishing a group of people

Somehow my in-head dictionary includes "often derogatory" in there. As in it is the thing that the in-group uses to exclude the out-group. So eating meat would be a shibboleth to vegans.

[Rogar Demonblud]

That comes from the Old Testament, where we're introduced to the word. Keeping it general, one group used it as a password and killed anybody who couldn't pronounce it right.