Thesauri provide 'synonyms'?

Question

Just how similar is similar enough to be a synonym?eg., I would have thought there'd be a better term for the relationship between those words.

Usenet · Accepted Answer

[nq:1]Just how similar is similar enough to be a synonym? eg., I would have thought there'd be a better term for the relationship between those words.[/nq]
I see that as a trap that people have fallen into more than once. They think "synonyms" are supposed to be identical, interchangeable, and then they grumble that that they can't find any true pairs of synonyms.

Whereas, the people who really find the concept of "synonym" useful allow for more differences in meaning and connotation than that. Dictionaries like M-W spend quite a bit of space explaining the subtle differences among synonyms (in their "SEE" notes).

Best Donna Richoux

Usenet · Answer

[nq:1]Whereas, the people who really find the concept of "synonym" useful allow for more differences in meaning and connotation than that.[/nq]
How much difference can be allowed before "synonym" means nothing more than "also a word", though?

Usenet · Answer

[nq:1]Whereas, the people who really find the concept of "synonym" useful allow for more differences in meaning and connotation than that.[/nq]
How much difference can be allowed before "synonym" means nothing more than "also a word", though?

Usenet · Answer

[nq:2]Whereas, the people who really find the concept of "synonym" useful allow for more differences in meaning and connotation than that.[/nq]
[nq:1]How much difference can be allowed before "synonym" means nothing more than "also a word", though?[/nq]
"Nothing more than 'also a word'" would mean absolutely nothing in common, nothing similar. I don't see how you could get that far in anything labeled as a list of synonyms, no matter how loosely found.

Unrelated words would be like that gobbledygook that fllls up spam. Checking my Junk email file for a sample:
finessed dogtooth earthen potato corrosion brackish hijack balky imperious crewel slippage diva positron accuse robbery runt remorse geopolitic britain
cryptanalytic
No, those thesaurus entries you showed looked more or less meaningful to me. I notice the words were given alphabetically; it's been years since I've felt the need to consult a thesaurus, but I remember them being arranged more by meaning, with the closest words together. Maybe they were in little series, and alphabetical within each clump.

Since so much editorial judgement is involved, you might find that one thesaurus is more useful to your purposes than another.

What prompted you to look up "dictator," may I ask? Were you trying to remember some other word you couldn't quite think of?

Best Donna Richoux

Usenet · Answer

[nq:2]How much difference can be allowed before "synonym" means nothing more than "also a word", though?[/nq]
[nq:1]"Nothing more than 'also a word'" would mean absolutely nothing in common, nothing similar.[/nq]
Well, no. That would be a very special list in itself. That would exclude 'woof' from matching 'meow', 'hark' and 'dark', 'psychology' and 'meteorology', 'telescope' and 'cut', 'toothpaste' and 'understatement', 'tree' and 'shoe'. They're all "also a word" pairs, but they fail to have absolutely nothing (else) in common.
[nq:1]No, those thesaurus entries you showed looked more or less meaningful to me.[/nq]
I might as well declare my preconception. I'd always thought of synonyms as that list of words you'd try in situations like "he's not really an x, more of a y".
The given synonyms seem to meet that purpose in that they're 'other types of ruler' plus 'other types of bully', but it's a limited set of each of those, and I would think that if you're going through your list of rulers and bullies, you'd try to choose those most dictator-esque before those that imply something quite different.

Terrorism, for example, I would associate with those that do what they do for lack of any real power or authority, which would leave them well separated from dictators. Your head terrorists might fit the 'dictator of this letter' sense of the word, but if that sense is still in popular use then you're opening up a whole new set of synonyms for dictator 'other types of creator'.
[nq:1]What prompted you to look up "dictator," may I ask? Were you trying to remember some other word you couldn't quite think of?[/nq]
Just an example I ran into. I have no idea how it came up.

Usenet · Answer

[nq:2]How much difference can be allowed before "synonym" means nothing more than "also a word", though?[/nq]
[nq:1]"Nothing more than 'also a word'" would mean absolutely nothing in common, nothing similar. I don't see how you could ... to look up "dictator," may I ask? Were you trying to remember some other word you couldn't quite think of?[/nq]Interestingly (to me, at least), that's what prompted Dr. Roget to compile his thesaurus. It was intended to be a writing aid, a list of words that he knew perfectly well, but when he was writing and didn't have the word that best fit the situation on the tip of his tongue (or more exactly, his pen) at that very moment, he could simply pull it off his list. I don't know how his publisher discovered it and persuaded him to publish it (money may have been involved, or not).

I'm sure this is old hat to many here, and many know the story much better than I do, but this is the sort of thing that brings life to history (and English usage) and I'm sure that many of the lurkers will be interested. But anyway, the words on lists of synonyms certainly need not be totally synonymous. In fact, if they were, even to the point of connotation, then we wouldn't need synonyms. We could just repeat, since we would in fact just be saying the same thing.

Jon Miller

Usenet · Answer

[nq:2]Just how similar is similar enough to be a synonym? ... be a better term for the relationship between those words.[/nq]
[nq:1]I see that as a trap that people have fallen into more than once. They think "synonyms" are supposed to ... that. Dictionaries like M-W spend quite a bit of space explaining the subtle differences among synonyms (in their "SEE" notes).[/nq]
The person who compiles the crossword in my paper uses the most obscure 'synonyms' possible.

Rob Bannister

Usenet · Answer

[nq:1]The person who compiles the crossword in my paper uses the most obscure 'synonyms' possible.[/nq]
But where does 'possible' stop? Are there any limits at all?

Usenet · Answer

[nq:2]The person who compiles the crossword in my paper uses the most obscure 'synonyms' possible.[/nq]
[nq:1]But where does 'possible' stop? Are there any limits at all?[/nq]
Of course there are limits. If someone tried to tell you that "buffalo" was a synonym for "fishtank," you'd know they failed to grasp the concenpt of synonym.
Absurdities like that tell me there must be some sort of boundaries although they maybe fuzzy, erratic ones.
If you mean, can we draw those dividing lines clearly between "synonyms" and "not synonyms," then, I say no. Can we make a nice tidy formula that somehow measures the "sameness' and "difference" in meaning, and explains what "meaning" is, and what it means for a word to convey or express or refer to a meaning?
"Meaning" is one of those dark, deep philosophical topics, you know. People have gone down that road before you, whistling and carrying picnic baskets...
Philosophically, I'm more in tune with the "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance" guy. There are certain concepts, like good and bad, true and false, same and different, that can never be totally explained in terms of other things, and we have to just recognize them and go by our own individual judgement. Whether two words "mean the same" can be explored only so far in terms of the factual referents, and beyond that, it's a personal judgement call.
I'm certain that anyone who has published lists of synonyms must have wrestled mentally with whether to put this word here or there, whether it had crossed the line into a different category. They probably worked out subtle standards that they never had the time and space to explain to us. That's what we pay lexicographers for, to wrestle with such fine distinctions.
The above is probably not what you were hoping for, but I find it interesting to think about.

Best Donna Richoux

Thesauri provide 'synonyms'?

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