#47819
11/14/2001 2:38 AM
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Joined: Apr 2000
Posts: 3,065
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Apr 2000
Posts: 3,065 |
In a letter in today's Jakarta Post from an Australian commenting on Mr. Howard's re-election, I read:
It is a sobering thought which could drive us to drink.
As the letter was otherwise a humourless rant, I can't tell whether this was deliberate or not.
Bingley
Bingley
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#47820
11/14/2001 4:09 PM
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Joined: Aug 2000
Posts: 2,204
Pooh-Bah
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Pooh-Bah
Joined: Aug 2000
Posts: 2,204 |
Now that's a solemn thought that can only make you laugh.
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#47821
11/14/2001 8:49 PM
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Joined: Dec 2000
Posts: 13,803
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Dec 2000
Posts: 13,803 |
It is a sobering thought which could drive us to drink.
Perhaps the author of the line was used to a state of inebriation and, fearing the imminent onset of sobriety, felt the need of a prophylactic drink.
Ænigma likes ineffective for inebriation and propitious(!) for prophylactic.
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#47822
11/17/2001 1:43 AM
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Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 13,858
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 13,858 |
When sophisticated use of spell checker might have been helpful:
In Friday PM CNN online:
The mailer also displayed some criminal
sophistication to cover, or "dry clean," his true
identity and intent, Fitzgerald said. For example, one letter misspelled the word
"penicillin" as "penicillin," he noted.
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#47823
11/17/2001 1:20 PM
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Joined: Apr 2000
Posts: 3,065
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Apr 2000
Posts: 3,065 |
And an example from a book review in this week's edition of The Economist of a back formation that is new to me, at any rate:
"Mr. Buruma is very good at describing how, so often, emigres are revulsed by this obvious lack of sincerity."
Bingley
Bingley
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#47824
11/17/2001 3:04 PM
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Joined: Nov 2000
Posts: 3,439
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Nov 2000
Posts: 3,439 |
OED says - as a first definition - says revulsion is : "The drawing of blood from one part to another - as by counterirritation." (Hmmmm!)
Then notes it is also a "sudden or violent change of meaning"
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#47825
11/17/2001 3:20 PM
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Joined: Oct 2001
Posts: 1,385
veteran
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veteran
Joined: Oct 2001
Posts: 1,385 |
revulsion is : "The drawing of blood from one part to another - as by counterirritation."
Is that "counterirritation" or "counterirrigation", wow? They both seem to work.
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#47826
11/17/2001 4:01 PM
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Joined: Apr 2000
Posts: 10,542
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Apr 2000
Posts: 10,542 |
revulse is an obs. and rare verb, probably to be considered an inkhorn term of the 17th C. [L. revuls-, ppl. stem of revellere]
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#47827
11/17/2001 4:19 PM
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Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 13,858
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 13,858 |
No word is so ugly that it will not appeal to some teenage group. When looking for things to post about "stales" there was a group proud of name "Stale Urine".
And searching "revulsion" yielded:
Requiems Of Revulsion: A Tribute To Carcass
$11.49 - $13.98
by Various Artists
Song List : Genital Grinder; Reek Of Putrefaction; Rotten To The Gore; ...
CD:$11.49-13.98
I was revulsed.
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#47828
11/17/2001 5:04 PM
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Joined: Apr 2000
Posts: 10,542
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Apr 2000
Posts: 10,542 |
it was used in a less revulsive vein in medical texts:
1669 W. Simpson Hydrol. Chym. 78 This virulent acrimony+becomes by a retrograde motion revulsed into the veins. 1673 Harvey Anat. Exerc. ii. 123 To take away the blood+that it might be revulsed from the lungs.
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#47829
11/18/2001 12:01 AM
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Joined: Sep 2001
Posts: 6,296
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Sep 2001
Posts: 6,296 |
On revulsing blood from the lungs...did it work?
I remember reading somewhere that there were particular cases of using leeches that actually did help ameliorate the malady in question. Rare, but the article indicated that sometimes leeching did help.
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#47830
11/18/2001 12:49 AM
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Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 13,858
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 13,858 |
It is a wonder that the human race survived some of the things that were advocated by the best physicians available. It seems obvious that many patients must have been harmed by the widely used bleeding of patients who could ill afford to lose the blood. But until it became possible to keep accurate records of large number of patients, and analyze data with sound statistical methods, reliable conclusions were rare indeed. Look how long it took to recognize the evils of cigarette smoking.
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#47831
11/19/2001 6:18 AM
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Joined: Apr 2000
Posts: 3,065
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Apr 2000
Posts: 3,065 |
Just goes to show something or other. I automatically analysed revulsed as being from a verb revulse. Onelook refers to dictionary.com and Websters for revulse and they give the meaning pull back with force and ascribe it to Cowper (the poet? no dates given).
When I googled revulse and then revulsed there were about 8 or 9 times as many examples of revulsed. Using Onelook I found that revulsed is listed in AHD and Merriam-Websters as an adjective meaning "affected with revulsion". MW dates it back to 1934, but that doesn't make me like it any better.
Of course in a print dicitionary you would see the adjective revulsed if you tried to look up an almost non-existent verb revulse.
Bingley
Bingley
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#47832
11/19/2001 9:33 AM
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Joined: Sep 2001
Posts: 6,296
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Sep 2001
Posts: 6,296 |
About revulsed: Where's Dr. Sam Johnson when ya' need him?
WW
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