|
Joined: Mar 2000
Posts: 6,511
Carpal Tunnel
|
OP
Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Mar 2000
Posts: 6,511 |
I find it very cool that we have our virtual usage panel® here for the using.
|
|
|
|
Joined: Mar 2000
Posts: 1,027
old hand
|
old hand
Joined: Mar 2000
Posts: 1,027 |
Police may well be ubiquitous - vice is omnipresent
|
|
|
|
Joined: Mar 2000
Posts: 11,613
Carpal Tunnel
|
Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Mar 2000
Posts: 11,613 |
Sorry to bring this back after so long, but I've just read it, and cannot refrain from commenting. U. & o. may be frequently used interchangeably, but IMHO they shouldn't be; certainly not in all cases. I agree with the go/be folks. Wsieber gave one good example of how they are different. Here's another ex.: my concern about my weight is omnipresent; it is not ubiquitous. I hope that eating only things that are good for me will soon be ubiquitous; but they will not be omnipresent, because I do not eat every minute of the day. Another: our city buses used to have ads that read "TARC {Transit Authority of River City} is ubiquitous". I'll grant them that they were, for the sake of argument. But they were not omnipresent: you could not see one 100% of the time you looked for one.
|
|
|
|
Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 13,858
Carpal Tunnel
|
Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 13,858 |
Both words are inherently exaggerative. Nothing can really go everywhere , or be everywhere st the same time.I hesitate to say that space could meet the definitions.
|
|
|
|
Joined: Sep 2001
Posts: 6,296
Carpal Tunnel
|
Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Sep 2001
Posts: 6,296 |
|
|
|
|
Joined: Feb 2002
Posts: 833
old hand
|
old hand
Joined: Feb 2002
Posts: 833 |
I might say that beer bottles are ubiquitous in the student ghetto where I have the misfortune to live (but it's cheap and I love my little flat! just the neighbours are a drag) - in which case, I would mean that just about anywhere you cast your eye, you'd be likely to see at least one beer bottle within your range of vision. I would never say that beer bottles were omnipresent in the student ghetto: how would anyone move, what would we breathe?!
To me, regardless of definitions (I haven't even looked each word up), ubiquitous means unusually common (if that ain't too oxymoronic!) - something you can expect to see/encounter frequently; omnipresent means all-present. Air is, I think, the only "thing" that is omnipresent on Earth (obviously it's not in space, but), but I think of God as omnipresent. On His bad days, I reckon He probably thinks of people as ubiquitous.
|
|
|
|
Joined: Jun 2002
Posts: 161
member
|
member
Joined: Jun 2002
Posts: 161 |
Ubiquitous - Something that appears to be everywhere at once
…Coenzyme Q advertised now as an anti-ageing compound, for example, in Nivea Q10 lotion is known as ubiquinone because it is ubiquitous in biological systems
Biochemistry by L.Stryer
|
|
|
|
Joined: Sep 2019
Posts: 1
stranger
|
stranger
Joined: Sep 2019
Posts: 1 |
I don't think the etymologies of the words support the go vs. be distinction. Neither word has a root -- like -cur or -cede -- that suggests "going." Literally, 'ubique' means "anywhere," while 'omnipresent' means "everywhere."
It is actually the suffix -ous in 'ubiquitous' that adds the notion of "seeming to be." Thus, something that is ubiquitous seems to be anywhere you look, while something that is omnipresent is everywhere, regardless of whether it seems that way to you.
|
|
|
|
Joined: Jun 2008
Posts: 9,931 Likes: 3
Carpal Tunnel
|
Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Jun 2008
Posts: 9,931 Likes: 3 |
----please, draw me a sheep----
|
|
|
Forums16
Topics13,913
Posts229,580
Members9,187
|
Most Online3,341 Dec 9th, 2011
|
|
0 members (),
332
guests, and
0
robots. |
Key:
Admin,
Global Mod,
Mod
|
|
|
|