This may be a YART, but I got too many hits on the word "alarm" to figure that out. My Turkish friend and I were talking the other day about smoke detectors...
Why does a fire alarm "go off", meaning that it begins to sing? And when it stops singing, what do you use to indicate that? It doesn't "go off"; I would probably say "It stopped". Does this have something to do with the way alarms originally worked? We also say "I set off the fire alarm". (Or the burglar alarm.) Why, oh why?
Are there other situations where a "backward" verb is used like this?
Dear Bean: I guess saying "the alarm went off" meaning it sounded is an idiom, and so need not be logical.
I feel that it indicates a movement from its normal state. One could say that the alarm went back
on standby mode once it ceased "going off." So, in a sense (nonsense?) "on" and "off" reverse rolls.
BTW, what's a YART? I thought it was a Mongolian house.
YART, not yurt, is Yet Another Rehashed Topic, acc'g. to its
inventor.
And, Bean, this isn't one. My guess would be that alarms go off for the same reason something or someone sounds off, to make itself/himself heard, though why that is, I
don't know. Possibly because it is a departure from the normal pattern, or path, of behavior--off the regular path, as it were?
Isn't it alarming how we go on and on on a topic then go off it? Off on a tangent?
To Jackie and Geoff -
Certainly it is a deviation from the normal behaviour. But that implies that an alarm is "always on" except when it's going off.
Most other things are always off, except when they're turned on: light switches, television (at least in my house), computer, faucets, etc.
This leads me to my original suspicion. "Off" indicates an open circuit for household applicances, lights, etc. Maybe the original fire alarms normally had closed circuits, and began to sing when their circuit was opened (ie. when it was off) (instead of the other way around). I was wondering if anyone knew how the first fire bells worked, how they were activated. Maybe the clue is there.
"Off" indicates an open circuit for household applicances, lights, etc. Maybe the original fire alarms normally had closed circuits, and began to sing when their circuit was opened
Good point. I don't know if it's the same for everyone, but in my house there are little magnets on the tops of the doors and windows which make the alarm sound if they are separated from their mates in the door/window frames, thus 'opening' the magnetic circuit [not-a-very-good-grasp-of-physics-e]
"Off" indicates an open circuit for household applicances, lights, etcI think the use of "OFF" in this context predates modern electronics. Alarm clocks go off, ships sound off their horns, etc. (though the phrase "noises off" is from a completely different root
). It may come from "Go Off"="Explode"="Noise" perhaps?
And B96, rather like my telling every one my Mother's maiden name, we now know to bring a set of little metal disks to avoid setting the alarms off when we burgle (sorry - burglarize for you us'ns) your house
Rod
You've been caught Ron-- not little metal disks-- little magnets!
It's pretty simple -- the maganet pulls on a flexible "bar" (strip) and holds it away from a contact point. When you open the door, the magnet is no longer holding the bar-- and it falls back into its natural position... It is the very simplisity of it that make it easy to overcome.. take some of those flat, flexable magnetic sheets-- the would almost fit between the door and the frame... It is fun "science project" for a 10 to 15 year old to set up an "alarm circuit" with a door bell and some magnets, and some magnetic switches (and it can be recyle it to an other project by replacing magnet switches with "tilt" switches-- for a motion detector!)
And now i move from being a fellow AWAD, to being a felonious one!
Burgle?
Really? That's a funny word! Although it makes some logical sense that one who burgles is a burglar (and why not burgler?). I guess in the US we should, logically speaking, have burglarizers.
Burgle? Really? That's a funny word!
What we Brits lose on the ecology stakes in using Colour we gain in use burgle instead of burgularize. Apparently, Burgle is backformed from burglar.
Rod
If I may be forgiven for being a bit long-winded, I have an anecdote telling how a fire alarm taught me tolerance of other's opinions.
In the old days, fire stations had to have towers where the cotton hoses could be hung up to drain and dry to postpone deterioration by mould. In my home town the tower also held a large bell, which was synchronized by a 1920's technological electrical miracle with a steam whistle on a shoe factory half a mile to the east. So when the fire alarm sounded, in our neighborhood to the north, we heard the bell first, and then the hoot of the whistle. So to play "Firemen" we yelled "Dang, hoot! Dang,hoot!". But one day we went to play with some kids who lived a half-mile east of the shoefactory where the steam whistle was. When they started playing, they yelled "Hoot,dang! Hoot,dang!" Immediately a quarrel developed about the difference. Just as fists were about to fly, the fire-alarm sounded. And, to my total amazement, we heard:"Hoot, dang, Hoot,dang."
That experience taught me to avoid being hasty in deciding that someone who disagreed with me was wrong.
You've been caught Ron-- not little metal disks-- little magnets!Thank goodness I gave a false name! and Helen, I've heard that from your habit of giving a false name when caught in your nefarious activities, you are known as "Oft Roy"
Rod
And B96, rather like my telling every one my Mother's maiden name, we now know to bring a set of little metal disks to avoid setting the alarms off when we burgle
oh, in that case i suppose i should also mention the infra-red Smith and Wesson triggers on each door, the wall-mounted acid jets, and the twelve slobbering dobermans.
bring a few steaks.
I must admit that "burgle" is one of my favourite words. I just love the sound of it!
Allo all,
My M.W. has the 43rd definition of <off> as Starting; beginning. So the alarm went off can simply be an other way of saying the alarm started (ringing).
F.Y.I. only...there are 49 definitions of <off> in my M.W. I wonder what word has the most definitions.
"Apparently, Burgle is backformed from burglar."
Dear Rod: My dictionary confirms this. Also the etymology of burglar is interesting, being comprised of parts meaning "a hired servant of someone who lives in the city."
bur[glar 7b%r4gl!r8
n.
[Anglo-L burglator, altered by assoc. with L latro, thief (orig., hired servant < Gr latris: see -LATRY) < OFr burgeor, burglar; ult. < LL burgus: see BOURGEOIS] a person who commits burglary
I met very few beginning reporters who knew the difference between burglary and theft. They constantly confused the two when writing police reports.
(Glad to be retired emotion.)
I met very few beginning reporters who knew the difference between burglary and theft.
by theft do you mean larceny? i TA'd a procedure/evidence course in college, and the penal code crime definitions were always my favorite, particularly mayhem... ewwwww =)
In burglary someone enters your home/business and steals from you.
In theft something is stolen (example :pickpocket, shoplifting, purse snatching)
Larceny is more common in court reporting as there are charges on either petty and/or grand larceny. It gets complicated once the courts get involved. (Surprise!)
Reporting on police activity is mostly concerned with burglary and theft.
The more experienced reporters are generally sent to cover court proceedings, trials etc..
wow
It is coincidental that you should point out the distinctions between burglary and larceny, wow, since I've recently been thinking about the migration of meanings among various classes of crime and how they occur. I would add to your burglary/larceny/theft discussion the term "robbery". And because I know that you all are endlessly fascinated:
Burglary: per the old common law, the breaking and entering another's dwelling at night with the intent to commit a felony; per modern usage, breaking and entering any building with the intent to commit a felony
Larceny: the unlawful taking and carrying away of someone else's personal property with the intent to deprive the possessor of it permanently
Robbery: the illegal taking of property from the person of another, or in the person's presence, by violence or intimidation
Theft: the felonious taking and removing of another's personal property with the intent of depriving the true owner of it; broadly, it includes any instance of stealing, including larceny, burglary, embezzlement and false pretenses.
Now, what I've been contemplating specifically is the use and misuse of "assault."
Assault: the threat of use of force on another which causes that person to have a reasonable apprehension of imminent harmful or offensive contact
Assault means a threat of use of force, but is often used to indicate an application of force. The actual (hi tsuwm!) application of force is "battery."
Battery: the application of force to another, resulting in harmful or offensive contact
Often, of course, the two offenses occur together (first the threat, then the fulfillment of the threat), and so people are used to hearing the offenses paired, but a charge of "assault and battery" reflects two crimes, not one. But I think that the real source of confusion between assault and battery arises from the practice of the media (and police?) to term a rape an "assault." This practice apparently arose from a social aversion to acknowledging the existence of the crime of rape - it just wasn't fit for public discussion, and so rapes came to be reported with the euphemism "assault." Now, people think that an assault encompasses a physical attack rather than the threat of attack. And now, Webster’s first three definitions of "assault" are (1) a sudden violent attack, (2) an unlawful physical attack, and (3) rape.
Legal definitions
Thank you, Counsellor Sparteye, for this discussion, particularly for mentioning the fact that burglary, in its strict definition, is committed only at night; during the day, it's b&e. Mystery/crime writers have often pointed this out. Dr. Watson, in chronicling his and Holmes' exploits wrote in The Adventure of Charles Augustus Milverton something to the effect that they forced the door to Milverton's house (it being then late at night), stepped through and thereby become felons in the eyes of the law. Actually, as Holmes mentioned earlier in the story, they were already committing a criminal act by being on the public streets at night in possession of burglars' tools.
As I remember this one (from the radio transcription) Inspector Lestrade asked Holmes's help in solving the case. Holmes begged off, citing a case involving a giant rat of Sumatra that had been spotted at the waterfront. In his begging off he noted that the description of the suspects that Lestrade had could quite well apply to Watson and himself.
What fascinates me is the imbalance between the nouns for the crimes Sparteye cites and the corresponding verbs:
Burglar = Burgle/Burglarize
Larceny = ? (Commit larceny is the best I can do)
Robbery = rob (somebody (of something))
Theft = Thieve (It feels intransitive to me (They thieved for a living), but I'm open to other opinions)
So where does "steal" fit in? Steal (something (from somebody)).
Bingley
Burglary:Burgle/Burglarize::Larceny:Steal
IMHO
glar7b%r4gl!r8 Dr. Bill, please! There are "ladies" present!
Yes but, the other pairs are obviously connected, so why is there no noun for steal, other than the gerund stealing?
Bingley
Certainly it is a deviation from the normal behaviour.
Here I disagree: In the expression "Off we go" the idea of a start is clearly reflected. Also in talking about an explosive charge,
going off describes the fulfillment of its normal purpose
maybe because there are so many slang words for stealing-- "cop" ("Did you buy that lipstick or cop it?") was one i learned in my teens-- and is (was) used in UK with the say meaning--but more common, it seems in the UK is knick- ( recast sentence above with knick)-- and most everyone in US would understand stole or shoplifted. Five finger discount, lift (ed), and the NY favorite--"It fell off the truck"-- and to the other ways of speaking about stealing... and i am sure there are other words and phrases i have forgotten... If Sparteye deals with the criminal courts, i am sure she will have heard other terms...
A favorite word for "unlawful acquisition" in WWII was "liberate". The Nazis were not alone in this deplorable activity.
Certainly it is a deviation from the normal behaviour. Here I disagree: In the expression "Off we go" the idea of a start is clearly reflected. Also in talking about an explosive charge, going off describes the fulfillment of its normal purposeI suppose that's also true. But I meant that most of the time, the alarm was NOT ringing...Implicitly defining "normal behaviour" == "what the thing spends most of the time doing" (as opposed to what it was designed to do).
Therefore I both agree and disagree with you, wseiber.
but more common, it seems in the UK is knickThere's the Noo Yorker in you coming out again, helen. I am almost certain that you ill find that poms spell "nick" the way we do, not the way the NY Knicks do.
I wasn't thinking of "Knickerbocker" Washington Irving's name for old New Yorkers--(and the source of the teams name) but i did think the word for theiving came from "knick-knack" --as in a small thing or trifle.. (on the idea that one nicks a lipstick-- not a car.)
Most likely because on my mothers "knick-knack shelf" there were several small brass items and a miniture copper kettle-- all dutifully polished by me (not a chore-- I actually like polishing brass, but i digress) with Brass-o-- as in the street song
"Shine your buttons with Brass-o, its only tu'pence a tin,
You can buy it it or nick it from woolworths...."
So-- knick-knacks get polished with Brass-o, and Brass-o get knicked from Woolworths's does that make sense?
(Beware if it does-- my weird thought process is infecting your mind! My way of thinking is meme like!)
(on the idea that one nicks a lipstick-- not a car.)
At a rough, totally unscientific guesstimate, the word "nick" is used here in Zild at least as often as "steal" probably significantly more often. You are right that is is most often used in connexion with petty theft, but by no means exclusively so. It has always struck me as ironic that it is famous for being used by police officers when apprehending criminals, "you're nicked".
being used by police officers when apprehending criminals, "you're nicked".
I heard over the weekend that the term "nick" for prison (and presumably thence to "nick"= "arrest") is derived from St. Nicholas being the patron saint of prisons. Not sure I believe it yet.
With multiple meanings for nick/knick you could get: "Nick (of the NY Knicks) was nicked for nicking knickers worth half a knicker and ended up in nick". Stretching the elastic a little further, the knickers might have been damaged by a knife and hence been "nicked" in another sense.
"buy it or nick it from Woolworths"
always sung that as "Woolies". No one in UK calls it "Woolworths".
Rod
In reply to:
the NY favorite--"It fell off the truck"
similar to the English "It fell off the back of a lorry".
Bingley
and the twelve slobbering dobermans.
Do you take them out at Christmas time so that they can march in the parade with the Salivation Army?
the NY favorite--"It fell off the truck"
similar to the English "It fell off the back of a lorry".Once again, Zild displays its evenhandedness - we use "it fell off the back of a truck"
Once again, Zild displays its evenhandedness - we use "it fell off the back of a truck"Quite right. I saw it fall ...