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Saturday, September 18, 2010

Oxford as it wasn't: 187 senses of 'roll'

From Quinion's World Wide Words, today:

"I've had a sneak preview and it's
going to be excellent). Chief Editor John Simpson discusses some of
the new and revised entries (go via http://wwwords.org?OEDYL), in
particular the immense entry for the verb "roll", which now has 187
distinct senses."

!

I wonder if it were so easy!

Surely Grice is right: do not multiply senses beyond necessity -- or "senses should not be multiplied beyond necessity".

The very fact that this is such an odd number (in both 'senses' of 'odd') indicates that it can't be right.

There is only ONE sense of 'roll' -- the rest is implicature!

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