this post was submitted on 09 Aug 2023
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Memes

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That's unfortunate (lemm.ee)
submitted 1 year ago by LambLeeg@lemm.ee to c/memes@lemmy.ml
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[–] hglman@lemmy.ml 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

https://www.vernonmorningstar.com/news/morning-start-the-english-word-with-the-most-definitions-is-set/

430 diffrent meanings

264 as a verb https://www.oed.com/dictionary/set_v1?tab=factsheet#23402997

[–] rgb3x3@beehaw.org 11 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

American here, I'm going to challenge myself to remember as many as I can.

Set: A group of things that go together.

Set: Letting a dessert cool in the fridge

Set: A stage for a play or film

Set: A command to put something somewhere

Set: A part of Tennis

...

5/704 isn't so bad, right?

Edit: looking up the definitions shows a lot of sub-definitions that essentially have the same meaning. I don't think it's appropriate to say that the word has 435 meanings when "set a course" and "set a fire" are basically "start a thing," yet they're listed as different definitions. The are many many of these cases even just on Google's definition blurb.

But I'm no dictionary expert so...

[–] hglman@lemmy.ml 3 points 1 year ago

Yeah some do seem the same, but thats possilbe also a bias from knowning the language.