Talk:twice

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RFV discussion[edit]

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"(nonstandard, proscribed) Half, used in phrases like twice as less (meaning "half as much")." Firstly, twice as less is not IMO a noteworthily common phrase, though it was the deliberately ungrammatical title of a book about non-standard Black English. Secondly, that phrase, if we take it to mean "twice as much less", is just the normal use of twice: two times. Same goes for "twice as small" (originally included in this new sense, but which I have removed): it means two times as small, not half as small (which would be bigger than the original). Equinox ◑ 14:41, 14 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Surely in twice as less, it means "two-times as much". Should we really RFV rather than speedy this? Mglovesfun (talk) 14:44, 14 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Let's not waste the effort. Just give it long enough to collect the citations, ie, 30 days or more. There are conceptual as well as factual questions, eg, the question of how one construes and corrects the error in expressions like twice as less. (Why is that an entry anyway? Do we memorialize all cute errors?) DCDuring TALK 15:03, 14 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]
The entry was created in part in response to this thread from the Tea Room. —Angr 15:13, 14 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I don't understand your "surely", because for me "twice as less" doesn't mean "two-times as much", but rather "half as much". Well, at least, I mostly heard it when "half as much" would be the most likely interpretation. --80.114.178.7 20:15, 16 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Delete. (Yes, I know this is WT:RFV, not yet WT:RFD.) - -sche (discuss) 23:33, 16 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • In addition to the citations at twice as small and twice as less, I have added three more for twice meaning half: one instance each of "twice as thin", "twice as slow", and "twice as dumb". There were numerous examples to choose from in each case. For example, here's a translation of Johannes Kepler with "twice as weak", used in parallel with "twice as strong".
The objection to "twice as less" is not lack of grammar. It is lack of logic.
We do not memorialize all cute errors. We memorialize all errors that seem to have linguistic permanence. Note in the discussion here, and WT:RFD#twice as small, there are native speakers in disagreement about whether these phrases make literal sense or are an illogical idiom. Choor monster (talk) 18:29, 17 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]
"It is lack of logic". I think you totally misunderstand the function of the word 'twice' in these expressions. For some abstract property X, twice as X means double the intensity of property X. So twice as thin means double the intensity of thinness and twice as homogenous means double the intensity of homogeneity. I'm not sure how you don't understand this, but you seem to be thinking entirely in terms of one diametrically opposite term (thick) and not the other (thin). But in fact all combinations of [twice, half] and [thick, thin] are valid. Hyarmendacil (talk) 20:54, 17 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you. you're saying what I wanted to say at 2013-05-16 20:15 much clearer. However, I don't think it's a lack of logic, it's just another lexicon or grammar: words just mean what they mean, including assumed "contradictionary" meanings (cf. polysemy). That is, "twice as negative clause" can take opposite meanings in various lects, depending on how the combination of "twice as" and a negative clause is defined in those lects. --80.114.178.7 03:39, 18 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Oh, maybe I wasn't clear - I don't think it's illogical at all; I was quoting Choor Monster's statement. Hyarmendacil (talk) 07:05, 18 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I misread your comment, my apologies. --80.114.178.7 21:15, 18 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I think we lacked the most common definition of twice, which all dictionaries I've looked at have: "Doubled in quantity or degree", which we could split into two. "Doubled in quantity" seems to include the "logical" uses, which have an implicit commonly accepted associated ratio scale. "Doubled in degree" includes all other uses 'twice as red', 'twice as small', 'twice as rocky', which do not have such commonly accepted associated scales, though they may be quantifiable and even be quantified in special contexts. DCDuring TALK 11:17, 18 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]
The definition "Half" covers a subset of the above "degree" type, namely those "degrees" that have a commonly accepted ratio scale for the antonym of the associated adjective. This is not uncommon in technical contexts, as well as marketing speak.
Whether this elaboration adds value to normal users I doubt, but it is not obvious that such concerns influence our decisions much. DCDuring TALK 11:49, 18 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Passed. — Ungoliant (Falai) 13:29, 20 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]


RFV 2[edit]

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Rfv-sense "Half"?

Citations don't seem to support this meaning. Leasnam (talk) 02:27, 10 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]

I don't understand why that RFV was closed as "passed". I agree with Leasnam and SemperBlotto that the current citations are not adequate. The first and third quotations seem to support sense 4—"twice as slow" means "slow to a doubled degree", and "twice as dumb" means "dumb to a doubled degree". I'm not sure about the second quotation, because I don't fully understand what it's saying.
Maybe some confusion arises because, for example, speed is usually measured on a scale where higher on the scale means faster—often we talk about speed in terms of mph or kph, so doubling the speed means making it twice as fast. But when English speakers use the adjective "slow", they are using a different conceptual scale, where higher on the scale means slower. (At least that is what I was taught in my semantics class.) That is why "twice as slow" means a lower speed. The word "twice" still means "to a doubled degree"—it's just that the conceptual scale is not always the same as the scale that we usually use when we have to assign numbers to things. —Mr. Granger (talk • contribs) 13:13, 10 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]
This seems to me to be an RfD matter, rather than an RfV matter, though we may as well try to resolve it here.
I don't quite see how most uses of this type are "proscribed and nonstandard" and specifically not the three citations given. I do think the 'degree' definition encompasses most of the usage that the narrow-mindedly quantitative find objectionable, including the three citations given. There may be some usage that is more widely considered objectionable, but the definition in question doesn't accurately capture any such distinction. I don't think that we should include simply erroneous usage as a proscribed definition.
Any comments on the type of usage some object could appear in Usage notes, which could refer folks to Suppes, Luce, Krantz, and Tversky's Foundations of Measurement (1972) for some thorough prescription in this area. DCDuring TALK 13:53, 10 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]
  • See Talk:twice as small for a parallel past discussion and a source for the proscription. Choor monster (talk) 16:04, 10 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]
    I don't find on that page any basis for claiming that there is anything worth proscribing. If you can accurately characterize exactly which collocations are usually valid uses of the degree sense and which are usually invalid, you can see if you can come up with an acceptable usage note. If the best we can do is "sometimes proscribed by some people", we should leave it alone as we are providing no usable information. There are numerous uses of "twice as small" in edited works at Google Books, most apparently with native speakers as authors. DCDuring TALK 16:31, 10 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]
    The proscription comes from the fact that it's BEV, as asserted by Orr in her book. Choor monster (talk) 17:32, 10 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for the link. After reading your comment on that page, I think I understand what the second quotation is saying—it's a pun between the "two times" sense and the "to a doubled degree" sense. Still no support for the "half" sense, though, as far as I can tell. —Mr. Granger (talk • contribs) 16:59, 10 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]
"Half" certainly isn't a substitutable definition in cases like twice as small. What would half as small mean? It certainly doesn't seem to have the same meaning as twice as small. This would also be an argument for deletion in an RfD. DCDuring TALK 17:18, 10 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]
As the earlier discussion made clear, it was inserted to provide a home for the "twice as small" meaning "half as big", because apparently half of us think the phrase is an illogical idiom, versus another half who think it's transparently SOP. It's really a snow-clone, and a Usage note would certainly be better. Choor monster (talk) 17:32, 10 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]
I think the non-substitutable definition is an indication that the intention was not accomplished. I wonder whether anyone can characterize accurately any proscribed sense, that is not in fact is an instance of the valid degree sense. DCDuring TALK 18:08, 10 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Proscription occurs both when the proscribers know what they are talking and when they are just being snobbish. Choor monster (talk) 19:02, 10 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]
I am quite sure that most users assume that Wiktionary is putting its weight behind the proscription when the definition bears such a tag, even if they don't know what proscribed means. DCDuring TALK 19:32, 10 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Nonsense. If we were proscibing it, we would write "wrong" rather than "proscribed". --WikiTiki89 20:14, 10 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]
If we were doing it, it would have a good sound effect too (
proscribed(file)
) — or would we do that in IPA? DCDuring TALK 20:26, 10 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]
In IPA, I believe that would be either ʙ̺ or r̼, the linguolabial trill. Chuck Entz (talk) 01:59, 11 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]
I agree with Mr Granger that the previous RFV-closure was in error; none of the citations support the sense "half". It's theoretically possible that "twice" might mean "half" — maybe someone has remarked that "John has 4 cows but I have 2 cows, twice as many as John". But "twice as dumb" seems to be meant as an insult, "two times as dumb", not as a compliment, "not as dumb". - -sche (discuss) 08:40, 11 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]
I know, why was it passed? Twice as dumb means two times as dumb, not half as dumb. Would three times as dumb therefore mean a third as dumb? Easy delete as uncited. Renard Migrant (talk) 11:20, 11 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]
"Twice as dumb" means "half as smart". As has been mentioned, but apparently to no effect, then, now, and forevermore no doubt, some people think this is perfectly transparent, some people think this is inherently illogical. Choor monster (talk) 12:31, 11 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]
I can see that though I absolutely don't understand it. If twice as large makes sense, why would twice as small not make sense? If you know what twice as means and you know what small means, you know what twice as small means. Renard Migrant (talk) 12:52, 11 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Using the same logic, wouldn't 'smaller' mean 'bigger' and 'smallest' mean 'biggest'? You see why I'm struggling so much? Renard Migrant (talk) 13:18, 11 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]
No, I don't get it. "smallest" is the "superlative" of "small" - the most small. "Twice" is like "most" in that is implies a greater quality - so if the quality is "small" then twice that is even smaller. SemperBlotto (talk) 13:22, 11 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]
If "twice as dumb" meaning "half as smart" causes us to need to define "twice" as "half", why doesn't it cause us to need to define "dumb" as "smart"?
The supposedly "inherently illogical" nature of the construction is a red herring. As I pointed out on the linked-to talk page, "three times as dumb", "four times as small", "a hundred times as stupid", etc are all attested, i.e. there's nothing unique about "twice". - -sche (discuss) 02:44, 12 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]
This is a dictionary project, not a logic project. Why do people say "a friend of mine" not "a friend of me"? It doesn't matter, our job is to record usage, not analyze it as right or wrong. Renard Migrant (talk) 11:15, 12 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]
The important point is that whatever logic or illogic there is, it's not a lexical property of any one term: it has to do with how comparison of negative quantities is mapped by the human mind. It doesn't matter whether you say "twice as small", "200% smaller","two times smaller"- it means the same thing. If you start changing the ratios, it continues on in the same direction: "two and a half times as small", "thrice as small", "fifty times as small". In the other direction, "half as small", "one quarter as small", "one tenth as small", "fifty seven twenty-ninths as small" the change is analogous. One can quibble about whether "twice as small" really means "half as big", or means "half the difference from normal size", but that's more a characteristic of small, if anything. I would suggest that a usage note at twice and similar terms might be helpful, something to the effect of: "using this with terms of negative degree such as 'small' or 'thin' may be confusing for some people and should be avoided if clarity and precision is important". Chuck Entz (talk) 19:36, 12 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]
  • I seem to be late to the party here, and I agree that the citations that were there fit more correctly into the "doubled degree" meaning. Phrases like "twice as few" and "twice as less" are easy to find, however (I added a bunch of them), and they are harder to argue as being doubled in degree or extent - you really are talking about halving the count or quantity there. Kiwima (talk) 05:50, 16 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]
    The citations you added are all still using the "doubled" sense. As noted in the previous RFV, "twice X" entails double the quantity or intensity of the quality X: "twice as good" is "double the intensity of 'good'", "twice as few" is "double the intensity of 'few'", "twice as small" is "double the intensity of 'small'". And as pointed out above, the use of multiplication terms (rather than division terms) to multiply the intensity of qualities like 'few' is not specific/lexical to "twice"; one can also speak of "ten times", etc. - -sche (discuss) 06:39, 16 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]
I think "(usually with "as", of a specified quality) Doubled in quantity, intensity, or degree." covers the range of usage nicely: raise twice the money (double the amount of money), turn twice as slowly (double the intensity of slowness), be twice as thin (double the intensity of thinness), etc. - -sche (discuss) 23:56, 27 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Btw, note that the same construction occurs in other languages; in German one can in practice say "doppelt so dünn", "doppelt so jung oder doppelt so alt", etc (despite the claim by W. G. Klooster in The Structure Underlying Measure Phrase Sentences, citing Bierwisch (1967), that one theoretically cannot). - -sche (discuss) 01:30, 29 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Resolved, IMO: RFV-failed / covered by a sense that more accurately conveys what's going on, recognizing that in "twice as thin" etc (a) "twice" does not lexically mean "half", and (b) "twice" can be replaced with any other count, e.g. "thrice", "three times", "ten times", etc. - -sche (discuss) 01:32, 9 October 2015 (UTC)[reply]
  • Tangential Comment and Correction I cited Orr Twice as Less for source that the usage is BEV, and thus proscribed in standard English. I have found my copy, and I had forgotten the context. Orr was discussing the fact that BEV lacks "as ... as" constructions, and that it is quite unfamiliar to many who when asked to "translate" standard English that had such constructions, came up with responses that were all over the map. Said responses naturally enough included peculiar "twice as less" usages. As a completely artificial situation, there is no prescriptive inference to be drawn. Choor monster (talk) 14:59, 16 November 2015 (UTC)[reply]


(usually with "as", of a specified quality)[edit]

Does this label mean that the first phrase, usually with "as", only applies to "a specified quality"? Doestwice that many show a "quality"? --Backinstadiums (talk) 11:22, 26 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I mean "quality" means any aspect of an entity really. It could mean the color or taste or size... or the number (or amount). A pair of dice has the quality of being (or having) double the quantity of a singe die. I think. Herostratus (talk) 03:46, 6 January 2022 (UTC)[reply]

"Twice as" and "Twice the" as general intensifiers without specifying any specific number or quantity[edit]

"He was twice the fun when he was drunk" is same as "He was more fun when he was drunk. (Or "even more" or "especially" or whatever). "Fun" is not really countable or specifically measurable, so "twice the fun" isn't the same as "twice the sugar".

It could be "twice as much" instead of "twice the", and andy "twice as" is used for other constructions; "He was twice as likely to quit after that incident."

This should be noted somewhere. If not here, then I think you'd need two separate entries, one each for "twice as" and "twice the", and "twice as much" should be noted as also idiomatic, somewhere. So maybe here. I'm not a regular editor so I don't know, just pointing out this small lack. Herostratus (talk) 03:46, 6 January 2022 (UTC)[reply]

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