tautologyn.

Brit.

/tɔːˈtɒlədʒi/, U.S.

/tɔˈtɑlədʒi/,

/tɑˈtɑlədʒi/

Forms:

α. 1500s–1600s tautologia.

β. 1500s–1600s tautalogie, 1500s–1600s tautologie, 1500s– tautology, 1600s tautalogy.

Origin: A borrowing from Latin. Etymon: Latin tautologia.

Etymology: < post-classical Latin tautologia (from 3rd cent. in grammarians) < Hellenistic Greek ταὐτολογία < ταὐτολόγος (see tautologous adj.) + -ία -y suffix³. Compare Middle French, French tautologie (1576; 1521 in Latin form tautologia; 1835 in Comte in the specific use in logic).In β. forms with remodelling of the ending after -y suffix³; compare -logy comb. form.

1. Unnecessary repetition, usually in close proximity, of the same word, phrase, idea, argument, etc. Now typically: the saying of the same thing twice in different words (e.g. ‘they arrived one after the other in succession’), generally considered to be a fault of style.

ΘΚΠ

society > leisure > the arts > literature > style of language or writing > copiousness > [noun] > repetition > needless repetition

tautology1555

battologya1603

battism1617

tautologizing1645

overbeating1659

tautologism1817

1550 R. Sherry Treat. Schemes & Tropes sig. Cj (margin) Tautologia [is a vayne repeting agayn of one word or moe in all one sentence].]

1555 R. Sherry Treat. Figures Gram. & Rhetorike f. ix Tautologia, an unprofitable rehearsall of all one woorde, or construccion, when with great yrcksomnes we double the matter, whiche commonly they are wont to doe that bee not exercised, but therefore sing all one song.

1566 J. Martiall Replie to Calfhills Blasphemous Answer f. 43^v Howe will you excuse him from that foule figure Tautologia in so fewe wordes in one sentence?

1566 R. Crowley Apol. Eng. Writers f. 46^v I will aunswere to his Tautologie, or repeticion of the same wordes and matter that is before written and answered.

1587 A. Fleming et al. Holinshed's Chron. (new ed.) III. Contin. 1553/1 This ambassage is reported in the historie of Scotland, wherevnto (for the auoiding of tautologie) we refer the reader.

1655 W. Gouge & T. Gouge Learned Comm. Hebrewes (i. 2) i. 99 To shew that there is no tautology, no vain repetition of one and the same thing therein.

1686 J. Goad Astro-meteorologica i. xii. 56 The Taedium of Tautology is odious to every Pen and Ear.

a1748 I. Watts Improvem. Mind (1782) ii. ii. 21 By securing you from an Appearance of Tautology, or repeating the same Words too often.

1790 J. Wesley Wks. (1872) IV. 487 That villanous tautology of lawyers, which is the scandal of our nation.

1827 R. Hill in E. Sidney Life R. Hill (1834) 213 O the dulness, the circumlocutiousness, the conceit, the tautology.

1870 F. W. Farrar Families of Speech iv. 182 One leading syllable thrusting itself with the most obtrusive tautology through a whole sentence.

1928 J. Galsworthy Swan Song i. i, in Mod. Comedy (1929) 527 The expressions ‘Freedom of the Press’ and ‘At the pistol's mouth’, were being used to the point of tautology!

1973 Farmer's Weekly (S. Afr.) 18 Apr. 102 In the piping days of plenty, the red roman was not rated among the finest of fish. Its name is a corruption from ‘rooi man’ or red man. To refer to it as ‘red’ is, therefore, just a piece of tautology.

2004 Times (Nexis) 19 Aug. (Features) 38 This phrase [sc. each and every one of you] does cut a little deeper than mere tautology in that it addresses us first individually, and then collectively.

2. A phrase or expression in which a word, phrase, idea, argument, etc., is redundantly repeated, or (now typically) the same thing is said twice in different words; an instance of tautology (sense 1).In quot. 1599 more generally: a repetition of something already said.

ΘΚΠ

society > leisure > the arts > literature > style of language or writing > copiousness > [noun] > repetition > instance of

tautology1574

tautologism1628

1574 tr. P. Ramus Logike 10 Thou playest the Sophistes parte..and shalt be compelled to use tautalogies and vaine repetitions.

1579 W. Fulke Confut. Treat. N. Sander in D. Heskins Ouerthrowne 644 It is a foolish tautologie, for you sayed the same immediatly before.

1599 Master Broughtons Lett. Answered ix. 32 Euery later paperwork of yours is but a Tautology of the former.

1643 W. Slatyer Compl. Christian ii. vii. 138 A tautology of buriall, as to say, He was buried, and descended to the grave, in effect, but he was buried, and he was buried.

1698 H. Wanley in H. Ellis Orig. Lett. Eminent Literary Men (1843) 258 I called the library a venerable place; the Books sacred reliques of Antiquity, &c.; with half a dozen tautologies.

1727 G. Hickes Coll. Controv. Disc. II. (ed. 3) 81 The next Period is but a Tautology of the Precedent, and therefore I pass over it to the following Words.

1786 T. Jefferson Miscellany (1984) 618 The poet, unfettered by rhyme, is at liberty to prune his diction of those tautologies, those feeble nothings necessary to intrude the rhyming word.

1861 Ld. Brougham Brit. Constit. (ed. 2) xix. 309 Repetitions and tautologies are used.

1871 J. Dowson Elliot's Hist. India III. xvi. 270 The translation is close, without being servile; here and there exuberances of eloquence have been pruned out, and repetitions and tautologies have been passed over.

1929 A. Oras Milton's Editors & Commentators iv. 88 Order and sense and development of thought are discovered by Pearce where Bentley saw only crude tautologies.

1977 N.Y. Times 20 Oct. c23 I grossly oversimplify; I am a book reviewer; this is a tautology.

2008 J. Miles Dear Amer. Airlines 58 Love is love, she wrote on a Post-it. I scoffed and told her that was a meaningless tautology.

2010 Independent 21 June (Viewspaper section) 11/2 If there are ‘deadly’ massacres, are there some massacres which are not ‘deadly’, from which the victims walk away alive? It was a ludicrous tautology.

3. An unnecessary or superfluous action; (also) a repeated or repetitive act, incident, or experience. rare after 17th cent.

ΘΚΠ

the world > action or operation > repeating > [noun] > instance of

reviea1592

reprise1607

tautology1639

repeat1855

retake1882

ditto1887

redo1949

riff1952

the world > action or operation > harm or detriment > disadvantage > uselessness > uselessness, vanity, or futility > [noun] > futile activity

vanity1303

superfluitya1398

mappery1609

waste-time1609

tautology1639

boondoggling1935

taradiddle1970

1639 F. Quarles Mem. Death of Sir Robert Quarles Ep. Ded. sig. A3^v A busie hand will blow, although the fire burne: But let the world excuse the Tautology of my affection.

1650 T. Fuller Pisgah-sight of Palestine ii. v. 128 Some wil object it was a real tautology to bring purples to Tyre, seeing..the best of the world were made in that place.

1657 W. Dillingham Contin. Siege of Ostend in F. Vere Commentaries 134 It was so thick stuck with bullets, that the Ordnance could scarcely shoot without a tautologie and hitting its former bullets.

1687 J. Norris Coll. Misc. (1699) 324 Our whole Life is but a nauseous Tautology.

1863 C. C. Clarke Shakespeare-characters i. 14 The poet has avoided a dramatic tautology (if I may so use the term) in bringing about the death of two worthy men immediately upon the heels of each other.

2001 Esposizione internazionale d'arte: Biennale di Venezia 49 I. 226/2 The trilogy of videos Lessons..outlines even more this meaning of violence as a tautology of behaviour, as a cultural formula and strategy or as the masking of innocence.

4. An argument, explanation, or definition that merely restates in different words the very thing which is to be explained, shown, or defined; a failure fully to separate cause from effect in explaining an event, phenomenon, etc.

ΘΚΠ

the mind > mental capacity > philosophy > logic > logical syllogism > logical argument > [noun] > logical fallacy > vicious circle

circle1646

tautology1659

vicious circlec1792

vicious cycle1846

circulus vitiosus1902

society > leisure > the arts > literature > style of language or writing > copiousness > [noun] > repetition > of a statement as its own reason

tautology1659

1659 J. Pearson Expos. Apostles Creed ii. 219 To assign any thing as the cause or reason of it self, is a great absurdity, and the expression of it, a vain tautology.

1662 H. More Gen. Coll. Philos. Writings (1712) Pref. Gen. 15 The resolution of such Phaenomena as we experience in ourselves..into this vital oneness,..is no vain Tautology, or the mere saying a thing is so because it is so.

a1856 W. Hamilton Lect. Metaphysics (1859) II. xxxix. 377 There is thus conceived an absolute tautology between the effect and its causes. We think the causes to contain all that is contained in the effect; the effect to contain nothing which was not contained in the causes.

1959 J. Barzun House of Intellect ii. 53 The survival of the fittest, so far from being a theory, is either a fact or a tautology.

1995 M. Alvesson Managem. of Knowledge-intensive Companies viii. 168 [He] considers that a tautology between charisma as a personal attribute and charismatic effects on a group should be avoided.

1997 J. D. Moore Visions of Culture xiii. 178 ‘I am taller than other people because most people are shorter than I am’ is a tautology.

5. Logic and Philosophy. A formula of the propositional calculus which is true under every assignment of truth or falsehood to its propositional letters, for example ‘If p and q then p’; any sentence which can be symbolized as such a formula, for example ‘If the box is small and red, then it is small’. Also more widely: any proposition which is true because of its logical form rather than its content.

ΘΚΠ

the mind > mental capacity > philosophy > logic > logical truth > [noun] > tautology

tautology1919

1919 B. Russell Introd. Math. Philos. xviii. 203 The characteristic of logical propositions that we are in search of is the one which was felt..by those who said that it consisted in deducibility from the law of contradiction. This characteristic we may call tautology.

1919 B. Russell Introd. Math. Philos. xviii. 205 The importance of ‘tautology’ for a definition of mathematics was pointed out to me by..Ludwig Wittgenstein, who was working on the problem.

1922 C. K. Ogden et al. tr. L. Wittgenstein Tractatus 97 The tautology..is unconditionally true.

1933 Mind 42 37 So taken, a postulate is a tautology and cannot be denied.

1948 Philosophy 23 354 The Logical Positivists hope to be freed from the embarrassing necessity of having to interpret the criterion as either an analytic tautology or as an empirical statement of fact.

1979 J. A. Robinson Logic: Form & Function iii. 42 A..general decision procedure for determining whether or not a sentence is a tautology.

2002 M. J. Gabbay Logic with Added Reasoning 49 A tautology is a sentence that must be true only because of its truth functional structure.

This entry has been updated (OED Third Edition, June 2014; most recently modified version published online March 2022).

单词	tautology
释义	tautologyn. Brit. /tɔːˈtɒlədʒi/, U.S. /tɔˈtɑlədʒi/, /tɑˈtɑlədʒi/ Forms: α. 1500s–1600s tautologia. β. 1500s–1600s tautalogie, 1500s–1600s tautologie, 1500s– tautology, 1600s tautalogy. Origin: A borrowing from Latin. Etymon: Latin tautologia. Etymology: < post-classical Latin tautologia (from 3rd cent. in grammarians) < Hellenistic Greek ταὐτολογία < ταὐτολόγος (see tautologous adj.) + -ία -y suffix³. Compare Middle French, French tautologie (1576; 1521 in Latin form tautologia; 1835 in Comte in the specific use in logic).In β. forms with remodelling of the ending after -y suffix³; compare -logy comb. form. 1. Unnecessary repetition, usually in close proximity, of the same word, phrase, idea, argument, etc. Now typically: the saying of the same thing twice in different words (e.g. ‘they arrived one after the other in succession’), generally considered to be a fault of style. ΘΚΠ society > leisure > the arts > literature > style of language or writing > copiousness > [noun] > repetition > needless repetition tautology1555 battologya1603 battism1617 tautologizing1645 overbeating1659 tautologism1817 1550 R. Sherry Treat. Schemes & Tropes sig. Cj (margin) Tautologia [is a vayne repeting agayn of one word or moe in all one sentence].] 1555 R. Sherry Treat. Figures Gram. & Rhetorike f. ix Tautologia, an unprofitable rehearsall of all one woorde, or construccion, when with great yrcksomnes we double the matter, whiche commonly they are wont to doe that bee not exercised, but therefore sing all one song. 1566 J. Martiall Replie to Calfhills Blasphemous Answer f. 43^v Howe will you excuse him from that foule figure Tautologia in so fewe wordes in one sentence? 1566 R. Crowley Apol. Eng. Writers f. 46^v I will aunswere to his Tautologie, or repeticion of the same wordes and matter that is before written and answered. 1587 A. Fleming et al. Holinshed's Chron. (new ed.) III. Contin. 1553/1 This ambassage is reported in the historie of Scotland, wherevnto (for the auoiding of tautologie) we refer the reader. 1655 W. Gouge & T. Gouge Learned Comm. Hebrewes (i. 2) i. 99 To shew that there is no tautology, no vain repetition of one and the same thing therein. 1686 J. Goad Astro-meteorologica i. xii. 56 The Taedium of Tautology is odious to every Pen and Ear. a1748 I. Watts Improvem. Mind (1782) ii. ii. 21 By securing you from an Appearance of Tautology, or repeating the same Words too often. 1790 J. Wesley Wks. (1872) IV. 487 That villanous tautology of lawyers, which is the scandal of our nation. 1827 R. Hill in E. Sidney Life R. Hill (1834) 213 O the dulness, the circumlocutiousness, the conceit, the tautology. 1870 F. W. Farrar Families of Speech iv. 182 One leading syllable thrusting itself with the most obtrusive tautology through a whole sentence. 1928 J. Galsworthy Swan Song i. i, in Mod. Comedy (1929) 527 The expressions ‘Freedom of the Press’ and ‘At the pistol's mouth’, were being used to the point of tautology! 1973 Farmer's Weekly (S. Afr.) 18 Apr. 102 In the piping days of plenty, the red roman was not rated among the finest of fish. Its name is a corruption from ‘rooi man’ or red man. To refer to it as ‘red’ is, therefore, just a piece of tautology. 2004 Times (Nexis) 19 Aug. (Features) 38 This phrase [sc. each and every one of you] does cut a little deeper than mere tautology in that it addresses us first individually, and then collectively. 2. A phrase or expression in which a word, phrase, idea, argument, etc., is redundantly repeated, or (now typically) the same thing is said twice in different words; an instance of tautology (sense 1).In quot. 1599 more generally: a repetition of something already said. ΘΚΠ society > leisure > the arts > literature > style of language or writing > copiousness > [noun] > repetition > instance of tautology1574 tautologism1628 1574 tr. P. Ramus Logike 10 Thou playest the Sophistes parte..and shalt be compelled to use tautalogies and vaine repetitions. 1579 W. Fulke Confut. Treat. N. Sander in D. Heskins Ouerthrowne 644 It is a foolish tautologie, for you sayed the same immediatly before. 1599 Master Broughtons Lett. Answered ix. 32 Euery later paperwork of yours is but a Tautology of the former. 1643 W. Slatyer Compl. Christian ii. vii. 138 A tautology of buriall, as to say, He was buried, and descended to the grave, in effect, but he was buried, and he was buried. 1698 H. Wanley in H. Ellis Orig. Lett. Eminent Literary Men (1843) 258 I called the library a venerable place; the Books sacred reliques of Antiquity, &c.; with half a dozen tautologies. 1727 G. Hickes Coll. Controv. Disc. II. (ed. 3) 81 The next Period is but a Tautology of the Precedent, and therefore I pass over it to the following Words. 1786 T. Jefferson Miscellany (1984) 618 The poet, unfettered by rhyme, is at liberty to prune his diction of those tautologies, those feeble nothings necessary to intrude the rhyming word. 1861 Ld. Brougham Brit. Constit. (ed. 2) xix. 309 Repetitions and tautologies are used. 1871 J. Dowson Elliot's Hist. India III. xvi. 270 The translation is close, without being servile; here and there exuberances of eloquence have been pruned out, and repetitions and tautologies have been passed over. 1929 A. Oras Milton's Editors & Commentators iv. 88 Order and sense and development of thought are discovered by Pearce where Bentley saw only crude tautologies. 1977 N.Y. Times 20 Oct. c23 I grossly oversimplify; I am a book reviewer; this is a tautology. 2008 J. Miles Dear Amer. Airlines 58 Love is love, she wrote on a Post-it. I scoffed and told her that was a meaningless tautology. 2010 Independent 21 June (Viewspaper section) 11/2 If there are ‘deadly’ massacres, are there some massacres which are not ‘deadly’, from which the victims walk away alive? It was a ludicrous tautology. 3. An unnecessary or superfluous action; (also) a repeated or repetitive act, incident, or experience. rare after 17th cent. ΘΚΠ the world > action or operation > repeating > [noun] > instance of reviea1592 reprise1607 tautology1639 repeat1855 retake1882 ditto1887 redo1949 riff1952 the world > action or operation > harm or detriment > disadvantage > uselessness > uselessness, vanity, or futility > [noun] > futile activity vanity1303 superfluitya1398 mappery1609 waste-time1609 tautology1639 boondoggling1935 taradiddle1970 1639 F. Quarles Mem. Death of Sir Robert Quarles Ep. Ded. sig. A3^v A busie hand will blow, although the fire burne: But let the world excuse the Tautology of my affection. 1650 T. Fuller Pisgah-sight of Palestine ii. v. 128 Some wil object it was a real tautology to bring purples to Tyre, seeing..the best of the world were made in that place. 1657 W. Dillingham Contin. Siege of Ostend in F. Vere Commentaries 134 It was so thick stuck with bullets, that the Ordnance could scarcely shoot without a tautologie and hitting its former bullets. 1687 J. Norris Coll. Misc. (1699) 324 Our whole Life is but a nauseous Tautology. 1863 C. C. Clarke Shakespeare-characters i. 14 The poet has avoided a dramatic tautology (if I may so use the term) in bringing about the death of two worthy men immediately upon the heels of each other. 2001 Esposizione internazionale d'arte: Biennale di Venezia 49 I. 226/2 The trilogy of videos Lessons..outlines even more this meaning of violence as a tautology of behaviour, as a cultural formula and strategy or as the masking of innocence. 4. An argument, explanation, or definition that merely restates in different words the very thing which is to be explained, shown, or defined; a failure fully to separate cause from effect in explaining an event, phenomenon, etc. ΘΚΠ the mind > mental capacity > philosophy > logic > logical syllogism > logical argument > [noun] > logical fallacy > vicious circle circle1646 tautology1659 vicious circlec1792 vicious cycle1846 circulus vitiosus1902 society > leisure > the arts > literature > style of language or writing > copiousness > [noun] > repetition > of a statement as its own reason tautology1659 1659 J. Pearson Expos. Apostles Creed ii. 219 To assign any thing as the cause or reason of it self, is a great absurdity, and the expression of it, a vain tautology. 1662 H. More Gen. Coll. Philos. Writings (1712) Pref. Gen. 15 The resolution of such Phaenomena as we experience in ourselves..into this vital oneness,..is no vain Tautology, or the mere saying a thing is so because it is so. a1856 W. Hamilton Lect. Metaphysics (1859) II. xxxix. 377 There is thus conceived an absolute tautology between the effect and its causes. We think the causes to contain all that is contained in the effect; the effect to contain nothing which was not contained in the causes. 1959 J. Barzun House of Intellect ii. 53 The survival of the fittest, so far from being a theory, is either a fact or a tautology. 1995 M. Alvesson Managem. of Knowledge-intensive Companies viii. 168 [He] considers that a tautology between charisma as a personal attribute and charismatic effects on a group should be avoided. 1997 J. D. Moore Visions of Culture xiii. 178 ‘I am taller than other people because most people are shorter than I am’ is a tautology. 5. Logic and Philosophy. A formula of the propositional calculus which is true under every assignment of truth or falsehood to its propositional letters, for example ‘If p and q then p’; any sentence which can be symbolized as such a formula, for example ‘If the box is small and red, then it is small’. Also more widely: any proposition which is true because of its logical form rather than its content. ΘΚΠ the mind > mental capacity > philosophy > logic > logical truth > [noun] > tautology tautology1919 1919 B. Russell Introd. Math. Philos. xviii. 203 The characteristic of logical propositions that we are in search of is the one which was felt..by those who said that it consisted in deducibility from the law of contradiction. This characteristic we may call tautology. 1919 B. Russell Introd. Math. Philos. xviii. 205 The importance of ‘tautology’ for a definition of mathematics was pointed out to me by..Ludwig Wittgenstein, who was working on the problem. 1922 C. K. Ogden et al. tr. L. Wittgenstein Tractatus 97 The tautology..is unconditionally true. 1933 Mind 42 37 So taken, a postulate is a tautology and cannot be denied. 1948 Philosophy 23 354 The Logical Positivists hope to be freed from the embarrassing necessity of having to interpret the criterion as either an analytic tautology or as an empirical statement of fact. 1979 J. A. Robinson Logic: Form & Function iii. 42 A..general decision procedure for determining whether or not a sentence is a tautology. 2002 M. J. Gabbay Logic with Added Reasoning 49 A tautology is a sentence that must be true only because of its truth functional structure. This entry has been updated (OED Third Edition, June 2014; most recently modified version published online March 2022). < n.1555
随便看	ash of jerusalem ash of roses ash wednesday ash-barrel ash-bed ash-bellied ash-bin ash-blond ash-blonde ash-blue ash-boat ash-box ash-brown ash-bud ash-cake ash-colour ash-coloured ash-coloured vulture ash-drawer ash-fire ash-fly ash-furnace ash-grate ash-grey ash-grub