Sententious

Postby **Dr. Goodword** » Mon Jan 15, 2007 12:40 am

• sententious •

Pronunciation: sen-ten-chês • Hear it!

Part of Speech: Adjective

Meaning: 1. Concise, pithy, short but packed with meaning. 2. Pompous, bombastic, moralizing, especially with the overuse of maxims and aphorisms.

Notes: No, today's word does not mean "full of sentences", though the two words are related. As the Word History will show, the meaning of sentence has changed more than the adjective sententious has. It does have two contrary meanings. Be careful using the first since the second is pejorative and tends to overpower it. The adverb is sententiously and the only noun is sententiousness.

In Play: If you intend this word in the first sense above, it is best to add a clarifying word: "I always appreciate Malcolm's comments because they are so sententious and on point." Without supporting evidence, your listener will assume the pejorative meaning: "I don't mind the boss reminding me to get to work on time but I resent her sententious sermons filled with every adage in the English language."

Word History: Today's Good Word goes back through French to Latin sententiosus "full of meaning or opinion" from sententia "opinion, sentiment, intent". Since opinions are how you feel about things, it comes as no surprise that the origin of sententia is the verb sentire "to feel". Opinions expressed in words, of course, generally come out as sentences. For some reason, the root here, is PIE sent- "head for, make go to", which came to the Germanic languages meaning "send", e.g. German senden and English send. The best opinion of the semantic connection between these two meanings is that opinions and feelings are usually expressed, which means sent to others. It isn't convincing but it is the best we can currently do.

Perry · Postby **Perry** » Mon Jan 15, 2007 10:03 am

Is this another contranym?

Don · Postby **Don** » Mon Jan 15, 2007 10:34 am

Sentences

Per Dr. G, the Latin “sententia” means “opinion, sentiment, intent”.

This usage echoes traditional doctrines of logic. Aristotle in De Interpretatione and the Posterior Analytics distinguishes (among other things) assertions, which can be true or false, from (syllogistic) arguments which show the reasons why conclusions are true. Aristotle maintained moreover that assertions’ meanings must be determinate, since vague or ambiguous assertions could not be true-or-false. These Aristotelian notions echo distinctions Plato made in Book V of the Republic (and elsewhere) between opinion (δόξα), which could be true, and knowledge (επιστημη), which – by knowing causes – showed why a belief or opinion was true.

Drawing on these notions, it seems reasonable to say, using Dr. G’s locutions, that Aristotle’s true-or-false sentences express opinions and are packed with meaning (so are not vague or incomplete). (And “sententious” in its non-pejorative sense might refer to the property of full meaning which would, according to these Aristotelian doctrines, be characteristic of proper sentences.) Finally, we might speculate as to reasons for this apparent confluence of logic and etymology: medieval Aristotelian scholars, theorizing in Latin, were for more than a millennium the main custodians of our written language.

Don

jacobcak545 · Postby **jacobcak545** » Fri Oct 23, 2020 10:10 am

LukeJavan8 · Postby **LukeJavan8** » Fri Oct 23, 2020 12:02 pm

Welcome

and thanks for the tedious work you gave us. Quite a list.

Philip Hudson · Postby **Philip Hudson** » Fri Oct 23, 2020 7:05 pm

No entiendo.

bnjtokyo · Postby **bnjtokyo** » Fri Oct 23, 2020 9:02 pm

jacobcak545 has posted the same inappropriate list in four different threads in an attempt to get us to click on it. For what purpose I do not know, but at best it is spam and it could be an attempt to install malware on your computer. I urge the site administrators to remove these posts and to ban further posts from the Computer ID number associated with jacobcak545.

In addition to "sententious," there are posts on "valentine" (also Word of the Day), "In attendance" (Grammar) and "Group Poem XXII" (Res Diversae).

damoge · Postby **damoge** » Sat Oct 24, 2020 11:22 am

Thank you, BJN.
Wish there were a way to alert the administrators quickly of such attempts at disruption.

LukeJavan8 · Postby **LukeJavan8** » Sat Oct 24, 2020 11:58 am

Me too Debbie.
I thought this guy was putting a big effort into
promoting Nike shoes.
Forwarned is forarmed.

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