Technical Term For Quotes & Sayings

I am intentionally avoiding the standard term which, by the way, did not exist in Euler's time. One of the ugliest outgrowths of the "new math" was the premature introduction of technical terms. — George Polya

If history, philosophy and so on vanish from academic life, what they leave in their wake may be a technical training facility or corporate research institute. But it will not be a university in the classical sense of the term, and it would be deceptive to call it one. — Terry Eagleton

All the pools are going batshit like you wouldn't believe ... Batshit ... It's a technical term ... Fleidermausscheisse, okay?
Fleidermausscheisse? Kelly silently mouthed the word, and as silently clapped her hands. With a dictionary and patience, she could read scientific German. Thanks to fragments of Yiddish from her folks, she could make a better
not good, but better
stab at speaking it than most of her anglophone peers. But she knew she never would have come up with that particular terminus technicus in a million months of Sundays. — Harry Turtledove

We have just witnessed a classic example of what I like to call 'misdirected rage'. I believe the technical term is being an ass. — Natsuki Takaya

Did you see what happened?"
"Hard to miss," he said dryly. "Your boat went kaplooie."
Tally blinked at his easy dismissal of two lives and a million-dollar boat. "Is that the technical term for it? — Cherry Adair

Cognitive skills such as big-picture thinking and long-term vision were particularly important. But when I calculated the ratio of technical skills, IQ, and emotional intelligence as ingredients of excellent performance, emotional intelligence proved to be twice as important as the others for jobs at all levels. — Daniel Goleman

How does the living organism avoid decay? The obvious answer is: By eating, drinking, breathing and (in the case of plants) assimilating. The technical term is metabolism. The Greek word () means change or exchange. Exchange of what? — Erwin Schrodinger

There is a technical term for someone who confuses the opinions of a character in a book with those of the author. That term is idiot. — S.M. Stirling

It's a bit odd that nobody seems to be using the correct technical term to describe organized Islamic terrorists. They are not a faction of a religion or a social movement. They are a cult. A suicide cult. — Craig Bruce

Needless to say, I thought it was a bat-shit crazy idea (that's the technical term). The last thing I wanted was to reprise my role as Livvie's captor. - Caleb — C.J. Roberts

WAGs ... That's a technical term we engineers use. It means 'Wild-Assed Guess'. — David Weber

This development is possibly related to the fact that so much of "value" has been absorbed by technology itself. It is "good" to electrify a primitive area. Civilization and even morality are implicit in technological transformation ... New techniques are in themselves bien pensant and represent not only rationality but benevolence ... Romantic individuals (a mass of them by now) accuse this mass civilization of obstructing their attainment of beauty, nobility, integrity, intensity. I do not want to sneer at the term Romantic. Romanticism guarded the "inspired condition," preserved the poetic, philosophical, and religious teachings ... during the greatest and most rapid of transformations, the most accelerated phase of modern scientific and technical transformation. — Saul Bellow

Thus, consumption taxes tend to reduce conspicuous consumption and promote longer-term retirement security, family wealth, social welfare, technical progress, and economic growth. In essence, income taxes penalize people for what they contribute to society (labor and capital), whereas consumption taxes penalize people for what they take out of society (new retail purchases). So, to tax experts, it is no surprise that U.S. and U.K. citizens spend too much and don't save enough, relative to what would be optimal for society and even for themselves. — Geoffrey Miller

dark light. [Not actually an oxymoron. It's the color past ultra-violet. The technical term for it is infrablack. It can be seen quite easily under experimental conditions. To perform the experiment simply select a healthy brick wall with a good run-up, and, lowering your head, charge. The color that flashes in bursts behind your eyes, behind the pain, just before you die, is infra-black.] — Neil Gaiman

Some people are not just afraid of snakes, they're phobic. The technical term for a snake phobia is ophidiophobia, and people who have it dream of snakes, see snakes under every rock or rumple in the carpet, and freak out when they see snakes on TV. — James Patterson

The chief characteristic of English grammar is the way words are arranged within sentences, and the technical term for this process is syntax. It — David Crystal

Most people have a regulator between their mind and mouth that modulates their brutish sentiments and spikiest impulses. Not Jobs. He made a point of being brutally honest. My job is to say when something sucks rather than sugar coat it, : he said. This made him charismatic and inspiring, yet also,, to use the technical term, an asshole at times. — Walter Isaacson

There is a technical, literary term for those who mistake the opinions and beliefs of characters in a novel for those of the author. The term is 'idiot'. — Larry Niven

Whatever. So how is all this brilliant knowledge supposed to help me control the explody thing?" "Explody thing?" Jenny said. I nodded. "It's a technical term. — A&E Kirk

It was the kind of snow that didn't amount to anything on the ground. It would just dust the dead grass. The technical term for that level, he decided, was an "annoyance" of snow. — Cassandra Clare

When Adam Smith was being incomprehensible, he didn't have the luxury of brief, snappy technical terms as a shorthand for incoherence. — P. J. O'Rourke

Magic swirls about us like an invisible fog of energy that can be tapped by those gifted enough, using a variety of techniques that center on layered spelling, mumbled incantations, and a burst of concentrated thought channeled through the index fingers. The technical name for this energy is "variable electro-gravitational mutable subatomic force," which doesn't mean anything at all
confused scientists just gave it an important-sounding name so as not to lose face. The usual term is "wizidrical energy," or simply "the crackle. — Jasper Fforde

She's a bike. A tart. A slut. She'll be buried in a Y-shaped coffin. A baggage. A hussy. She's the good time that was had by all. A wanton floozy." She looked closely at him, but he still seemed to be stuck on cricket. "A nymphomaniac."
The use of a technical term shook him from his paralysis. Realisation flooded his face and a silent "Oh!" filled his mouth. — Jonathan L. Howard

Wow," Jake said, his face going blank. "Assface. Is that a technical term? Maybe some kind of psychiatric diagnosis I'm not familiar with? — Lynn Red

Zap,' I said. 'That's the technical term for it, is it? What do you call someone who's been zapped?'

'Mr. Crispy,' said Kumar. — Ben Aaronovitch

To go anywhere in philosophy, other than back and forth, round and round, one must have a keen sense of correlative vision. This is a technical term for a thorough understanding of the Game of Black-and-White, whereby one sees that all explicit opposites are implicit allies - correlative in the sense that they "gowith" each other and cannot exist apart. This, rather than any miasmic absorption of differences into a continuum of ultimate goo, is the metaphysical unity underlying the world. — Alan W. Watts

It's old. Really old.
Is that a technical term?
Yeah, it's technical. Translation: I don't know how old it is, but it's really fucking old.
Wow. That is old. — Alex Adams

Synaptic summation is the technical term used in neurophysiology for those instances in which some neuron C is fired only by a combination of neurons A and B. — Gregory Bateson

In case you're not a computer person, I should probably point out that 'Real Soon Now' is a technical term meaning 'sometime before the heat-death of the universe, maybe'. — Scott Fahlman

Kaboom."
"Kaboom?" I parroted.
Greg made a mushroom cloud motion with his hands, his grin widening. "Big kaboom."
"Big kaboom? Is that the technical term?" Both Greg and I turned our attention back to the screen, finding Sandra's face filling the window. "See, this is why I won't let you play with Alex, Greg. He likes to blow things up figuratively, and you like to blow things up literally," she chided.
Alex was still smiling as he gently pushed her out of the way, "I like to blow things up literally, too."
"All men do." She sounded exasperated. — Penny Reid

Critical discussions of Western colonialism and imperialism and of what the term postcolonialism could mean, require, and enable first became acceptable in literature and cultural studies departments in the United States some three decades ago. Yet it has been much harder to create such discussions of sciences and technologies. Especially resistant are those departments where the West's scientific rationality and technical expertise have long been lovingly explained and "served up" for use in corporate and nationalist policies: sociology, philosophy, economics, and international relations, as well as the natural sciences themselves. — Sandra G. Harding

As we locked the front door behind us, she said, "How do you keep getting in without my knowing it? Did Jill give you a key without mentioning it to me?"
"Trade secret," I said.
"What trade is that? Cat burglar?"
"Yes, although I prefer the technical term."
"What's that?"
"Music promoter. — Steven Brust

My Department has already recognised this and has been working specifically on the technical support issue since January and will offer advice to schools during the Autumn term. — Estelle Morris

The key to long-term survival and prosperity has a lot to do with the money management techniques incorporated into the technical system. — Ed Seykota

International community - a technical term referring to the U.S. government and whoever goes along with it. — Noam Chomsky

Many Introverts are also "highly sensitive," which sounds poetic, but is actually a technical term in psychology. If you are a sensitive sort, then you're more apt than the average person to feel pleasantly overwhelmed by Beethoven's "Moonlight Sonata" or a well-turned phrase or an act of extraordinary kindness. You may be quicker than others to feel sickened by violence and ugliness, and you likely have a very strong conscience. — Susan Cain

I believe the technical term is "space cadet." But she is the kind of space cadet many people aspire to be. My sister is fully alive to each moment and each observation. — Susan Juby

Oh, stick a cork in it, B," Jen snarled at Decebel.
Vasile cocked his head to the side as he looked at Jen. "B?"
"Yeah. Ya know, for Beta. Although, I like it because I could also be calling him the technical term for a female dog and he wouldn't know it. So really, calling him B totally works to my advantage," Jen explained in all seriousness.
Everyone turned when a quick burst of laughter came from the right side of the room. When Sorin saw everyone turn their eyes on him, he quickly began coughing.
Holding up his hands, he finally composed himself. "Pardon me, Alpha. I seemed to have swallowed wrong."
"You have to be careful while swallowing smart ass comments, Sorin," Jen teased.
"They tend to have a choking effect. — Quinn Loftis

In the technical realm, we repeatedly enter into a series of social contracts, the terms of which are revealed only after the signing. — Langdon Winner

Many times drugs and alcohol - there's a technical term that they're called, emotional suppressants - are the only things that can help a person survive and get through and be able to deal with their pain. — Axl Rose

The same researchers also wanted to know why red hampers academic performance. It turns out that the color red activates the right hemisphere of the frontal cortex, a pattern of brain activity that typically indicates avoidance motivation. Avoidance motivation is the technical term for a state in which you're more concerned with avoiding failure than you are with achieving success. It's a distracting state of mind that all but guarantees poorer performance when you're trying to solve questions that require insight and mental effort. Psychologists have also shown that people literally recoil from the color red, leaning slightly farther backward in their seats when they're about to begin a test with a red rather than green cover. None of these effects occurs consciously, but when they occur together it becomes clear why the color red can be so damaging in academic contexts. — Adam Alter

Any detail can be magnified to reveal even more detail ad infinitum. The technical term is "infinite complexity." Fractals are the theological equivalent of what theologians call the incomprehensibility of God. Just when we think we have God figured out, we discover a new dimension of His kaleidoscopic personality. — Mark Batterson

Compare 'now' with 'here'. 'Here' designates the place where a speaker is: for two different people 'here' points to two different places. Consequently 'here' is a word the meaning of which depends on where it is spoken. The technical term for this kind of utterance is 'indexical'. 'Now' also points to the instant in which the word is uttered and is also classed as 'indexical'. But no one would dream of saying that things 'here' exist, whereas things that are not 'here' do not exist. So then why do we say that things that are 'now' exist and that everything else doesn't? — Carlo Rovelli

There's no way to get from the point in Hemn space where we are now, to one that includes pink nerve-gas-farting dragons, following any plausible action principle. Which is really just a technical term for there being a coherent story joining one moment to the next. If you simply throw action principles out the window, you're granting the world the freedom to wander anywhere in Hemn space, to any outcome, without constraint. It becomes pretty meaningless. The mind - even the sline mind - knows that there is an action principle that governs how the world evolves from one moment to the next - that restricts our world's path to points that tell an internally consistent story. So it focuses its worrying on outcomes that are more plausible, such as you leaving. — Neal Stephenson

Heresy is usually quite sophisticated, actually has a meaning, and is to be taken very seriously. It is therefore to be carefully distinguished from turgid, pretentious, badly-written Bullsgeshichte, to use the technical German theological term. — Carl R. Trueman

Character actor' is a technical term denoting a clever stage performer who cannot act, and therefore makes an elaborate study of the disguises and stage tricks by which acting can be grotesquely simulated. — George Bernard Shaw

You might want to do something about your neck."
I was totally lost. "My neck?"
She reached into her purse and handed me a compact mirror. I opened it and surveyed my neck, still trying to figure out what she could be talking about. Then I saw it. A small, brownish purple bruise on the side of my neck.
"What on earth is that?" I exclaimed.
Ms. Terwilliger snorted. "Although it's been a while for me, I believe the technical term is a hickey" She paused and arched an eyebrow. "You do know what that is, don't you?"
"Of course I know!" I lowered the mirror. "But there's no way - I mean, we barely - that is - "
She held up a hand to silence me. "You don't have to justify your private life to me. But you might want to consider how you can actually keep it private in the next fifteen minutes. — Richelle Mead