What's with dictionary definitions for metaphorical usage?

Like a Jeopardy contestant giving an anecdote about their life changing experience when a pet dog tore up a favorite slipper, I have something I am terribly upset about.

I have noticed some online dictionaries giving metaphorical definitions. By this I mean that for a word, giving a meaning entry that is metaphorical, not its literal meaning.

For example, 'to devour'. Without checking, this means to eat ravenously. But it's easy to see that, say, a paper shredder could be said to devour some documents,

You may well note that many words, rather most words, really almost all words have multiple meanings (except for highly stipulated technical terms, and even then things can get loose). Our perception is usually that a word has one meaning and that's that. But then we notice that, well, that same spelling can be used for more than one distinct concept, usually nearby.

You may then well note that for many words, there really is a primary meaning: its meaning out of context that everyone thinks of first, and then secondary meanings, ones that appear in different contexts, that are slight extensions of the primary meaning, or used in analogous situations, not literally.

Here is the example for 'devour' from google:

de·vour

• eat (food or prey) hungrily or quickly.

• (of fire, disease, or other forces) consume (someone or something) destructively.

• read (something) quickly and eagerly.

The first is the primary definition, the second a metaphorical one, the third... huh? That is definitely not what 'devour' means. Sure, one can easily use it in 'I devoured the sequel' meaning that I read the sequel quickly and eagerly. But that's not the meaning of 'devour'. That's not what 'mean' means. It's too specific. Does the omission mean you can't watch a movie voraciously? How come 'reading' is more devour-like than other metaphorical uses? This isn't right! If you include read, you should include every other possible metaphorical usage. But of course that is too laborious to imagine.

The difficulty I'm having is the demarcation line. When does a reasonable metaphorical usage of a word become dictionary-entry-worthy?

Taking the title word 'incensed', which was not deliberate, its primary and only definition is around 'angry', and no mention of the ostensible literal meaning which might have been 'burned like incense'. It already is a metaphor. The only definition is non-literal. So putting in metaphorical usages is necessary. At what point of semantic drift, at what point of leaving the original does a dying metaphor become dead, and at what point does the altered meaning move from quantitative difference to qualitatively requiring a new entry?

A close analogy is with suffixes. You can take any word in the dictionary and find some suffix that applies that will create a perfectly good word. 'Neologistically' is my favorite. 'Neologism' to 'neologistical' to 'neologistically'. Probably not in any dictionary, but perfectly understandable, sounds like a word, and is (arguably) undeniable as a word. Does it need to be in a dictionary? At what point do lexicographers decide not to include a possible variant?

There are a number of possibilities. Checking multiple dictionaries, most don't have the strange 'read' entry, only Google and Macmillan. What I suspect is that there is a tendency to require definitive alternate usage for an additional entry to be made when the entries are edited by humans. And that Google and/or Macmillan introduce metaphorical entries mechanically and its easier to be lenient. The latter two dictionaries certainly need human oversight; that is, the 'read' entry isn't a mistake but a lower threshold.

This will require looking into the editing policies of the various dictionaries.

Fix it now! Necessary minimal examples for change in English

The problems (two of them) are pronouncing can vs can't and fifteen vs fifty (or really more generally -n vs -n't and -ty vs -teen).

Well, it's not global warming, but there are a couple problems with English, specifically pronunciation, that are problems in information exchange. It's not some style thing, like the inarticulation of textspeak or emojis, or plain semantic errors like 'literally' for when it's not literal.

It's about pronunciation where the actual information being transferred is at it's most distinct. And the distinctions are being softened to almost disappearing but the information is as substantive as you can get. This screams out for language change, but...I just don't see any that people are unconsciously doing. The details are:

- can vs can't - In American English, standing alone, these two are identical except for the addition of the 't', which stands out in only the most labored of articulate speech. Word final 't' is unreleased in AmE, meaning that though 't' is usually aspirated elsewhere, but at the end of a word it is not.  This results in a difficulty for foreign language learners for hearing the distinction and for producing the distinction, what little there is.

But what's hard for foreigners can be hard for natives and even an area for language change (see the cot-caught merger).

• I can do that
• I can't do that

The intonation/timing for these is different (easy to see for native speakers but difficult for non-natives). But in high noise areas, these will be impossible to differentiate. "Can you move this 400 lb sofa off my chest?". "I can do that" vs "I can't do that". The answer is kind of important.

The same situation holds for a few other contractions involving 'not': could/couldn't.

My proposed solution: I can't think of a good natural one other than encouraging people to not contract when there is a 'not'. But for the positive version, the most natural way would by to shorten it considerably as '/kn/' or for both emphasize the sentence into nation "I cn do that" vs "I can't do that" (where the intonation would be terribly weird for the version of opposite polarity).

- -ty vs -teen:  The teens and the tens, thirteen/thirty and above, are similarly rooted but dictionary-pronounced distinctly. thir-TEEN vs THIR-tee. Different stress, different last syllable.

Except in regular speech these are about as close as you can get in pronunciation, and differently from most other close pronunciations (or eevn homophones), context rarely distinguishes them. "How far is it from the last to the next gas station?" "Oh about  thirt.. miles." "What? Is that thirty or thirteen miles?" "Thir-Teen" "What? THIR-ti or thir-TEEEE-nuh?" "The first one." "Oh. Then we're going to run out of gas."

The context doesn't say which one is more likely, and pronunciation has to be very articulate to tell the difference. The stress isn't pointed enough to tell. This is a perfect time for native speakers to unconsciously do something (make a slight change) to encourage better understanding (to avoid the waste of energy).

My suggestion? It's gonna sound bad but... for 'thirteen' say 'thir-TANE' or 'thir-TEEN-uh, and for 'thirty' say 'THIR-tuh'. To me these are the least unnatural and closest to natural pronunciation. Spelled out they look awful. But this is my prediction/suggestion.

I know. It sounds terrible.  But I don't want to run out of gas.


NB This is entirely about General American English... I can't expect to speak for other varieties of English. Also, I speak authoritatively about my own variety...but I may be biased and there may be free variation and some people may speak with more articulation than I can. So in one sense I am saying 'I am right' (which may be annoyingly authoritarian) but in another I am saying 'here is what I think I see, some others with great authority see it too, you can check now too now that you're aware of the possibility'.

Docs don't want to see your FitBit records, but ...

Docs don't want to see your FitBit records, but they do want your Holter monitor.

Docs do want you to exercise, or rather keep an active life and intense exercise is a good part of that but also make sure you don't sit down all the time, just walking and standing up and moving around calmly is probably a better thing to shoot for.

Having a FitBit or other exercise tracker, they consider that great, of course, because it means you are thinking about your fitness and trying to keep active.

But your PCP (your family doctor) does not want to see your FitBit records. They don't care how many steps you make a day. They don't care that you missed a few days last week (OK all last week. but the week before I made it every day!). They don't care about the fine detail of every second of every hour. They just want to know that you're using it. Or that you're making progress. Or that you're unable to hit the targets (knee surgery?).

Yes, the FitBit data is 'big data', and big data is useful...in general, but your PCP can't do anything with all those numbers. Your PCP isn't a big data consumer. Your PCP just wants to know (for the most part) Yes or No (or better than last year). Yes, totally get a FitBit, and totally because you think it'll please your PCP, and totally tell your PCP that you have one, and they'll totally be genuine proud of you. But don't think they can do anything with your data.

Maybe, just maybe, your cardiologist wants to know some of these details. Wait, no, your cardiologist doesn't want to know your FitBit data. What FitBit is tracking is not useful for them. Steps per day? Heart rate pattern over a time period? Oh...maybe a cardiologist does want to see a continuous EKG, like what you get from a Holter monitor. That is a specialist who can understand that data under a very prescribed situation. And with intensive study of that data as a specialist.

If say these fitness trackers somehow morph into a full body tricorder, measuring all possible metrics continuously, then maybe just maybe, it will become useful as a big continuous stream.

I'm sure the FitBit company data scientists could tell something interesting about behavior and fitness by working with sports physicians, epidemiologists, internal medicine in general, to discover interesting patterns of use of the product and specific health metrics.

But for you? Right now? Are you using a fitness tracker? Your doc does want to know that. Are you meeting your fitness goals everyday? Yes, your doc want to know that. Does your doc want to see your heart rate for the past month continuously by minute? No, your doc does not want to see that.