Engineering amazing

ronbutters at AOL.COM ronbutters at AOL.COM
Fri Sep 16 16:37:15 UTC 2011


I saw "engineering" as a gerund, not a participle.

Sent from my iPad

On Sep 15, 2011, at 5:02 PM, Benjamin Barrett <gogaku at IX.NETCOM.COM> wrote:

> I'm not sure whether to top-post or bottom-post now, but I don't see the connection between "engineering amazing" (vt + adj) and "Ram tough" (noun + adj).
>
> Benjamin Barrett
> Seattle, WA
>
> On Sep 15, 2011, at 1:39 PM, Ronald Butters wrote:
>
>>
>> Surely there are constructions galore of the form Noun + {Adjectivey thing}, particularly in advertising? "POM wonderful"? "the coffee delicious"? "Ram Tough"?
>>
>> On Sep 15, 2011, at 2:46 PM, Benjamin Barrett wrote:
>>
>>> On Sep 15, 2011, at 11:23 AM, Arnold Zwicky wrote:
>>>
>>>> On Sep 15, 2011, at 11:05 AM, Arnold Zwicky wrote:
>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> On Sep 15, 2011, at 10:46 AM, Benjamin Barrett wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>> Sorry. Not the website (that was just for reference) but the expression. It's more engaging than Apple's "Think different."
>>>>>
>>>>> it *could* be that Lexus's "engineering amazing" was intended to convey 'engineering amazingly' (parallel to Apple's "think different"). but the interpretation i got was with "amazing" as a nouning of the adjective "amazing", so that it's the direct object of "engineering": Lexus engineers amazing stuff...
>>>>
>>>> of course, Apple's "think different" can also be read as involving a nouning: 'think of different things' or 'think in a different way'.
>>>>
>>>> arnold
>>>>
>>>
>>> That's what sent my mind in circles on this one by Lexus: They are engineering [things that are] amazing OR They are engineering amazing [things]. What goes into your head is that if Lexus makes it, it is amazing.
>>>
>>> At the same time, I felt like "amazing" was nouny and tried to think of an alternative such as "amazingness."
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org

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