factoid

[Jonathan Lighter]

>  Back in our old unsophisticated days we used to think that if it wasn't
true, it wasn't a fact (however trivial it might (not) be.

That *was* a long time ago, wasn't it?

(Don't forget my obsessive-compulsive discussion of current uses of "fact"
here a few years ago.)

Norman Mailer coined "factoid" in 1973 in the sense of something widely
accepted as a fact though of dubious or no truthfulness. IIRC, he suggested
that a steamy affair between Marilyn and JFK would make a great factoid and
- voila! - it came to pass.

If I'm wrong, please advise. (When I tell people that JFK and MM were never
an item, they back away like I'm a mental patient released too soon.)

OED, BTW, doesn't recognize the later (and very common) sense, 'an
interesting but trivial or irrelevant fact.'

My sense is that it developed very soon after the original.

JL

On Fri, Nov 16, 2012 at 1:29 AM, Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at yale.edu>wrote:

> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at YALE.EDU>
> Subject:      Re: factoid
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> On Nov 15, 2012, at 7:01 PM, Dave Wilton wrote:
>
> > Urban dictionary has a decent breakdown of the senses that I've heard:
> > http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=factoid
> >
> > In my experience, their sense #2 is the more common: "A fact that may or
> may
> > not be true, but is trivial in nature."
>
> Interesting.  Back in our old unsophisticated days we used to think that
> if it wasn't true, it wasn't a fact (however trivial it might (not) be.
>
> LH
> >
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: American Dialect Society [mailto:ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU] On
> Behalf Of
> > James Harbeck
> > Sent: Thursday, November 15, 2012 8:11 PM
> > To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
> > Subject: factoid
> >
> > I had a debate today about the meaning of "factoid". I'm wondering
> whether
> > my sense of what more or less everyone uses it to mean is in fact
> accurate.
> > Tell me: what, in your world, does "factoid" mean?
> >
> > Thanks,
> > James Harbeck.
> >
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> > The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
> >
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> > The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>
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>



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