[Ads-l] majority; plurality

[Jonathan Lighter]

This may be the source of the confusion, such as it is:


Congress requires a 2/3 supermajority to ratify treaties (e.g., the Iranian
deal) and to overcome a Presidential veto.

Cable news seems not to like the word "supermajority."  (Neither does my
spell-checker, which keeps underlining it). They usu. say "majority," with
51% being a "plurality."

This usage appear to be creeping into more general use, though I admit that
right now I can't prove it.

JL



On Thu, Apr 21, 2016 at 1:07 AM, Mark Mandel <thnidu at gmail.com> wrote:

> You mentioned your "favorite lemma",  so I thought it not out of place to
> point out the way it differs from the general use w.r.t. votes, etc.
>
> Mark
>
> On Apr 20, 2016 9:02 PM, "Laurence Horn" <laurence.horn at yale.edu> wrote:
> >
> > > On Apr 20, 2016, at 8:52 PM, Mark Mandel <thnidu at GMAIL.COM> wrote:
> > >
> > > When there are only two candidates, or in this case two subgroups,
> > > "majority" and "plurality" are synonymous.
> >
> > The difference would indeed be neutralized in such cases, but I thought
> we were discussing the meaning and use of "majority" and "plurality", not
> about how they apply to a particular case.
> >
> > LH
> > >
> > > On Apr 18, 2016 9:45 PM, "Laurence Horn" <laurence.horn at yale.edu>
> wrote:
> > >> ...
> > >> Just checked to see if the 'super-majority' sense is in the OED--it's
> not
> > > (at least not without a clarifying adjective), although the loose use
> of
> > > "majority" to mean 'plurality' or 'significant proportion' is, (3a).
> My
> > > favorite lemma is a use with which I was previously unfamiliar and
> which is
> > > evidently obsolete [apparently a calque of Lat. "ad plures"]:
> > >>
> > >> 3c. "the majority": the dead. Chiefly in phrases "to join the
> majority"
> > > and "to go/pass over to the majority": to die. Obs.
>
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>



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