[Ads-l] [Non-DoD Source] to metal detect

[Laurence Horn]

That’s my intuition too, and there are G-hits for the non-success use, e.g.

The FBI messengered me a very cool sticker for my dashboard, which gave me access to the estate. The evening of the event, I drove past eight hundred cute police and several thousand secret service agents posing as secret service agents, on my way to the valet parker. My purse was searched, I was metal detected and boom - I was in.
http://www.songmd.com/col_hill-bill-molly.shtml

Of course if we parse the verb as “detect whether there’s any metal (on)” or “detect any metal there might be (on)”, it is a success verb…

LH

> On Jan 18, 2017, at 10:40 AM, MULLINS, WILLIAM D (Bill) CIV USARMY RDECOM AMRDEC (US) <william.d.mullins18.civ at MAIL.MIL> wrote:
> 
> Although in this case, actual metal may have been detected, I don't think that the verb phrase "metal detect" actually needs to imply success.  I have on occasion been at airport gates where TSA metal detected me, when I had no metal on my person.
> 
>> 
>> 2017 _Curse of Oak Island_ (History Channel TV) (Jan. 17):
>> "They went down there, they metal detected, they tried to repeat the metal detection."
>> 
>> 'To detect metal successfully through use of a metal detector.'
>> 
> 
> 
> 
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org


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The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org