Saturday, September 8, 2007

From the Branch Collective

Word of the Day from The Branch Collective (i.e. dictionary.com)

fungible ..FUHN-juh-buhl.., adjective:

1. (Law) Freely exchangeable for or replaceable by another of like nature or kind in the satisfaction of an obligation.

2. Interchangeable.

3. Something that is exchangeable or substitutable. Usually used in the plural.



"People think this tax is for Social Security. But tax monies are really fungible. They get raided all the time."

-- Eugene Ludwig, "Motivated to Work," interview by Kerry A. Dolan", Forbes, March 20, 2000


"The setting is Ireland in the 1950's, but, a cynical reader might reflect, this sort of fiction is so common that the characters will be completely fungible."

-- Susan Isaacs, "Three Little Girls From School", New York Times, December 30, 1990


"Genuine eros makes us desire a particular person; crude desire is satisfiable by fungible bodies."

-- Edward Craig (general editor), Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy


Fungible comes from Medieval Latin fungibilis, from Latin fungi (vice), "to perform (in place of)."

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

That's the dictionary.com word of the day. Leave it to a myspace collective to lack the imagination to come up with their own. The Bukowski, however, was a pleasing surprise - albeit sadly misappropriated.

"Boring damned people. All over the earth. Propagating more boring damned people. What a horror show. The earth swarmed with them."

b.s. said...

ouch. so much for getting my hopes up.