Talk:boiled egg

From RfD

Yet again, a phrase which has no idiomatic meaning besides the sum of its parts: an egg which has been boiled. — Hippietrail 00:52, 9 October 2005 (UTC)

Keep! It is hard for me to believe this as a serious nomination. --Connel MacKenzie 03:16, 10 October 2005 (UTC)

Of course Keep. I have adjusted the definition to show what type of egg is normally used, and added some related terms. SemperBlotto 07:52, 10 October 2005 (UTC)

Keep, absolutely. The variety in the translations given so far indicates that this phrase is idiomatic. — Paul G 09:53, 10 October 2005 (UTC)

I agree the translations are interesting, but that would make a case for keeping this only as a translating dictionary entry - it does not need a definition - it is an egg which is boiled and nothing more. The fact that the translations are interesting has nothing to do with idiomaticity of the English phrase. — Hippietrail 15:06, 10 October 2005 (UTC)

But "an egg which is boiled" would include a crocodile egg boiled in tar - NOT what I want for breakfast. Keep. SemperBlotto 15:33, 10 October 2005 (UTC)

Keep this and all multi-word nouns that HT considers to not be idioms, even though they are idiomatic. Translation entries are deleted here on en.wikt:, so what is proposed is not a viable solution. --Connel MacKenzie 15:40, 10 October 2005 (UTC)

I can't find definitions for some of your idiomatic language so am unable to understand what you are saying. What do serious nomination, normally used, related term, crocodile egg, multi-word noun, translation entry, and viable solution mean?. It is hard for me to believe these are not defined! (-; — Hippietrail 15:50, 10 October 2005 (UTC)

Um, three people comment in direct opposition to you, so you remove the content of the entry? Is your intent to make the entry mangle my parser, leaving it forever on my automated cleanup list of "definition-less" entries? Roll it back. --Connel MacKenzie 05:06, 11 October 2005 (UTC)

I changed the article and opened that Beer Parlour thread before any of the replies here. In the Beer Parlour I have introduced this as an experiment, much like your ranking experiment, which for all I know also "mangles" your parser, but which I don't see you complaining about. I am very much in favour of being parseable as you know. But we are open to experimentation and improvement and parser-compatibility is not and has never been our first priority. — Hippietrail 15:47, 11 October 2005 (UTC)

I'm questioning the timing of opening it in Beer Parlor, in the manner you did, to justify removing real content from this entry, while under discussion here. While Wiktionary as a whole is open to experimentation and improvement there is a long tradition of leaving items under discussion alone. Anyone looking at the content-less entry now must be wondering why it garnered strong support initially. Again, the two-word noun boiled egg (used with the adjectives hard and soft especially) should be kept. (After being restored to it's previous state.) --Connel MacKenzie 02:24, 12 October 2005 (UTC)

Hmm well maybe we need a template to tag articles under discussion in the Beer Parlour. I apologize if I'm breaking some standing policy that I wasn't aware of. I can't see how you say the entry is content-less. It currently has the same content as any print monolingual dictionary I've seen (no definition), combined with the content of many bilingual dictionaries (the translations). — Hippietrail 16:12, 12 October 2005 (UTC)

As for your grammatical analysis I think you're quite wrong in think there is a boiled egg which is soft. It is an egg which is soft-boiled. At least the online AHD and Merriam-Webster also contain hard-boiled and also soft-boil and hard-boil as verbs back formed from the two-letter adjectives. — Hippietrail 16:12, 12 October 2005 (UTC)

I'd like to note that a helpful soul has "corrected" your "Phrasebook" resulting again in an unparsable entry (because you removed the most important content.) --Connel MacKenzie 00:22, 23 October 2005 (UTC)

Delete. Quickly throwing in a half cent to say my stance is if you can look up each word separately and understand what it means, a separate entry is not needed for both words together.--shark 01:32, 31 December 2005 (UTC)

Keep - not obvious that water is involved from the two words - Παρατηρητής 11:41, 1 January 2006 (UTC)

I disagree. See the second verb definition of boil. Delete--Curtis 19:51, 11 January 2006 (UTC)

Benefit of doubt applied for keeping. "Fried" and "boiled" are the two ways of preparing eggs which might seem most obvious, and probably the only ones where this question would come up seriously. Eclecticology 19:52, 17 January 2006 (UTC)

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RFD 2

The following information passed a request for deletion.

This discussion is no longer live and is left here as an archive. Please do not modify this conversation, but feel free to discuss its conclusions.

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boiled egg

Nothing more than sum of parts. --EncycloPetey 05:05, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

Haven't we been here before? Keep. Definition is not obvious. Translations are useful. SemperBlotto 07:09, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

Discussed at length during October 2005. As before, keep. —Stephen 13:38, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

Out of curiousity, what would the obvious definition be? — Beobach972 16:56, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

Isn't this part of the test on when not to delete an entry? Or is that fried egg? — Beobach972 15:04, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

That's fried egg, which I can see keeping. I am surprised that we decided to keep boiled egg, though. The arguments don't hold water (natch) for me. --EncycloPetey 16:02, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

Oh, I agree with you, I don't see how it's idiomatic; I just thought it would be ignominious to delete one of our tests. Because it's not, though... — Beobach972 16:56, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

The fact is that this kind of entry is only here for translation purposes; the actual English definition is very obvious, supererogatory really. I have no major problem with that but we should probably be clear about it. Widsith 17:04, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

Not so, actually. See Muke Tever's comment about the Peanuts cartoon. It is idiomatic because a boiled egg is not a poached egg, although the latter is also boiled in water. Therefore it passes the fried egg test. Indeed, it had already passed at the same time that fried egg itself was nominated. DAVilla 17:47, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

Maybe there is a hypothetical person who would be confused by the phrase. But I must say I don't believe such a person does or will exist in reality. Also it seems to me that unpicking such cultural information is beyond the scope of a dictionary. Muke and others point out that if you ordered a boiled egg in a restaurant you would expect a certain kind of preparation which is not inferrable. But you would also expect, for example, that it be a chicken egg rather than that of a platypus yet this is not something we feel the need to point out in our definition. I also think that this sort of cultural assumption could be equally claimed of single-word entries as well as phrases. Widsith 18:02, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

It is very easy to see how someone learning English can be confused by the phrase. But that is why we should have itemized which parts of the Pawley list are considered valid tests on Wiktionary, somewhere in WT:CFI. --Connel MacKenzie 16:15, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Yes. Any one of the 23 tests should be good. I think that would also take into account my usual criterium, which is "a set phrase". —Stephen 12:59, 11 May 2007 (UTC)