unthing

English

Etymology

Calque of German Unding, equivalent to un- +‎ thing. Compare also West Frisian ûnding, Dutch onding.

Noun

unthing (plural unthings)

1. Something irrelevant or inconsequential; a non-issue; an absurdity.

   Synonym: nothingburger

   • 1964, Testimony of members of Congress, interested individuals, and organizations:

     They made a thing of an unthing and put it on paper.

   • 1998, U.C. Mandal, J. Rawat, Public Administration: Principles and Practice, page 272:

     Whether or not PPB is an unthing in the federal bureaucracy, the budgetary concepts that are represented by it and its conceptual predecessors are still viable within OMB: control, management, and planning.

   • 2006, Anne Carolyn Klein, Geshe Tenzin Wangyal Rinpoche, Unbounded Wholeness:

     This hidden heart essence, so secret,
     An unthing untouched by the eterne […]

   • 2015, Catherine Wilson, Leibniz's Metaphysics, page 218:

     It does not follow from either the metaphor or the possibility of defining this space mathematically that it must be Leibniz's dreaded unthing “unthing” – a something that is nothing.

See also

• thingly
• nonperson, unperson, nonplace, unplace, nonthing