[John Whitworth]

Do you leave your property to your heirs absolutely?

My reading of Dorothy Sayers tells me that absolutely has a legal meaning in property law, though I can't remember what it is.

There is also the set: I am fairly sure, I am pretty well sure, I am absolutely sure.

[Alan Rain]

Of course, H.G Wells' time machine requires a going-back in time. Gazing into the sky is looking back in time. Hindsight is seeing the wisdom or otherwise of an alternative course of action. Etc Etc.

I am referring to the redundant clause 'going forward' plonked into a sentence when the speaker is talking about his or her intentions.
Simple as that.

[Roger Slater]

Originally Posted by Erik Olson

Back to redundancies, plan ahead is a common offender

I don't know if I agree that "plan ahead" is a redundancy that ought to be avoided. I think it conveys a meaning that "plan" alone would often not convey. "Be sure to plan ahead" certainly sounds more natural to me than "Be sure to plan." Or, "I suspected it might rain, so I brought my umbrella. I'm glad I planned ahead." Wouldn't that last sentence sound a bit awkward if you left out "ahead"?

[Julie Steiner]

Romance languages tend to encode directional information into the verb itself; linguists say that the path of motion is verb-framed. In contrast, Germanic languages provide directional information via auxiliary particles; linguists say that the path of motion is satellite-framed.

Since modern English has satellite-framed Germanic ancestry, but also extensive borrowings from verb-framed Latin and French (et al.), the directional information sometimes gets both verb-framed and satellite-framed. Thus the belt-and-suspenders effect.

[Erik Olson]

Roger, yes it is true that "I'm glad I planned ahead" might sound awkward without ahead. But planned ahead is still redundant. You see there are some redundancies we use that have become common parts of our speaking and some of which would be awkward to omit. But technically they are still redundant. To be sure, Plan is a. trans. To arrange in advance (an action or proposed proceeding); to devise, contrive, or formulate (a project or manner of proceeding). Thus ahead is not strictly necessary since the verb itself is to make arrangements in advance for the future. Yet as I said this is a case of a naturalized redundancy, not all redundancies are to be avoided. That said, I will plan for graduation is better to my mind than I will plan ahead for graduation. In some cases, the ahead can be omitted to get rid of unnecessary words.

[Rob Stuart]

I heard someone refer to 'the male penis' on TV today.

[Roger Slater]

That's funny. But I put +"male penis" into Google and it returned over 500K results. But then I looked for "female penis" and found this.

[Jayne Osborn]

Originally Posted by Rob Stuart

There's a whole class of redundancies around acronyms, like 'PIN number'.

Oh yes... like "LCD display", "PCB boards", "AC current" and "ISBN number".

This thread is fun and it's great to sound off... speaking of which, I also agree with Rob's other post #40, re TV chefs using ''off'' as in ''cook the onions off..." I hate that too.

"Oh, it's hard not to feel superior... when you are!" as my husband likes to say (not knowingly having pinched the expression )

Jayne

[Ann Drysdale]

Ah, my dears - we live, we learn. All over the Eratosphere words and phrases lie awaiting discovery along the shores of the Atlantic. I pick them up and polish them and slip them in my pocket. Moments ago on GT I found another. By planning ahead we can go loaded for bear. Hurrah!

[Lightning Bug]

Ann, you might be referring to the one that inspired this thread - someone saying they would "...continue to persist..." on some mission. I suppose the opponents - being of contrary mind - vowed to persist, in their continued crusade.