4 ms·

Can someone explain to a non-native speaker what’s surprising about this? > The leap from a word meaning "imaginary" to a word meaning "fantastic" struck me as

Can someone explain to a non-native speaker what’s surprising about this? > The leap from a word meaning "imaginary" to a word meaning "fantastic" struck me as odd initially, but apparently it comes from the sense of the word "imaginary" as "unreal". What other sense is there that Wiktionary doesn’t know about? https://en.m.wiktionary.org/wiki/imaginary https://en.m.wiktionary.org/wiki/imaginary

DanielDe 5y ago
Author of the post here, I'll try to elaborate. My primary association with the word "fantastic" is simply "great" or "very good", as in "you did a fantastic job!". It's this meaning of the word that I found oddly disconnected from the word "imaginary". How do you get from something meaning "not real" to something meaning "very good"? But the word "unreal" helped me make the leap, since that's a word I would use to describe something I thought was "very cool" or "well done".
- missblit 5y ago
  Fantastic can still be used to describe something fantasy-esque in modern usage. Albeit it's probably getting more rare. Like "fantastic voyage", "fantastic beliefs", "fantastic visions".
  - tesseract 5y ago
    And "fancy" still retains some links to "fantastic" and "fantasy", as in "fancy dress" or "flight of fancy".
  - StavrosK 5y ago
    "Fantastical" is probably more used for that nowadays (and that very rarely), but it didn't occur to me that there could be any other explanation, as in Greek we use "fantastic" for both meanings commonly, ie "fantastic job" and "fantastic world" (imaginary world).
- cecilpl2 5y ago
  That seems very roundabout. "unreal" seems like relatively recent slang to me, just like the "very great" meaning of "fantastic". "Fantastic" also means "based on fantasy", so the leap to "imaginary" is short.
- spoondan 5y ago
  Similarly, awesome is great, but awful is terrible. And terrible and terrifying are bad, but terrific is awesome.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
derbOac 5y ago
I'm a native speaker and this wasn't really surprising to me. "Fantastic" is still used in the sense of "imaginary" sometimes. The link between "fantastic" and "phenotype" was surprising to me, even though it makes sense reading it.

DanielDe 5y ago

Author of the post here, I'll try to elaborate. My primary association with the word "fantastic" is simply "great" or "very good", as in "you did a fantastic job!". It's this meaning of the word that I found oddly disconnected from the word "imaginary". How do you get from something meaning "not real" to something meaning "very good"? But the word "unreal" helped me make the leap, since that's a word I would use to describe something I thought was "very cool" or "well done".

missblit 5y ago
Fantastic can still be used to describe something fantasy-esque in modern usage. Albeit it's probably getting more rare. Like "fantastic voyage", "fantastic beliefs", "fantastic visions".
- tesseract 5y ago
  And "fancy" still retains some links to "fantastic" and "fantasy", as in "fancy dress" or "flight of fancy".
- StavrosK 5y ago
  "Fantastical" is probably more used for that nowadays (and that very rarely), but it didn't occur to me that there could be any other explanation, as in Greek we use "fantastic" for both meanings commonly, ie "fantastic job" and "fantastic world" (imaginary world).
cecilpl2 5y ago
That seems very roundabout. "unreal" seems like relatively recent slang to me, just like the "very great" meaning of "fantastic". "Fantastic" also means "based on fantasy", so the leap to "imaginary" is short.
spoondan 5y ago
Similarly, awesome is great, but awful is terrible. And terrible and terrifying are bad, but terrific is awesome.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]

derbOac 5y ago

I'm a native speaker and this wasn't really surprising to me. "Fantastic" is still used in the sense of "imaginary" sometimes. The link between "fantastic" and "phenotype" was surprising to me, even though it makes sense reading it.