4 ms·

Fabrication is a bit amusing. This factory fabricates iPhones. vs. The fabricated iPhones came from this factory.

• pekk 13y ago
  "The fabricated iPhones" simply means the iPhones which were made. "The fabricated news came from this propaganda ministry" works perfectly, however
  • vacri 13y ago
    'The fabricated iPhones came from this factory', where 'fabricated' means 'produced', is a tautology and hence an ungainly way to present such a sentence ('unfabricated iPhones' wouldn't 'come from' anywhere). As presented, I feel it's more likely for 'fabricated' to mean 'fake', given the context.
    • pekk 13y ago
      I don't think "fabricated iPhones" means fake iPhones at all. It might be awkward, but that doesn't mean that it means 'fake'.
• jholman 13y ago
  When physical objects are fabricated, it means they're created. "Fabricated" never means "of fraudulent provenance", like your iPhone example. When statements-which-purport-to-be-facts are fabricated, it means they're falsified. So "his claim (that these phones are iPhones) was fabricated" does mean that the phones are not truly iPhones. As I consider it, this makes some sense; you cannot create a fact, but you can create a physical object, and you can create a lie. Things like an analysis are on the border. And indeed, my intuition as a native speaker accepts "fabricate an analysis" in either sense.
  • gojomo 13y ago
    Never say never; I think most American speakers would find that the 'fabricated iPhones' noun phrase implies that the iPhones are counterfeits. Otherwise the adjective would be awkwardly unnecessary – all iPhones are already manufactured. So, it must be there to emphasize (or at least hint at) the other meaning of 'fabricated'. It's a little bit of an uncommon/sloppy usage, but still clear... more likely to appear in impromptu speech than writing.