3 ms·
free fre·er, fre·est, adverb, verb, freed, free·ing. adjective 1. enjoying personal rights or liberty, as a person who is not in slavery: a land of free people
by lucasnemeth 13y ago
free fre·er, fre·est, adverb, verb, freed, free·ing.
adjective
1.
enjoying personal rights or liberty, as a person who is not in slavery: a land of free people.
2.
pertaining to or reserved for those who enjoy personal liberty: They were thankful to be living on free soil.
3.
existing under, characterized by, or possessing civil and political liberties that are, as a rule, constitutionally guaranteed by representative government: the free nations of the world.
4.
enjoying political autonomy, as a people or country not under foreign rule; independent.
5.
exempt from external authority, interference, restriction, etc., as a person or one's will, thought, choice, action, etc.; independent; unrestricted.
- lukifer 13y agolit·er·al·ly 1. in a literal manner or sense; exactly. 2. used for emphasis or to express strong feeling while not being literally true. Words are literally defined by how they are actually used by humans over time. If I hold up a sign saying "Free Donuts", no one is going to think I mean that pastries should be liberated. To unnecessarily cling to the word "free" when it has a more obvious secondary meaning is to tilt at windmills; there is no shortage of synonyms.
- tomflack 13y agoIf there is one argument it's impossible to win, it's an argument with people trying to impose their own "original" or "traditional" word usage over the more colloquial understanding of it's meaning.
- lucasnemeth 13y agoIf I say "A free bird", it's quite dubious if it is a free bird as in the beatles song, or if i'm giving away caged birds with no cost. The two meanings are quite common in the english language, it's not a pedantic invention of the FOSS community to make this distinction.