2022-03-19
ศัพท์ น่าสับสน - Set – F - feasible & possible
แนะนำการใช้ ตามที่ส่วนใหญ่ใช้ แต่ละท้องถิ่น
ความหมาย อาจผันแปร ตาม ตำแหน่ง/หน้าที่ ในประโยค
Dictionary.com:
ออกเสียง feasible = “FEE-zuh-buhl”
ออกเสียง possible = “POS-uh-buhl”
Dictionary of Problem Words and Expressions:
feasible & possible
Feasible means “capable of being done”;
possible means that something can happen.
Feasible suggests the ease with which something can be done
and implies desirability for doing it:
“This is a feasible plan that I hope you will adopt.”
Possible refers to that which is likely to happen:
“It ispossible that prices will continue to rise.”
“It is possible (not feasible) that we will have rain tomorrow.”
Dictionary.com:
SYNONYM STUDY FOR POSSIBLE
Possible, Feasible, Practicable
refer to that which may come about
or take place without prevention by serious obstacles.
That which is
possible is naturally able or even likely to happen,
other circumstances being equal:
Discovery of a new source of plutonium may be possible.
Feasible refers to the ease with which something can be done
and implies a high degree of desirability for doing it:
This plan is the most feasible.
Practicable applies to that which can be done
with the means that are at hand and with conditions as they are:
We ascended the slope as far as was practicable.
Merriam-Webster Dictionary:
Choose the Right Synonym for possible
Possible, Practicable, Feasible
mean capable of being realized.
Possible implies that a thing may certainly exist
or occur given the proper conditions.
a possible route up the west face of the mountain
Practicable implies that something may be effected
by available means or under current conditions.
a solution that is not practicable in the time available
Feasible applies to what is likely to work or be useful
in attaining the end desired.
commercially feasible for mass production
Dictionary.com:
How Does Adding The Word “Possible” Change News?
Published February 11, 2019
by Ashley Austrew
What is a possible hate crime?
A possible sexual assault?
A possible terrorist attack?
Crime-related news is often reported
in the media using tentative language
—like the word possible
—that makes it seem as if there is room for doubt
as to whether or not a crime was actually committed.
Butin many instances,
either through video, photos, or the victim’s own words and evidence,
it is obvious to everyone that a crime was definitely committed.
So, why do journalists keep using the word possible?
For many years,
a common word journalists used in crime reporting was allege.
To allege means “to assert something without proof,”
especially when a person has been accused of or arrested for,
but not legally convicted of, some crime.
But, the Columbia Journalism Review
stated in 2009 that allege was being misused.
As the review explains, alleged is,
in this context, synonymous with suspected,
and “calling someone ‘an alleged thief’
is all but saying ‘we know you did it.'”
The Associated Press (AP) Stylebook, moreover,
cautions that journalists should avoid
any suggestion that they are personally
making an allegation or accusation.
For this reason, the stylebook instructs journalists
to instead use words like apparent, ostensible, or reputed.
Possible is also a similar qualifier in this vein,
and it likely evolved from those instructions.
What does possible mean?
Journalists use a qualifier like possible
for information that is unconfirmed or claims that are unproven.
Possible comes from the Latin possibilis, “that may be done,”
in turn from the verb posse, “to be able.”
Recorded in English by the late 1300s,
possible more generally describes
something “that may or can be, exist, happen, or be done.”
But, the adjective has evolved to imply
that something may or may not be true
—and that’s why many people find possible problematic
when it’s used in regard to crimes.
When actor Jussie Smollet, for instance,
was hospitalized in late January 2019,
many people were outraged when media outlets
reported on the attack as a “possible hate crime.”
Smollet said attackers yelled
racist and homophobic slurs as they beat him, poured chemicals on him,
and wrapped a noose around his neck, as if lynching him.
Many headlines that used the word possible,
though, included quotation marks
because they were directly quoting police,
who said they were investigating the attack as a possible hate crime.
Still, reporters often use possible
to describe acts of crime even when not quoting police,
such as when reporting in early January 2019
that a woman in a vegetative state gave birth
at an Arizona healthcare facility near the end of December 2018.
Many outlets reported the woman was a victim of
a “possible sexual assault.”
Libel is to blame
The main reason that journalists
use language like possible is to avoid being sued for libel.
Libel is “defamation by written or printed words or photos.”
(Slander is the spoken equivalent.)
Writing that someone committed a crime, for instance,
when they didn’t, is bad
because such false statements can damage a person’s reputation
—and even their livelihood.
Libel is something journalists must always be cautious to avoid.
When journalists are reporting on a crime,
they often are stating
what has appeared in an official report
or has been told to them by police.
Unless a person has been formally convicted of a crime,
a journalist cannot take an accusation and state it as undisputed fact.
As First Amendment scholar David L. Hudson Jr.
wrote for the Freedom Forum Institute in 2002,
“individuals possess a right not to be
subjected to falsehoods that impugn their character.”
Nevertheless, there are many who feel that
journalists’ use of language like possible is too timid or passive,
that is, it’s not actively or aggressively calling out wrongdoing.
This complaint is especially directed
incidents of racism, homophobia, transphobia, and sexual violence.
In the case of the victim who gave birth while in a vegetative state,
the woman was physically incapable of consenting to sexual contact.
How else could she have given birth, then, if someone didn’t rape her?
To say she was “possibly raped” or “possibly sexually assaulted”
seems to cast doubt on
what the victim experienced rather than signaling,
as is usually intended, that many details of the case were still unknown.
Similarly, some outlets wrote that
Smollet was a victim of a “racially charged” attack
rather than saying it was outright racist.
For many, this language came across
as unwillingness to call out racist violence.
How do we stop downplaying racism, violence, and hatred?
Journalists may use terms
like racially charged and alt-right
because they fear that calling someone racist
could constitute libel, which is itself a crime.
But, the AP itself has taken the position that
terms like alt-right should not be used in reporting
because “it is meant as a euphemism to disguise racist aims.”
The AP Stylebook instructs:…
when writing on extreme groups,
be precise and provide evidence to support the characterization.
Report their actions, associations, history and positions
to reveal their actual beliefs and philosophy,
as well as how others see them.
And so, while journalists need to rely on words
like possible in crime reporting
so they don’t publish false or unestablished information,
it is critically important in today’s culture,
amid the threat of misinformation and growing respect
for marginalized identities, to assess
when our language qualifies information
—and when it diminishes a victim’s credibility or the severity of a crime.
We should correct and clarify that language when necessary.
Having an objective and impartial media is indispensable,
but it should never come at the expense of recognizing racism
and other forms of violence and hatred.
Not for what they possibly are,
but what they really are.
Ashley Austrew is a freelance writer from Omaha, Nebraska.
Her work has been published at
Cosmopolitan, Scary Mommy, Scholastic, and other outlets.
Merriam-Webster Dictionary:
Choose the Right Synonym for feasible
Possible, Practicable, Feasible
mean capable of being realized.
Possible implies that a thing may certainly exist or occur
given the proper conditions.
a possible route up the west face of the mountain
Practicable implies that something may be effected by
available means or under current conditions.
a solution that is not practicable in the time available
Feasible applies to what is likely to work or be useful
in attaining the end desired.
commercially feasible for mass production
Merriam-Webster Dictionary:
Feasible and Doable
Feasible comes from faire, the French verb
meaning “to do.”
Doable and feasible therefore originally
meant literally the same thing: “capable of being done.”
Indeed, doable was formed with -able,
the Latin-derived French ending meaning “capable of”
combined, in this instance, with do,
a word with roots in Old English and one of the most basic
and useful of our verbs.
Though their respective etymological meanings may overlap,
doable and feasible exist more in parallel with each other
than as true synonyms.
As with most such pairs of words, the Latin-derived term
is used when describing more abstract notions.
The words most commonly modified by feasible
include:
option
alternative
solution
plan
approach
These are words that
describe what has yet to be decided
or what will be carefully considered.
By contrast,
doable modifies more concrete terms:
task
thing
target
Feasible is used when an element
of abstraction, distance, and technical specificity is needed.
The more earthy doable is rarely used in formal writing,
and is not found in the works of Shakespeare, the King James Bible,
or any of the founding documents of the United States.
This abstract use of feasible
also accounts for the word
that expresses a putative, conceptual, or hypothetical state: feasibility.
Indeed, we frequently encounter “feasibility study”
but not “doability study”
(although doability is a word that is sometimes used,
it hasn’t yet been added to most dictionaries).
As long as somethingis just an idea, it’s feasible.
When it’s time for action, we need to find out if it’s doable.
Merriam-Webster Dictionary:
Word History
Is It 'Feasible' or Is It 'Doable'?
Two words separated by a common meaning
The richness of English vocabulary
is partly due to the subtle shades of meaning
expressed by words that are similar enough to be called synonyms
but rarely used interchangeably:
lean/skinny
clean/cleanse
dead/deceased
The most common and basic words in English,
such as the so-called helping verbs
or auxiliary verbs have, be, may, can, and do,
provide functions that are not duplicated by synonyms.
But when a word
happens to derive from one of these function words,
its synonym is almost surely used in a more narrow and specific way.
Such is the case with the twin words doable and feasible.
The verb do is as old as English itself,
one of the workhorses of the language.
After the Norman Conquest,
the Latin-derived French ending -able was added to
create doable, formed at the very moment that a parallel
and more formal French term was also being introduced to English:
feasible comes from faire, the French verb meaning “to do.”
Doable and feasible therefore
originally meant literally the same thing: “capable of being done.”
And yet, from the beginning,
feasible seemed to be used
when describing more abstract notions.
The words it most commonly modifies include:
option
alternative
solution
plan
approach
These are words that describe what has yet to be decided
or what will be carefully considered.
By contrast, doable modifies more concrete terms:
task
thing
target
The words used in some definitions for these synonyms
express this distinction:
doable means “practicable” and
feasible means “possible.”
As is so often the case, the term derived from Latin is used
when an element of
abstraction, distance, and technical specificity is needed.
The more earthy, Old English-derived
doable is rarely used in formal writing,
and is not found in the works of Shakespeare, the King James Bible,
or any of the founding documents of the United States.
This abstract use of feasible also accounts for the word
that expresses a putative, conceptual, or hypothetical state: feasibility.
Notice that
it is used here, in this early example, in contrast with practicable:
The Lords and Commons assembled in Parliament,
having by several Certificats from credible men
received full satisfaction, not onely of the feasibility
of a late invention of double and multiple writing,
found out and discovered by the industry of William Petty,
and by him made practicable by Instruments,
and means of several natures and fashions,
but also of the great use and profit
which may redonnd to the Common-wealth in generall.
— William Petty, A Declaration Concerning the Newly
Invented Art of Double Writing, 1648
Indeed, we frequently encounter feasibility study
but not doability study
(although doability is a word that is sometimes used,
it hasn’t yet been added to most dictionaries).
The technical specificity of usage
for feasible connects it
to related words used in legal contexts
and some close cousins of feasible:
malfeasance, meaning “wrongdoing” or “misconduct”;
misfeasance, meaning “trespass”
or “the performance of a lawful action in an illegal or improper manner”;
nonfeasance, meaning “failure to do what ought to be done”;
and feasance itself, a now-obsolete legal term
meaning the “doing” or “execution” of an obligation or duty.
Though their etymological meanings may overlap,
doable and feasible exist more
in parallel with each other than as true synonyms.
As long as something is just an idea, it’s feasible.
When it’s time for action, we need to find out if it’s doable.
Collins English Dictionary:
possible
Usage:
Although it is very common
to talk about something being very possible or more possible,
these uses are generally thought to be incorrect,
since possible describes an absolute state,
and therefore something can only be possible or not possible:
it is very likely (not very possible) that he will resign;
it has now become easier (not more possible) to obtain an entry visa
Collins COBUID English Dictionary:
Possible & possibly
1. 'possible'
Possible is an adjective.
If something is possible, it can be done or achieved.
It is possible for us to measure the amount of rain.
Some improvement may be possible.
Possible is often used in expressions such as as soon as possible
and as much as possible.
If you do something as soon as possible, you do it as soon as you can.
I like to know as much as possible about my patients.
He sat as far away from me as possible.
Be Careful!
Don't say 'as soon as possibly'.
You also use possible to say that something may be true or correct.
It is possible that he made a mistake.
That's one possible answer.
2. 'possibly'
Possibly is an adverb.
You use possibly to show that you are not sure about something.
Television is possibly to blame for this.
She is always cheerful, which is possibly why people like her.
You also use possibly
when you are asking someone to do something in a very polite way.
For example, you say
'Could you possibly carry this for me?'
Could you possibly meet me there tomorrow at ten?
