Re: To waffle, 'to waver, to vacillate, to equivocate, to dither'

On 26/04/2024 at 08:26, Aidan Kehoe wrote:

>
  Ar an séú lá is fiche de mí Aibreán, scríobh Steve Hayes:
>
  > On Thu, 25 Apr 2024 09:19:58 +0100, Aidan Kehoe <kehoea@parhasard.net>
  > wrote:
  >
  > >
  > > Ar an cúigiú lá is fiche de mí Aibreán, scríobh Steve Hayes:
  > >
  > > > >Speaking (in sci.lang) of Andy Grove, he uses waffle in the above sense in
  > > > >his good, well-edited ‘High Output Management.’ In my youth I would only
  > > > >have used or understood the word in the meaning ‘to ramble on, to say
  > > > >nothing of much consequence,’ and OED2 documents that the
  > > > >fail-to-make-a-decision sense is colloquial or non-standard.
  > > >
  > > > What is the "above" sense?
  > >
  > >The one in the subject, ‘to waver, to vacillate, to equivocate, to dither.’
  >
  > Ah, I didn't read it like that. I might have done so if the comma
  > after "waffle" had been replaced by a colon.
  >
  > > > >I presume I have misunderstood various Americans over the years in not
  > > > >picking up on the ‘dither’ meaning. How universal is that meaning over
  > > > >there?
  > > >
  > > > For what values of "that"?
  > >
  > >“Dither,” to fail to make a decision when making a decision would be
  > >appropriate.
  >
  > As in the driver of a car on a multilane highway being unable to
  > decide which lane they want to drive in, and holding up the following
  > traffic while they try to decide?
>
For example!
>
Another really common one comes up when a consulting firm (e.g. Accenture) is
hired. The people hiring the consulting firm are the managers of the relevant
business, and their job as managers is to understand and to assess the
conditions of their business and to make decisions based on that understanding
and that assessment, in order to improve their business. They are hiring the
consulting firm to understand and to assess their business and to come up with
decisions based on that understanding and assessment in order that the business
can be improved ...
>

 Consultant: Someone who borrows your watch and uses it to tell you what time it is.