Re: To waffle, ‘to waver, to vacillate, to equivocate, to dither’

On Thu, 25 Apr 2024 07:43:54 +0100, Aidan Kehoe <kehoea@parhasard.net>
wrote:

>
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.
>
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?

In my usage, to "waffle" is to provide a reply to a question or demand
that does not provide a specific response, acceptance, or denial.

To include the "ramble" meaning, I would use "waffle-on".  The
response is extended, but with additional comments that don't clarify
anything.

A classic waffle used by a parent to child's request or demand is
"We'll see".  If the parent adds a number of conditions that may or
may not determine if the request or demand will be granted, the parent
has "waffled-on".