Hmmm....just putting this "out there".....what would be the modern equivalent of

[BillyJack]

Clarion call?

Conundrum?

Paradox?

Farcical?

More words please.....

[petronius]

1. Don't we still use those words? I'm not getting it...

:shrug:

[RKP5637]

2. Wakeup call n/t

[DJ13]

3. Republican intelligence operative

Or, oxymoron.

[Drale]

4. I use Paradox on a daily basis

for instance, "You want to go back in time? Your going to create a Paradox and destroy the universe, I just know it."

EDIT: Sorry was posting from my phone.

[BillyJack]

6. Drale....I love ya......but "daly"?

*sigh*

[BillyJack]

5. Teenagers don't use these words in their daily lexicon....

...that's where I was "going with this".

nm (as my teenager would text me *sigh*).

[1620rock]

7. Well then by God they should learn them.

[Quantess]

9. If they want a good score on the verbal part of the SAT, then they should learn new vocabulary!

I still remember many of those obscure words I learned.
"fulgent"
"rusticating"
"torpid"
"saturnine"

[BillyJack]

13. Great words!

thank you.

Oh how we will desend (sp?) unto the 'tower of babel' if we don't understand ~ OR LISTEN ~ to each others words!

[fishwax]

14. did teenagers in the past use these words in their daily lexicon?

:)

[Honeycombe8]

8. These terms all mean something different, don't they?

I'm not cheating my looking them up. Going by memory, I've used "conundrum" to mean a perplexing dilemma, a problem of sorts. "Whether to buy a blue sofa that I hate but fits and is on a great sale, or to buy a camel sofa that I love but is regular price and slightly too large for my space? What a conundrum."

Paradox I thought means opposite ends of a situation that exist simultaneously.

Farcical: Keystone Cops-like.

Clarion call: Wakeup call.

[BillyJack]

10. thanks for making me laugh..

[canetoad]

11. Expand your quote marks

to "just putting it out there". Easier to find comparable phrases. You parse down to the words you need.

Floating in the ether

Testing the waters

Scanning the horizon

All phrases indicate an appeal for popular opinion by consensus.

Could be read as: Seeking approval, weak, indecisive. IMO a 'nothing term', used for filler, justification.

[BillyJack]

12. Yes, indeed!

All phrases indicate an appeal for popular opinion by consensus.

That's what I was looking for exactly: popular opinion by consensus.

[Duer 157099]

15. CC, cndrm, prdx, frccl

It's hard getting everything in 140 characters y'know.