this post was submitted on 13 Jul 2025
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Showerthoughts

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A "Showerthought" is a simple term used to describe the thoughts that pop into your head while you're doing everyday things like taking a shower, driving, or just daydreaming. The most popular seem to be lighthearted clever little truths, hidden in daily life.

Here are some examples to inspire your own showerthoughts:

Rules

  1. All posts must be showerthoughts
  2. The entire showerthought must be in the title
  3. No politics
    • If your topic is in a grey area, please phrase it to emphasize the fascinating aspects, not the dramatic aspects. You can do this by avoiding overly politicized terms such as "capitalism" and "communism". If you must make comparisons, you can say something is different without saying something is better/worse.
    • A good place for politics is c/politicaldiscussion
  4. Posts must be original/unique
  5. Adhere to Lemmy's Code of Conduct and the TOS

If you made it this far, showerthoughts is accepting new mods. This community is generally tame so its not a lot of work, but having a few more mods would help reports get addressed a little sooner.

Whats it like to be a mod? Reports just show up as messages in your Lemmy inbox, and if a different mod has already addressed the report, the message goes away and you never worry about it.

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[–] SaltSong@startrek.website 9 points 3 days ago (3 children)

Right, that's "speaking figuratively." There are rules for that.

But a word that means the opposite of what it means is not a useful word.

I'd hate to find a box in my lab marked "inflammable."

[–] my_hat_stinks@programming.dev 6 points 3 days ago (2 children)

Plenty of words mean the opposite of themselves, so much so that there's multiple words for it; autoantonym, contranym, or Janus words.

This morning my alarm went off so I turned it off.
I wanted to buy a new console as soon as it was out but they were all out.
Two people were left so I left.
I fought with Bob over chores, but I fought with Bob in the war.

[–] Cocodapuf@lemmy.world 4 points 3 days ago

That's actually pretty cool.

[–] SaltSong@startrek.website 1 points 3 days ago

I'm aware of the existence of contranyms. None of the examples you gave apply, as they just have different meanings, or the same leaving with different connotations.

[–] Bob_Robertson_IX@discuss.tchncs.de 4 points 3 days ago (1 children)

Or a letter from my college saying that my club has been "sanctioned".

[–] SaltSong@startrek.website 1 points 3 days ago

Yea. Not helpful.

[–] voracitude@lemmy.world 1 points 3 days ago (1 children)

Context is as important to language as syntax. If you see a box marked "inflammable" and the box is made of cardboard, you know it's quite inflammable. If it's made of metal, most people would think it's inflammable, but if you're in a lab you've probably got a few ways to prove them wrong.

[–] SaltSong@startrek.website 1 points 3 days ago

Context is as important to language as syntax.

Context is important to the message, yes. But if I need the context to understand a particular word, I would understand the message just as well without that word.