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#1 2011-09-07 08:56:50

DavidTuggy
Eggcornista
From: Mexico
Registered: 2007-10-11
Posts: 2713
Website

seeking fit

Ran across this one yesterday: it seems common, and probably is standard for some.

Freedom to do in life as you seek fit. Do not question me for what is important is how you wish to live your own lives is Souly up to you.

(Souly! I love it.)

It’s okay if you seek fit to attempt to backfire towards how popular Doom is.

(Backfire = react negatively?)

he had formed the resolution of travelling a day earlier than planned and not seeking fit to warn his housekeeper of the change

the Constitution would have to be absolved or the government would not have sovereign power to do as they seek fit to control the aspects of

(By all means, let’s absolve the Constitution, but blame the government)

He can move around as he seeks fit – a position he has craved for years – and he can pull wide from time to time to give us some width

Debi will continue to strive to achieve her visions as she seeks fit. I hope you take the opportunity to walk alongside of her journey and experience her results

(Walking alongside of a journey rather than a person. Hmm. Do we accompany journeys too?)
.
Anyway, it is almost certainly at least sometimes a blend of “seek to Verb” with “see fit to Verb”. I think there might be enough construal of seeking a comfortable position (e.g. the one that allows the guy to move around at will in the next-to-last example), seeking what fits or seeking to fit in, or something, to make it at least marginally an eggcorn.
It does sound, in isolation, somewhat as if the person is looking for an physico-emotional explosion; the kind of fit you throw rather than (usually) seek. But I don’t suppose any of the phrase’s users have that in mind.

Last edited by DavidTuggy (2011-09-07 08:57:36)


*If the human mind were simple enough for us to understand,
we would be too simple-minded to understand it* .

(Possible Corollary: it is, and we are .)

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#2 2011-09-07 11:23:46

kem
Eggcornista
From: Victoria, BC
Registered: 2007-08-28
Posts: 2851

Re: seeking fit

Great find, David yclept Tuggy. Seems like I’ve heard “seek fit” before. It feels strangely right.

“Seek” for “see” appears to be a popular substitution, despite the fact that a less common word replaces a more common word. Examples below. None of them occur with significant frequency:

“Seek the light of day” for “see the light of day:”

Wiki description of fantasy character: “She’s actually very short for an elf, and has the pallor of one who doesn’t seek the light of day too often”

“Seek the error of” for “see the error of:”

Blog entry: “This exploitational commercialism breaks the group apart until they all seek the error of their ways. The game has to be played out by the rules, no matter what the outcome.”

“Seek the writing on the wall” for “see the writing on the wall:”

Conspiracy BB: “This story breaks so fast, so many unconfirmed sources, Kaddafy has to seek the writing on the wall, he is 79 after al and might really like to enjoy his billions in the south of France or Sardinia, or Dubai”

“Wait and seek” for “wait and see:”

Blog entry: “I have the sure feeling you’ll be kicking yourself later however and suggest renting and then taking a wait and seek attitude about buying this obsolete “Special Edition”. ”

“Monkey seek, monkey do” for “monkey see, monkey do:”

Comment on a news article: “remember the old saying – monkey seek monkey do ”

“Seek the forest for the trees” for “see the forest for the trees:”

Bulletin board for apocalypse issues: “This place is so darn full of the BS, that most of us cannot seek the forest for the trees. ”


Hatching new language, one eggcorn at a time.

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#3 2011-09-08 11:08:36

David Bird
Eggcornista
From: The Hammer, Ontario
Registered: 2009-07-28
Posts: 1690

Re: seeking fit

I sought examples of the past tense, which is also eggcornishly close phonetically: sought fit to instead of ‘saw fit to’. Someone else has noticed this odd construction, while reading the New Zealand Herald. She thought it might be a blend of ‘saw’ and ‘thought’. I’ve quoted it here because it so closely follows the form of our own posts.

The article includes the phrase ‘have sought fit’, which caught my attention. I’m sure they mean, ‘have seen fit’ or ‘saw fit’, but evidentally, it is not a unique mistake. Google reveals about 6920 hits for the phrase (as compared with 4,060,000 for ‘have seen fit’ and 4,130,000 for ‘saw fit’). Is it just a spelling mistake or might people have learned it that way?
.
Incidentally, ‘thought fit to’ has 1,020,000 and ‘seek fit to’ has about 8530 hits, including some pages definitely fitting ‘see fit to’ e.g., and e.g, and e.g. ‘Seeked fit to’ gets a measly 2 hits.
.
Perhaps the incidence of ‘sought fit to’ can be attributed to tripping over the tongue and merging ‘saw fit’ and ‘thought fit’. On the other hand, the fact that people actually also ‘seek fit to’ suggests that that is the initial error and saying ‘sought fit to’ is just a matter of consistency.
Blog

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#4 2014-06-22 16:24:42

DavidTuggy
Eggcornista
From: Mexico
Registered: 2007-10-11
Posts: 2713
Website

Re: seeking fit

Kem wrote (in the dim dark ages, long ago):

“Seek” for “see” appears to be a popular substitution, despite the fact that a less common word replaces a more common word.

I’m wondering if we have some sort of search routine or recognition program that says “Words from the following list are likely to show up in standardized phrases, proverbs or other antiquated speech when you expect something more common:
seek
slay
(etc.)”
.
It could help explain the otherwise backwards “usage gradient” here.


*If the human mind were simple enough for us to understand,
we would be too simple-minded to understand it* .

(Possible Corollary: it is, and we are .)

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#5 2014-06-25 16:32:58

kem
Eggcornista
From: Victoria, BC
Registered: 2007-08-28
Posts: 2851

Re: seeking fit

I’m wondering if we have some sort of search routine or recognition program

Not sure how we would come up with something like that.

The distance between common and uncommon words in English is not represented in our brains, I suspect, in a way that closely resembles power law word and letter frequencies ratios. Neurons that fire together wire together, to be sure, but the distances between discrete words in our neural net is closer than frequency counts in corpora would suggest.


Hatching new language, one eggcorn at a time.

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#6 2015-11-23 16:47:28

burred
Eggcornista
From: Montreal
Registered: 2008-03-17
Posts: 1112

Re: seeking fit

An ad on the radio today said that the host had no limits on what type of music he could play; he could play “whatever he sees fits.” There’s not a whole lot of difference between as you see fit and as you see fits, but the latter still strikes my funnybone, probably because it can mean both deem appropriate and observe to slot together. The change is as much in the sense of see as it is of fit.

Indeed it is your right, if not your obligation, to change yourself exactly as you see fits.
Self help book

This is shown in a HUD [heads-up display or status bar], which can be moved around on the screen as you see fits.
Gamepedia

Last edited by burred (2015-11-23 17:43:06)

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#7 2015-11-24 05:22:59

DavidTuggy
Eggcornista
From: Mexico
Registered: 2007-10-11
Posts: 2713
Website

Re: seeking fit

Fits. Very nicely.


*If the human mind were simple enough for us to understand,
we would be too simple-minded to understand it* .

(Possible Corollary: it is, and we are .)

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#8 2015-11-24 07:43:27

kem
Eggcornista
From: Victoria, BC
Registered: 2007-08-28
Posts: 2851

Re: seeking fit

There’s not a whole lot of difference between as you see fit and as you see fit.

It’s the same distance as in the joke about the NYT masthead slogan being changed from “All the news that’s fit to print” to “All the news that fits, we print.”


Hatching new language, one eggcorn at a time.

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