Maybe someone can explain this phrase to me.

[dem629]

Sometimes, when someone is trying to convey the idea of "very little" they will say "just a fraction."

Example: "The cost of getting the car repaired is just a fraction of buying a new one."

Couldn't that fraction be 9/10, even though the person might be trying to convey the idea that the cost is only 1/10?

:shrug:

Where and why did this cliche ever start? It's stupid!

[Dr. Strange]

1. I've always thought that would make a funny joke.

Tell someone your product costs just a fraction of the competition's. And when they agree to buy it, you charge them twice as much. When they say, "Hey! I thought yours was a fraction of the cost," you tell them, "Well, 2/1 is a fraction!"

[TZ]

2. hmm

well if you ever get tired of teaching math sounds like you could have a future as a used car salesman..:rofl:

[Tommy_Carcetti]

3. It's a way to make a portion of something sound smaller than it actually is. nt

[sammythecat]

4. "a fraction" is just as vague, unhelpful, and exasperating as "a while"

Neither really tells you anything.

[HarukaTheTrophyWife]

10. I don't say awhile, I say 20 minutes for everything

Because I'm from NJ.

[sammythecat]

13. I see

Cuts off that, "Whad'ya mean... a while??" nonsense right from the start.

:rofl:

[HarukaTheTrophyWife]

14. Everything in NJ is 20 minutes away, unless you're going down the shore

That's at least an hour.

[Tangerine LaBamba]

5. It's not stupid

It's meant to convey the notion that something is less than the original.

No amount is specified - just that it's less.

You're putting a gloss on it - believing that it's meant to imply that it is far smaller than the original - that isn't there.

[sammythecat]

7. I'd bet most of the time when someone wants to know

if something is less than the original, they'd like to know "how much less".

"How much money is left?"
"A fraction of what you had." :banghead:

To me, that's as useless as,

"How long will it take?"
"Oh, probably a while." :grr: :banghead: :spank:

[Tangerine LaBamba]

15. Now you're posing a different situation -

and you are asking specific questions requiring a specific answer. You want a concrete, measurable response.

That's not how I read your OP.

I, like you, wouldn't accept such vague answers.........................

[Pacifist Patriot]

6. Sure...

It's a figure of speech. Most of them make little sense when examined literally. :)

[jobycom]

8. Easily. The word is not originally a mathematical word, but instead meant a broken piece.

From Latin "Fractus," meaning broken. (I did look that part up).

It later became a mathematical term, but originally it just meant a small part of something, and that's what the expression refers to.

So stupid calling things stupid!

(In case you think I made any of that up: WORD HISTORY Our word fraction did not originally have a mathematical sense. It goes back ultimately to the Latin verb frangere, “to break.” From the stem of the past participle frāctus is derived Late Latin frāctiō (stem frāctiōn-), “a breaking” or “a breaking in pieces,” as in the breaking of the Eucharistic Host. In Medieval Latin the word frāctiō developed its mathematical sense, which was taken into Middle English along with the word. The earliest recorded sense of our word is “an aliquot part of a unit, a fraction or subdivision,” found in a work by Chaucer written about 1400. One of the next recorded instances of the word recalls its origins, referring to the “brekying or fraccioun” of a bone.) http://www.answers.com/topic/fraction

[av8rdave]

9. For some reason - maybe the way we were taught about fractions as kids -

we seem to think of a "fraction" as something small.

My best guess as to how that one got started.

[Pharlo]

11. 'just a fraction' or 'a while' don't bother me very much.

For me, the problem is in recipes. I can't cook. When I ask "how much do I put add?" I do NOT want to hear "to taste" or "until it looks good".........I mean, I can't cook. I have NO reference. If it 'tastes good' and 'looks' good before I add this thing, do I even really need it? If I don't, why bother telling me I do? Is asking for definitive quantities in a recipe TOO much to ask?

I think the 'fraction' thing irks a lot of people - only in different fashions. For me, it's in recipes.

[Tangerine LaBamba]

16. I understand

But, if you had more experience with cooking, you'd maybe understand that there are some things for which there are no measured recipes. When someone wants to learn how to cook my marinara sauce, I invite them over to watch and take notes. I just don't have a written recipe.

Once, when a recipe of mine was printed in an article I wrote for Newsday, I got a call from the editor the day before publication, incredulous at the amounts I had listed, but I assured her they were correct, and the recipe got a wonderful reader response.

So, sometimes a cook can make a good, workable guess about amounts. But, I have never heard any use "a fraction of" in describing how much of an ingredient is to be used.

I think the whole "to taste" thing comes with experience. In my case, a lifetime of experience....................

[Bertha Venation]

12. It's as lame as using "decimated" to describe hurricane damage (for example)

To decimate means to reduce by one-tenth.

(So I postulate.)

[Tangerine LaBamba]

17. I love you

Get over here and sit with Tangerine while we mock people who use our beloved language incorrectly.

Then we'll plot what we'll do with their bodies when we're done with them.

Yes?

:toast:

[Bertha Venation]

21. Sounds like a plan, Tangerine

:pals:

[trof]

18. Like 'decimated' has come to mean worse than it actually is.

To decimate is to reduce something by only 10%.
But when you read "The troops were decimated by the attack." it's come to mean damn near wiped out.
:shrug:

[Pharlo]

19. Actually, in it's original meaning,

'decimated' troops were the Roman army's way of keeping discipline among their own soldiers. In instances of lack of line discipline in battle, the military response would be to line the soldiers up, pull every tenth one out of the line and execute them. That is why the Roman army was as disciplined and effective as it was.

Roman soldiers feared their own army more than they did the enemy.

[HopeHoops]

20. Technically, 100,000,000/4 is a fraction - so yeah, it is stupid.