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OPTHO
Meaning of the word "ticket" in given sentence

Glossary entry

English term or phrase:

but

English answer:

simply / just

Added to glossary by Donna Stevens
May 29, 2013 09:06
11 yrs ago
English term

but

English Science Science (general) oceans
It is World Oceans Day. Why is it important to commemorate such a day?
>> Well, the ocean actually dominates the world. It's the underpinning of everything we care about: our economy, health, security, ***but*** life itself. So we should celebrate it. We should draw attention to the ocean and why we should care.

Does the phrase mean "and even life itself"? Or "that is, life itself"?
Responses
4 +1 simply
Change log

May 30, 2013 13:18: Donna Stevens changed "Edited KOG entry" from "<a href="/profile/21487">Ana Juliá's</a> old entry - "but"" to ""simply / indeed""

Discussion

Ana Juliá (asker) May 30, 2013:
Thank you all .
Armorel Young May 29, 2013:
Both Tony and Jack have clearly hit on the right meaning, and expressed it well. The writer may have been aware that "but" can in some circumstances be used for emphasis ("He gave me nothing, but nothing, for all the work I'd done") but got it wrong on this occasion.
Barbara L Pavlik May 29, 2013:
I have to agree with Tony. If you look at it logically, life itself does depend on the ocean (among other things). The whole water cycle depends on it, and with it, the food cycle, so I don't think that there can be any question of excluding life itself from the list of things underpinned by the ocean.
Tony M May 29, 2013:
@ Asker I agree with Nuno that it would be best to check with the customer; I believe this is not an error nor sloppy writing, but rather an archaic poetic use with the sense of 'yea, indeed, ...'

However, unfamiliar as it would be to most contemporary readers, I think it was probably an unwise choice on the part of the writer!
Tony M May 29, 2013:
@ David I don't agree with your suggestion: it isn't 'everything but...', it's clearly 'indeed, life itself'
David Moore (X) May 29, 2013:
Lazy author... IMO, it should have been written as follows:

"...everything we care about: our economy, health, security - indeed, everything but life itself."
Jack Doughty May 29, 2013:
Yes Perhaps it should be "not just our economy, health and security, but life itself".
Barbara L Pavlik May 29, 2013:
That is a very strange sentence. I would have expected "and" instead of "but." Can you check with the author to see if it is a typographical error?

Responses

+1
2 hrs
Selected

simply

This is an adverb, not a conjunction or preposition. Here it means "simply life itself" or "just life itself"
This is a rather old-fashioned, or perhaps one could say poetic use of the word "but". You find it used in the King James Version of the Bible e.g. 1 Samuel 17 "Philistine looked about, and saw David, he disdained him: for he was but a youth,..."
Edgar Allan Poe wrote "All that we see or seem is but a dream within a dream."
Example sentence:

This was but the start of the tragedy.

She was but a child when her father died.

Reference:

http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/e/edgarallan109738.html

Peer comment(s):
agree Edith Kelly : just
4 hrs
Thanks, Edith!
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4 KudoZ points awarded for this answer. Comment: "Thanks"
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