Walking at the
Matthaei Botanical Gardens this morning, my friend and I happened across the "new walking labyrith". At first we saw signs for it and were all excited, and as we followed the signs for it, we postulated about it having legs and walking away from us as fast as we were walking towards it..... and then we found it. And son, we were disappoint.
It was a circle with a spiral path to the centre. The turns of the spiral were separated by two-inch-high grass. We could see all the way across the twenty-foot or so labyrith. We were invited by a sign to "traverse" it (language nazi says argh!) by walking slowly and contemplating inner peace (yes, it is Ann Arbor, what made you ask?)
No dead ends, no choices, no wrong decisions to be made, no anticipation of where the path might lead.....
So I googled labyrinth when I got home and found this:
Quote:
Labyrinths and mazes have often been confused. When most people hear of a labyrinth they think of a maze. A labyrinth is not a maze. A maze is like a puzzle to be solved. It has twists, turns, and blind alleys. It is a left brain task that requires logical, sequential, analytical activity to find the correct path into the maze and out.
A labyrinth has only one path. It is unicursal. The way in is the way out. There are no blind alleys. The path leads you on a circuitous path to the center and out again.
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from
here
So then I pulled out my Shorter Oxford, which made no mention of this alternate/original meaning:
1) A structure consisting of a complex network of tunnels, paths, etc. through which it is difficult to find one's way, a maze.....
2) A complex or confusing situation
3) (anatomical along that theme)
4) (engineering/electonical along that theme)
So I checked with the source of all that is true, Wikipedia, which has both meanings.
To my mind, they are mutually exclusive ideas. Maybe that makes labyrinth an autoantonym. Can nouns be autoantonyms? I guess this should be in the philosophy or nothing forum, but it isn't so there.
So which definition do you support -Maze, or Unicursal Path? Or Autoantonym?
Discuss. If you feel like it and/or have work to avoid...