meta4
(Stay tuned for a guide entry summarizing metaphor.)
see also http://h2g2.com/h2g2/guide/U139946" >http://h2g2.com/h2g2/guide/U139946
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A departure from the apparent meaning of this name...
Me·ta (mt, mtä)
meta- \Met"a-\, or Met-
pref.
1. A prefix meaning between, with, after, behind, over, about; a placing reversely.
Change; transformation: metachromatism.
Having undergone metamorphosis: metasomatic.
Beyond; transcending; more comprehensive: metalinguistics.
A carrying over: metathesis
Alternation: metagenesis.
Later in time: metestrus.
[Greek from meta, beside, after; see me-2 in Indo-European Roots.]
me-2
Derivatives are: mid, In the middle of.
Suffixed form *me-dhi. from Old English mid, among, with, from Germanic *mid-.
Suffixed form *me-ta. meta-, from Greek meta, between, with, beside, after.
See also medhyo-.
[Gr. ? between, with, after; akin to AS. mid with, G. mit, Goth. mi[thorn], E. mid.]
Source: Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary, © 1996, 1998 MICRA, Inc.
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meta <analytic philosophy> /me't*/ or /may't*/ or (Commonwealth) /mee't*/
A prefix meaning one level of description up (higher). If X is some concept then meta-X is data about, or processes operating on, X.
For example, a metasyntax is syntax for specifying syntax, metalanguage is a language used to discuss language (or a metasyntactic variable is a variable in notation used to describe syntax), meta-data is data about data, and meta-reasoning is reasoning about reasoning.
This is difficult to explain briefly, but much hacker humour turns on deliberate confusion between meta-levels. See {hacker humor}.
[Jargon File 4.2.0]
(1999-04-06)
Source: The Free On-line Dictionary of Computing, © 1993-2000 Denis Howe
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Ceci n'est pas un babelfish ><> This is a metababelfish
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Meta4
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