New answers tagged linguistics
2
Materialistic is an adjective derived from the noun
Materialist:
1660s and after in various philosophical and theological senses, on model of French matérialiste, from material (n.) + -ist
Materialistic:
"pertaining to, of the nature of, or characterized by materialism" in any sense, 1829, from materialist + -ic.
(Etymonline)
The suffix -like is ...
2
"Mining" is apparently the established term for bitcoin, which seems to have been influential on following cryptocurrencies (I don't know much about the history of cryptocurrencies, so I can't give a detailed account). Satoshi Nakamoto's paper "Bitcoin: A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System" includes the analogy to mining:
The steady addition of a ...
4
The formation is often, although not always, based on etymology. When not based on etymology, analogy with other adjectives can play a role. As Greg Lee mentioned, there are no firm principles about the formation of such adjectives.
Adjectives ending in ian, -eian, -ean tend to come from Latin adjectives ending in -ius, -eius, -eus, which in turn may come ...
0
The word hippopotomonstrosesquipedalian ["Of or pertaining to extremely long words"] and the even more dubious hippopotomonstrosesquipedaliophobic ["(humorous) The fear of long words"] can be found online, but neither appears in any reputable dictionary; indeed, Wiktionary notes of the latter that "It is unlikely that this 15-syllable contrivance is ever ...
Top 50 recent answers are included
