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What's it called when an inventor's invention backfires on them?
(midwest.social)
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this post was submitted on 08 May 2024
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I really hope there’s a single word for it out there… more convenient yanno.
There's probably a long and complex German word for it :-)
There's probably a German word for the concept that there is a German word for everything.
Indeed - for OP's purposes, I came up with this (but I don't speak German, so it may make no sense at all): Erfindungselbstfehlzündung
Google seems to like it well enough!
Or better, Erfindungdererfinderselbstfehlzündung:
The first one works, the second doesn't. You cannot simply put any words together.
Maybe YOU can't.
Well, not with that attitude... ;-)
Nah, fair enough - as I said, I can't speak German, so was just mucking about trying to get something that might be plausible. Thanks for clarifying.
The first one kinda works, but I think it'd be more clear, when used without "selbst"/self, as this would be read to reference the invention instead of the inventor.
On the other hand, that then feels like "yeah, it didn't work. The invention misfired and is crap". Maybe "Erfindungserschafferzerstörer"? (Invention's creator destructor) but that sounds off, too.
There's not really a word that I can come up with that really conveys this meaning. There's a german saying "wer Andern eine Grube gräbt, fällt selbst hinein" (he, who digs a hole for others, will fall into it by itself). Then there's the humorous "Rohrkrepierer" (along the lines of "died in the barrel") which basically means something like "dead on arrival" / that went wrong and didn't work. So it'd be probably something that references one of those, which would make it work culturally?
German words are all made up.
:-)
Hey!
German is not the only language to use compound words!
Swedish is another good example of a language with compound words.
The best compound word I can come up with is "Uppfinnarmissöde"
Uppfinnar - Inventor
missöde - misadventure or mishap
So "uppfinnarmissöde" would translate to either "inventor mishap" or "inventor misadventure", I prefer the latter as it kinda rhymes when you say it.