Clue (information)

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A clue or a hint is a piece of information bringing someone closer to a conclusion. [1] It is revealed either because it is discovered by someone who needs it or because it is shared (given) by someone else.

In some games, if a player is stuck on a puzzle, they can ask for clues to help them progress in the game.

In some games, clues are an integral ludeme of the game mechanics, whereas in others they are considered cheats.

Clues can either be given straight, be cryptic, be riddles, or contain contradictions.

The word originally was an alternate of spelling of clew, which was defined as "a ball of thread". The word evolved to have its current meaning in part because of the common motif in mythology and folklore of using a ball of thread to aid in escaping a maze. [2]

Related Research Articles

Hubris, or less frequently hybris, describes a personality quality of extreme or excessive pride or dangerous overconfidence and complacency, often in combination with arrogance. The term arrogance comes from the Latin adrogare, meaning "to feel that one has a right to demand certain attitudes and behaviors from other people". To arrogate means "to claim or seize without justification... To make undue claims to having", or "to claim or seize without right... to ascribe or attribute without reason". The term pretension is also associated with the term hubris, but is not synonymous with it.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Leet</span> Online slang and alternative orthography

Leet, also known as eleet or leetspeak, is a system of modified spellings used primarily on the Internet. It often uses character replacements in ways that play on the similarity of their glyphs via reflection or other resemblance. Additionally, it modifies certain words on the basis of a system of suffixes and alternative meanings. There are many dialects or linguistic varieties in different online communities.

A shill, also called a plant or a stooge, is a person who publicly helps or gives credibility to a person or organization without disclosing that they have a close relationship with said person or organization. Shills can carry out their operations in the areas of media, journalism, marketing, politics, sports, confidence games, cryptocurrency, or other business areas. A shill may also act to discredit opponents or critics of the person or organization in which they have a vested interest.

A connotation is a commonly understood cultural or emotional association that any given word or phrase carries, in addition to its explicit or literal meaning, which is its denotation.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Synonym</span> Words or phrases having the same meaning

A synonym is a word, morpheme, or phrase that means exactly or nearly the same as another word, morpheme, or phrase in a given language. For example, in the English language, the words begin, start, commence, and initiate are all synonyms of one another: they are synonymous. The standard test for synonymy is substitution: one form can be replaced by another in a sentence without changing its meaning. Words are considered synonymous in only one particular sense: for example, long and extended in the context long time or extended time are synonymous, but long cannot be used in the phrase extended family. Synonyms with exactly the same meaning share a seme or denotational sememe, whereas those with inexactly similar meanings share a broader denotational or connotational sememe and thus overlap within a semantic field. The former are sometimes called cognitive synonyms and the latter, near-synonyms, plesionyms or poecilonyms.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Crossword</span> Grid-based word puzzle

A crossword is a word game consisting of a grid of black and white squares, into which solvers enter words or phrases ("entries") crossing each other horizontally ("across") and vertically ("down") according to a set of clues. Each white square is typically filled with one letter, while the black squares are used to separate entries. The first white square in each entry is typically numbered to correspond to its clue.

Before the popularization of the Internet in the 1990s, Internet slang defined a luser as a painfully annoying, stupid, or irritating computer user. The word is a blend of "loser" and "user". Among hackers, the word luser takes on a broad meaning, referring to any normal user, with the implication the person is also a loser. The term is partially interchangeable with the hacker term lamer.

A puzzle is a game, problem, or toy that tests a person's ingenuity or knowledge. In a puzzle, the solver is expected to put pieces together in a logical way, in order to arrive at the correct or fun solution of the puzzle. There are different genres of puzzles, such as crossword puzzles, word-search puzzles, number puzzles, relational puzzles, and logic puzzles. The academic study of puzzles is called enigmatology.

In linguistics, homonyms are words which are either homographs—words that have the same spelling —or homophones—words that have the same pronunciation —or both. Using this definition, the words row, row and row are homonyms because they are homographs : so are the words see (vision) and sea, because they are homophones.

Flesh is any aggregation of soft tissues of an organism. Various multicellular organisms have soft tissues that may be called "flesh". In mammals, including humans, flesh encompasses muscles, fats and other loose connective tissues, but sometimes excluding non-muscular organs and typically discarded parts. More generally, it may be considered the portions of the body that are soft and delicate. In a culinary context, consumable animal flesh is called meat, while processed visceral tissues are known as offal.

A gimmick is a novel device or idea designed primarily to attract attention or increase appeal, often with little intrinsic value. When applied to retail marketing, it is a unique or quirky feature designed to make a product or service "stand out" from its competitors. Product gimmicks are sometimes considered mere novelties, and tangential to the product's functioning. Gimmicks are occasionally viewed negatively, but some seemingly trivial gimmicks of the past have evolved into useful, permanent features. In video games, the term is also sometimes used to describe unusual features or playstyles, especially if they are unnecessary or obnoxious.

A contronym, contranym or autantonym is a word with two meanings that are opposite each other. For example, the word cleave can mean "to cut apart" or "to bind together". This phenomenon is called enantiosemy, enantionymy, antilogy or autantonymy. An enantiosemic term is by definition polysemic.

A counsel or a counsellor at law is a person who gives advice and deals with various issues, particularly in legal matters. It is a title often used interchangeably with the title of lawyer.

An ostensive definition conveys the meaning of a term by pointing out examples. This type of definition is often used where the term is difficult to define verbally, either because the words will not be understood or because of the nature of the term. It is usually accompanied with a gesture pointing to the object serving as an example, and for this reason is also often referred to as "definition by point ".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Champion</span> Victor in a challenge, contest or competition

A champion is the victor in a challenge, contest or competition. There can be a territorial pyramid of championships, e.g. local, regional/provincial/state, national, continental and world championships, and even further (artificial) divisions at one or more of these levels, as in association football. Their champions can be accordingly styled, e.g. national champion, world champion.

Kuso is a term used in East Asia for the internet culture that generally includes all types of camp and parody. In Japanese, kuso (糞,くそ,クソ) is a word that is commonly translated to English as curse words such as fuck, shit, damn, and bullshit, and is often said as an interjection. It is also used to describe outrageous matters and objects of poor quality. This usage of kuso was brought into Taiwan around 2000 by young people who frequently visited Japanese websites and quickly became an internet phenomenon, spreading to Taiwan and Hong Kong and subsequently to Mainland China.

A usurper is an illegitimate or controversial claimant to power, often but not always in a monarchy. In other words, one who takes the power of a country, city, or established region for oneself, without any formal or legal right to claim it as one's own. Usurpers can rise to power in a region by often unexpected physical force, as well as through political influence and deceit.

Beaner is a derogatory slur originally from the United States to refer to individuals of Hispanic or Latino descent, particularly those that are from Mexico or of Mexican American heritage. It originates from the bean being a staple ingredient in Mexican cuisine.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sardonicism</span> Expressions of humor used during adversity: cynicism, derision, skepticism

To be sardonic is to be disdainfully or cynically humorous, or scornfully mocking. A form of wit or humour, being sardonic often involves expressing an uncomfortable truth in a clever and not necessarily malicious way, often with a degree of skepticism.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Guessing</span> Swift conclusion drawn from data directly at hand

A guess is a swift conclusion drawn from data directly at hand, and held as probable or tentative, while the person making the guess admittedly lacks material for a greater degree of certainty. A guess is also an unstable answer, as it is "always putative, fallible, open to further revision and interpretation, and validated against the horizon of possible meanings by showing that one interpretation is more probable than another in light of what we already know". In many of its uses, "the meaning of guessing is assumed as implicitly understood", and the term is therefore often used without being meticulously defined. Guessing may combine elements of deduction, induction, abduction, and the purely random selection of one choice from a set of given options. Guessing may also involve the intuition of the guesser, who may have a "gut feeling" about which answer is correct without necessarily being able to articulate a reason for having this feeling.

References

  1. "Clue Definition & Meaning | Britannica Dictionary". www.britannica.com. Retrieved 2023-12-06.
  2. "Definition of CLUE". www.merriam-webster.com. 2024-01-26. Retrieved 2024-01-31.