Word of the Day for Thursday, May 19, 2011
fungible \FUHN-juh-buhl\, adjective:
1. (Law) Freely exchangeable for or replaceable by another of like nature or kind in the satisfaction of an obligation.
2. Interchangeable.
noun:
1. Something that is exchangeable or substitutable. Usually used in the plural.
Someone said the other day that the B.O.'s presidency would be easily fungible with Mad Magazine's Alfred E. Newman; now, I don't think that is fair one bit - for Alfred!
--Spy Maker, JSA's Blog
People think this tax is for Social Security. But tax monies are really fungible. They get raided all the time.-- Eugene Ludwig, "Motivated to Work," interview by Kerry A. Dolan, Forbes, March 20, 2000
The setting is Ireland in the 1950's, but, a cynical reader might reflect, this sort of fiction is so common that the characters will be completely fungible.-- Susan Isaacs, "Three Little Girls From School", New York Times, December 30, 1990
Genuine eros makes us desire a particular person; crude desire is satisfiable by fungible bodies.-- Edward Craig (general editor), Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy
Fungible comes from Medieval Latin fungibilis, from Latin fungi (vice), "to perform (in place of)."
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