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Clutter vs Tangle - What's the difference?

clutter | tangle | Synonyms |

As nouns the difference between clutter and tangle

is that clutter is a confused disordered jumble of things while tangle is a tangled twisted mass.

As verbs the difference between clutter and tangle

is that clutter is to fill something with clutter while tangle is to become mixed together or intertwined.

clutter

English

Noun

(-)
  • A confused disordered jumble of things.
  • * L'Estrange
  • He saw what a clutter there was with huge, overgrown pots, pans, and spits.
  • *{{quote-magazine, year=2013, month=May-June, author= William E. Conner
  • , title= An Acoustic Arms Race , volume=101, issue=3, page=206-7, magazine=(American Scientist) , passage=Nonetheless, some insect prey take advantage of clutter' by hiding in it. Earless ghost swift moths become “invisible” to echolocating bats by forming mating clusters close (less than half a meter) above vegetation and effectively blending into the ' clutter of echoes that the bat receives from the leaves and stems around them.}}
  • (obsolete) Clatter; confused noise.
  • (Jonathan Swift)
  • Background echos, from clouds etc., on a radar or sonar screen.
  • (countable) A group of cats;
  • * 2008 , John Robert Colombo, The Big Book of Canadian Ghost Stories , Introduction
  • Organizing ghost stories is like herding a clutter of cats: the phenomenon resists organization and classification.

    Derived terms

    * surface clutter * volume clutter

    Verb

    (en verb)
  • To fill something with .
  • *{{quote-magazine, title=No hiding place
  • , date=2013-05-25, volume=407, issue=8837, page=74, magazine=(The Economist) citation , passage=In America alone, people spent $170 billion on “direct marketing”—junk mail of both the physical and electronic varieties—last year. Yet of those who received unsolicited adverts through the post, only 3% bought anything as a result. If the bumf arrived electronically, the take-up rate was 0.1%. And for online adverts the “conversion” into sales was a minuscule 0.01%. That means about $165 billion was spent not on drumming up business, but on annoying people, creating landfill and cluttering spam filters.}}
  • (obsolete) To clot or coagulate, like blood.
  • (Holland)
  • To make a confused noise; to bustle.
  • * Tennyson
  • It [the goose] cluttered here, it chuckled there.
    (Webster 1913)

    tangle

    English

    (wikipedia tangle)

    Etymology 1

    Origin uncertain; apparently a variant form of (tagle).

    Verb

    (tangl)
  • to become mixed together or intertwined
  • Her hair was tangled from a day in the wind.
  • to be forced into some kind of situation
  • to enter into an argument, conflict, dispute, or fight
  • Don't tangle with someone three times your size.
    He tangled with the law.
  • to mix together or intertwine
  • to catch and hold
  • * Milton
  • Tangled in amorous nets.
  • * Crashaw
  • When my simple weakness strays, / Tangled in forbidden ways.
    Synonyms
    * (to become mixed together or intertwined) dishevel, tousle * (to be forced into some kind of situation) drag, drag in, embroil, sweep, sweep up * argue, conflict, dispute, fight * (to mix together or intertwine) entangle, knot, mat, snarl * (to catch and hold) entrap
    Antonyms
    * (to mix together or intertwine) untangle, unsnarl

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • A tangled twisted mass.
  • A complicated or confused state or condition.
  • * {{quote-magazine, date=2013-08-03, volume=408, issue=8847, magazine=(The Economist)
  • , title= Boundary problems , passage=Economics is a messy discipline: too fluid to be a science, too rigorous to be an art. Perhaps it is fitting that economists’ most-used metric, gross domestic product (GDP), is a tangle too. GDP measures the total value of output in an economic territory. Its apparent simplicity explains why it is scrutinised down to tenths of a percentage point every month.}}
  • An argument, conflict, dispute, or fight.
  • (mathematics) A region of the projection of a knot such that the knot crosses its perimeter exactly four times.
  • Synonyms
    * (tangled twisted mass) knot, mess, snarl * (complicated or confused state or condition) maze, snarl * argument, conflict, dispute, fight

    Etymology 2

    Of Scandinavian origin; compare Norwegian tongul, Faroese tongul, Icelandic .

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • Any large type of seaweed, especially a species of Laminaria .
  • * 1849 , , In Memoriam , 10:
  • Than if with thee the roaring wells / Should gulf him fathom-deep in brine; / And hands so often clasped in mine, / Should toss with tangle and with shells.
  • (in the plural) An instrument consisting essentiallly of an iron bar to which are attached swabs, or bundles of frayed rope, or other similar substances, used to capture starfishes, sea urchins, and other similar creatures living at the bottom of the sea.