Twitch vs Still - What's the difference?
twitch | still |
A brief, small (sometimes involuntary) movement out of place and then back again; a spasm.
(informal) Action of spotting or seeking out a bird, especially a rare one.
(farriery) A stick with a hole in one end through which passes a loop, which can be drawn tightly over the upper lip or an ear of a horse and twisted to keep the animal quiet during minor surgery.
To perform a twitch; spasm.
* (rfdate) — [http://www.mindspring.com/~randyhoward/new_page_6.htm]
* 1922 , (Margery Williams), (The Velveteen Rabbit)
*:Their feet padded softly on the ground, and they crept quite close to him, twitching their noses...
To jerk sharply and briefly.
* Alexander Pope
To spot or seek out a bird, especially a rare one.
* 1995 , Quarterly Review of Biology vol. 70 p. 348:
* 2003 , Mark Cocker, Birders: Tales of a Tribe [http://books.google.com/books?id=tv-Noj1Fvc0C], ISBN 0802139965, page 52:
* 2005 , Sean Dooley, The Big Twitch: One Man, One Continent, a Race Against Time [http://books.google.com/books?id=fWLmpqL4EMsC], ISBN 1741145287, page 119:
couch grass, Elymus repens ; a species of grass, often considered as a weed.
Not moving; calm.
Not effervescing; not sparkling.
Uttering no sound; silent.
* Addison
(not comparable) Having the same stated quality continuously from a past time
* {{quote-news, 2007, January 3, Gerry Geronimo, Unwanted weed starts to sprout from a wayward ponencia, Manila Standard
, passage=To follow the still President’s marching orders, all that Secretary Ronnie Puno has to do is to follow the road map laid out by Justice Azcuna in his “separate” opinion. }}
Comparatively quiet or silent; soft; gentle; low.
* Bible, 1 Kings xix. 12
(obsolete) Constant; continual.
* Shakespeare
(aspect) Up to a time, as in the preceding time.
* Francis Bacon
* , chapter=15
, title= *
* {{quote-magazine, title=A better waterworks, date=2013-06-01, volume=407, issue=8838
, page=5 (Technology Quarterly), magazine=(The Economist)
(degree) To an even greater degree.
* Shakespeare
(conjunctive) Nevertheless.
* Moore
(archaic, poetic) Always; invariably; constantly; continuously.
* 1609 (William Shakespeare), Troilus and Cressida 5.2.201-202:
* Addison
* Boyle
(extensive) .
* {{quote-magazine, year=2013, month=July-August, author=
, title= A period of calm or silence.
(photography) A non-moving photograph. (The term is generally used only when it is necessary to distinguish from movies.)
(slang) A resident of the Falkland Islands.
A steep hill or ascent.
a device for distilling liquids.
(catering) a large water boiler used to make tea and coffee.
(catering) the area in a restaurant used to make tea and coffee, separate from the main kitchen.
A building where liquors are distilled; a distillery.
to calm down, to quiet
* Woodward
* Shakespeare
* Hawthorne
(obsolete) To trickle, drip.
* 1590 , Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene , III.ii:
To cause to fall by drops.
To expel spirit from by heat, or to evaporate and condense in a refrigeratory; to distill.
As nouns the difference between twitch and still
is that twitch is a brief, small (sometimes involuntary) movement out of place and then back again; a spasm while still is a period of calm or silence.As verbs the difference between twitch and still
is that twitch is to perform a twitch; spasm while still is to calm down, to quiet.As an adjective still is
not moving; calm.As an adverb still is
up to a time, as in the preceding time.twitch
English
Etymology 1
From (etyl) twicchen, from (etyl) twiccian, from (etyl) ).Noun
(es)- I saw a little twitch in the man's face, and knew he was lying.
Derived terms
* nervous twitchVerb
- "Why is it that you twitch whenever I say Faith?"
- to twitch somebody's sleeve for attention
- Thrice they twitched the diamond in her ear.
- "The Birdwatchers Handbook ... will be a clear asset to those who 'twitch' in Europe."
- "But the key revelation from twitching that wonderful Iceland Gull on 10 March 1974 wasn't its eroticism. It was the sheer innocence of it."
- "I hadn't seen John since I went to Adelaide to (unsuccessfully) twitch the '87 Northern Shoveler, when I was a skinny, eighteen- year-old kid. "
Usage notes
When used of birdwatchers by ignorant outsiders, this term frequently carries a negative connotation.Derived terms
* atwitchEtymology 2
alternate of quitchNoun
(-)still
English
Etymology 1
From (etyl) . Related to (l).Alternative forms
* (l) * (l), (l), (l) (obsolete)Adjective
(en-adj)- Still waters run deep.
- still''' water; '''still wines
- The sea that roared at thy command, / At thy command was still .
citation
- a still small voice
- By still practice learn to know thy meaning.
Synonyms
* (not moving) fixed, stationary, unmoving * See alsoDerived terms
* stillnessAdverb
(-)- It hath been anciently reported, and is still received.
The Mirror and the Lamp, passage=Edward Churchill still attended to his work in a hopeless mechanical manner like a sleep-walker who walks safely on a well-known round. But his Roman collar galled him, his cossack stifled him, his biretta was as uncomfortable as a merry-andrew's cap and bells.}}
- Hepaticology, outside the temperate parts of the Northern Hemisphere, still lies deep in the shadow cast by that ultimate "closet taxonomist," Franz Stephani—a ghost whose shadow falls over us all.
citation, passage=An artificial kidney these days still means a refrigerator-sized dialysis machine. Such devices mimic the way real kidneys cleanse blood and eject impurities and surplus water as urine.}}
- ("still" and "taller" can easily swap places here)
- The guilt being great, the fear doth still exceed.
- As sunshine, broken in the rill, / Though turned astray, is sunshine still .
- Lechery, lechery, still wars and lechery; nothing else holds fashion.
- The desire of fame betrays an ambitious man into indecencies that lessen his reputation; he is still afraid lest any of his actions should be thrown away in private.
- Chemists would be rich if they could still do in great quantities what they have sometimes done in little.
Sarah Glaz
Ode to Prime Numbers, volume=101, issue=4, magazine=(American Scientist) , passage=Some poems, echoing the purpose of early poetic treatises on scientific principles, attempt to elucidate the mathematical concepts that underlie prime numbers. Others play with primes’ cultural associations. Still others derive their structure from mathematical patterns involving primes.}}
Synonyms
* (up to a time) yet * (to an even greater degree) yet, even * (nevertheless) nonetheless, though, yetNoun
(en noun)- the still of the night
Etymology 2
Via (etyl), ultimately from (etyl) stillaNoun
(en noun) (wikipedia still)See also
* pot stillEtymology 3
(etyl) stillanVerb
(en verb)- to still the raging sea
- He having a full sway over the water, had power to still and compose it, as well as to move and disturb it.
- With his name the mothers still their babies.
- toil that would, at least, have stilled an unquiet impulse in me
Etymology 4
Aphetic form of distil, or from (etyl) (lena) stillare.Verb
(en verb)- any drop of slombring rest / Did chaunce to still into her wearie spright [...].
- (Tusser)