| 词组 | ascertain |
| 释义 | ascertain As late as Nicholson 1957 we find objection to the use of ascertain used to mean simply "to find out"; Nicholson insists it must mean "to find out or learn for a certainty, by experiment, investigation, or examination." The problem with this insistence is that it depends upon the ways definers in various dictionaries have handled ascertain and neglects the far more important question of how good writers have actually used ascertain. Definers may have been influenced by the etymology of the word and a desire to semantically tie this one surviving sense to older defunct senses. It is certainly hard to tell, in a great many contexts, the difference between "finding out or learning" and "finding out or learning for certain." The objection is of obscure origin, perhaps alluded to as early as 1889 by Walter Pater in his Appreciations. It seems to have been in its fullest flower in the 1920s: Whipple 1924 emphasizes "definitely," and in 1927 both Krapp and Emily Post object to its use as simply "find out." These three suggest that the use may have been a popular one at the time, and quite likely a conversational one. Krapp's example—"I will ascertain if Mr. Jones is free to see you"—is not typical of our examples of written use. But Jane Austen had already established the less strenuous use: • Morland produced his watch, and ascertained the fact—Northanger Abbey, 1818 • ... they had the advantage of ascertaining from an upper window that he wore a blue coat, and rode a black horse —Pride and Prejudice, 1813 It was thereafter available for other writers to use, and use it they certainly have: • It was not difficult for one who knew the city well, to find his house without asking any question. Having ascertained its situation ... —Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities, 1859 • The boy crept along under the bank to ascertain from the nature of the proceedings if it would be prudent to interrupt so splendid a creature as Miss Eus-tacia on his poor trivial account —Thomas Hardy, The Return ofthe Native, 1878 • ... even went the length of reading the play of "King John" in order to ascertain what it was all about — George Bernard Shaw, Cashel Byron's Profession, 1886 • ... his whole attention concentrated on ascertaining by ear what he had been accustomed to judge by sight —C. S. Forester, The African Queen, 1935 • ... to catch intermittent glimpses of the Germans and so ascertain that they were still alive —Jeremy Bernstein, New Yorker, 30 Oct. 1971 There is no problem with this use of ascertain, and probably there never was. |
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