lie detector
2
3.5
- noun
- /laɪ dɪˈtɛktər/
- Neologism
:
detector de mentiras
- I think the voters are a pretty good lie detector test.
- a human lie detector
People cheat more and the lie detector stops working.
- People cheat more and the lie detector stops working.
Examples
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DAVE: IT'S A LIE DETECTOR APP.
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The new lie detector app analyzes your speech to determine if you are being honest.
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Just to really bring it home, if this lie detector was a musical, what would you sing?
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Yeah, the whole room's a lie detector.
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"A lie detector," she said.
Fiction book (1998) -
People cheat more and the lie detector stops working.
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Don't tell me you think you're a human lie detector.
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Which is bad... ...because I've been avoiding Rodrick's built-in lie detector.
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When I asked the anonymous author of the Twitter parody whether he was a latter-day Prutkov, he responded with characteristic bite: "More like a lie detector."
Academic text (2011) -
Using a lie detector, the police hoped to uncover the truth behind the suspect's alibi.
Surface Forms
Morphology
The meaning 'an instrument or system that detects lies' is directly and transparently composed from 'lie' (to utter a falsehood) + 'detector' (a device that detects), so a B1 learner who knows both constituents can readily infer the MWE meaning. This noun-noun compounding is cross-linguistically common and follows basic compositional patterns, making the expression transparent despite varying technologies used to implement such detectors.
Etymology
Lie detector in a newer sense comes from the old machine idea but now means software that watches voice, face, or words to spot a lie. The same idea of a detector that looks for signs of 'lying' stays the same, but the tools are computers and phones instead of instruments on the body.