common fate
1
8.1
- noun
- Specialized
:
destino común
- In the experiment, participants realized that the dancers' movements showed a common fate that united them visually.
Examples
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As the two teams faced the same challenges throughout the tournament, it was clear they were experiencing a common fate.
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And now we also share a common fate.
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While the two states of postwar Germany existed, Germans could believe in the unity of their nation, of a people with a common language, a common past, even a common fate.
Academic text (1993) -
When the animals moved in sync across the field, it was a demonstration of their common fate in the wild.
Synonyms
A rule that makes things moving the same way look like one group
Surface Forms
Morphology
A learner who knows 'common' (shared) and 'fate' (destiny) can plausibly infer a general meaning of 'shared destiny' from the constituents, so there is a clear compositional cue. However, the technical Gestalt sense (a perceptual grouping principle about elements moving together) is a specialized, partly metaphorical extension that is not fully predictable without exposure, so the expression is only partially transparent.
Etymology
The term common fate comes from watching things that move the same way. Imagine a flock of birds all flying together — because they move alike they seem to 'belong together', so common fate means we see parts that behave the same as one group.