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What is "dilemma"

Crossword clues for dilemma

dilemma
Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
dilemma
noun
COLLOCATIONS FROM OTHER ENTRIES
a moral dilemma (=a difficult decision for moral reasons)
▪ Doctors face a moral dilemma when a patient can be kept alive but has no chance of real recovery.
herein/therein lies the problem/dilemma etc
▪ And herein lies the key to their achievements.
pose a dilemma (=cause a situation in which it is very difficult to decide what to do)
▪ In the future, the possibility of genetic testing on unborn children will pose a dilemma for parents.
solve a dilemma
▪ Can you solve my dilemma?
COLLOCATIONS FROM CORPUS
■ ADJECTIVE
big
▪ It is an even bigger dilemma at the ideology-setting level, which relates more to strategic movement.
central
▪ Yet, once the doctrine of consideration has been abandoned, the central dilemma of choice theories becomes even more obvious.
▪ The central dilemma of the war was embodied in these considerations.
▪ The central dilemma the Committee faced was how to achieve a balance in company boards between strong direction and accountability.
▪ She endlessly debates the central dilemma in her life.
ethical
▪ For over a decade I lived with this new knowledge and with the ethical dilemma surrounding my own pursuit of insider research.
▪ How everyone has relished the moral, ethical and legal dilemmas.
moral
▪ His moral dilemmas now appear in novels such as Schindler's Ark, his 1982 Booker prizewinner.
▪ Snipes gives a brilliant performance as a man caught in a moral dilemma.
▪ Different moral considerations might apply for different people in the face of similar moral dilemmas.
▪ When a clinical situation poses a genuine moral dilemma, by definition no right answer exists.
▪ The boy presented me with a moral dilemma.
▪ There are plenty of moral dilemmas.
▪ It takes no account of the moral dilemmas of human life.
▪ Dante wrote that the hottest room in hell is reserved for those who remain neutral in times of great moral dilemma.
political
▪ They have felt misunderstood and scapegoated, quite unprepared for the political and social dilemmas in which they were caught.
▪ To me, that campaign epitomized the political dilemma facing feminists.
▪ Thus a political dilemma has re-emerged.
▪ Instead, they take a hard look at a difficult moral and political dilemma and find no easy answers.
▪ But this is only a tongue-tip taste of the political dilemma Harrison faces.
▪ Both these factors interrelate with a third major political dilemma: the succession to political leadership.
real
▪ Nor do they deal with the real dilemmas of participation that have been the focus of considerable research.
▪ The only real dilemma, besides parking, is choosing which acts to see.
▪ I was now faced with a real dilemma.
▪ This posed a real dilemma for administrators.
■ VERB
confront
▪ Winkler sees the administration in the corporatist state as confronted by two dilemmas.
▪ When the time comes for him to write his next report, Blue is forced to confront this dilemma.
▪ When they hand out grades, and give or with-hold promotion, teachers are inescapably confronted with this dilemma.
▪ When 1 first came to work for the network, I was confronted with a nasty dilemma.
create
▪ Falun Gong's decision to stage demonstrations here has created a vexing dilemma for Hong Kong officials and business leaders.
deal
▪ They had dealt with the normative dilemma: should they stay at home or not after the child was born?
▪ Even the fashion of interdisciplinary studies can not really deal with the dilemma.
▪ Nor do they deal with the real dilemmas of participation that have been the focus of considerable research.
face
▪ This is no longer the case: scientists today are facing a similar dilemma!
▪ The task force chair, Robert Spitzer, was then faced with a dilemma.
▪ The managerial dilemmas Managers are paid more than workers because they face constant dilemmas which they have to resolve.
▪ In the decades to come, presidents would face the dilemma of what to do about gifts.
▪ But here we are faced with a dilemma.
▪ But now I face another dilemma.
▪ Blues-lovers such as myself face a dilemma.
▪ This sprawling town faces no shortage of dilemmas as it oozes toward the millennium.
pose
▪ Yet these brighter prospects pose their own dilemma.
▪ When Joe was asked to join the First Family each year for Christmas dinner, it posed a dilemma.
▪ This deliberate emphasis on the young people's unreliable and hurtful past relationships poses a dilemma for residential workers.
▪ When a clinical situation poses a genuine moral dilemma, by definition no right answer exists.
▪ This posed a dilemma for him.
▪ Federal disinvestment posed a serious dilemma for distressed cities.
▪ This poses a dilemma for the Fed.
▪ But it also poses problems and dilemmas which occur in communications policy more widely.
present
▪ Such bodies present us with a dilemma.
resolve
▪ The managerial dilemmas Managers are paid more than workers because they face constant dilemmas which they have to resolve.
▪ And the protagonists sounded fairly confident in their attempts to resolve the dilemma.
▪ The observational data show that Easton's neighbourhood police have two recipes for resolving this dilemma and its associated conundrum.
▪ Her brief from the state there was to resolve the dilemma.
▪ In resolving the many dilemmas of structure, solutions may only be temporary.
▪ In practice settings, those involved are often struggling to find ways of resolving the dilemmas they face.
▪ An argument with a colleague clarified and resolved the dilemma.
▪ I have never completely resolved my own dilemma, for I do not think it has a simple resolution.
solve
▪ I am so pleased that we have solved the dilemma and we can feel morally superior!
▪ Low-performing enterprises solve this dilemma by ignoring or denying potential qualitative costs.
▪ The students say they've put forward new ideas which could solve the dilemma.
▪ No mere textual reading or logical talisman can solve the dilemma.
▪ Oh, it brings plenty of its own unique disappointment and despair, but nothing to solve the dilemma of today.
PHRASES FROM OTHER ENTRIES
be on the horns of a dilemma
▪ Stirling, who had come direct from Eighth Army Headquarters, was on the horns of a dilemma.
EXAMPLES FROM OTHER ENTRIES
▪ It is a common dilemma: Should you stay where you have friends and family, or take that good job in a far-away city?
▪ Many single parents struggle with the dilemma of dividing time between work and children.
▪ With a child on each opposing team, Dad was faced with a dilemma: which supporters should he sit with?
▪ Writers are debating the ethical dilemma raised by the parents who did not want their Siamese twins separated.
EXAMPLES FROM CORPUS
▪ Another unforeseen dilemma which now surfaced was how to satisfy the demands of the new customers for winter-weight, or seasonal clothes.
▪ But last week's global stock market slump underscores the cartel's dilemma.
▪ I explained the dilemma to a friend.
▪ Peace campaigners in the 1980s, and animal-rights and environmental groups in the 1990s, faced this dilemma.
▪ Snipes gives a brilliant performance as a man caught in a moral dilemma.
▪ The first dilemma has been discussed: the managers gradually learned that their subordinates varied extensively in skill and motivation.
▪ This happens when the employee learns to escape the personal dilemma temporarily by devoting more effort to his or her job.
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Dilemma

Dilemma \Di*lem"ma\, n. [L. dilemma, Gr. ?; di- = di`s- twice + ? to take. See Lemma.]

  1. (Logic) An argument which presents an antagonist with two or more alternatives, but is equally conclusive against him, whichever alternative he chooses.

    Note: The following are instances of the dilemma. A young rhetorician applied to an old sophist to be taught the art of pleading, and bargained for a certain reward to be paid when he should gain a cause. The master sued for his reward, and the scholar endeavored to elude his claim by a dilemma. ``If I gain my cause, I shall withhold your pay, because the judge's award will be against you; if I lose it, I may withhold it, because I shall not yet have gained a cause.'' ``On the contrary,'' says the master, ``if you gain your cause, you must pay me, because you are to pay me when you gain a cause; if you lose it, you must pay me, because the judge will award it.''
    --Johnson.

  2. A state of things in which evils or obstacles present themselves on every side, and it is difficult to determine what course to pursue; a vexatious alternative or predicament; a difficult choice or position.

    A strong dilemma in a desperate case! To act with infamy, or quit the place.
    --Swift.

    Horns of a dilemma, alternatives, each of which is equally difficult of encountering.

Related phrases:
Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
dilemma

1520s, from Late Latin dilemma, from Greek dilemma "double proposition," a technical term in rhetoric, from di- "two" + lemma "premise, anything received or taken," from root of lambanein "to take" (see analemma). It should be used only of situations where someone is forced to choose between two alternatives, both unfavorable to him. But even logicians disagree on whether certain situations are dilemmas or mere syllogisms.

Wiktionary
dilemma

n. 1 A circumstance in which a choice must be made between two or more alternatives that seem equally undesirable. 2 A difficult circumstance or problem. 3 (context logic English) A type of syllogism of the form "if A is true then B is true; if C is true then D is true; either A or C is true; therefore either B or D is true". 4 (context rhetoric English) Offering to an opponent a choice between two (equally unfavorable) alternatives.

Related phrases:
WordNet
dilemma

n. state of uncertainty or perplexity especially as requiring a choice between equally unfavorable options [syn: quandary]

Wikipedia
Dilemma

A dilemma ( "double proposition") is a problem offering two possibilities, neither of which is unambiguously acceptable or preferable. One in this position has been traditionally described as "being on the horns of a dilemma", neither horn being comfortable. This is sometimes more colorfully described as "Finding oneself impaled upon the horns of a dilemma", referring to the sharp points of a bull's horns, equally uncomfortable (and dangerous).

The dilemma is sometimes used as a rhetorical device, in the form "you must accept either A, or B"; here A and B would be propositions each leading to some further conclusion. Applied incorrectly, it constitutes a false dichotomy, a fallacy.

Dilemma (song)

"Dilemma" is a song by American rapper Nelly, featuring American R&B singer Kelly Rowland. It was released on June 25, 2002 as the third single from the Nelly's second studio album Nellyville (2002), and the lead single from Rowland's debut solo album Simply Deep (2002). It was number one in ten countries, including the UK, the US and Australia, selling over 7.6 million copies worldwide. The song depicts the declaration of forbidden love by a female lover in a committed relationship, and the predicament the male protagonist must face.

In the 55th Anniversary of the Hot 100 issue of Billboard magazine, the song was ranked at number 75 on the all-time Hot 100 songs while at the end of 2009 was named the 11th most successful song from 2000 to 2009, on the Billboard Hot 100 Songs of the Decade. The song won a Grammy Award for Best Rap/Sung Collaboration at the 45th Grammy Awards. "Dilemma" was accredited internationally with 16 certifications. The song is also featured in the film About Time.

The song is also known as an internet meme in Hong Kong after it was parodied online.

Dilemma (bivalve)

Dilemma is a genus of marine bivalves of the family Poromyidae. The genus is remarkable for encompassing predators of isopods and ostracods, unusual for sessile molluscs.

Dilemma (novel)

Dilemma is a 1999 novel from Australian author Jon Cleary. It was the sixteenth book featuring Sydney detective Scobie Malone and involves his investigation of a murder in his parent's town and a kidnapping.

Dilemma (disambiguation)

A dilemma is a double proposition in logics.

Dilemma may also refer to:

  • "Dilemma" (song), by 2002 song performed by Nelly and Kelly Rowland
  • Dilemma (bivalve), a genus of bivalves
  • Dilemma, (British crime film 1962)
  • Prisoner's dilemma, a type of non-zero-sum game in which two players may each "cooperate" with or "defect" (i.e. betray) the other player
  • Confrontation analysis, also known as dilemma analysis
  • False dilemma, a logical fallacy
  • Darwin's Dilemma, a computer game released in 1990
  • The Dilemma, a 2011 comedy film
  • The Dilemma (1914 film), a silent movie
  • Dilemmas, a collection, published in 1954, of shorter pieces by the British philosopher, Gilbert Ryle (1900–1976)
  • Dilemma (novel), a 1999 novel by Jon Cleary
Related phrases:

Usage examples of "dilemma".

Dalmaticus Pontifex Maximus, thought this was a splendid way out of the Ahenobarbus dilemma, particularly because old Ahenobarbus had secured an augurship for his younger son, Lucius, not long before he died.

I very soon begged him to go away for fear the prefect should be awake, for in such a case we should have found ourselves in a very unpleasant dilemma, and most likely would have been accused of some abominable offence.

He did his best to get out of the dilemma, but seeing that I was pitiless he said he could not leave without paying a few small sums he owed the landlord, and without the wherewithal to obtain another lodging.

In this dilemma I took the part of taking the bill of exchange to him in person.

And my easy method with spiritual dilemmas proved to be but a case of ignotum per ignotius.

Tomorrow would be soon enough to face the devil and the dilemma of what to do about returning Merissa Thomas to Baton Rouge.

Now consider the dilemma facing an ovulating cave-woman who has just been fertilized.

What had been just a question of using my greater strength to force Peewee to behave was now an unsolvable dilemma.

After three decades of mathematical and scientific conquests, the philosopher in him was rising up, scrutinizing the new technological society through the long lens of history, and pondering its new ethical dilemmas and their human consequences.

This dilemma occupied him less and less as he became aware of still another Sonce phenomenon.

It not only flattened the Kosmos to a one-dimensional, monological affair, it sealed out the possibility of deeper and wider developments that alone could defuse its own insoluble dilemmas.

Janet mentioned casually that she would like a chair for herself, and after it formed she sat and began explaining about capricious city behavior and the Zeroth Law and moral dilemmas with large and small factions on either side of the issue.

The only solution to this dilemma that Brewster could devise was to actually get inside the time machine himself, so that he could find out where it went after he tripped the switch.

Dilemma, then, is a compound Conditional Syllogism, having for its Major Premise two Hypothetical Propositions, and for its Minor Premise a Disjunctive Proposition, whose alternative terms either affirm the Antecedents or deny the Consequents of the two Hypothetical Propositions forming the Major Premise.

Whatever the governments of countries like Britain, the United States, France and Germany had said about never giving in to terrorist blackmail, Meltdown would present them with the gravest dilemma any country had yet faced.