italki - Are pencils dull or blunt when you need to sharpen them, or can you use both terms? For knives:

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Robin

Are pencils dull or blunt when you need to sharpen them, or can you use both terms? For knives: - Are dull knives the ones that need sharpening and - Blunt knives would be knives like butter knives not intended to be sharp in the first place?

2023년 9월 30일 오전 3:24

답변 · 5

I'd say the most used term for all of those situations is 'blunt'. 'Dull' has been used for knives which needs to be sharpened but it's not heard much these days. In fact, if somebody told me the knives were dull, I might think they needed to be polished - they aren't shiny.

2023년 9월 30일

I’m curious how others will reply, but I wouldn’t use ‘blunt’ for any knife, even if it were dull. I hear ‘blunt’ as either ‘blunt object’ or figuratively to describe communication.

2023년 10월 1일

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