absolute power corrupts absolutely

proverb One who holds unchecked power or authority is likely to become corrupt or abuse one's position. This phrase is usually attributed to 19th-century historian Lord Acton. He really started abusing the authority of his office when he was promoted to CEO. Absolute power corrupts absolutely. A: "I never should have appointed Brian head of the committee." B: "You need to call him in for a meeting before he thinks that he can do whatever he wants. Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely." Their king isn't the first to take his power too far, and he won't be the last—absolute power corrupts absolutely.

See also: absolute, absolutely, corrupt, power

absolute unit

slang A large person or thing, especially due to being extremely overweight. Chiefly used in Internet memes, especially in the phrase In awe at the size of this lad. Absolute unit, or similar variations. Primarily heard in UK. Would you look at the size of the fella heading out of that pub? What an absolute unit! Some creep on Twitter shared an old photo of me with the caption, "In awe at the size of this lad. Absolute unit." I'm nearly four stone lighter now, for God's sake! A: "In awe at the size of this lad. Absolute unit." B: "Look at all the hot girls with him, though. My hats off to you, lad!"

be the (absolute) limit

To be a source of intense aggravation. Oh, I can't listen to that fool any longer—his idiotic questions are the limit! These forms the HR department makes us fill out are the absolute limit, I'm telling you! This audit has been the absolute limit for my whole team. Thank goodness it's almost over!

power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely

The more powerful one is, the more unscrupulous one becomes. A: "I never should have appointed him head of the committee." B: "You need to call him in for a meeting before he thinks that he can do whatever he wants. Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely."

See also: absolute, absolutely, and, corrupt, power

the (absolute) limit

A source of intense aggravation or annoyance. Oh, I can't listen to that fool any longer—his idiotic questions are the limit! These forms the HR department makes us fill out are the absolute limit, I'm telling you!

Absolute power corrupts absolutely.

Prov. One who has total authority is very likely to abuse his position. (This phrase was used by the British historian Lord Acton: "Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely.") We thought that Johnson would be a responsible mayor, but within a year of taking office, he was as bad as all the rest. Absolute power corrupts absolutely.

See also: absolute, absolutely, corrupt, power

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References in periodicals archive

It can be seen more exactly that the absoluteness of the power is objectified in the movement, and becomes a dominating power that oppresses people rather than liberating them.

The religiosity of populism: The sanctified and abused power of the people

Once we begin to differentiate ultimacy from absoluteness and recognize the source of theological ultimacy as its existential character and not religious uniqueness, it also becomes possible to uncouple uniqueness from superiority.

Absolutism to ultimacy: rhetoric and reality of religious "pluralism"

For Badiou to claim, for instance, that mathematics is ontology requires a meta-ontological decision, and only after the decision has taken place can we decide what that claim reveals about being and thinking, the absoluteness of mathematical discourse as an ontology.

The necessity of contingency or contingent necessity: Meillassoux, Hegel, and the subject

In Old Mortality, Scott resorts to his characters as a strategy to carry out two purposes: first, to break the absoluteness of reality, the definite and unique version of people and facts, and second, to undo the ideal conception of war through the analysis of the grounds which underlie the involvement and ideological tendencies of characters regarding war.

Anti-nationalism in Scott's Old Mortality

He has no qualms about this "relative absoluteness": "Christianity is absolute for [the] Christian, as other religions are for their adherents." In any case, he detects a universal intention in the Christian scriptures that has always, oddly enough, been moot.

Universal salvation: McLelland's latest book is an invaluable landmark

In order to keep self-maintaining, through constant improvement on the way that leads from the chaos to the absoluteness, the organization established a dynamic relation among: management dictatorship that is based on the strong need to realize the aims of perfection; active knowledge with the manual for action taking; processes for improvement and innovations with usage of modified Deming (PDCA) cycle.

Creating innovative environment in total quality management system within companies

The absoluteness of absolute music is the very condition of its meaning.

The social functions of music: articulating the dynamic relation between music and society

Just far enough to appreciate the uncanny, superhuman, impervious, all-powerful essence of the Murdoch mystique, to grasp the absoluteness of his power and come away with a book's worth of choice anecdotes about the Murdoch magic.

The Man Who Owns the News: Inside the Secret World of Rupert Murdoch

i had become distinctly, color-ridden, i was delivering the same message that had been diligently written, me, in my garage, with my utensils, the sky, perfect, similar, daunting, what carriage am i, i supposed, what relief, where it all ended i was dreaming comfortably, reclined on an imaginary horse, there were roses flying around in the air that smelled faintly of suicide and wet newspaper, the Resistance had been smitten for months, i imagined myself entering the bloody mouth, the gurgle i had encountered in the Absoluteness, in the guest book: "i have something to write, i was saying, majestic-ish."

the ex- (op)ponents

It is the absoluteness of this independence of judgment that causes people to attach the term "god-like" to the image of the physician.

What is a "Doctor?"

As a result there have been a number of reductions in the "absoluteness" of the exclusion, for example liability coverage for claims arising from smoke, fumes, vapor, and suit due to a hostile fire are no longer excluded.

Are ISO forms plain vanilla or tutti-frutti?

It is easy to envisage judges of Brennan's (Greenawalt's?) persuasion jumping off from the absoluteness of the prohibition: "shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion." No need (the argument might run) to predicate a correlative right in aliens abroad; many citizen members of the "dis-established" religion might be deemed to have standing to challenge its discriminatory, "other-religions-establishing" restriction on their opportunity to be joined by co-religionists (family-members, imams, etc.) from abroad.

Discrimination between religions: some thoughts on reading Greenawalt's "Religion and the Constitution: Establishment and Fairness"

The usual concept of space and time, based on Aristotle's principle of contemplation of the world and of the absoluteness of time, is a product of rational thinking.

Rational thinking and reasonable thinking in Physics

However, according to Istvan Hont, unlike the physiocrats' insistence on the absoluteness of private property, Smith admitted that in times of necessity, property rights could be overridden.

Jealousy of Trade: International Competition and the Nation-State in a Historical Perspective

Schelling also states in Philosophy of Art that Greek mythology is the highest archetype of the poetic world (Schelling 1989, 36), and believes that the essence of the Greek gods is their pure limitation and undivided absoluteness. From a modern perspective, this is a paradox since they unite universal and particular in themselves.

Hellenism, romanticism, and subjectivity