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on a tangent



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Idioms and Phrases

On a sudden digression or change of course, as in The professor's hard to follow; he's always off on a tangent . This phrase often occurs in the idioms fly off or go off on a tangent , as in The witness was convincing until he went off on a tangent . This expression alludes to the geometric tangent—a line or curve that touches but does not intersect with another line or curve. [Second half of 1700s]

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Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023

Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.

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