"Penrose steps" meaning in English

See Penrose steps in All languages combined, or Wiktionary

Noun

Etymology: After a drawing by Lionel Penrose and Roger Penrose. Head templates: {{en-noun|p}} Penrose steps pl (plural only)
  1. An impossible loop of endlessly ascending and descending stairs, or an optical illusion appearing to be one. Wikipedia link: Lionel Penrose, Roger Penrose Tags: plural, plural-only Categories (topical): Artistic works Synonyms: Penrose staircase, Penrose stairs
    Sense id: en-Penrose_steps-en-noun-F1txWXSc Categories (other): English entries with incorrect language header, English pluralia tantum, Pages with 1 entry, Pages with entries
{
  "etymology_text": "After a drawing by Lionel Penrose and Roger Penrose.",
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "p"
      },
      "expansion": "Penrose steps pl (plural only)",
      "name": "en-noun"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "noun",
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "English entries with incorrect language header",
          "parents": [
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            "Entry maintenance"
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          "source": "w"
        },
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "English pluralia tantum",
          "parents": [
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            "Nouns",
            "Lemmas"
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          "source": "w"
        },
        {
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        },
        {
          "kind": "topical",
          "langcode": "en",
          "name": "Artistic works",
          "orig": "en:Artistic works",
          "parents": [
            "Art",
            "Culture",
            "Society",
            "All topics",
            "Fundamental"
          ],
          "source": "w"
        }
      ],
      "examples": [
        {
          "ref": "2010 July 8, Inception (Movie), spoken by Arthur (Joseph Gordon-Levitt):",
          "text": "In a dream, you can cheat architecture into impossible shapes. That lets you create closed loops, like the Penrose Steps. The infinite staircase.",
          "type": "quote"
        },
        {
          "ref": "2011 May 13, Amal A. Islim, Walking with the Vain Cattle: In the Womb of Life, the Plant of Miracle Is Ready to Blossom a White Flower, Bloomington: Balboa Press, →ISBN, →OL:",
          "text": "I'll have my heaven, / Where heaven is love and love is my heaven. / I just have to climb through those Penrose steps! / Till I find sky number seven.",
          "type": "quote"
        },
        {
          "ref": "2012 April 16, Rob Coley with Dean Lockwood, Cloud Time, Alresford: Zero Books, →ISBN, →OL, page 100:",
          "text": "At this book's inception, when we came to, we found ourselves already traipsing around Penrose steps, already reactively enclosed in an unceasing loop.",
          "type": "quote"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "An impossible loop of endlessly ascending and descending stairs, or an optical illusion appearing to be one."
      ],
      "id": "en-Penrose_steps-en-noun-F1txWXSc",
      "links": [
        [
          "impossible",
          "impossible"
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        [
          "loop",
          "loop"
        ],
        [
          "endlessly",
          "endlessly"
        ],
        [
          "ascend",
          "ascend"
        ],
        [
          "descend",
          "descend"
        ],
        [
          "stairs",
          "stairs"
        ],
        [
          "optical illusion",
          "optical illusion"
        ]
      ],
      "synonyms": [
        {
          "word": "Penrose staircase"
        },
        {
          "word": "Penrose stairs"
        }
      ],
      "tags": [
        "plural",
        "plural-only"
      ],
      "wikipedia": [
        "Lionel Penrose",
        "Roger Penrose"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "word": "Penrose steps"
}
{
  "etymology_text": "After a drawing by Lionel Penrose and Roger Penrose.",
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "p"
      },
      "expansion": "Penrose steps pl (plural only)",
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  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "noun",
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        "English entries with incorrect language header",
        "English eponyms",
        "English lemmas",
        "English multiword terms",
        "English nouns",
        "English pluralia tantum",
        "English terms with quotations",
        "Pages with 1 entry",
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      ],
      "examples": [
        {
          "ref": "2010 July 8, Inception (Movie), spoken by Arthur (Joseph Gordon-Levitt):",
          "text": "In a dream, you can cheat architecture into impossible shapes. That lets you create closed loops, like the Penrose Steps. The infinite staircase.",
          "type": "quote"
        },
        {
          "ref": "2011 May 13, Amal A. Islim, Walking with the Vain Cattle: In the Womb of Life, the Plant of Miracle Is Ready to Blossom a White Flower, Bloomington: Balboa Press, →ISBN, →OL:",
          "text": "I'll have my heaven, / Where heaven is love and love is my heaven. / I just have to climb through those Penrose steps! / Till I find sky number seven.",
          "type": "quote"
        },
        {
          "ref": "2012 April 16, Rob Coley with Dean Lockwood, Cloud Time, Alresford: Zero Books, →ISBN, →OL, page 100:",
          "text": "At this book's inception, when we came to, we found ourselves already traipsing around Penrose steps, already reactively enclosed in an unceasing loop.",
          "type": "quote"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "An impossible loop of endlessly ascending and descending stairs, or an optical illusion appearing to be one."
      ],
      "links": [
        [
          "impossible",
          "impossible"
        ],
        [
          "loop",
          "loop"
        ],
        [
          "endlessly",
          "endlessly"
        ],
        [
          "ascend",
          "ascend"
        ],
        [
          "descend",
          "descend"
        ],
        [
          "stairs",
          "stairs"
        ],
        [
          "optical illusion",
          "optical illusion"
        ]
      ],
      "tags": [
        "plural",
        "plural-only"
      ],
      "wikipedia": [
        "Lionel Penrose",
        "Roger Penrose"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "synonyms": [
    {
      "word": "Penrose staircase"
    },
    {
      "word": "Penrose stairs"
    }
  ],
  "word": "Penrose steps"
}

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This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable English dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2024-12-21 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2024-12-04 using wiktextract (d8cb2f3 and 4e554ae). The data shown on this site has been post-processed and various details (e.g., extra categories) removed, some information disambiguated, and additional data merged from other sources. See the raw data download page for the unprocessed wiktextract data.

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