lens.
So spelled — not “lense.” But the misspelling occurs fairly often, as something like a back-formation from the plural — e.g.:
o “Raunchy Lisa ‘Left Eye’ Lopez — who got her nickname after wearing a condom over one lense [read ‘lens‘] of her glasses — makes no apologies for her behaviour.” John Dingwall, “Latest Flame,” Daily Record (Baltimore), 8 Feb. 1996, at 23.
o “You will, however, pay a price for such surreal sensationalism — a single lense [read ‘lens‘] is $150.” Sylvi Capelaci, “For Your Eyes Only,” Toronto Sun, 24 June 1997, at 42.
For information about the Language-Change Index click here.
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Quotation of the Day: “A zoologist who divided animals into invertebrates, mammals, and beasts of burden would not get very far before running into trouble. Yet the traditional grammar is guilty of the same error when it defines three parts of speech on the basis of meaning (noun, verb, and interjection), four more on the basis of function (adjective, adverb, pronoun, conjunction), and one partly on function and partly on form (preposition). The result is that in such an expression as ‘a dog’s life’ there can be endless futile argument about whether ‘dog’s’ is a noun or an adjective.” W. Nelson Francis, “Revolution in Grammar” (1954), in Readings in Applied English Linguistics 69, 77 (Harold Byron Allen ed., 2d ed. 1964).
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