misplot

An instance of misplotting.

Noun

  1. An instance of misplotting.
    • A misplot of ship position is the most frequently made plotting error . - 1963, United States. Bureau of Naval Personnel, Aerographer's Mate 3 & 2, page 117:
    • A printout of individuals too far from block's center enabled me to eliminate obvious misplots. - 1979, Richard Wolniewicz, Northeast Minneapolis, page 31:
    • Of the four locations which turned out not to be cultural, two were small rock outcrops shaped like the blinds that had been positively identified on the aerials, one was a total bust and one may have been a misplot on...
  2. A plot error; an inconsistency or mistake in creating a storyline.
    • Some, who read this, may not know what the crowning misplot was, and it will bear mentioning. - 1858, Alexander Lovett Stimson, History of the Express Companies, page 338:

Origin

From mis- + plot.

Forms

misplots

Verb

  1. To incorrectly mark the position of.
    • I believe that M. H. Abrams, Harold Bloom, and Geoffrey Hartman, for example, all miss or misplot Wordsworth's position on the crucial intellectual axes represented by Burke and Rousseau. - 1984, James Chandler,...
    • If the doctor is not familiar with the dermatome patterns, he may misplot the dermatome areas, and the test may be either a false positive or a false negative. - 1989, Marshall Houts, Leonard Marmor, Proving Medical...
    • They implanted viruses that would make the systems report aircraft where none existed, hide some aircraft that were airborne, and misplot the positions and altitude of other aircraft. - 1999, Tom Cool, Secret Realms,...
  2. To make an error in planning a trajectory or route.
    • Mr. O'Hara, athlete that he was, misplotted his course and plunged into the well. - 1953, Mr. O'Hara, page 52:
    • It is amazing how easy it is, in the distracting environment of a boat under way, to misplot a bearing by 10°; to write down the wrong time for something; to misidentify charted features used for range; to copy the...
    • One day Connie Mayers is at point doing 'recky' while the squad is going over the central highlands, but somehow he has misplotted the course. - 1992, Maurice Paterson, Big Sky/little Bullet: A Docu-novel, page 17:
  3. To make a mistake in forming a course of action or storyline.
    • And now and then we find a great idea, misplotted and half told. - 1929, Camera: A Practical Magazine for Photographers - Volume 39, page 65:
    • By contrast Levin's sequel, Rosemary's Son (1997), is an ill-conceived and misplotted attempt to imagine the future that awaits Rosemary's baby at the dawn of the millennium. - 1999, Marshall B. Tymn, Neil Barron,...
    • If we misplot ourselves, no doubt we will mislive ourselves; but we are storied creatures. - 2012, Mike Graves, What's the Shape of Narrative Preaching?, page 100:

Forms

misplots misplotting misplotted