the.com/false alarm
The relief of a crisis that respected your time enough not to happen.
means A warning or sign of danger that turns out, on inspection, to have signaled nothing real.
from Straightforward compound: 'alarm' traces back through French to the Italian battle cry 'all'arme!' — 'to the weapons!' — shouted when danger appeared, so an 'alarm' was originally the call itself, not a device. Add 'false' and you get a cry to arms that should never have been raised — a lineage that still echoes faintly every time a fire alarm turns out to be burnt toast.
- origin
- literal fire-bell errors, 1800s firefighting jargon
- body cost
- adrenaline doesn't know it was unnecessary
- social use
- often announced with visible disappointment, oddly
- paradox
- too many breed the real disaster: ignoring the next one