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Is "smash together" a good phrase for describing a creation of a new entity from (possibly smaller) entities, which are destroyed in the process?

Are there any reasonable synonyms?

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Can you give us an example phrase? Is this for chemistry? – Matt E. Эллен Jul 28 '11 at 9:57
@Matt It's actually for programming. I found some good google occurrences, for example: "Two Galaxies Smash Together To Create Binary Quasar", but there aren't that many. – Let_Me_Be Jul 28 '11 at 10:02
What are you combining? – Matt E. Эллен Jul 28 '11 at 10:06
@Matt Data structures. But I don't want to use merge, since the result isn't a direct combination, it's sort of blend. And since the original data structures are destroyed I came up with smash together. – Let_Me_Be Jul 28 '11 at 11:01

2 Answers 2

up vote 3 down vote accepted

Smash together” implies some violence in the process. For softer alternatives, I would go with merge (simpler is often better), amalgamate, conflate, consolidate, blend, or integrate.

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Smash together only works if the combining bodies are moving at high speed and collide.

When things are created from smashing together, such as in your quasar example, then the original bodies are combined into a new one and some matter and energy are transferred away from the resulting body in the process. However some of the original matter and energy remain.

Since this is for programming then I imagine you are combining data structures. If we assume that, because you want to smash them together, this means that some data is lost when you combine your structures then the following phrases might be applicable.

I say selectively so that it is clear that not everything from the original structures will remain.

  • Fuse together
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