Wordnet Find Synonyms

Sankalp picture Sankalp · Mar 31, 2013 · Viewed 22k times · Source

I am searching for a way to find all the synonyms of a particular word using wordnet. I am using JAWS.

For example:

love(v): admire, adulate, be attached to, be captivated by, be crazy about, be enamored of, be enchanted by, be fascinated with, be fond of, be in love with, canonize, care for, cherish, choose, deify, delight in, dote on, esteem, exalt, fall for, fancy, glorify, go for, gone on....

love(n): Synonym : adulation, affection, allegiance, amity, amorousness, amour, appreciation, ardency, ardor, attachment, case*, cherishing, crush, delight, devotedness, devotion, emotion, enchantment, enjoyment, fervor, fidelity, flame, fondness, friendship, hankering, idolatry, inclination, infatuation, involvement

In a related question user Ram has pointed to some code but that does not suffice as it just gives a vastly different output:

love, passion: any object of warm affection or devotion beloved, dear, dearest, honey, love: a beloved person; used as terms of endearment love, sexual love, erotic love: a deep feeling of sexual desire and attraction love: a score of zero in tennis or squash sexual love, lovemaking, making love, love, love life: sexual activities (often including sexual intercourse) between two people love: have a great affection or liking for

So how do I achieve it and is wordnet suited for what I want to do?

Answer

Wesley Baugh picture Wesley Baugh · Apr 2, 2013

Sticking with just WordNet, you could try to use semantic similarity to determine if two words (synsets) are similar enough to be synonyms. Below is a quick example that came from modifying another of my answers on semantic similarity using WordNet.

It does have its problems though:

  • Antonyms are mixed in with synonyms
  • It is slow! (as it has to check all ~117k synsets)

Still, it produces more synonyms than using lemma_names alone, so I leave it here in case it might be useful (in conjunction with something else perhaps).

>>> from nltk.corpus import wordnet as wn
>>> def syn(word, lch_threshold=2.26):
    for net1 in wn.synsets(word):
        for net2 in wn.all_synsets():
            try:
                lch = net1.lch_similarity(net2)
            except:
                continue
            # The value to compare the LCH to was found empirically.
            # (The value is very application dependent. Experiment!)
            if lch >= lch_threshold:
                yield (net1, net2, lch)


>>> for x in syn('love'):
    print x

Code above outputs:

(Synset('love.n.01'), Synset('feeling.n.01'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('love.n.01'), Synset('conditioned_emotional_response.n.01'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('love.n.01'), Synset('emotion.n.01'), 2.9444389791664407)
(Synset('love.n.01'), Synset('worship.n.02'), 2.9444389791664407)
(Synset('love.n.01'), Synset('anger.n.01'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('love.n.01'), Synset('fear.n.01'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('love.n.01'), Synset('fear.n.03'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('love.n.01'), Synset('anxiety.n.02'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('love.n.01'), Synset('joy.n.01'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('love.n.01'), Synset('love.n.01'), 3.6375861597263857)
(Synset('love.n.01'), Synset('agape.n.02'), 2.9444389791664407)
(Synset('love.n.01'), Synset('agape.n.01'), 2.9444389791664407)
(Synset('love.n.01'), Synset('filial_love.n.01'), 2.9444389791664407)
(Synset('love.n.01'), Synset('ardor.n.02'), 2.9444389791664407)
(Synset('love.n.01'), Synset('amorousness.n.01'), 2.9444389791664407)
(Synset('love.n.01'), Synset('puppy_love.n.01'), 2.9444389791664407)
(Synset('love.n.01'), Synset('devotion.n.01'), 2.9444389791664407)
(Synset('love.n.01'), Synset('benevolence.n.01'), 2.9444389791664407)
(Synset('love.n.01'), Synset('beneficence.n.01'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('love.n.01'), Synset('heartstrings.n.01'), 2.9444389791664407)
(Synset('love.n.01'), Synset('lovingness.n.01'), 2.9444389791664407)
(Synset('love.n.01'), Synset('warmheartedness.n.01'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('love.n.01'), Synset('loyalty.n.02'), 2.9444389791664407)
(Synset('love.n.01'), Synset('hate.n.01'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('love.n.01'), Synset('emotional_state.n.01'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('love.n.02'), Synset('content.n.05'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('love.n.02'), Synset('object.n.04'), 2.9444389791664407)
(Synset('love.n.02'), Synset('antipathy.n.02'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('love.n.02'), Synset('bugbear.n.02'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('love.n.02'), Synset('execration.n.03'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('love.n.02'), Synset('center.n.06'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('love.n.02'), Synset('hallucination.n.03'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('love.n.02'), Synset('infatuation.n.03'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('love.n.02'), Synset('love.n.02'), 3.6375861597263857)
(Synset('beloved.n.01'), Synset('person.n.01'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('beloved.n.01'), Synset('lover.n.01'), 2.9444389791664407)
(Synset('beloved.n.01'), Synset('admirer.n.03'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('beloved.n.01'), Synset('beloved.n.01'), 3.6375861597263857)
(Synset('beloved.n.01'), Synset('betrothed.n.01'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('beloved.n.01'), Synset('boyfriend.n.01'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('beloved.n.01'), Synset('darling.n.01'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('beloved.n.01'), Synset('girlfriend.n.02'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('beloved.n.01'), Synset('idolizer.n.01'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('beloved.n.01'), Synset('inamorata.n.01'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('beloved.n.01'), Synset('inamorato.n.01'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('beloved.n.01'), Synset('kisser.n.01'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('beloved.n.01'), Synset('necker.n.01'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('beloved.n.01'), Synset('petter.n.01'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('beloved.n.01'), Synset('romeo.n.01'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('beloved.n.01'), Synset('soul_mate.n.01'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('beloved.n.01'), Synset('squeeze.n.04'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('beloved.n.01'), Synset('sweetheart.n.01'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('love.n.04'), Synset('desire.n.01'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('love.n.04'), Synset('sexual_desire.n.01'), 2.9444389791664407)
(Synset('love.n.04'), Synset('love.n.04'), 3.6375861597263857)
(Synset('love.n.04'), Synset('aphrodisia.n.01'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('love.n.04'), Synset('anaphrodisia.n.01'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('love.n.04'), Synset('passion.n.05'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('love.n.04'), Synset('sensuality.n.01'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('love.n.04'), Synset('amorousness.n.02'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('love.n.04'), Synset('fetish.n.01'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('love.n.04'), Synset('libido.n.01'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('love.n.04'), Synset('lecherousness.n.01'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('love.n.04'), Synset('nymphomania.n.01'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('love.n.04'), Synset('satyriasis.n.01'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('love.n.04'), Synset('the_hots.n.01'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('love.n.05'), Synset('bowling_score.n.01'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('love.n.05'), Synset('football_score.n.01'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('love.n.05'), Synset('baseball_score.n.01'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('love.n.05'), Synset('basketball_score.n.01'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('love.n.05'), Synset('number.n.02'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('love.n.05'), Synset('score.n.03'), 2.9444389791664407)
(Synset('love.n.05'), Synset('stroke.n.06'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('love.n.05'), Synset('birdie.n.01'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('love.n.05'), Synset('bogey.n.02'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('love.n.05'), Synset('deficit.n.03'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('love.n.05'), Synset('double-bogey.n.01'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('love.n.05'), Synset('duck.n.02'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('love.n.05'), Synset('eagle.n.02'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('love.n.05'), Synset('double_eagle.n.01'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('love.n.05'), Synset('game.n.06'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('love.n.05'), Synset('lead.n.07'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('love.n.05'), Synset('love.n.05'), 3.6375861597263857)
(Synset('love.n.05'), Synset('match.n.05'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('love.n.05'), Synset('par.n.01'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('sexual_love.n.02'), Synset('bondage.n.03'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('sexual_love.n.02'), Synset('outercourse.n.01'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('sexual_love.n.02'), Synset('safe_sex.n.01'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('sexual_love.n.02'), Synset('sexual_activity.n.01'), 2.9444389791664407)
(Synset('sexual_love.n.02'), Synset('conception.n.02'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('sexual_love.n.02'), Synset('sexual_intercourse.n.01'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('sexual_love.n.02'), Synset('pleasure.n.05'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('sexual_love.n.02'), Synset('sexual_love.n.02'), 3.6375861597263857)
(Synset('sexual_love.n.02'), Synset('carnal_abuse.n.01'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('sexual_love.n.02'), Synset('coupling.n.03'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('sexual_love.n.02'), Synset('reproduction.n.05'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('sexual_love.n.02'), Synset('foreplay.n.01'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('sexual_love.n.02'), Synset('perversion.n.02'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('sexual_love.n.02'), Synset('autoeroticism.n.01'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('sexual_love.n.02'), Synset('promiscuity.n.01'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('sexual_love.n.02'), Synset('lechery.n.01'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('sexual_love.n.02'), Synset('homosexuality.n.01'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('sexual_love.n.02'), Synset('bisexuality.n.02'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('sexual_love.n.02'), Synset('heterosexuality.n.01'), 2.538973871058276)
(Synset('sexual_love.n.02'), Synset('bestiality.n.02'), 2.538973871058276)
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