A gadget or object whose name you can't remember, or something considered unimportant or silly.
Likely derived from Dutch 'dinges' (thing) or German 'Ding' (thing), brought to America by Dutch settlers. It became slang in the early 1900s as a playful substitute for forgotten names.
Every language needs a word for 'that thing whose name I don't know'—English has 'dingus,' Spanish has 'chisme,' and German has 'Dings.' Linguists call these placeholder words 'indefinite nouns,' and they're surprisingly common in casual speech because human brains process speaking faster than remembering labels.
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