talk down

present singular third person talks down · participle present talking down · participle past talked down · past talked down

1. idiomatictransitiveTo negotiate a lower price.

   If he offers a very high price, see if you can talk him down before you agree to anything.

2. transitiveaeronauticsTo verbally assist someone to land an aircraft.

   In other words, if you talk him down and he crashes, you're worse off than if you hadn't tried.

   2008, Nelson DeMille, Thomas Block, Mayday, →ISBN

   3 more examples

   GET TALKED DOWN: When a pilot gets caught in weather, he may call the nearest tower for Ground Controlled Approach landing assistance, wherever the airport has GCA radar.

   1960 Feb, “Business with FAA”, in Flying Magazine, page 109

   He got out, looked at me, and said, “I feel like Doris Day in Julie when she was talked down by air traffic control and landed the airplane.”[.]

   2000, Larry King, Anything Goes!: What I've Learned from Pundits, Politicians, and Presidents, →ISBN, page 139

   Its Spielberg-inspired first commercial, in which Manhattan Island floated loftily through the sky and was talked down by air traffic control at Heathrow[.]

   2008, Winston Fletcher, Powers of Persuasion: The Inside Story of British Advertising 1951-2000, →ISBN

3. transitiveTo convince a person to cease a drastic action or response, such as a suicide attempt or act of rage.

   I saw a man today / He led a big parade downtown / A helicopter takes a snapshot to talk him down

   2018, “Living In Hell”, performed by Cobra Man

   2 more examples

   Talk him down, the rule book went. Calm him, get him secured. Easier said than done. Crane had talked down a would-be jumper standing on a support cable of the George Washington Bridge.

   2007, Lincoln Child, Deep Storm

   And that guy that talked him down told us what happen^([sic]). It's kidnapping, attempted assault.

   (Can we date this quote?), CJ Raines, Shelby: A Great Love

4. transitiveTo overcome by spoken argument.
5. slangtransitiveTo comfort someone experiencing a bad trip, to help them come down.

   They may then go to a hippie clinic crash pad to be "talked down."

   1969, American Journal of Psychiatry, volume 125, number 4, page 154