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From the Friends TV show:

Monica: I have some pretty exciting news.
Phoebe: You're pregnant!

Monica was in a relationship and had expressed that she wanted kids, but didn't have a tummy and hadn't given any hint whatsoever that she may be pregnant.

Is there a word to describe these guesses that may be technically feasible but that are very exaggerated?

It's somewhat like the domino effect meme

For example:

  • You posted a picture of a house. Did you buy it?!
  • Well that's a ____. No, I didn't, I just like taking pictures.
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    @KannEt thanks. Posted a sentence. I did some research. I found the domino effect meme, which led me to the "slippery slope" logical fallacy, but it's not exactly what i'm looking for..
    – Maria Ines Parnisari
    Commented Nov 15, 2021 at 6:29
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    leap fits well into the hollow sentence proposed. If I have time and the inclination later I might dig out some citations to support my suggestion.
    – High Performance Mark
    Commented Nov 15, 2021 at 6:31
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    Wild guess. But neither of the responses you list are really odd in the circumstances.
    – Xanne
    Commented Nov 15, 2021 at 9:20
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    @HighPerformanceMark: Yes, the meaning being leap of intuition although it would rarely be spelled out.
    – Ben Voigt
    Commented Nov 15, 2021 at 20:02
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    @HighPerformanceMark it's probably a bit of a Britishism, but a bit of a leap would be a sarcastically understated way of putting it.
    – Ken Y-N
    Commented Nov 16, 2021 at 7:09

3 Answers 3

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How about jumping to conclusions?

Defined by Wikipedia as:

a psychological term referring to a communication obstacle where one "judge[s] or decide[s] something without having all the facts; to reach unwarranted conclusions"

With respect to the updated example sentence you could use

… that’s a [big] leap / that’s a [huge] jump … etc

Or you could remove the article:

… that’s jumping to conclusions

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The word you are looking for is presumption (noun), presume (verb). You could alternately use assumption (noun), assume (verb).

Quoting from Lexico

Presumption (noun)
An idea that is taken to be true on the basis of probability.

Quoting from Lexico

Assumption (noun)
A thing that is accepted as true or as certain to happen, without proof.

This is close to the idiom "jumping to conclusion".

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    Screenshots are bad because they don't work with screen readers, user style sheets, or other accessibility features, so the blind or visually impaired will have problems as may people who prefer e.g. dark mode viewing. And links can break. It's always better to quote text (and attribute properly).
    – Stuart F
    Commented Nov 15, 2021 at 9:20
  • @Stuart F thanks a lot for the heads up, I will change the screenshots just quoting the text and leave the link for further details.
    – Megha
    Commented Nov 15, 2021 at 12:29
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    @KannE thanks for the warm welcome. I will remove the screenshots and leave only quotes, to make it easier to read.
    – Megha
    Commented Nov 15, 2021 at 12:31
  • I sprinkled some markdown on your answer, and got rid of the links to images that were left over. Now the OP has provided an example sentence, you could edit in how your suggestions fit, like "This works in the example sentence: 'Well that's a presumption. No, I didn't, I just like taking pictures.' "
    – AncientSwordRage
    Commented Nov 16, 2021 at 16:12
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a stab in the dark

noun phrase

: a guess that is based on very little or no information or evidence

  • They don't really know how much the work will cost. They're just taking a stab in the dark.

Merriam-Webster

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    I'd suggest that "shot in the dark" is probably better known (Google Ngram shows that since ~1908, 'shot' is more common than 'stab')
    – costrom
    Commented Nov 15, 2021 at 14:34
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    But the person doing this knows they're making a wild guess, often saying "I'm going to take a stab in the dark here and say...". They wouldn't say "you're pregnant!", they'd say "ummm...you're pregnant?"
    – Owen Reynolds
    Commented Nov 15, 2021 at 14:38
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    I don't think this is a good fit, firstly because it emphasises uncertainty in the guess, whereas in OP's case there may be absolute certainty, it's just not correct or warranted; secondly because it's usually/always said about one's own guess (perhaps for the first reason, little odd to tell someone how sure they are about something).
    – OJFord
    Commented Nov 16, 2021 at 10:09
  • @OJFord the question has since been clarified and an example sentence provided which was missing when I posted my answer.
    – Mari-Lou A
    Commented Nov 16, 2021 at 10:57
  • @Mari-LouA That's fair enough, just commenting for the sake of someone (perhaps non-native speaker) reading later really.
    – OJFord
    Commented Nov 16, 2021 at 11:13

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