Two different words happen to be spelled the same here. The noun is the person who lays the foundation of something — a school, a company — and is still named as its starting point years later. The verb is the opposite motion: a boat taking in water and going down, and by extension a plan that sinks after it has already set off.
From the word’s history
Two distinct entries: the verb (early 14c. "to sink or fall") is from Old French fondrer "collapse, submerge, sink", from fond "bottom" (Latin fundus); the noun (mid-14c. "one who establishes") is from Old French fondeor, Latin fundator, from fundare "to lay a foundation".
這是兩個不同的詞條。動詞（14 世紀初，「下沉、倒塌」）來自古法文 fondrer「崩塌、沉沒」，源頭是 fond「底部」（拉丁文 fundus）；名詞（14 世紀中，「創立者」）則來自古法文 fondeor、拉丁文 fundator，源頭是 fundare「打地基」。兩邊遠古都跟「底」有關，但在英文裡是各走各的路，所以不必硬把「創辦」和「沉船」連成一個意思。
Online Etymology Dictionary (etymonline.com/word/founder)
登入就可以看每一支怎麼連回核心畫面。
原始詞典資料11 筆記錄
以下是外部詞典記錄的用法，摘錄並精簡格式，我們還沒有寫成教學內容。上面的說明才是我們自己寫的；有些用法可能上面已經講過了。
Foundernoun
- 1
A Founding Father.
- As the Founders saw it, the great driver of freedom was knowledge.
foundernoun詞源 1/ˈfaʊ̯n.dəː/
- 1
One who founds or establishes (a company, project, organisation, state, etc.).
- The founder of Facebook is Mark Zuckerberg.
- As to eleemoſynary corporations, by the dotation the founder and his heirs are of common right the legal viſitors, to ſee that that property is rightly employed, which would otherwiſe have deſcended to the viſitor himſelf: […]
- 2
biologygeneticsmedicineA common ancestor of some population (especially one with a certain genetic mutation).
- a founder population
- the founder effect
foundernoun詞源 2/ˈfaʊ̯n.dəː/
- 1
The iron worker in charge of the blast furnace and the smelting operation.
- The term 'founder' was applied in the British iron industry long afterwards to the ironworker in charge of the blast furnace and the smelting operation.
- 2
One who casts metals in various forms; a caster.
- a founder of cannon, bells, hardware, or printing types
foundernoun詞源 3/ˈfaʊ̯n.dəː/
- 1
biologymedicinenatural-sciencesA severe laminitis of a horse, caused by untreated internal inflammation in the hooves.
founderverb詞源 3/ˈfaʊ̯n.dəː/
- 1
To flood with water and sink.
- We were not much more than a quarter of an hour out of our ship but we saw her sink, and then I understood for the first time what was meant by a ship foundering in the sea.
- This ended, in prolonged solemn tones, like the continual tolling of a bell in a ship that is foundering at sea in a fog—in such tones he commenced reading the following hymn;(...)
- 2
To fall; to stumble and go lame.
- 3
To fail; to miscarry.
- All his tricks founder.
- The other ambitions, and much of Prescott's plan, foundered just south of Hatfield that October, when a GNER express derailed on a shattered rail […], plunging the railway into a crisis that led to private track owner Railtrack being put into administration.
- 4
archaicnauticaltransportTo cause to flood and sink, as a ship.
- We found a strong Tide setting out of the Streights to the Northward, and like to founder our Ship.
- I was amazed when we came among the breakers (which to me seemed large enough to founder our ship), to see with what wondrous dexterity they carried us through them, and ran their canoes on the top of one of those rolling waves […]
- 5
To disable or lame (a horse) by causing internal inflammation and soreness in the feet or limbs.
摘錄自 英文維基詞典 English Wiktionary，已精簡格式；依 CC BY-SA 4.0 授權使用，改動後的內容同樣以此授權提供。