What does the saying, you want your cake and eat it too mean?

[gnuel3]

yeah...

 

[pulse8]

It means you want everything and aren't willing to settle.

 

[Cyberian]

"The usual way in which one sees this one is as the negative you can?t have your cake and eat it, expressing the idea that you have to make an either/or choice, that you can?t reconcile two mutually incompatible situations. It would be a little clearer if it were written as you can?t both have your cake and eat it. It would be more obviously the same as the other form if you also rewrote that as you can?t eat your cake and still have it."

 

[btz0013]

it's: you can't have your cake and eat it too.

i.e. it's greed v. indulgence:

greed wants to hold onto the whole cake
indulgence just wants to eat it

you can't statisfy both desires

 

[OrganizedChaos]

wtf would you want the cake anyway

 

[MacBaine]

Seriously... what else would you do with cake besides eat it? Who ever coined that phrase needs to get a clue and use it too.

 

[welst10]

that's a dumb phrase.

 

[beatle]

Probably the same people who want lots of money and then not spend any of it. Money is only valuable when you exchange it for something.

 

[Ornery]

Ever seen a cake really beautifully decorated? People say, "It looks too good to eat!" You'll no longer have that beautiful cake, if you eat it.

Ever had a hard job that paid well? Ever had an easy job that paid poorly? If you could have an easy job that paid well, that would be having your cake, and eating it too!

 

[Vic]

It's a smart phrase. It means you want something but aren't willing to pay the price to get it.

edit: Like this. You have $300 bucks to buy a new video card, but getting the card means giving up the $300 bucks, which you don't want to do. "You want your cake and eat it too" means that you want to get the video card while keeping the $300 bucks. Greed.