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To be fair, there is a logic behind “hone in on” that is at least plausible that relates to the intended meaning, and is perhaps somewhat responsible for it sticking around besides simply the similarity between “home” and “hone”.

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As much as it angers me to say it, I do believe it is an eggcorn.

I agree, though remarkably it’s an eggcorn that is still sort of correct on its own.

This usage is a double misunderstanding, it gets both the phonetics of homing and the mechanics of sharpening a blade wrong.

It’s like calling someone a “stropping young lad”.

Honing a blade still "moves" the blade close to what you want: a blade that cuts well. It's not correct enough to have spawned the original phrase, but it's not completely absurd, like saying, "should of" instead of "should've" or saying "I could care less" instead of "I couldn't care less" - the first of which is nonsense and the second means the opposite of the intended meaning.

"Hone in on" is at least mildly in the correct direction.

I actually stumbled on this earlier today! I was reaching for home in on and settled on hone in on as it intuitively fit better to me! I remember thinking "Im trying to express reducing something critically which is like refining". Now I very clearly see the home etymology too though!

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