word of the day: sidelight

The word of the day is sidelight:

noun

1. an item of incidental information.

2. either of two lights carried by a vessel under way at night, a red one on the port side and a green on the starboard.

3. light coming from the side.

4. a window or other aperture for light in the side of a building, ship, etc.

5. a window at the side of a door or another window. 

 

(https://www.dictionary.com/browse/sidelight)

 

 

"Then in 1969 came an unusual tree from Robert H. Whittaker, a plant ecologist at Cornell University for whom 'broad classification,' as he called it - numbering and delineating the kingdoms of life - was a sidelight."

 - David Quammen, The Tangled Tree: A Radical New History of Life

word of the day: bruit

The word of the day is bruit:

to voice abroad; rumor (used chiefly in the passive and often followed by about)

1400–50; late Middle English (noun) < Anglo-French, Old French, noun use of past participle of bruire to roar < Vulgar Latin *brūgere, a conflation of Latin rūgīre to bellow and Vulgar Latin *bragere; see bray¹

(https://www.dictionary.com/browse/bruit?s=t)

"At the very least, the stories bruiting 'Oldest Life Form' were missing an essential point presented by Woese and Fox.  A headline about 'Weirdest Life Form' might have captured that better."

 - David Quammen, The Tangled Tree: A Radical New History of Life

word of the day: blepharitis

The word of the day is blepharitis:

Inflammation of the eyelids.  (https://www.dictionary.com/browse/blepharitis?s=t)

"The twisting motion of spirochetes, such as the ones that cause syphilis and Lyme disease, evidently allows them to wiggle through obstacles that other bacteria can't easily cross, such as human organ linings, mucous membranes, and the barrier between our circulatory system and our central nervous system - a fateful degree of access.  Even the less dynamic shapes, the short rods known as bacilli, the spheres known as cocci, and the rods slightly curved like commas, serve well enough the bacteria responsible for a long list of diseases: anthrax, pneumonia, cholera, dysentery, hemoglobinuria, blepharitis, strep throat, scarlet fever, and acne, among others."

 - David Quammen, The Tangled Tree: A Radical New History of Life

word of the day: salubrious

The word of the day is salubrious:

favorable to or promoting health; healthful:

1540–50; < Latin salūbr(is ) promoting health (akin to salūs health) + -ious

 

(https://www.dictionary.com/browse/salubrious?s=t)

"It was also a salubrious reminder to humans of our inescapable linkage to other creatures, including some very humble ones.  We are, at the most basic level of classification, eukaryotes.  So are amoebae.  So are yeasts.  So are jellyfish, sea cucumbers, the little parasites that cause malaria, and rhododendrons."

 - David Quammen, The Tangled Tree: A Radical New History of Life

word of the day: perspicacity

The word of the day is perspicacity:

noun

1. keenness of mental perception and understanding; discernment; penetration.

2. Archaic. keen vision. 

 

1540–50; earlier perspicacite < Late Latin perspicācitās sharpness of sight, equivalent to perspicāci- (stem of perspicāx sharp-sighted; see perspicuous) + -tās -ty²

 

(https://www.dictionary.com/browse/perspicacity)

"One of the bacteria he cultured and squashed was Clostridium perfringens, the microbe responsible for gas gangrene, an ugly form of necrosis that takes hold in muscle tissue made vulnerable by wounds, especially the sort that lay open among injured soldiers on battlefields.  When he realized this, Luehrsen complained, but Woese 'just chuckled and said not to worry' in the absence of an open wound.  He had been to medical school for 'two years and two days,' Woese said, and he could assure Luehrsen that Clostridium perfringens was unlikely to give him gangrene.  Luehrsen took the episode as a lesson - not a lesson to trust Woese but to rely on his own perspicacity more - and never probed the matter of why Woese had quit medical school two days into his third-year rotation in pediatrics."

 - David Quammen, The Tangled Tree: A Radical New History of Life

Word of the day: cognate

The word of the day is cognate:

1. related by birth; of the same parentage, descent, etc.
2. Linguistics. descended from the same language or form.
3. allied or similar in nature or quality.

c.1645, from L. cognatus "of common descent," from com- "together" + gnatus, pp. of gnasci, older form of nasci "to be born" (see genus). Words that are cognates are cousins, not siblings.

(http://www.dictionary.com/browse/cognate)

"It was plain to see that these three religions all share historical antecedents with Nigerian Yoruba and Beninese Fon religions. They are clearly cognate religions."

- Henry Louis Gates, Jr., Black in Latin America

Letter to the Baltimore Sun

The Baltimore Sun published a letter I wrote to them: http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/opinion/readersrespond/bs-ed-rr-oprah-letter-20180110-story.html

Text reproduced here:

Dear Baltimore Sun,

Do you ever ask yourself what might have happened if, in the very early days of the 2016 presidential election, you hadn't breathlessly reported every movement and tweet of a celebrity whose only qualifications for running for national office were wealth and fame? Have you soberly reflected on dictionary.com’s word of the year for 2017, "complicit," and asked yourself to what extent you too are complicit in the current state of the world?

If you have, then, why, after everything we have all learned, did you choose to publish, "Oprah 2020: She can run, but will she?" (Jan. 9)? Before publishing this article, did you ask yourself to what extent does it report what actually happened (Oprah Winfrey gave a speech as she accepted an award at the Golden Globes), and to what extent does it fan the flames of wild speculation that a celebrity whose only qualifications are wealth and fame might run for national office?

Did you hope that reporting on Ms. Winfrey's presidential run would make the idea sound as plausible as "Icebreakers called out as cold weather persists" (also on page 6), and that two wrongs would somehow make a right?