As I wrote last week, a cellular automaton is a computational system with two components: an ordered array of cells and a set of rules that determines the state of […]
Jeff Aronson’s Words
Jeffrey Aronson: When I Use a Word . . . Cellular automata
A cellular automaton is a computational system with two components: an ordered array of cells, such as on a Go board, and a set of rules that determines the state […]
Jeffrey Aronson: When I Use a Word . . . Snowflakes
I love snowflakes. I enjoy crunching them underfoot on a crisp winter’s day and the silky feeling that you get when skiing through a fresh fall. The word “snowflake” entered […]
Jeffrey Aronson: When I Use a Word . . . Stereoisomerism
This year’s Nobel Prize in Chemistry has been won by David MacMillan at Princeton and Benjamin List at the Max-Planck-Institut für Kohlenforschung in Muelheim an der Ruhr. They developed a […]
Jeffrey Aronson: When I Use a Word . . . Diction
Last week I discussed two of three related elements of speech— dialect and accent. I now turn to diction. The IndoEuropean root DEIK meant to show or utter. The Greek […]
Jeffrey Aronson: When I Use a Word . . . Medical accents
There is currently a discussion about the differences between related aspects of speech—dialect, accent, and diction. Dialect is a form of a language that is peculiar to a specific region. […]
Jeffrey Aronson: When I Use a Word . . . Medical snowclones
A few weeks ago I wrote about tortured phrases, phrases that are meaningless or misleading because some of the words have been replaced by inappropriate synonyms. For example, calling artificial […]
Jeffrey Aronson: When I Use a Word . . . Curiosity
Jeff Bezos, hoping to retard ageing, is reportedly investing in a company whose stated aim is to do curiosity-driven research. I wonder if he has contemplated the nature of curiosity. […]
Jeffrey Aronson: When I Use a Word . . . Double troubles
“Duplication” is defined in the Oxford English Dictionary (OED) as “The action of doubling”. It has meanings relevant to biology (division into two), mathematics (multiplication by two and the problem […]
Jeffrey Aronson: When I Use a Word . . . Pharmacographic
As I mentioned last week, when discussing the medical entries in Crooke’s 1903 edition of Yule and Burnell’s 1886 compilation Hobson–Jobson: A Glossary of Colloquial Anglo-Indian Words and Phrases, and […]