One can hardly pick up a newspaper or magazine these days without reading something about artificial intelligence, typically in relation to computer programmes or robots. In March 2017 a computer […]
Jeff Aronson’s Words
Jeffrey Aronson: When I use a word . . . Artificiality
Artificiality is an ambiguous concept. The Latin adjective artificialis (from ars, art, and facere, to make) was introduced by the Roman rhetorician Marcus Fabius Quintilianus (c. 35–100 AD), as a […]
Jeffrey Aronson: When I use a word . . . Automata, androids, replicants, and robots
The words automaton, android, replicant, and robot refer to pretty much the same thing. The word automaton (Greek αὐτόματον, a marionette), describing a device that moves by virtue of a […]
Jeffrey Aronson: When I use a word . . . Modes of speech: can and may, must and should
Which is better: “Aspirin can cause Reye’s syndrome” or “Aspirin may cause Reye’s syndrome”? The answer lies in a consideration of modal verbs, also called modal auxiliaries. Modal verbs are […]
Jeffrey Aronson: When I use a word . . . Implementation
In various blogs that I have been writing in the last few months about translational research, algorithms, knowledge and its diffusion and dissemination, skills, performance, and competence, implementation has been […]
Jeffrey Aronson: When I use a word . . . Checklists
If etymology were anything to go by, checklists would rule our lives, although we must beware not to let etymology rule our views of language, informative though it can be. […]
Jeffrey Aronson: When I use a word . . . Language that counts
Last week I referred to “‘competence’ and the more recent ‘competency’”. But both of these words first appeared in English, as cited in the OED, in 1594. So in what […]
Jeffrey Aronson: When I use a word . . . Competence
To recap: the triad of knowledge, skills, and performance is, I have suggested, a modern trivium, underpinned by a modern quadrivium—literacy, numeracy, oracy, and computeracy. In its document Working with […]
Jeffrey Aronson: When I use a word . . . Performance
As I discussed last week, skills and knowledge constitute the art and science of medicine. To these the General Medical Council, in the first domain in its document Working with […]
Jeffrey Aronson: When I use a word . . . Art and science; medical skills and knowledge
To recap, for many years medicine has been regarded as both an art and a science. Is it? As we have already seen, the word “art” has its origin in […]