I Don't Understand

I was in college, and I thought I was expanding my learning considerably. Then one day, while visiting my brother and father, who both lived in the Cincinnati area, I overheard their discussion. It may have been a disagreement, but it wasn't heated. The subjects of their discussion were the definitions of perspicacity and perspicuity. (That was the same visit when my father offered to buy White Castle hamburgers for us if we'd go get them. He asked how many my brother and I wanted and we each said "a dozen." Dad asked "EACH?" and we replied "Yes." If you love White Castle hamburgers like we do you understand.)

Both words (perspicacity and perspicuity - remember them?) derive from the Latin word from which we get perspective. The Latin word perspicere means "to see through." There has been a lot of discussion the last few years about transparency - in financial reporting, in governing, and in various other dealings. Transparency of action is a good thing, as is transparency of information. It is transparency of communication that is meant here, and whether it is transparent understanding or transparent communication iti s always best to have no hidden agenda.

Perspicacity is the receiving side of transparency. It is the ability to understand or the ability to judge well. It is used of someone who is acutely perceptive. My wife has a gift of perspicacity especially in relation to non-verbal matters. She can judge a person sometimes better than they can themselves. That's what makes her such a wonderful mental health counselor.

Perspicuity is the ability to express oneself clearly. For some reason I think it should mean what perspicacity meants, probably because of the -cuity ending. Acuity is what comes to my mind, but acuity has an entirely different etymology. It comes almost directly from the French acuite, which originated from the Latin word for needle. The word acuity maintains a sense of sharpness about it, these many centuries later.

To some extent perspicuity relies on the perspicacity of the listener, and familiarity with the nuances of words. It is more easily achieved in talking/hearing than in writing/reading because of inflection and other extra-verbal communication.

Part of my reason for writing this blog is to offer words that have better descriptiveness than more common words, and to differentiate between two similarly good but less-known or less-understood word. Mark Twain said "The difference between the right word and the almost-right word is the difference between lightning and a lightning bug."

There is a nice web site at difference-between.com which provides answers to questions like the difference between nectar and pollen, between presume and assume. It is interesting reading and a good source for clarification of common words. I recommend anyone who wonders about there/they're/their or infer/imply to make difference-between.com one of your bookmarked sites. Please!

Anything to help us be more perspicacious is good.

In Search of Words

It was reading Theodore White's "In Search of History" started me "In Search of Words".

Both of today's main words were ones I first became aware of while reading that book, and were so unknown to me that I wrote them down for later research into their meaning.

The second one, troglodyte, I remember was used as an adjective of Mao Tse Tung, who as a revolutionary prior to the march that took over China had been living in a cave. That is its primary meaning, although it can also mean someone living in seclusion (like Greta Garbo, I suppose). I have since run across its use several times, more to mean caveman than cavedweller: with a sense of prehistoric development to it rather than relating to someone living in a cave. It could more accurately refer to the early Christians who lived in the catacombs, in my opinion, than to someone with an unenlightened view of things.

Speaking of caves, a fun word is spelunking, which defines people who like to explore caves. While it sounds like an onomatopoetic word (one formed from the sound associated with the object) it actually comes from the Greek word for cave. But I digress.

The other word from White's book for consideration today is sycophant. I don't remember its reference, but when I looked it up in the dictionary I had found something of value. I had been looking for just such a word; sycophant refers to someone who seeks favor of another person through the use of flattery. Up until I read that word the only phrase I knew to describe it was "brown-noser" and I wasn't sure if the phrase was scatological (referring to feces/excrement, which I'll leave for another day) or racist (a phrase remaining from slavery days). Either way, I preferred my new word.

Since then, I've happened upon a similar word, toady, which has a very interesting etymology (word origin). Back in the day when medicines were sold by travelling salesmen, their efficacy was difficult to demonstrate, so (too often) the saleman's assistant would demonstrate how well the medicines "worked". Since toads were thought to be poisonous the assistant would eat a toad, then take the "medicine" to counteract the allegedly poisonous effects of the toad. Now the word means anyone willing to do something distasteful (to say the least) to curry someone's favor.

Sycophant has a less negative connotation than toady, having more of an adoring servile quality. A slightly less negative phrase is "yes-man", which has no sense of adoration, only spineless agreement.

So, is it better to be a sycophant or a troglodyte? Hard to tell, but I'm grateful (there's an interesting word - see how it happens?) for the wonderful journey on which those two words have taken me.

Be Ept

While screening resumes for a recent opening in my department, I encountered the misuse of inept for adept. Needless to say, the person who wrote they were inept in the particular requirement for the job I was filling was taken “at their word” and didn’t get the job. They made the mistake of using the wrong prefix.

The prefix “in-“ refers to a lack of the characteristic it modifies, as in inarticulate, insufficient, or indubitably.

Of course, the latter word raises the question “what happened to the original word that is modified? What happened to dubitably? It’s in the dictionary, but rarely used. And while I’ve heard people frequently be overwhelmed I’ve not heard of one being whelmed. It’s also in my dictionary but rarely used.

The word ept is not in my dictionary, nor have I heard anyone talk about being ept at something. So we have to discern its meaning from words from which it is formed.
The words formed by ept (inept and adept) have a quality of mastery about them. If one is inept it connotes being unable to perform even at an average ability some particular function. Incapable is a word with a similar meaning, but it can indicate being unable to perform either because of external or internal factors. Inept means being able to perform, but not as well as most people.

Adept is the opposite. It indicates a mastery of the function, and the dictionary defines is as expert or highly skilled. The word from which it comes is the past participle of the Latin word adipisci, which means to arrive at or pursue; the past participle is adeptus, and was used in middle Latin of alchemists claiming to have arrived at the philosopher’s stone.

Why do some words use “in-“ and some words use “un-“? The prefix “in-“ comes to us from Old French, with the initial negative connotation, whereas the prefix “un-“ comes from Old English.
As long as we’re on the subject, what about or “il-“, “im-“, or “ir-“ as a prefix of negativity? For me, it all makes sense most clearly when you try to say the words aloud. So “il-“ is often used when the word being modified begins with the letter L, “im-“ before words beginning with M, P, and B, and “ir-“ before words beginning with R. There are always, unproductively and unremittingly, exceptions.

So, while you may be dubitable or whelmed, you want to be adept, not inept at everything you do.