Deane Barker

Non-Cagean

Fri, 24 Nov 2023 00:00:00 +0000

This is a weird one, because it’s an invented form of the name of John Cage, who was an experimental composer in the 20th century. Cage was known for using strange and unique musical instruments and styles.

He might be most known for 4′33″, which is a 1952 musical “composition” consisting of four minutes and 33 seconds of silence. He advised that it was for any instrument or combination of instruments, and consisted of three acts. During this “performance,” the orchestra literally sits and does nothing (often while the audience nervously giggles, then erupts in ironic applause – here’s an example).

It was either a joke or a biting comentary on the state of music and attention, depending on who you asked.

Why I Looked It Up

In an article about Spotify music royalites:

They likely will point to examples of bad faith uploads (30 seconds of non-Cagean silence, and so on)

This clearly means “silence not intended as art” … but what does that even mean? That there are different forms of silence, and some can be art while others are just, well, silence?

Weirdly, I did find “non-Cagean” in reference to some other situations:

The daring element of the venture was that the conductor had never attempted a fully notated (non-Cagean) score in public.

The same applies to music of a non-Cagean kind (some of Cage’s works are, characteristically, recordings – rather than representations – of everyday sounds), literature, poetry, theater, sculpture, and dance.

What this actually means is anyone’s guess.

Grimoire

Fri, 24 Nov 2023 00:00:00 +0000

This is a spellbook – a mythical textbook of magic. The etymology is not clear.

Why I Looked It Up

In an article about programming:

I went to the Borders bookstore in the Short Hills mall and bought “Beginning Visuall C++” by Ivor Horton. It ran to twelve hundred pages – my first grimoire.

I also saw many references to the fictional Necronomicon, by H.P. Lovecraft.

Finally, while walking through Barnes and Noble, I saw a gaming book called Grimoire Nier. Not sure what it was about – something to do with magic.

Carbuncular

Fri, 24 Nov 2023 00:00:00 +0000

This word doesn’t actually exist: rather, it’s an invented form of the word “carbuncle,” which is a cluster of boils or infections.

Why I Looked It Up

In 100 Essential Things You Didn't Know You Didn't Know about Math and the Arts, there’s a discussion of “The Gherkin,” which is an oddly shaped skyscraper in London:

Prince Charles sees it as a rash of carbuncular towers on the face of London.

Charles clearly didn’t like it, and it turns out that he’s used the word to describe architecture before. He called a new extension to the National Gallery:

a monstrous carbuncle on the face of a much-loved and elegant friend

The BBC even has an article where they refer to Charles’s “list of carbuncles.”

Stochastic

Fri, 24 Nov 2023 00:00:00 +0000

For most intents and purposes, this is synonymous with “random,” though it’s a rabbit hole of a word – you can go very deep on what it means to various disciplines and in various combinations. The meaning can be very subtle or technical depending on what discipline or practice it’s applied.

Most commonly, you hear it in the context of a “stochastic process,” which is to say some sequence of events that involves a random variable, making the outcome of the process itself random.

You would rarely hear of the word used to describe a single thing – like, “a stochastic variable.” More often, it’s mean to describe a series of interrelated things, the outcome of which can’t be predicted. A random variable will produce a stochastic process.

The “ch” is hard – “STOW-kass-tick.”

Why I Looked It Up

I just kept seeing the word. My first few attempts to figure it out where stymied by the “rabbit hole” I mentioned above – I kept going down into specific disciplines – but then I realized I was just over-thinking it.

I finally took another look when The New Yorker published a visual essay entitled Is My Toddler a Stochastic Parrot? which refers to a concept in AI:

In machine learning, a stochastic parrot is a large language model that is good at generating convincing language, but does not actually understand the meaning of the language it is processing.

So, an AI just randomly stitiches words together based on what it’s heard, until it finds something that makes sense, then learns from that. It doesn’t know what it’s saying, but just has some fitness function at the end that tells it whether or not the word combination means something. (Much like a toddler, I suppose – if they randomly make a noise that results in them getting a bite of Mac and Cheese, they will learn to do that again.)

Prosaic

Tue, 21 Nov 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Definition: dull, ordinary

This is another word for “prose” as opposed to something more artistic like poetry or art.

Why I Looked It Up

In Life Lessons from Literature, when discussing Anna Karenina:

The trials and tribulations of Anna and Vronsky’s affair is contracted with the relationship between Kitty and Levin, which is noticeably more prosaic. However, Levin and Kitty work hard at their love and, through mutual respect, forge a partnership which endures and blossoms.

Hora

Tue, 21 Nov 2023 00:00:00 +0000

This is the traditional Jewish wedding dance where the married couple is lifted up in chairs and the guests lock arms and dance in a circle around them. It’s often performed to a song called the Hava Naglia.

Why I Looked It Up

“Jewish wedding dance” was a clue in the NY Times crossword. I had no idea, so I had to finally look it up.

Perforce

Wed, 15 Nov 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Definition: by force or necessity

Why I Looked It Up

I knew of a type of software named Perforce (the company still exists; the software product doesn’t). I always thought it was a weird name.

In Everything, All the Time, Everywhere, another book called The Origins and Postmodernity is quoted:

Although not within its grim satifations, such plebeianization perforce denotes not great popular englighthenment, but new forms of inebriation and delusion…

What is the author saying here? No idea. “Plebeianization” means to make something simple or common or pedestration. So, I guess he’s saying this happened by force?

Prior to this, the author of the original book said:

It entailed a leveling process by means of which the great geniuses of modernism were cut down to size.

So…smart people were “cut down to size” by force? I guess?

Neoliberalism

Wed, 15 Nov 2023 00:00:00 +0000

This term has a long historical context, first being used in France in the 1800s. It seems to have switched sides many times, and been flexed and twisted to mean a lot of different things.

In contemporary Western politics, it mainly refers to the resurgence of conservative (yes, conservative) politics in the late 20th century. These politics involved policies like deregulation, economic austerity, privatization, etc. – anything that acknowledged and enabled the supremacy of the free market.

Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher are the most representative neoliberals, and the ones with whom the label is most associated.

So, where did the name come from? If it’s associated with the word “liberal,” it’s odd that it refers to conservative politics. This page has a lot of history of the term (although, with a conservative slant).

From my reading, I don’t see any absolute agreement on the etymology of the term. Does the “liberal” part refer to a political position, or the idea of “liberty”? Or does it mean a “new liberal,” meaning a liberal who has changed positions? Or does it mean “new liberty”?

(This is further complicated by the existence of the term “classic liberalism,” which is essentially the opposite of what we consider a “liberal” in contemporary politics.)

This page acknowledges the confusion by quoting an author:

[Neoliberal] is now widely acknowledged in the literature as a controversial, incoherent, and crisis-ridden term, even by many of its most influential deployers.

Why I Looked It Up

I had heard the term often, and I knew it was somehow associated with Reagan, but the juxtaposition of his politics and the term “liberal” confused me.

(It still does. I don’t know that I have a clear answer to this.)

Total War

Wed, 15 Nov 2023 00:00:00 +0000

This is a concept which is in opposition to a “restricted war” or “limited conflict.” In that scenario, two countries are at war in a limited area, specifically seeking military out military targets, and trying to achieve a limited objective.

A “total war” is when two countries go to war with each other for complete domination, and make no differentiation between civilian and military people or targets. All objects and personell under the control of or aligned with the enemy are considered combatants and are considered legitimate targets.

In modern times, these are conflicts like the two World Wars, the American Civil War, etc.

For example, in 1864, General Sherman wrote:

[We are] not only fighting hostile armies, but a hostile people, and must make old and young, rich and poor, feel the hard hand of war, as well as their organized armies…

It’s commensurate with phrases like “scorched Earth” and “take no prisoners.”

Why I Looked It Up

I had heard the term for years, and in particular saw a YouTube video entitled: How the US & China Are Preparing to Fight Total War.

(It’s a long video, and I haven’t actually watched it, so I don’t know what it actually had to say about the phrase.)

Gainsay

Mon, 13 Nov 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Definition: contradict or deny

There’s an Old English interpretation of “gain” as meaning “against.” So, “gainsay” is to literally “say against.”

Why I Looked It Up

In The Tyranny of Clichés:

One need not gainsay the scientific endeavor to call attention to the remarkably large amount of equine excrement in many of its manifestations…

The author was talking about the idea that there are biological roots to political position. I think he was trying to make the point that you can disagree with this point without disagreeing with all science… I think?

Shakshouka

Mon, 13 Nov 2023 00:00:00 +0000

This is a Middle Eastern dish consisting of eggs poached in a tomato sauce. The word comes from Arabic for “mixture.”

Why I Looked It Up

In 2023, there was a minor online controversy when a woman posted a TikTok video about how she was 29 and single with no children and she loved her life. Several times in the video, she mentioned a shakshouka recipe she wanted to try.

The video became famous when conservative blogger Matt Walsh commented about how empty the woman’s life must be. Predictable, drama ensued.

Shuckling

Sun, 12 Nov 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Shuckling refers to the ritualistic rocking motion made by Jews during prayer.

(Note that this isn’t a situation where I found a word and looked it up. Rather, I observed something and assumed it had a name, so I went looking for it.)

This page has a lot of explanations for it, such as:

being so moved by prayer that your entire body becomes involved
the need for exercise during long periods of prayer
when multiple people prayed from a single Torah, they would constantly stand up and bend down, leading over time to the ritualistic swaying

I gather it’s one of those things just passed on by custom, and everyone might have a different reason for it. Over time, it likely has just become a communal norm – you do it because everyone else does it, and it becomes a rite of passage or membership.

Why I Looked It Up

I first saw this during the 80s or 90s during a news segment about a prayer space in Yankee Stadium. Being a sheltered Protestant kid, I was expecting silent or spoken prayer, and wasn’t prepared to see Jewish prayer. I was a little unnerved by it.

I encountered it again over the years, notably in a Netflix series called Rough Gems about an Orthodox Jewish community in Belgium.

Then, while watching this series, I saw a woman shuckling while praying in an airport (in real life, not on the show), and I was finally prompted to look it up.

Life of Riley

Fri, 10 Nov 2023 00:00:00 +0000

This means a comfortable life, free from worry or anxiety.

No one seems to agree on where it came from. It dates to the early 1900s. Later, there was a radio show, a TV show, and a couple of movies that used the title.

Why I Looked It Up

It was a clue in the NY Times Mini Crossword. “Living the life of _____.” I knew it intutively, but had no idea why. (Still don’t, honestly.)

Off Piste

Fri, 10 Nov 2023 00:00:00 +0000

“Piste” is French for trail or track. So, “off piste” is a skiing term for backcountry skiiing, meaning to ski in areas that are not groomed slopes at ski resorts.

As an idiom, “off piste” could mean to do something unexpected or outside the ordinary.

Why I Looked It Up

I saw a billboard in the London Underground promoting “off piste” as a lifestyle choice. It’s an interesting angle, since it’s likely that a lot of non-skiers wouldn’t understand the term.

The Dolomites

Fri, 10 Nov 2023 00:00:00 +0000

A mountain range in Italy. They’re named for the type of rock they’re formed of.

Also known as The Southern Alps. The mountains are located at the Northern Edge of Italy, towards Austria.

This is where you ski in Italy, apparently. Unbeknownst to me, the winter scenes of For Your Eyes Only – one of my favorite James Bond movies – were filmed in Cortina d’Ampezzo, which is right in the middle of the Dolemites.

Why I Looked It Up

A friend has spent a lot of time in Italy. He was talking about how beautiful it was, and said something like:

…because, you know, you’re right there in The Dolemites.

I nodded along as if I did, in fact, know.

I did not know.

Postscript

Added on November 10, 2023

I flew from Trieste, Italy to Frankfurt, Germany on an small, regional airline called Air Dolomiti. The flight path took me directly over the Dolomites.

Tarmac

Fri, 10 Nov 2023 00:00:00 +0000

This is short for “tarmacadam,” which differs slightly from macadam.

Wikipedia defines it as:

Tarmacadam is a road surfacing material made by combining crushed stone, sand, and tar […] It is a more durable and dust-free enhancement of simple compacted stone macadam surfaces…

Vocabulary.com says:

The name comes from a specific tar-based paving material that’s also commonly used on roads. Originally, the word was trademarked as shorthand for tarmacadam, “tar mixed with crushed rock…”

So, it technically refers to a specific method of road construction, but honestly, we know it as the concrete areas at airports.

I gather that in the UK, “tarmac” is sometimes used as a verb, like we would use “pave” here in the US.

We should tarmac that gravel road.

Why I Looked It Up

I used the word in a Facebook post, and I suddenly got to wondering where it came from. We all know it intuitively, but it’s such an odd word that I figured there had to be a story behind it.

Ergodic

Fri, 3 Nov 2023 00:00:00 +0000

This word has been used in many contexts. It’s original mathematic, but has been repurposed in several domains.

Generally, it means that a system which appears to be chaotic will eventually return to a previously-known state. So, if we consider one combination of all variables in a system as a “state,” an ergodic system will eventually return to that state at some point.

(…I think. Seriously, it’s complicated.)

I found the word in relation to interactive fiction. An author proposed a new phrase – “ergodic literature” – to refer to fiction that is non-linear and requires effort on the past of the reader to consume.

The adjective I propose for this function is “ergodic,” which implies a situation in which a chain of events (a path, a sequence of actions, etc.) has been produced by the nontrivial efforts of one or more individuals or mechanisms.

Now, that doesn’t totally fit the original, mathematical description, but it implies a system in which any moment is a collection of variable states.

Why I Looked It Up

I originally found the word from an article called The Best Ergodic Fiction. The summary of that article reads:

The best fiction doesn’t have to be straightforward, and some novels contain clever devices to make the reader complicit in the story itself. [This article] recommends five gamified novels that subvert our ideas of how fiction works.

The quote in the explanation is from the book Cybertext: Perspectives on Ergodic Literature (cover above), which is generally considered the source from which it was coined.

Postscript

I noticed that I have “ergodicity” listed as another name for The Gambler's Fallacy.

Postscript

Added on November 22, 2023

In Knowledge and Power, I found this:

[these things are] a mouthful of philosophical cogs, pins, widgets and chmiebal elements. In information theory, these factors represent an “ergodic” universe, which assures that the same functions will reliably prodice the same outputs. Ergodicity is crucial to any predictive model.

Atavism

Fri, 3 Nov 2023 00:00:00 +0000

This is a biological feature that reappears after being absent for sometime – usually many generations.

For example, every once in a while, a human is born with a tail stump, or covered in fur. Additionally, very rarely, someone will find a whale with legs.

Socially, an atavism can refer to something which is “throwback” or “retro.” When bell-bottoms come back into style, that can be considered a fashion atavism.

Why I Looked It Up

In Neuromancer:

You couldn’t kill a zaibatsu by assassinating a bunch of executives; there were others waiting to step up the ladder to the vacated position. […] T-A was an atavism, a clan.

The usage here is odd. The speaker is comparing a large corporation (a “zaibatsu”) as a sort of immortal being, like genetic traits that you think are gone but eventually re-surface.

Syncope

Fri, 3 Nov 2023 00:00:00 +0000

This is the official medical term for fainting or sudden loss of conciousness. “Pre-syncope” is the feeling that you’re about to faint.

The most common form is “vasovagal syncope” which means you have a sudden drop in blood pressure which causes you to faint due to lack of oxygen to the brain, so-named because the vagus nerve regulates heart rate (among other things).

It’s pronounced “SINK-o-pee.”

Why I Looked It Up

In The Mystery of Dr. Fu-Manchu:

“Suoutherly died during the night, but Sir Frank Narcombe, arriving a few minutes later, unhesitatingly pronounced death to be due to syncope, and seems to have noticed nothing suspcious.”

You can’t die directly from fainting, so perhaps it was assumed he hit his head on something when he fell?

Tmesis

Fri, 3 Nov 2023 00:00:00 +0000

This is generally when another word is inserted in between the two segments of a compound work, usually as slang or exclamation.

Example: “un-freaking-believable”

There is a more technical definition, when the subject is interserted into a verb phrase: “turn off” becomes “turn the radio off”

Why I Looked It Up

I found it in a discussion of interactive fiction in Cybertext: Perspectives on Ergodic Literature.

Oubliette

Mon, 30 Oct 2023 00:00:00 +0000

This is a combination of dungeon and torture device from the Middle Ages. It was a small room or shaft where someone was confined and left to die.

It seems slightly different from a dungeon, though the words are often conflated (indeed, the Wikipedia page even redirects). Whereas a dungeon was a general prison, an oubliette was specifically designed for people to simply waste away until they died.

It’s from the French word for “forget.”

Why I Looked It Up

I was watching the 1984 movie Labyrinth, and it was used by several characters to describe a hole where the main character fell into.

Insouciance

Mon, 30 Oct 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Definition: state of nonchalance or indifference

It’s French for “not anxious”

Why I Looked It Up

From Information Hunters:

To the men who had been in distant outpoints, Paris was a wonder. Eating real meals, taking in shows, and strolling the streets, they marveled at the beauty and insouciance of the city.

Not quite sure of the meaning there, honestly.

Palimpsest

Sun, 29 Oct 2023 00:00:00 +0000

This refers to a material that has been written over many times, such as a parchment that has been cleaned and reused, or a painting canvas that has layers of paint because the painter reused it.

Parchment was rare and expensive, and made of animal skin, so it was very durable. Oil canvases are also expensive (especially for struggling artists). Both are/were often reused.

The word comes from a Greek compound word literally for “again scrape.”

It’s pronounced exactly how it looks: “PAL-um-zest.”

Why I Looked It Up

In the coffee table book Joan Miró, the opening essay discusses a painting which was painted over a drawing of Christopher Columbus. The author imagines that this was intentional:

If this is not how Miró was thinking, the fact remains that, fragmentary as it may be, he deliberately left one text to be read through another – the very definition of allegory, of which the palimpsest is the paradigm.

Harlequin

Sun, 29 Oct 2023 00:00:00 +0000

This is a stock character originating in Italian theater of the 17th century. It’s generally the equivalent to the court jester – a Harlequin is often a servant, known for quick wit, comedy, and getting themselves into complicated situations.

The Harlequin is usually depicted in a diamond-patterned costume, wearing a mask.

Additionally, the traditional Harlequin character had a consistent love interest: Columbina. This seems to be where the association with romance comes from – the Harlequin was always getting in predictaments due to his pursuit of Columbina.

Why I Looked It Up

I was, of course, familiar with the term, but it was in the name of a painting by Joan Miró: The Harlequin’s Carnival. I got to wondering about the term.

I had most associated the term with the publisher of romance novels. Interestingly, I read their history page and their Wikipedia entry, and it seems that they were founded and named without any reference to the romantic aspects of the traditional Harlequin character.

Early in its history, Harlequin published inexpensive reprints of detective stories, cookbooks, westerns, and a smattering of tragic love stories.

About 10 years after it’s founding, Harlequin partnered with another publisher which was known for romance novels, which is when they drifted into that genre.

From this page called “How Harlequin Became the Most Famous Name in Romance”:

At first, the company published a mishmash of genres, with mixed success. Palmour, who ran much of the business day-to-day, noticed “nice little romances” were performing particularly well.

There’s no indication that the company ever changed its name, so its apparently just a coincidence that it was named Harlequin to start with.

Nomological Network

Sat, 28 Oct 2023 00:00:00 +0000

This is an inter-related set of proof points to prove a hypothesis. It’s a little hard to grasp, but it basically means “a mountain of related evidence.”

From Oxford Reference:

A lawful pattern of interrelationships that exists between hypothetical constructs and observable attributes and that guides a researcher in establishing the construct validity of a psychological test or measure.

Two researchers coined the term in 1955, based on the Greek word for law. They stated that a nomological network of evidence for a point should generate testable hypotheses.

“Nomology” is the study of scientific laws. So a nomological network is a group of laws for an argument.

Why I Looked It Up

It came up quite a bit in The Parasitic Mind.

The author doesn’t strictly define it, but as an example he presents a set of evidence to prove that men generally prefer women with an hourglass figure. He provides seven proof points (example: “the hourglass figure has been associated with greater fertility and superior health”), but doesn’t stick to one discipline or methodology.

His points are all over the map – a “network of evidence” for his point. I think the author was saying that even though no single point completely makes the case by itself, all the points together form a solid argument.

He uses the phrase “nomological network of cumulative evidence” several times.

Holler

Tue, 24 Oct 2023 00:00:00 +0000

This is an informal geographic term – it seems to be slang or patois for “hollow,” but some resources reject that and claim it has a definition all its own.

It’s an Appalachian term for valley. The University of South Carolina defines it as:

A small, sheltered valley that usually but not necessarily has a watercourse.

Deep in Appalachia, most towns were built in valleys next to rivers, thus they became the natural social designations, like “neighborhood” or “block” in an urban setting.

This recollection frames it in more social terms.

I lived in Graveyard Holler for six years in the 1940s. It had a dirt road, and there were 18 coalminers’ houses in there. The school bus wouldn’t even come up the holler to pick us up.

A holler has a head and a mouth. The head is as far as you can go, and the mouth is where the creek runs into a larger stream of water.

A holler can have houses spaced out on both sides of the road. You can ‘holler’ from one house to the other to tell the latest news. It may have several branches of forks.

A holler may have a small grocery store at its mouth, and if you see someone walking to the store, give them some money and your list and they will bring your groceries back with them. Or, let them check your mail.

Why I Looked It Up

I can’t remember. It came up in some book I was reading. I understood it from context, but wondered if there was a formal definition.

Gaijin

Fri, 20 Oct 2023 00:00:00 +0000

This is a Japanese term for “foreigner.” There’s debate as to whether it’s an insult or not (I imagine it could go both ways, depending on context or usage).

Why I Looked It Up

It came up in Neuromancer a lot, especially the early chapters set in Chiba City.

Senescent

Thu, 19 Oct 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Definition: old, aged

The root is the Latin “sen,” which means “old,” which is also where we get “senile” from.

Why I Looked It Up

In Information Hunters, which dicussingdiscussing a request for a pension:

It has “a slightly crackpot (or senescent) air of plaint and persecution.”

The implication is that the requestor was either crazy or senile.

Daisy Cutter

Thu, 19 Oct 2023 00:00:00 +0000

This term seems to have originated in early baseball or cricket, referring to a ball that travels low across the ground – either a cricket bowl or a baseball hit. Presumeably, the name comes from the idea that the ball was low enough to “cut daisies” as it traveled.

From there, it morphed into munitions. A fuse was developed that allowed bombs to explode just before they hit the ground, which means the blast didn’t get absorbed by the Earth and instead spread out over a larger area. So, like the ball described above, the blast of the bomb skimmed over the top of the ground.

These bombs were often used to clear areas for helicopter landing zones, as they would fell trees in a wide radius. This culminated in the famous BLU-82 bomb used in Vietnam, which was nicknamed “The Dasiy Cutter.”

This video shows the bomb dropped in a forest to clear an area for a helicopter to land.

Why I Looked It Up

In The Kaiju Preservation Society, characters discussed using “lots and lots of daisy cutters,” for a specific tactical situation, instead of nuclear weapons, because the latter would open up the rift between worlds. The implication being that daisy cutters were the only comparable conventional weapons. (Notably, it was in lower case, not title case, like it would be if referring to the BLU-82 as a proper noun.)

I had heard of that phrase used for the BLU-82, but I wasn’t sure if it was a general phrase, or where it originated.

Stalking Horse

Wed, 18 Oct 2023 00:00:00 +0000

This is a candidate or an idea that is put forth to “test the waters” and see how something is received, while hiding the mastermind behind it.

It’s named for a fake horse that hunters would use when stalking prey. The logic is subtle: “stalking horse” means “a horse used for stalking,” not “a horse that is stalking” (remember, horses don’t really stalk anything).

So, the “stalking horse” is the thing you hide behind, or the tool you’re using to get achieve your goal.

In finance, a “stalking horse offer” is a pre-arranged bid that effectively acts as a reserve, or lower-boundary on what the seller will receive.

Why I Looked It Up

In The Scandal of the Evangelical Mind:

[…] evangelicals of many sort […] connjectured that Mussolini might be the Antichrist or at least a stalking for him.

This is kind of interesting, because the Antichrist is commonly characterized as – itself – a stalking horse for Satan.