Tonights Words AKA here I go again...
The stream of insanity consciousness ends and begins at the prefix pro
Pro- | Define Pro- at Dictionary.com
pro- advancing or projecting forward or outward, used in compound words borrowed from Latin such as...
provision to provide or supply something, arrangement or preparation made before hand i.e. 'forward vision'
'Forward Vision' was my own 'etymological deduction' of which I became very proud. Then I also became proud of the phrase 'etymological deduction' and decided to heretofore call it an 'etyduction'! Then I actually wrote..."What an awesome AmyLyn word! It's because the 'ty' and 'de' sound alike! But really I'm just going to write 'etyduct'." Wow. Apparently I really do like myself. smiley face. But then I encountered one more Dictionary.com etymological WTF? and with these two words my stream of insanity consciousness was forever changed!
provide to arrange for or stipulate beforehand, to supply or equip, to make available, to afford or yield, from pro (forward) + videre (to see)...just like provision ... obviously my next stop would be...
divide to separate into parts, groups, sections; to cleave or to part < Latin
dividere to separate, divide
Dictionary.com offers no additional etymological information from any 'real' dictionary (i.e. one produced for the intentional purposes of material viability and reckless profiteering, hopefully by a grand old publishing concern such as Oxford or Merriam Webster or New American, etc...) for the word divide which is unfortunately just one more example of the lazy etymology that has come to define the Dictionary.com institution. Obviously divide and provide contain the same stem, and I make the following case:
divide < L
dividere to separate, divide <
di (to go through (as in disect) or cleave) +
videre (to see)
Therefore provide means forward vision and divide means cleaved vision. It is a perfectly reasonable and simple deduction and Elementary, my dear Watson. However and sadly and unfortunately the only additional etymological information provided by Dictionary.com is from the Online Etymological Dictionary as follows.
Modern Language Association (MLA):
divide
late 14c., from L. dividere "to force apart, cleave, distribute," fromdis- "apart" + -videre "to separate," from PIE base *widh- "toseparate," related to widow; and see with. Mathematical sense isfrom early 15c. The noun meaning "watershed, separation betweenriver valleys" is first recorded 1807. Divider "partition or screen,"especially in a room, is from 1959. Divide and rule (c.1600)translates L. divide et impera , a maxim of Machiavelli. Related:Divided ; dividing . Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2010 Douglas Harper
To be clear the purpose of this rant is in no way to disparage the Online Etymology Dictionary. I believe the author and creator, Mr. Douglas Harper, to be a hero. It is an enterprise I genuinely adore and I've spent many happy hours lost in it's charms. However, why does Mr. Harper get so much right when the producers of 'real' dictionaries so often turn in lazy, unacceptable and just plain wrong work? The Online Etymology Dictionary is an enterprise produced by one person, albeit an amazing one, and it is unrealistic to expect Mr. Harper to have the resources...the time, the money, the linguists!...that must be available to the producers of 'real' dictionaries. So I am officially disgusted by the 'real' dictionaries and believe that they should just get off of the Internet if they are going to continue to turn in substandard work. The Online Etymology Dictionary, Free Dictionary, Wikipedia, Urban Dictionary and other 'free' user produced content consistently prove to be at least equal sources of information, if not better.
As I am now exhausted following is a list of the additional pro words followed by the words that began the stream of consciousness insanity, all of which I want to look up and etyduct tomorrow.
prologue, produce, prostrate, prodigal, prodigy, prodigious...and here I quote from the Dictionary.com pro- definition page..."sometimes intensive force such as promiscuous" (?!?!)...followed and proceeded by prolate, oblate, lateral, collateral, oblique finally ending at ischial tuberosity...which will probably then obliquely or laterally direct me to perineum, pedundal and scrotal nerves and arteries.
And all because I had to watch Bones before I went to bed
and couldn't let it go when the silly genius-savant* Temperance said:
"Due to the melting of the bones (plot point...bones don't melt...they actually crystalized and only appeared to be melted!) his Ilium is located where his Ischial Tuberosity is usually located."
*I look forward to defining genius-savant during a future Bones rant. The joy and inspired glee I feel for preparing a critique of the show actually worries me.
So Awesome! Check out the cute heart graphic I found! Hopefully I can work on it and make a cute signature graphic! It makes me so happy! Praise you Jesus!
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