I’m a big fan of word origins. One interesting one is the word “science.” The related word “Scientology” has been getting a lot of play lately, with some people claiming that it’s merely trying to cash in on the word-power of “science.” Really though, they both come from the Latin root “scientia” which means knowledge or learning. Scientology is said to literally mean “knowing how to know” or the “study of knowing”. Even more interesting than that though is the Indo-European root of scientia, “skei-”.
Skei- is a word root which actually means to cut or split. Small wonder then that science as we know it is so concerned with breaking things down, categorizing, splitting things into component pieces. It’s closely tied to the IE root, “sek-” from which we derive the words “saw” and “scythe”. Science in the sense of cutting or splitting is related also to “schism” and “schizo-”. And one of the weirder correlations is that the extended form “skeid-” is the root for our modern word “shit”, to defecate.
One other connection this calls to mind. Jung talks somewhere about how the sword in dreams and myth often symbolizes reason and the analytical mind, because it’s able to cut things down, the ability of discernment or judgement. This makes the famous story of King Solomon also make a bit more sense - that tale where two women come battling for ownership of a baby. Solomon orders the baby to be cut in half and divided between the two women. The real mother breaks down and says she’ll give up her claim to the baby as long as it’s life is spared. And it’s by this selflessness that Solomon discerns that she’s the real mother.
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6 Comments
makes sense.
what a interesting spell……
no wonder ive never liked the word.
one
human?
When I look at Indo-European word origins, my mind starts to sort of fritz… it makes me realize how language develops by taking one word, and creating new shades and colorations of it. But it’s like all the offshoots somehow are still connected in this way that makes you realize we’re really only using a very limited word-set. I don’t know how many words are in the vocabulary, but maybe it’s somewhere in the range around or above what dogs understand. I think their max vocab is something like 150, but I’ll have to look into that.
Imagine your dog could understand the differences between:
- “I went for a walk yesterday.”
- “I walked home from work.”
- “I’ll go for a walk tomorrow.”
- “Come on boy, let’s go for a walk!”
All the dog hears is WALK!
It’s also interesting to think about the connection between swords, warfare, colonization and the progress of science and culture through history
The Online Etymology Dictionary also relates shit to conscience:
etymonline.com on shit
Yes, it’s true: Solomon did use a sword to discern the real mother.
as opposed to proscience i assume…
makes perfect sense..
well conscience is the same root as science… oh they had a good explanation of how “shit” relates to “cut” in that the shit is separating itself from the body.
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[...] u’ve known for a long time. For example, this linguistic connection between the word “science” and the Indo-European root it comes from meaning “cut& [...]