quword 趣词
Word Origins Dictionary
- biology




- biology: [19] The modern European languages have made prolific use of Greek bíos ‘life’ as a prefix, particularly in the 20th century. The first compound into which it entered in English seems to have been biotic, in the now obsolete sense ‘of secular life’ (around 1600), but the trend was really set by biography, first recorded as being used by John Dryden in his Life of Plutarch 1683. Biology itself came along at the beginning of the 19th century, via French, having been coined in German by Gottfried Reinhold in 1802.
Twentieth-century contributions have included bioengineering, biometric, bionic, biorhythm, and biotechnology. Greek bíos itself goes back to an Indo-European base *gwej-, from which English also ultimately gets quick, vital, vivid, and zoo.
=> quick, vital, vivid, zoo - apperception (n.)




- 1753, from French aperception (17c.), from German Apperzeption (or Latin apperceptionem), coined by German mathematician and philosopher Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz (1646-1716) as noun corresponding to French apercevoir "perceive, notice, become aware of" (11c., from Latin ad "to" (see ad-) + percipere; see perceive) on analogy of Perzeption/percevoir.
- bacteria (n.)




- 1847, plural of Modern Latin bacterium, from Greek bakterion "small staff," diminutive of baktron "stick, rod," from PIE *bak- "staff used for support" (also source of Latin baculum "rod, walking stick"). So called because the first ones observed were rod-shaped. Introduced as a scientific word 1838 by German naturalist Christian Gottfried Ehrenberg (1795-1876).
- biology (n.)




- 1819, from Greek bios "life" (see bio-) + -logy. Suggested 1802 by German naturalist Gottfried Reinhold Treviranus (1776-1837), and introduced as a scientific term that year in French by Lamarck.
- dynamic (adj.)




- 1817 as a term in philosophy; 1827 in the sense "pertaining to force producing motion" (the opposite of static), from French dynamique introduced by German mathematician Gottfried Leibnitz (1646-1716) in 1691 from Greek dynamikos "powerful," from dynamis "power," from dynasthai "to be able, to have power, be strong enough," which is of unknown origin. The figurative sense of "active, potent, energetic" is from 1856 (in Emerson). Related: Dynamically.
- Godfrey




- masc. proper name, from Old French Godefrei (Modern French Godefroi), from Old High German Godafrid (German Gottfried), literally "the peace of God," from Old High German got "God" (see god) + fridu "peace" (see Frederick). In early 20c., the name sometimes was used as a slang euphemism for "God."
- optimism (n.)




- 1759 (in translations of Voltaire), from French optimisme (1737), from Modern Latin optimum, used by Gottfried Leibniz (in "Théodicée," 1710) to mean "the greatest good," from Latin optimus "the best" (see optimum). The doctrine holds that the actual world is the "best of all possible worlds," in which the creator accomplishes the most good at the cost of the least evil.
En termes de l'art, il l'appelle la raison du meilleur ou plus savamment encore, et Theologiquement autant que Géométriquement, le systême de l'Optimum, ou l'Optimisme. [Mémoires de Trévoux, Feb. 1737]
Launched out of philosophical jargon and into currency by Voltaire's satire on it in "Candide." General sense of "belief that good ultimately will prevail in the world" first attested 1841 in Emerson; meaning "tendency to take a hopeful view of things" first recorded 1819 in Shelley. - statistics (n.)




- 1770, "science dealing with data about the condition of a state or community" [Barnhart], from German Statistik, popularized and perhaps coined by German political scientist Gottfried Aschenwall (1719-1772) in his "Vorbereitung zur Staatswissenschaft" (1748), from Modern Latin statisticum (collegium) "(lecture course on) state affairs," from Italian statista "one skilled in statecraft," from Latin status (see state (n.2)). OED points out that "the context shows that [Aschenwall] did not regard the term as novel," but current use of it seems to trace to him. Sir John Sinclair is credited with introducing it in English use. Meaning "numerical data collected and classified" is from 1829; hence the study of any subject by means of extensive enumeration. Abbreviated form stats first recorded 1961.
- terminology (n.)




- 1770, from German Terminologie, a hybrid coined by Christian Gottfried Schütz (1747-1832), professor of poetry and rhetoric at Jena, from Medieval Latin terminus "word, expression" (see terminus) + Greek -logia "a dealing with, a speaking of" (see -logy). Related: Terminological.
Decandolle and others use the term Glossology instead of Terminology, to avoid the blemish of a word compounded of two parts taken from different languages. The convenience of treating the termination ology (and a few other parts of compounds) as not restricted to Greek combinations, is so great, that I shall venture, in these cases, to disregard this philological scruple. [William Whewell, "The Philosophy of the Inductive Sciences," 1847]
- zinnia (n.)




- genus of herbs of the aster family, 1767, from Modern Latin (Linnæus, 1763), named for German botanist Johann Gottfried Zinn (1729-1759) + abstract noun ending -ia.