Is it happening more now than it did in the past?
Or do I simply notice it more, since I’ve become aware of it?
Last week, Xi Jinping, the president of China, said that he hoped the world could avoid falling into a “Thucydides trap.”
Xi wins. I’d heard of Thucydides, but I couldn’t have told you what his trap was.
(Now that I’ve investigated, Xi probably said this to avoid Trump’s criticism. If Xi had said that America was in decline, Trump might have objected. If Xi said that the world should avoid a Thucydides trap, Xi could be pretty damn confident that Trump wouldn’t say a word.)
If you’re interested in Thucydides traps, google it. That’s not really my point.
A couple of weeks ago, Bill Maher said there were phrases that he understands well enough. He doesn’t want anybody to give a more precise definition. Among Maher’s phrases was “Overton window.”
I knew that one, but only because I’d recently looked it up.
If you care, google it. That’s not really my point.
Someone was talking about the Strait of Hormuz recently, and he said the strait was seemingly open and closed at the same time. American leaders said they had defeated the Iranians, so the strait was open, but then had independently chosen to blockade the strait, so it was closed. Open and closed at the same time, snickered the pundit. Sort of like Schrodinger’s cat.
If you care, google it. That’s not really my point.
If you read Scott Greenfield’s thoughts over at Simple Justice, you’ll occasionally be told that you shouldn’t change a rule unless you know what purpose the rule was intended to serve. According to Greenfield, that’s like Chesterton’s fence.
If you care, google it. That’s not really my point.
I was reading something recently, and the text told me that I’d have to turn the thought over in my mind, like pondering Theseus’s ship.
If you care, google it. That’s not really my point.
This morning (I’m writing on Saturday), the “Opinion Today” email from The New York Times told me that the author had fallen prey to Fredkin’s paradox.
Google, here I come.
I started to think about this. Why do I notice the adjectival use of people’s names today in a way that I didn’t years ago? Occam’s razor tells me that the simplest explanation is often the best. I’m not, after all, looking for a Platonic ideal, just a basic explanation.
The simplest explanation, I think, is the existence of search engines. In the past, when I hit a phrase that I didn’t understand, I just kept reading; there was no easy way to cure my ignorance. Today, when I hit a phrase that baffles (or intrigues) me, I google it. How convenient to hold all human knowledge in the palm of one’s hand!
If you don’t understand a phrase and just keep on reading, the phrase won’t stick in your mind; you move on in your ignorance. But if you pause to look up a phrase, you make a mental note of the new words. You become more attentive to the phrase than you’d otherwise be.
I agree with many of the critics who say that social media shortens our collective attention span and is dangerous for kids (and many adults). Social media may well sharpen the political divide in our country; it sure seems that way. Artificial intelligence may soon exterminate us all.
But at least there’s an upside to all this technology.
In the past, I never stopped to investigate new adjectival uses of people’s names, because it was almost impossible to do the research. I went on using (or understanding) phrases that I’d understood for decades. Prose could be Shakespearean in its eloquence, and certain items survived Darwinian selection. I knew Orwellian and Machiavellian and Kafkaesque. I’ve had my share of Freudian slips (although none involved an Oedipal complex) and, when I work up a head of steam, Newton’s law helps to keep me going.
But I never went beyond the basics, because it was too hard to get there.
Now, because of the internet, we can use — and remember, or at least look up — more people’s names as adjectives.
But why, you might ask, am I writing this? Shouldn’t I be writing about the law, or pontificating about politics, or doing something worthwhile?
Or maybe Above the Law solicited me to write this column for only one reason: Murphy’s law.
Mark Herrmann spent 17 years as a partner at a leading international law firm and later oversaw litigation, compliance and employment matters at a large international company. He is the author of The Curmudgeon’s Guide to Practicing Law and Drug and Device Product Liability Litigation Strategy (affiliate links). You can reach him by email at inhouse@abovethelaw.com.
The post Your Name As An Adjective appeared first on Above the Law.
Is it happening more now than it did in the past?
Or do I simply notice it more, since I’ve become aware of it?
Last week, Xi Jinping, the president of China, said that he hoped the world could avoid falling into a “Thucydides trap.”
Xi wins. I’d heard of Thucydides, but I couldn’t have told you what his trap was.
(Now that I’ve investigated, Xi probably said this to avoid Trump’s criticism. If Xi had said that America was in decline, Trump might have objected. If Xi said that the world should avoid a Thucydides trap, Xi could be pretty damn confident that Trump wouldn’t say a word.)
If you’re interested in Thucydides traps, google it. That’s not really my point.
A couple of weeks ago, Bill Maher said there were phrases that he understands well enough. He doesn’t want anybody to give a more precise definition. Among Maher’s phrases was “Overton window.”
I knew that one, but only because I’d recently looked it up.
If you care, google it. That’s not really my point.
Someone was talking about the Strait of Hormuz recently, and he said the strait was seemingly open and closed at the same time. American leaders said they had defeated the Iranians, so the strait was open, but then had independently chosen to blockade the strait, so it was closed. Open and closed at the same time, snickered the pundit. Sort of like Schrodinger’s cat.
If you care, google it. That’s not really my point.
If you read Scott Greenfield’s thoughts over at Simple Justice, you’ll occasionally be told that you shouldn’t change a rule unless you know what purpose the rule was intended to serve. According to Greenfield, that’s like Chesterton’s fence.
If you care, google it. That’s not really my point.
I was reading something recently, and the text told me that I’d have to turn the thought over in my mind, like pondering Theseus’s ship.
If you care, google it. That’s not really my point.
This morning (I’m writing on Saturday), the “Opinion Today” email from The New York Times told me that the author had fallen prey to Fredkin’s paradox.
Google, here I come.
I started to think about this. Why do I notice the adjectival use of people’s names today in a way that I didn’t years ago? Occam’s razor tells me that the simplest explanation is often the best. I’m not, after all, looking for a Platonic ideal, just a basic explanation.
The simplest explanation, I think, is the existence of search engines. In the past, when I hit a phrase that I didn’t understand, I just kept reading; there was no easy way to cure my ignorance. Today, when I hit a phrase that baffles (or intrigues) me, I google it. How convenient to hold all human knowledge in the palm of one’s hand!
If you don’t understand a phrase and just keep on reading, the phrase won’t stick in your mind; you move on in your ignorance. But if you pause to look up a phrase, you make a mental note of the new words. You become more attentive to the phrase than you’d otherwise be.
I agree with many of the critics who say that social media shortens our collective attention span and is dangerous for kids (and many adults). Social media may well sharpen the political divide in our country; it sure seems that way. Artificial intelligence may soon exterminate us all.
But at least there’s an upside to all this technology.
In the past, I never stopped to investigate new adjectival uses of people’s names, because it was almost impossible to do the research. I went on using (or understanding) phrases that I’d understood for decades. Prose could be Shakespearean in its eloquence, and certain items survived Darwinian selection. I knew Orwellian and Machiavellian and Kafkaesque. I’ve had my share of Freudian slips (although none involved an Oedipal complex) and, when I work up a head of steam, Newton’s law helps to keep me going.
But I never went beyond the basics, because it was too hard to get there.
Now, because of the internet, we can use — and remember, or at least look up — more people’s names as adjectives.
But why, you might ask, am I writing this? Shouldn’t I be writing about the law, or pontificating about politics, or doing something worthwhile?
Or maybe Above the Law solicited me to write this column for only one reason: Murphy’s law.
Mark Herrmann spent 17 years as a partner at a leading international law firm and later oversaw litigation, compliance and employment matters at a large international company. He is the author of The Curmudgeon’s Guide to Practicing Law and Drug and Device Product Liability Litigation Strategy (affiliate links). You can reach him by email at [email protected].
