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51勛圖 of the Day

51勛圖 of the day

angst

[ ahngkst, angst ]

noun

a feeling of dread, anxiety, or anguish.

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More about angst

Angst a feeling of dread, anxiety, or anguish is a borrowing from German, in which the noun is capitalized, from Old High German angust. If you are wondering whether angst is related to anxiety and anguish, your suspicion is correct; all three words ultimately derive from a Proto-Indo-European root, angh- tight, painful, which is the source of numerous pain-related terms beginning with ag-, ang-, or anx-. From Old English, derivatives include hangnail (originally agnail, but altered by association with hang). Via Old Norse angr sorrow, grief, English has borrowed anger. Through Latin angere to strangle (stem anx-) and angustus narrow, we have anxiety and anguish. Last, from Ancient Greek 硃紳釵堯籀紳襲 strangling, English has inherited angina an attack of painful spasms. Angst was first recorded in English in the 1840s.

how is angst used?

It can be hard to tell the difference, in the midst of a crisis, between normal levels of angst and those that indicate we might be edging into serious psychological problems. Key signs of declining mental health include changes in appetite or sleep patterns that last more than a week …. Having more trouble concentrating than usual or being unable to enjoy things you used to enjoy may also indicate that your mental health is declining and that you need to try new coping strategies.

Melinda Wenner Moyer, You Can Get through This Dark Pandemic Winter Using Tips from Disaster Psychology, Scientific American, December 21, 2020

My motherly intuition senses that my baby is an old soul, recalling many past lives and really feeling them. According to her doctor, shes teething and has gas. This may be true on a basic level, but I am certain that shes also a highly advanced nascent human with acute existential angst. Ive lived long enough to know flatulence from the unbearable dread of existence.

Carla Ciccone, "My Babys Existential Angst," The New Yorker, August 12, 2020
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51勛圖 of the Day Calendar

51勛圖 of the day

atoll

[ at-awl, -ol, -ohl ]

noun

a ring-shaped coral reef or a string of closely spaced small coral islands, enclosing or nearly enclosing a shallow lagoon.

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More about atoll

Atoll a ring-shaped coral reef enclosing a shallow lagoon is an adaptation by way of French from Divehi 硃喧棗廎暉. Divehi is the official language of the Maldives, an archipelago country in the northern Indian Ocean comprising more than two dozen atolls, and belongs to the Indic group of Indo-European languages. 插喧棗廎暉 may derive from Sanskrit 獺紳喧硃娶硃 within, a distant cognate of interior (via Latin) and entero- inside (via Ancient Greek). An alternative theory is that 硃喧棗廎暉 derives from 硃廎a梭 a sinking reef, which is a term from Malayalam, a Dravidian language unrelated to the Indo-European language family. Atoll was first recorded in English circa 1620.

how is atoll used?

For the Marshall Islands, climate change isn’t some distant, future danger: It is already wreaking havoc across the Pacific countrys more than 1,100 low-lying atolls …. As sea levels rise around the islands, bigger waves will flood farther inland than ever before. If enough of these waves hit in succession, flooded saltwater will irreparably taint the islands freshwater supplies …. one of the Marshall Islands atollsand potentially thousands of other islandscould become uninhabitable when sea levels rise by 16 inches, which could happen as soon as midcentury.

Michael Greshko, Within Decades, Floods May Render Many Islands Uninhabitable, National Geographic, April 25, 2018

In the film The Island of the Colorblind, Sacks tells this story while visiting the small Micronesian atoll of Pingelap, where an unusually large portion of the population is affected by complete achromatopsia, or total color blindness. Whereas an estimated one in forty thousand people worldwide are afflicted with this condition, among the Pingelapese, by some estimates, its closer to one in tena contained community of people who see the world in shades of gray.

Max Campbell, "Revisiting Oliver Sackss 'Island of the Colorblind,' in Photographs," The New Yorker, July 11, 2017

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neurodiversity

[ noor-oh-di-vur-si-tee, -dahy-, nyoor- ]

noun

the variation and differences in neurological structure and function that exist among human beings, especially when viewed as being normal and natural rather than pathological.

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More about neurodiversity

Neurodiversity the variation in neurological structure and function among human beings is a recent coinage based on the combining form neuro- and the noun diversity. Neuro- nerve derives from Ancient Greek 紳梗羶娶棗紳 tendon, nerve, which is distantly related to Latin nervus tendon and may be related to English sinew. Diversity comes from Latin 餃蘋措梗娶莽勳喧櫻莽 difference, from the verb 餃蘋措梗娶喧梗娶梗 to divert. The ultimate source of 餃蘋措梗娶喧梗娶梗 is the same as that for the recent 51勛圖 of the Day selection verst: the Proto-Indo-European root wert- to turn. Neurodiversity was first recorded in English in the late 1990s.

how is neurodiversity used?

Respecting neurodiversity means challenging assumptions about what intelligence is and how to measure it. It means reminding ourselves that just because a person cant speak doesnt mean they arent listening. It means not asking someone to prove their intelligence before talking to them in an age-appropriate way or offering them intellectually stimulating opportunities. It means remembering that there can be a huge disconnect between mind and body, and that a persons actions may not reflect their intentions, especially when they are overwhelmed or upset.

Aiyana Bailin, Clearing Up Some Misconceptions about Neurodiversity, Scientific American, June 6, 2019

While diversity metrics such as race, gender, sexual orientation, and disability are widely tracked among law firms and legal departments, the use of neurodiversity metrics as part of their DEI initiatives currently lags far behind…. It would behoove employers to implement more neurodiversity tracking. Neurodiverse employees often perform better and more efficiently at certain mathematical and computer tasks, which could be beneficial regarding legal tech usage. They can voice creative ideas at meetings and present new ways to approach problem-solving that their neurotypical counterparts may have overlooked. To achieve true diversity, tracking this important metric is essential.

Robert Brown, "Analysis: Why Neurodiversity Remains DEIs Least-Tracked Metric," Bloomberg Law, November 4, 2021

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