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Ancient Greek terms worth reviving

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161–170 of 247 posts

Re: Ancient Greek terms worth reviving

#161
post #148
post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Actually it is very expensive. I am talking about consuming a lot of grams every day, 50 to 100 grams, which is not a lot given it is roughly 1/1000 of the weight of a normal human, but it is the luxury of a millionaire for the moment. It is true that we most probably don't see any statistical correlation between saffron consumption and intelligence, especially in a country level, but i would argue, that the dosage m…

> 50 to 100 grams Saffron is toxic at that dose, very likely lethal. Please stay safe.

I haven't seen anywhere mentioning any toxicity to the spice. Everywhere i looked no side effects. That costs too much money for me anyway, to eat a lot of it, and i guess for most people. A millionaire who values his brain too much, may try it. Someone like PG or Marc Andersen.

[edit]I would love to see PG coming back, programming a new Common Lisp by hand, and writing a 1000 page manual just by himself, if he gets a supercharged brain. GPT and Artificial intelligence will be left back in the dust.

Re: Ancient Greek terms worth reviving

#162
Completely tangential to the list itself, I find the only illustration in this article a bit jarring. It lists the adventures of Odysseus during his journey home and prominently highlights "7 years 'forced' to be a sex slave" with that section in the accompanying bar chart marked with hearts. The quotation marks and hearts suggest this is intended to imply that the sex was voluntary and he was free to leave at any time. I find this pretty vile, especially given that sexual abuse and rape of men by women is still a social taboo.

The story of the Odyssee describes Odysseus as being (literally) charmed by Calypso, a nymph with magical powers. Odysseus is described as longing for his wife, crying himself to sleep and Calypso using him for sex against his will. This is as straightforward as it gets when it comes to a description in Ancient Greece of a man being raped by a woman.

After skimming a few of the other unpaid articles it seems the author prefers implying their biases over outright stating them, often publishing articles with promising or suggestive titles, presenting two sides of an argument, then leaving the conclusion to the readers whose responses may or may not end up in the next article's "mailbag" section. Upon closer inspection the two sides are rarely truly representative of the entire spectrum of an issue, instead revealing a consistent political bent, e.g. Ayn Rand being contrasted with a free market liberal opinion.

It's always worth widening your horizon by reading material from people with contrasting opinions but it's also worth keeping in mind the bias of an author when engaging with their work, especially if it tries to appear objective and neutral.

Re: Ancient Greek terms worth reviving

#163
post #115

From a fun book I have “Philosophy in 40 Ideas” Eudaimonia THIS IS AN ANCIENT GREEK WORD, normally translated as 'fulfilment', particularly emphasised by the philosopher Aristotle. It deserves wider currency because it corrects the shortfalls in one of the most central terms in our contemporary idiom: happiness. The Ancient Greeks resolutely did not believe that the purpose of life was to be happy; they proposed that…

> The Ancient Greeks resolutely did not believe that the purpose of life was to be happy I bet Ancient Greeks didn't constitute a hivemind and had different opinions on the matter.

Yes, but it is also accurate to say "Americans believe in individualism" even though they aren't a hivemind either. It's short for "X is a cultural value of theirs".

Re: Ancient Greek terms worth reviving

#164
post #57

These are great suggestions. Adding these words to your own internal vocabulary is totally worth it for self-reflection. Less seriously, a grammatical construction I wish we had in English is the Latin future passive participle, typically ending in -ndus, -nda, -ndum. It means that something needs/ought to be done. For instance "Amanda" is "she who must be loved." So if someone asks you why your feature isn't in prod…

On the subject of grammar, Greek grammar (ancient? I assume this one has carried into modernity) has a handy construction I like in the form of the particles μέν and δέ, used to highlight counterpoint/point through something closer to grammar than word semantics. You might see it translated as "on the one hand x, on the other hand y" or "while x, y" or "x, but y", in English, it loses a lot of its punch. Like the ver…

It's more "but then", no? As in, "πάταξον μεν, άκουσον δε" ("hit me, but then listen to me")?

Re: Ancient Greek terms worth reviving

#165

I have been several times confused by the word "arete" - because in French (arête) it's a kind of rock formation and has been taken up by the rock climbing community, and in Greek (ἀρετή) it's "excellence." There's a coffee shop near me, attached to and co-operated by a climbing gear store, called arête. The proximity to the climbing store suggests one interpretation, but it is an excellent coffee shop.

This is an artifact of transliteration. The French word is pronounced "a'ret", whereas the Greek is pronounced "are'ti".

Re: Ancient Greek terms worth reviving

#166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What examples of people being offended, for being called out for what, did you have in mind? Just very simple things, like if you were to suggest to someone evidently overweight to perhaps move around a little more or watch their diet, they (or other people for that matter) are likely to call you judgemental and be offended.

Ah, then, this sounds to me of an example of misaligned ethics (you and example overweight person). I suppose you could argue about the health and longevity benefits of being low bodyfat, restricting calories, regular cardiovascular activities, these are scientifically documented... however , allow me to assume for a second that you haven't maximized these to their utmost. Do you, personally, fast to the maximum reco…

Obv I wasn't talking about going up to strangers and telling them to put the fork down.

Furthermore: your questions are about ethics, which mine may differ from yours. I wouldn't be offended by such questions and in fact I could quite vividly debate all of them.

However I may be concerned over someone's weight especially if they are close to me, for the objectively indisputable reason of health.

Re: Ancient Greek terms worth reviving

#167

I'm fond of polis, which we do use as part of words like metropolis but not on its own. It's the word for the Greek city-state but also means the citizens or social fabric. It's why we have the two sayings "Man is a political animal" and "Man is a social creature." They are different translations of the idea that "Man is a creature of the polis."

You do also use it on its own, "police".

Re: Ancient Greek terms worth reviving

#168
post #4

Almost all these words still exist in modern Greek, they’re still being used

Clearly the author means "revived in modern intellectual discourse in the English language". And some of them already have, e.g. eudaimonia as described by the ancient Greeks is brought up all the time in the literature on "positive psychology".

It wasn't very clear to me, as "revive" has a connotation of "in the context it originally was". If I said "we should revive the dodo" I wouldn't immediately imagine a US zoo.

Re: Ancient Greek terms worth reviving

#170
post #65
post #39

As a Greek, living in Greece i second most of the terms. Know thyself (γνώθι σαυτόν) is a big one as well. Ancient Greeks were masters of psychology, i.e. what kind of animal humans are. Are we a good creature by nature or a bad one? The more we study chimps the more we realize that we, as their descendants, are pretty vicious as well. Education by our parents, schools and social circles play a big role, to keep in c…

> "As a Greek, living in Greece i second most of the terms. Know thyself (γνώθι σαυτόν) is a big one as well. Ancient Greeks were masters of psychology, i.e. what kind of animal humans are. Are we a good creature by nature or a bad one?" Cool! I hope we can learn from this rich vocabulary the Greeks have developed to describe and to understand our common nature. > "So there is a solution for every person on the plane…

Yeah, that took a turn.
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