Origin of words

We had such an interesting discussion on terms and another discussion on translations that I thought it might be interesting to learn the origin of some words we use regularly but are fairly new to the English language.

Please bear with me, for some it may be boring and for others it may be interesting. Man has always had a facsination with "artificial beings" all through history. The Greek god of the forge, Hephaistos, had maids of gold that were like living girls, Greece had a bronze giant called Talos, in medieval time Rabbi Loew created a golem, and of course there was Mary Shelley’s MONSTER in Frankenstein.

The words that I am going to give the origin for are ROBOT and Robotics. In my examples above, and other tales, it is possible to apply the term robot to some cases.

The term "robot" was introduced in 1920 in a play named R.U.R. (Rossums Universal Robots) by Karel Čapek but the actual credit for creating the term is given to his brother Josef Čapek. The term is a loose translation meaning forced labor or slave.

Reference: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karel_Capek

Robotics was introduced as a word by Science Fiction writer Isaac Asimov http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isaac_Asimov. There is some discrepancy between my information and what wikipedia states. The first time the term robotics was used was in Asimov’s 4th story titled Runaround, March 1942 Astounding Science Fiction, when one of the characters states "Now, look, lets start with the Three Fundamental Rules of Robotics." These eventually came to be known as the Three Laws of Robotics.

WAIT, there is more. In the early 1950’s, while studying at Columbia, Joseph F. Engelberger read I, Robot (a collection of Asimov Robot stories) and decided to devote his life to robotics. Not long after that, at a ****tail party, Engelberge met George C. Devol Jr and together they created a company called Univeral Automation which was shortened to Unimation. http://www.robothandbook.com/Unimation.htm

...i think robot is only one world-wide known word from my genuine language... but i also thought that everybody already knows that it comes from an novel

marius said:

...i think robot is only one world-wide known word from my genuine language... but i also thought that everybody already knows that it comes from an novel

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Marius the point of this thread is to have a little fun and discover where "technical" words we deal with regularly originated.

Technically it was a short story, not a novel.

Karel Čapek was "officially" born in Austria-Hungary but in the areA that later became part of Czechosolavakia or Czech Rwpublic.

NOTE: Robot is an international term that originated from the "native language" of people from the Czech Republic.


When Asimov used the term robotics, he ASSUMED, that it was already a word that matched other terms in the mechanical field i.e. pnuematics, hydraulics etc.

ANYONE got a word????

Motorola. When Galvin started the company, Rock-ola was making music equipment. Motor cars + Rock-ola = Motorola for communications for cars. The early two-way radios were so massive that you'd drain the battery if the car was off.

Walkie-talkie. A name given the first two way portable radios. In hindsite, a funny name.

Not related to etymology, but my wife, my son, and myself were cast as robots in a production of R-U-R here in Milwaukee. It was actually an interesting play, even in translation. I found it interesting that the robots as envisioned by Capek were based on chemistry, not mechanics, and certainly not electronics which didn't exist when the play was written. The public perception of "hot" technologies certainly changes with time.

Interesting - I thought Motorola was a combination of Motor plus Victrola

bernie_carlton said:

Interesting - I thought Motorola was a combination of Motor plus Victrola

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Bernie, you are probably still right.

"Rock-ola" probably comes from an origin of "Victrola" somehow. (Just my guess.)

All this talk about Victrolas and we've hardly scratched the surface...

Here are some more to be defined:

RADAR
LORAN
SONAR
RAMBAM
YHVH
PS
GESTAPO
SMERSH
HALO

The term ROBOT was introduced in 1920, but who designed the first known robot(mechanical man), and when and where?

Lancie1 said:

Here are some more to be defined:

RADAR
LORAN
SONAR
RAMBAM
YHVH
PS
GESTAPO
SMERSH
HALO

The term ROBOT was introduced in 1920, but who designed the first known robot(mechanical man), and when and where?

Click to expand...

It is not definitions that are necessary, it is how the word was introduced and came to be an international term.

RADAR and SONAR are easy but I will leave that too others.

You said DESIGNED the first robot...that would be Da Vinci.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leonardo%27s_robot

Built the first would be:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacques_de_Vaucanson
The above assumes you are not refering to mythological "robot(s).

MY aplogies on dominating the robot subject, I am an avid Sci-Fi reader and have had a minor obsession on this subject most of my life.

Is this a quiz?

Of the top of my head:

LORAN - LOng RANge navigational radio, used in aviation.

RAMBAM - the name of medieval Jewish philosopher, learned man and commentator of the Scriptures; this is an abbreviation the meaning of which I don't remember but it can be found on the Net.

YHVH - so-called "tetragrammathon" (which is Greek for 'four-letter code') which is used in the original Hebrew text of the Old Testament in place of the unpronouncable name of God. It is often rendered as "Yahveh" (or some similar spellings) but it should be noted that the religious Jews never utter the word, saying "Adonai" (i.e. the Lord) instead.

PS - Latin "post scriptum", i.e. "after the text".

GESTAPO - German "GEheime STats-POlizei" = "secret state police". No need to explain the meaning, I guess.

SMERSH - Russian "SMERt' SHpionam" = "death to spies". The scary-sounding name of the counter-intelligence wing of the Soviet military intelligence (so-called Second Directorate of the General Staff) from approximately middle of WWII to several years after it.

HALO - that is the circle of light around the heads of saints as depicted in traditional Christian denominations, right?

Another for HALO - High Altitude Low Opening - for troops parachuted in secrecy. High altitude exit from the aircraft and low opening of the parachute.

Bump, got a word?

Since I am learning another language.

Karate and Karaoke.

Karate = Kara + te
Kara = empty
te = hand or hands.
We all know about this classic un-armed combat style.

Karaoke = Kara+oke
Kara = empty, as above
Oke is short for orchestra (English translated to Japanese)
Karaoke is an empty orchestra, empty as in there is no singer, so you have to sing yourself. This is a loan word from Japanese that is made up partially from a loan word from English.

Explaining this at a pub is a good way to pick up chicks

How about "fractal"? We can see the derivation of this relatively clearly, but the extent of its usage has grown enormously over the years since computers were first able to provide visual indications of the mathematical concept.

One area where the rate of discovery and progress is demanding the invention of new words to define hitherto unknown ideas is bio-sciences and molecular biology in particular. Who would have known what a "prion" was 25 years ago? (Yeah, sure, isn't that the latest little Honda?) But everyone has heard of Mad Cow disease and CJD now.

And closer to home in our own technologies, what about the good old "transistor"?

Going back to the first post (robot), this is not so much a new formulation or creation of a word, but the complete adoption of an existing word from another language. And of course there are very many examples of this in English. 'Pure' English doesn't really exist as a concept, it has always been a mixture of bits and pieces garnered from other nations and languages. The days of the British Empire, and especially the links with India, gave us bungalow, pyjama, guru, verandah, thug, shampoo and many others. Germany has given us the marvellous schadenfreude (hey, well I use it all the time!)

I'm reminded of a (probably apocryphal) story early in the last century when a television set was being demonstrated for the very first time to a group of Classical scholars and professors in Oxford University. Afterwards, one of the most senior and venerable professors was asked what he thought of television. He shook his head in despair "Television? Dreadful, quite dreadful. Why, the thing's half-Greek and half-Latin!"

Regards

Ken

I work with a gentleman from South America, he's been in the States for about 15 years. Yesterday he asked me the following question:

"How come a group of puppies and the trash along side the highway are both called 'LITTER'?"