Word of the Day

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for November 12, 2019 is:

bruit • \BROOT\  • verb

: report, rumor — usually used with about

Examples:

"Analysts have bruited about the notion that Comcast and Disney might team up and divide Fox's assets to prevent a drawn-out bidding war—a turn of events that Mr. Iger has dismissed." — Edmund Lee, The New York Times, 20 June 2018

"In the new bio-pic 'Judy,' Renée Zellweger stars as Judy Garland…. The narrowly focussed yet emotionally expansive film has been bruited about as a likely springboard for a statuette for its lead actress ever since the movie's première, last month, at the Telluride Film Festival." — Richard Brody, The New Yorker, Sept. 25, 2019

Did you know?

Back in the days of Middle English, the Anglo-French noun bruit, meaning "clamor" or "noise," rattled into English. Soon English speakers were also using it to mean "report" or "rumor" (it was applied especially to favorable reports). They also began using bruit the way the verb noise was used (and still occasionally is) with the meaning "to spread by rumor or report" (as in "The scandal was quickly noised about"). The English noun bruit is now considered archaic, apart from a medical sense that is pronounced like the French word and refers to one of the abnormal sounds heard on auscultation.

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for November 11, 2019 is:

armistice • \AHR-muh-stus\  • noun

: temporary stopping of open acts of warfare by agreement between the opponents : truce

Examples:

The Korean War ended with an armistice signed in July of 1953, though a permanent peace accord was never reached.

"[Ralph] Bunche, a Howard University professor, was an African-American scholar and diplomat who achieved prominence in 1949 after negotiating armistice agreements between Israel and four Arab states, for which he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize." — Richard Freedman, The Vallejo (California) Times-Herald, 24 Sept. 2019

Did you know?

Armistice descends from Latin sistere, meaning "to come to a stand" or "to cause to stand or stop," combined with arma, meaning "weapons." An armistice, therefore, is literally a cessation of arms. Armistice Day is the name that was given to the holiday celebrated in the United States on November 11 before it was renamed Veterans Day by Congress in 1954. The original name refers to the agreement between the Allied Powers and Germany to end hostilities that constituted the First World War—an agreement designated to take effect on the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month.

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for November 10, 2019 is:

teleological • \tel-ee-uh-LAH-jih-kul\  • adjective

: exhibiting or relating to design or purpose especially in nature

Examples:

"The standard story about mass printing is a story of linear, teleological progress. It goes like this: Before Johannes Gutenberg invented the printing press, books were precious objects, handwritten by scribes and available primarily in Latin. Common people … were left vulnerable to exploitation by powerful gatekeepers—landed élites, oligarchs of church and state—who could use their monopoly on knowledge to repress the masses. After Gutenberg, books became widely available, setting off a cascade of salutary movements and innovations…." — Andrew Marantz, The New Yorker, 23 Sept. 2019

"A team of psychology researchers at Boston University (BU) asked chemists, geologists and physicists … to evaluate explanations for different natural phenomena. The statements included purpose-based (or teleological) explanations such as 'Trees produce oxygen so that animals can breathe,' or 'The Earth has an ozone layer in order to protect it from UV light.' Scientists who were not under time pressure tended to accurately reject these purpose-based explanations. Meanwhile, scientists who were instructed to assess the statements quickly were more likely to endorse these teleological explanations…." — Live Science, 29 Oct. 2012

Did you know?

Teleological (which comes to us, by way of New Latin, from the Greek root tele-, telos, meaning "end or purpose") and its close relative teleology both entered English in the 18th century, followed by teleologist in the 19th century. Teleology has the basic meaning of "the study of ends or purposes." A teleologist attempts to understand the purpose of something by looking at its results. A teleological philosopher might argue that we should judge whether an act is good or bad by seeing if it produces a good or bad result, and a teleological explanation of evolutionary changes claims that all such changes occur for a definite purpose.