Galaxy

Galaxy (pronounced gal-uhk-see)

(1) In astronomy, a large system of stars, galactic dust, black holes etc, held together by mutual gravitation and isolated from similar systems by vast regions of space.  They exist (in at least the billions) as independent and coherent systems although because not static, can collide and merge.  Planet Earth is in a galaxy called the Milky Way.

(2) Figuratively, an assemblage of things or persons seen as luminous or brilliant.

(3) To gather together into a luminous whole (archaic).

(4) In mathematics, a hyper-real number in non-standard analysis

(5) In fashion or graphic design, any print or pattern reminiscent of a galaxy, constructed usually by blending semi-opaque patches of vibrant color on a dark background.

(6) The Milky Way, the apparent band of concentrated stars which appears in the night sky over earth (now long obsolete and used only in historic reference).

1350–1400: From the Middle English galaxyë, galaxie & galaxias from the Old French galaxie and Medieval Latin galaxia & galaxias (the Milky Way; in the classical Latin via lactea or circulus lacteus), from the Ancient Greek γαλαξίας (galaxías kyklos) (milky circle) from γάλα (gala (genitive galaktos)) (milk) and related to the Latin lac (milk)), from the primitive Indo-European g(a)lag (milk).  Galaxy is a noun and verb, the adjective is galactic the noun plural galaxies; the present participle is galaxying and the past participle galaxied.)  The technical astronomical sense as it’s now understood as a discrete stellar aggregate including the sun and all visible stars emerged as a theory by 1848, the final scientific proof being delivered in the 1920s; the figurative sense of "brilliant assembly of persons or articles" dates from the 1580s.

It will all end badly

The Milky Way, planet Earth’s cosmic suburb was in the late fourteenth century defined as "the galaxy as seen in the night sky", and was a loan-translation of Latin via lacteal which had existed formerly in the Middle English as milky Wey, Milken-Way & Milky Cercle.  The philosophers (natural scientists) of antiquity had speculated on the nature of what they could see when gazing at night sky and some (Democrates, Pythagoras (and even the historian Ovid)) guessed they were looking at a vast array of stars, the matter when Galileo, using his telescope, reported that the whole vista was resolvable into stars and it attracted other names including Jacob's Ladder, the Way to St James's, and Watling Street.

Artist's impression of the Milky Way generated by the Chinese Academy of Sciences, 2019.

The Milky Way was originally thought the entire universe but as telescopes improved astronomers by the mid nineteenth century speculated that some of the spiral nebulae they observed were actually vast and immensely distant structures perhaps similar in size and shape to the Milky Way but the proof of that wasn’t definitive until the 1920s.  Galaxies are held together by the gravitational attraction of the material within them, most coalescing around a nucleus into elliptical or spiral forms although a few are irregular in shape.  Galaxies range in diameter from hundreds to hundreds of thousands of light-years and contain between a few million and several trillion stars, many grouped into clusters, with these often parts of larger super-clusters.

Lindsay Lohan Samsung Galaxy S24 phone case.

German philosopher Immanuel Kant (1724–1804) was among the first to theorize the Milky Way was not the only galaxy in the universe and coined the term “island universe to describe a galaxy”.  Kant was right and while estimates vary, over one hundred-billion galaxies exist in the observable universe, most of which are moving away from our Milky Way; those farther away receding faster than those nearby.  The Milky Way rotates at about 560,000 mph (900,000 km/h) and completes a full revolution about every two-hundred million years, thus one galactic revolution ago, dinosaurs roamed the Earth.  In about four billion years, the Milky Way will begin a slow-motion (in astronomical terms) collision with the Andromeda galaxy, a process which will take at least one hundred million years.  Optimistically, astronomers have suggested the ellipsoidal result be named Milkomeda.

Notable Ford Galaxies, 1959-1970

Initially to augment their range-topping Fairlane, Ford adopted the Galaxie name in 1959 as a marketing ploy to take advantage of public interest in the space race, using the French spelling to add a touch of the exotic.  On the full-sized platform, the name was used until 1974 but it was the brief era of the charismatic high-performance versions built in the early-mid 1960s which are most remembered;  already a force on US circuits, they became also in England, Australia, South Africa & New Zealand, one of the more improbably successful racing cars.  The Galaxie was notable also as the platform which Ford used to create the LTD, essentially a Galaxie bundled with a number of otherwise optional features and some additional appointments, sold at an attractive price.  It was an immediate success and had two side effects, (1) other manufacturers soon used the same tactic, creating most notably the Chevrolet Caprice and (2) the creation of "a luxury Ford" began the process of rendering the Mercury brand, introduced in 1938 as "the luxury Ford", eventually redundant.  In an evolution which would play-out over two decades, the interior fittings of the Ford LTD and its competitors would become increasingly ornate although critics were sometimes divided on the aesthetic success of the result.  A generation after the name was retired in the US, Ford in Europe used the anglicized spelling, in 1995 introducing the Galaxy, a dreary family van.

1959 Ford Galaxie Skyliner.

The Galaxie was a mid-year addition to the line, assuming the role of the top-of-the-range model from the Fairlane 500, a position it would occupy until 1965 when it began to be usurped by the LTD, added that year as a Galaxie option although it would later become a separate model which would outlast the Galaxie by more than a decade.  Best remembered from the 1959 range was the Skyliner, a two-door convertible with the novelty of a retractable hard-top a marvel of analogue-era engineering, the operation of the all-steel apparatus a mesmerizing piece of mechanical choreography from the early space-age, controlled by three drive motors, ten solenoids, many relays & circuit breakers, all connected with a reputed 610 feet (186 m) of electrical cabling.  Despite the intricacy, it proved a reliable system.

1960 Ford Galaxie Starliner.

As the 1960s dawned, the muscle car thing was still years away, the intermediate and pony-cars on which they would be based not yet in production and by choice, Ford probably wouldn’t have produced any high performance versions of the Galaxie.  For some time, Detroit had been putting more powerful versions of their biggest engines into their top-line models but these tended to be early interpretations of what would later come to be known as the “personal car”, heavyweight coupés laden with power accessories, air conditioning and luxury fittings but those big engines were increasingly and extensively being modified by those seeking competitive advantage in what rapidly had become the wildly popular racing series run by the National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing (NASCAR).  With some alarm, the sanctioning body, concerned both at the extent to which the cars being used differed from their “stock car” concept and the high speeds being attained, imposed rules designed to restrict the use of components used on the track to those genuinely available to customers.  Thus was born the 352 cubic inch (5.8 litre) (FE) “Special” V8, a US$204.70 option available on all 1960 Fords except the wagons although, reflecting the intended market, niceties like air conditioning, power steering and power brakes weren’t available.  Rated at 360 (268 kW) horsepower, the 352 Special actually out-powered the 430 cubic inch (7.0 litre) (MEL) V8, which, at 350 horsepower (261 kW), was available in the Thunderbird but was so bulky and heavy that its use on the track had been curtailed although it would enjoy some success in powerboat racing.  The 352 Special also provided quite a jump in performance from other 352s which offered a (standard) 235 horsepower (175 kW) or 300 (224 kW) in the 352 Super, neither exactly sparkling performers although typical for the era; a Special-equipped Galaxie managing a standing quarter-mile five seconds quicker than a Super, admittedly one hampered by one of Ford’s early, inefficient automatic transmissions.  The 352 Super wasn’t available for long but the streamlined Starliner body to which most of them were fitted proved to have aerodynamic properties close to idea for use on NASCAR’s ovals but public enthusiasm for the style soon waned and it was replaced by something thought more elegant but which proved less slippery, inducing Ford to try (unsuccessfully) one of the more blatant cheats of the era and one which would prove to be the first shot in what came to be called the “aero-wars”.

1961 Ford Galaxie.

The power-race had for a while been raging on the ovals but NASCAR’s rules dictating all the bits be available for public sale and produced in sufficient number to make purchase genuinely possible meant the race moved to the showroom and thus, public roads, something which produced a remarkable generation of cars but which would have implications for the public, the industry and, ominously, the laws which would follow.  Facing competition with more power and displacement, Ford in 1961 released a version of the new 390 cubic inch (FE) (6.5 litre) this time with an induction system which used three two-barrel carburetors rather than the single four barrel which had sat atop the 352 Special.  Strangely, most owners had to go a circuitous route to get their six-barrel 390, few assembled that way by the factory, the cars instead delivered equipped with a high-performance version of the 390 which included in the trunk (boot), a kit with the parts and accessories to upgrade from the supplied single four barrel carburetor to a triple, two barrel apparatus.  Intended for installation by the dealer, thus equipped, power jumped from 375 horsepower (280 kW) to 401 (299 kW).

1962 Ford Galaxie 406 (replica).

The power race however was accelerating faster than the vehicles it inspired and in 1962, the Galaxie’s new high-performance engine was a 406 cubic inch (FE) (6.6 litre) V8, offered either with a single four-barrel carburetor and rated at 385 horsepower (287 kW) or a 405 horsepower (302 kW) version with the triple two-barrel Holleys.  The 406 certainly delivered increased power but the internal stresses this imposed, coupled with effects of the higher speeds now possible exposed weaknesses in some aspects of underlying engineering, some components being subject to forces never envisaged in the late 1950s when the design was finalized.  The most obvious and frequent failure afflicted the main (bottom-end) bearings and, part-way during the production run, change was made to add a second set of bolts to secure the main-bearing caps, the novelty being that they were drilled sideways, entering through the skirt of the block, thus gaining the moniker “cross-bolted”.

Ford Galaxie 427s, Brands Hatch, 1963.

The 406 however had a production life of less than two years, replaced in 1963 by a the 427 cubic inch (FE) V8, an engine which would be offered in so many configurations that the stated power ratings were more indicative than calculated but the versions available for the street versions of the Galaxie were rated at 410 horsepower (360 kW) if fitted with a single four barrel carburetor and 425 (317 kW) if running a pair.  The 427 would go on to a storied and decorated history on the street, strip and circuit including twice winning the 24 hour classic at Le Mans but unexpectedly, it had a successful career in saloon car racing in England, Australia, South Africa and New Zealand.  Predicted at the time to be briefly fast, loud and spectacular before its hunger for brake linings and tyres ended its outings, it instead proved competitive, stable and reliable, dominating the 1963 British Saloon Car Championship, ending the reign of the 3.8 litre Jaguars.  In the US however, although the 427 had powered the Galaxie to trophy winning successes in the 1964 NASCAR season, the larger displacement had further increased internal pressures and reliability issues with the bottom end had again been encountered.  The cross-bolting had solved the issues caused by vibration but now the lubrication was proving inadequate, the oiling system setup to first to lubricate the top end and then to the crankshaft.  The solution was another oil galley along the side of the block, delivering priority lubrication to the bottom end; introduced in 1965 as a running change, these engines came to be known as “side-oilers”, the earlier versions retrospectively known as “top oilers”.

1966 Galaxie 7 Litre.

By 1966, the era of the Galaxie as a race car was nearly over, Ford finding the Lotus Cortina and the Mustang quicker on tighter circuits while on the big NASCAR ovals, the race teams during the year switched from the full-sized cars to the intermediates, the Fairlane (the name re-applied to a smaller vehicle after 1962) now the platform of choice. In 1966 & 1967, the 427 remained available but demand was muted, the two-door Galaxie gaining an option called "7 Litre" (they really did use the French spelling (presumably to avoid a linguistic clash with "Galaxie") and the choice was between the 427 (noisy, cantankerous, an oil burner, expensive and powerful) or the 428 (mild-mannered, smooth, quiet & cheap) and the market spoke, the sales breakdown between the 427/428 in 1966/1967 being 11035/38 and 1056/12.  The message was clear; there were many who wanted high-performance cars but fewer and fewer wanted the package in a big machine, the attention of the market now focused on the intermediates and pony cars.

1970 Ford XL.

By 1970, except for a run heavy-duty units for police fleets which used the old 428, for its top-line option, the full-sized range switched to the new 429 cubic inch (385) (7.0 litre) V8, designed with emission control systems in mind, which had for a couple of seasons been offered in the Thunderbird.  Although available in a version rated at 360 horsepower (265 kW) which was rather more convincing than the perhaps optimistic numbers granted to some of the 428s used in the earlier Galaxies, the emphasis was now on effortlessness rather than outright performance although, Ford was the last of the big three still to offer a four-speed manual gearbox in the big cars and the option lasted until 1970 although the deletion from the option list must have been a late change because while brochures printed for that year’s range included it, it seems none were built.  Actually, technically, by then such things were no longer Galaxies, the two-doors after 1967 called just the “Ford XL” although everyone seemed still to call them Galaxies and for those who still lusted for the way full-size things used to be done, Plymouth did offer their triple carburetor 440 cubic (7.2 litre) inch V8 but only with an automatic transmission.  It would last only until 1971.

Drake

Drake (pronounced dreyk)

(1) The male of any duck.

(2) As “Drake equation”, a formula proposed as a mechanism to estimate the number of active, communicative extraterrestrial civilizations in the Milky Way galaxy.

(3) A small-bore cannon, used mostly in the seventeenth & especially in the 17th and 18th centuries.

(4) A dragon (archaic).

(5) In angling, an artificial fly resembling a mayfly.

(6) A fiery meteor, comet or shooting star (archaic).

(7) A beaked galley or Viking warship.

1250–1300: From the Middle English drake (male duck, drake), from the Old English draca, an abbreviated form of the Old English andraca (male duck, drake (literally “duck-king”), from the Proto-West Germanic anadrekō (duck leader) and cognate with the Middle Dutch andrake, the Low German drake, the Dutch draak (drake), the German Enterich (drake) and the dialectal German drache.  In the Old High German, the equivalent forms were antrahho & anutrehho (male duck).  The archaic meaning in Middle English (a dragon; Satan) dates from before 900 and was from the Old English draca (in the sense of “dragon, sea monster, huge serpent”), from the Proto-West Germanic drakō (dragon), from the Latin dracō (dragon), from the Ancient Greek δράκων (drákōn) (serpent, giant seafish), from δέρκομαι (dérkomai) (I see clearly), from the primitive Indo-European derḱ-.  The Proto-Germanic drako was productive, the source also of the Middle Dutch and Old Frisian drake, the Dutch draak, the Old High German trahho and the German drache.  In a footnote in the long history of the Royal Navy, HMS Marshal Ney, the ship once known as "the worst ship in the navy" was briefly (during her surprisingly long service) re-named HMS Drake.  Drake is a noun, the noun plural is drakes.

Guilty as sin.  Functional necrophilia by a drake: In November 2001, a researcher at Natuurmuseum (Museum of Natural History), Rotterdam, reported the first known case of homosexualnecrophilia in the mallard duck (mallard Anas platyrhynchos (Aves: Anatidae)).

In idiomatic use, the phrase “ducks and drakes” (usually in the form “playing ducks and drakes”) dates from 1585 and means “recklessly or irresponsibly to behave with something valuable or to waste something precious”.  The origin is believed to lie in the pastime of throwing flat stones across the surface of water (known also as “skipping stones”, “stone skiffing” or “skimming stones”, the allusion being to the behavior of the water as the stones bounce before eventually losing energy and sinking, the effect (the circular rings produced by the skipping stone) said to be something like that created by the splashing of ducks and drakes (and waterfowl in general).  It was thus a a reference to doing something in a haphazard and careless manner, without any particular aim or purpose and over time, came to be used generally to refer to any kind of wasteful or irresponsible behavior.  It accurately described the pointlessness of skimming stones but was something of a slight on the birds; their activities on water an indication of their industriousness.  The sense of “to squander, to throw away” emerged in 1614, the notion being “throwing money away, as if throwing away stones in this pastime”.  The perfectly-shapes stone for the purpose (flattish & disc-like) was called a drakestone and in parts of northern England the pastime was known as drakestoning.

The Drake equation

The Drake Equation is a mathematical formula developed in 1961 by US astrophysicist Dr Frank Drake (1930–2022) to estimate the number of intelligent civilizations that (1) might exist in our Milky Way galaxy and (2) be capable of communicating with us. The equation takes into account various factors, such as the number of habitable planets, the probability of life forming on those planets, and the likelihood of intelligent life evolving.  The equation takes the form:

N = R* × fp × ne × fl × fi × fc × L

where:

N = the number of civilizations in our galaxy that are within the parameters capable of communicating with us
R* = the rate of star formation in our galaxy
fp = the fraction of stars that have planets
ne = the average number of habitable planets per star with planets
fl = the fraction of habitable planets that develop life
fi = the fraction of planets with life that develop intelligent life
fc = the fraction of intelligent civilizations that develop technology to communicate with others
L = the length of time such civilizations release detectable signals into space

Sixty-odd years ago, Dr Drake was well aware his equation was not a tool of immediately practical application because there was no certainty about any of the values.  Additionally, the formula was designed not to estimate the actual volume of intelligent life in the galaxy but the number of instances where the conditions might exist which would allow an intelligent to broadcast radio transmissions into space.  Since then, science has became able better to quantify two of the variables but the equation remains an interesting, speculative device and it remains a widely used tool for discussion and debate.

Portrait of Sir Francis Drake (circa 1581), oil on panel by an unknown artist, National Portrait Gallery, London.  A navigator and buccaneer (a kind of pirate), Sir Francis Drake (1540–1596) was the first Englishman to sail around the world (1577–80) and is best remembered for his command of the fleet which faced the Spanish Armada in 1588.

Peculiar

Peculiar (pronounced pi-kyool-yer)

(1) Something thought strange, queer, odd, eccentric, bizarre.

(2) Something uncommon or unusual.

(3) Distinctive in nature or character from others.

(4) Belonging characteristically to something.

(5) Belonging exclusively to some person, group, or thing.

(6) In astronomy, designating a star or galaxy with special properties that deviates from others of its spectral type or galaxy class.

(7) A property or privilege belonging exclusively or characteristically to a person.

(8) In the Church of England, a particular parish or church that is exempted from the jurisdiction of the ordinary or bishop in whose diocese it lies and is governed by another.

(9) In printing and typesetting, special characters not generally included in standard type fonts, as phonetic symbols, mathematical symbols etc (such as ±§¿).  Also called arbitraries.

1400-1450: From the late Middle English, from the Old French peculiaire and directly from the Latin pecūliāris (as one's own property), from pecūlium (private property (literally "property in cattle") a derivative of pecū (flock, farm animals) from pecus (cattle) (in Antiquity, the ownership of cattle was an important form of wealth).  The meaning “unusual” dates from circa 1600, a development of the earlier idiom “distinguished or special”.  The meaning "unusual, uncommon; odd" emerged by circa 1600, an evolution from the earlier "distinguished, special, particular, select" which was in use by at least the 1580s.  The euphemistic phrase "peculiar institution" (slavery; "peculiar" used here in the sense of "exclusive to the "slave states") dates from the 1830s when it was used in speeches by Southern politician John C Calhoun (1782-1850) and it was a standard part of the US political lexicon until abolition.  In ecclesiastical administration, peculiar was used in the sense of "distinct from the auspices of the diocese in which it's located".  Peculiar is a noun & adjective, peculiarize is a verb, peculiarity is a noun and peculiarly is an adverb; the noun plural is peculiars.

Photographers will use the natural environment to produce peculiar effects which can be striking: This is Lindsay Lohan straked by sunlight & shadow from a photo session by Ellen Von Unwerth (b 1954) for Vogue Italia, August 2010.  The caption “Ho fatto terribili sbagli dai quali però ho imparato molto.  Probabilmente per questo sono ancora viva” translates from the Italian as “I've made terrible mistakes, but I've learned a lot from them.  That's probably why I'm still alive.”

In the Church of England, a peculiar is an ecclesiastical district, parish, chapel or church which operates outside the jurisdiction of the bishop and archdeacon of the diocese in which they are situated. Most are Royal Peculiars subject to the direct jurisdiction of the monarch but some are those under another archbishop, bishop or dean.  The arrangement originated in Anglo-Saxon times and developed as a result of the relationship between the Norman and Plantagenet Kings and the English Church. King Henry VIII (1491–1547; King of England (and Ireland after 1541) 1509-1547) retained Royal Peculiars following the Reformation and the Ecclesiastical Licences Act (1533), as confirmed by the Act of Supremacy (1559), transferred to the sovereign the jurisdiction which previously been exercised by the pope.  Surprisingly, most peculiars survived the Reformation but, with the exception of Royal Peculiars, almost all were abolished during the nineteenth century by various acts of parliament.  Mostly harmless among Anglicans, the concept existed also in the Roman-Catholic Church where it caused a few difficulties, usually because of bolshie nuns in convents answerable to Rome and not the local bishop.  The bishops, used to obedience, even if grudging, enjoyed this not at all.

One archaic-sounding peculiarity in the sometimes intersecting world of geopolitics and diplomatic conventions is that on the Chrysanthemum Throne sits an emperor yet there is no Japanese empire.  Actually, despite the institution having a history stretching back millennia, no empires remain extant and some of the more recent (such as the Central African Empire (1976-1979)) have been dubious constructions.  Despite that, the Japanese head of state remains an emperor which seems strange but the reasons the title has endured are historical, linguistic & diplomatic.  The Japanese sovereign’s native title is 天皇 (Tennō (literally “Heavenly Sovereign” and best understood in the oft-used twentieth century phrase “Son of Heaven”).  When, in the mid 1800s, the Western powers first began their engagement with Japan, the diplomatic protocol specialists soon worked out there was in their languages no exact term which exactly encapsulated Tennō and because “king” historically was lower in status than “emperor”, that couldn’t be used because, the Japanese court regarding itself as equal to (in reality probably “superior to”) the ruling house in China, it would have implied a loss of face.  So, on the basis of the precedent of the Chinese 皇帝 (huángdì (Emperor), Tennō entered English (and other European languages) translated as “emperor”.  This solved most potential problems by placing the Japanese sovereign on the same level as the Chinese Emperor & Russian Tsar.

Cars of the Chrysanthemum Throne: Emperor Akihito (b 1933; Emperor of Japan 1989-2019) waving while leaving Tokyo's Imperial Palace in 2006 Toyota Century (left) and the 2019 Toyota Century four-door parade cabriolet (right).  Although in the West, Toyota in 1989 created the Lexus brand for the upper middle class (and hopefully above), the royal household has for years been supplied with Toyotas, some of them with bespoke coachwork and interior appointments although mechanical components come from the Toyota/Lexus parts bin.  The four-door cabriolet replaced a 1990 Rolls-Royce Corniche DHC (drophead coupé) which, having only two doors made less easy an elegant ingress or egress.

As things turned out, the linguistic pragmatism turned out to be predictive because during the Meiji period (1868-1912), Japan emerged as a modern imperial power, with colonies in Taiwan, Korea and other places.  After World War II (1939-1945), the empire was dissolved but the imperial institution was retained, a fudge the Allied powers tacitly had conceded as an alternative to insisting on the “unconditional surrender” the Potsdam Declaration (26 July, 1945) had demanded.  Tennō thus remained the head of state’s title and in English it has continued to be rendered as “Emperor”, a nod more to historical continuity than diplomatic courtesy.  In a practical sense, this represented no obvious challenge because being styled “The Emperor” was geographically vague, unlike the king in the UK who obviously ceased to be called “Emperor of India” after the Raj was dissolved with the granting of Indian independence in 1947.  The peculiar anomaly of an emperor without an empire remains peculiar to Japan.

Peculiar has a range of meanings.  One is the sense of something “uniquely peculiar to” meaning an attribute or something else shared with no other and sometimes things one thought peculiar to one thing or another are proved not so unique.  Saturn’s lovely rings were once thought peculiar to that planet but exploration and advances in observational technology meant that by the late twentieth century it could be revealed Jupiter, Uranus & Neptune all had ring systems, albeit more modest than those of Saturn but they were there.  Non-realistic art has often for its impact depended on a depiction of the peculiar: blue trees, flying dogs and green people once all enough to shock.  This too can change.  Once, a painting of a black swan would have seemed peculiar because, as the Roman saying went rara avis in terris nigroque simillima cygno (a bird as rare upon the earth as a black swan).  The accepted fact was that all swans were white.  However, late in the seventeenth century, Dutch explorers visiting what is now the coast of Western Australia became the first Europeans to see black swans and event subsequently picked up in philosophy as the “black swan moment”, referencing the implications of an accepted orthodoxy of impossibility being disproven, later developed into the “black swan logical fallacy” which became a term used when identifying falsification.

However, the two meanings can co-exist in the one sentence such as: (1) “Fortunately, the most peculiar of the styling motifs Plymouth used on the 1961 range remained peculiar to that single season” or (2) “On the basis of comments from experts in the linguistics community, Lindsay Lohan's peculiar new accent seems peculiar to her.”  In each case the first instance was used in the sense of “strange or weird” while the second suggested “uniqueness”.  Because in sentence construction, unless done for deliberate effect, there's some reluctance to repeat what may be called “noticeable words” (ie those which “stick out” because they’re rare or in some way unusual), writers can be tempted by the sin of what Henry Fowler (1858–1933) in his A Dictionary of Modern English Usage (1926) called “elegant variation”.  Although willing to concede inelegance had its place as a literary or dramatic device (rather as a soprano with a lovely voice sometimes has to sing an aria which demands she sounds “ugly”), Henry Fowler preferred all sentences to be elegant.  Elegance however was a product and not a process, and he cautioned “young writers” (those older presumably written off as beyond redemption) against following what had become established as a “misleading rules of thumb”: Never to use the same word twice in a sentence or within 20 lines or other limit.”  His view was that if unavoidable, repetition, elegantly done was preferable to the obviously contrived used of synonyms such as (1) monarch, king, sovereign, ruler or (2) women, ladies, females, the variants there just to comply with a non-existent rule.  Predictably, the law was singled out as repeat offender, the use of “suits, actions & cases appearing in the one sentence to describe the same thing pointlessly clumsy in what was merely a list in which a repeated use of “cases” would had added clarity although that quality is not one always valued by lawyers.   

Peculiar in the sense of something bizarre: 1961 Plymouth Fury Convertible.  It must have seemed a good idea at the time and never has there been anything to suggest the stylists were under the influence of stimulants stronger than caffeine or nicotine.

Sometimes something thought peculiar can be described as “funny-peculiar” to distinguish it from something disturbing: peculiarities can be thought of as perversions.  In 1906, an embittered and vengeful Friedrich von Holstein (1837–1909; between 1876-1906, an éminence grise in the foreign office of the German Empire) sent a letter to the diplomat Prince “Phili” Phillip of Eulenburg (1847–1921), the man he blamed for ending of his long and influential career:

“My dear Phili – you needn’t take this beginning as a compliment since nowadays to call a man ‘Phili” means – well, nothing very flattering… I am now free to handle you as one handles such a contemptible person with your peculiarities.”

From this incendiary note ensued a series of legal proceedings exploring the allegations of “unnatural conduct” (homosexual activity) levelled against Prince Phillip, proceedings which involved a roll-call of characters, many with motives which went beyond their strict legal duty and a few with their own agendas.  The matter of Phili’s “peculiarities” was of real political (and potentially constitutional) significance, not merely because homosexuality was punishable under the criminal code (although the statute was rarely enforced) but because the prince had for decades been the closest friend of the German Emperor, Kaiser Wilhelm II (1859–1941; German Emperor & King of Prussia 1888-1918).  To this day, the exact nature of the relationship between the two remains uncertain.

Deadline

Deadline (pronounced ded-lahyn)

(1) The time by which something must be finished or submitted; the latest time for finishing something.

(2) A line or limit that must not be passed; a time limit for any activity.

(3) Historically, a boundary around a military prison beyond which a prisoner could not venture without the risk of being shot by the guards.

(4) A guideline marked on a plate for a printing press, indicating the point beyond which text would not be printed (archaic).

(5) Historically, a fishing line that has not for some time moved (indicating it might not be a productive place to go fishing).

(6) In military use, to render an item non-mission-capable; to remove materiel from the active list (available to be tasked); to ground an aircraft etc.

1864: The construct was dead + line.  Dead was from the Middle English ded, from the Old English dead (having ceased to live (also “torpid, dull” and of water “still, standing, not flowing”), from the Proto-Germanic daudaz (source also of the Old Saxon dod, the Danish død, the Swedish död, the Old Frisian dad, the Middle Dutch doot, the Dutch dood, the Old High German & German tot, the Old Norse dauðr and the Gothic dauþs), a past-participle adjective based on dau-, which (though this is contested by etymologists) may be from the primitive Indo-European dheu- (to die).  Line (in this context) was from the Middle English line & lyne, from the Old English līne (line, cable, rope, hawser, series, row, rule, direction), from the Proto-West Germanic līnā, from the Proto-Germanic līnǭ (line, rope, flaxen cord, thread), from the Proto-Germanic līną (flax, linen), from the primitive Indo-European līno- (flax).  The development in Middle English was influenced by the Middle French ligne (line), from the Latin linea (linen thread, string, plumb-line (also “a mark, bound, limit, goal; line of descent”)).  The earliest sense in Middle English was “a cord used by builders for taking measurements” which by the late fourteenth century extended to “a thread-like mark” which led to the notion of “a track, course, direction; a straight line.  The sense of a “limit, boundary” dates from the 1590s add was applied to the geographical lines drawn to divide counties.  The mathematical sense of “length without breadth” (ie describing the line drawn between points (dimensionless places in space)) was formalized in the 1550s and in the 1580s the “equatorial line was used to describe the Earth’s equator."  Other languages including Dutch, Finnish, Italian & Polish picked up deadline from English in unaltered form while the word also entered use in many countries for use in specific industries (journalism, publishing, television, printing etc).  Deadline & deadliner are nouns; deadlining & deadlined are verbs and postdeadline is an adjective; the noun plural is deadlines.

In the oral tradition, a deadline (which probably should be recorded as “dead line”) was a fishing line which for some time after being cast, hadn’t moved, indicating it might not be a productive place to go fishing.  The source of the first formalised meaning (a line which must not be crossed) was a physical line, the defined perimeter boundary line of prisoner of war (PoW) caps during the US Civil War (1861-1865): Any prisoner going beyond the “deadline” was liable to being shot (and thus perhaps recorded as “SWATE” (shot while attempting to escape).  Despite the name, the Civil War records indicate the deadline was rarely marked-out as a physical, continuous line but was instead defined by markers such as trees, signposts or features of the physical environment.  However, the word appears not to have caught on in any sense until 1917 when it was used to describe the guideline on the bed of printing presses which delineated the point past which text would not print.  It seems that the word migrated from the print room to the news room because by 1920 it was used in journalism in the familiar modern sense of a time limit: Copy provided after a specified time would not appear in the printed edition because it has “missed the deadline”.  From this use emerged “postdeadline” (after the deadline has passed) which sometimes existed on a red stamp an editor would use when returning copy to a tardy journalist, “deadliner” (a journalist notorious for submitting copy only seconds before a deadline) and the “deadline fighter” (a journalist who habitually offered reasons why their postdeadline copy should be accepted for publication).  Writers often dread deadlines but there are those who become sufficiently successful to not be intimidated.  The English author Douglas Adams (1952–2001), famous for The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy (1979-1992) wrote in the posthumously published collection The Salmon of Doubt: Hitchhiking the Galaxy One Last Time (2002): “I love deadlines. I love the whooshing noise they make as they go by”.  Few working journalists enjoy that luxury.  Other similar expressions include “zero hour”, “cut-off date” and the unimaginative “time limit”.  Deadline was unusual in that it was one of the few examples of the word “dead” being used as a word-forming element in its literal sense, another being “deadman”, a device used mostly in railways to ensure a train is graceful brought to a controlled stop in the event of the driver’s death on incapacitation.

The meaning shift in deadline was an example of an element of a word used originally in its literal sense (dead men SWATE) changing into something figurative.  Other examples of the figurative use of the element include “dead leg”, deadlock, dead loss, dead load, dead lift, dead ringer, dead heat and dead light.  The interesting term “dead letter” has several meanings.  In the New Testament it was used by the Apostle Paul in his second letter to the Corinthians (2 Corinthians 3:6) to contrast written, secular law with the new covenant of the spirit.  Paul’s argument was that legal statutes, without the Spirit, were powerless to bring about salvation and were therefore “dead letter” whereas the new covenant, based on the Spirit, brings life:  “He has made us competent as ministers of a new covenant--not of the letter but of the Spirit; for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life.” (2 Corinthians 3:6).  So, law devoid of the power of the Holy Spirit to interpret and apply it is a “dead letter” that can never be transformative, unlike the new covenant which is based on a living relationship with God through the Holy Spirit.

In a post office, a “dead letter” (which can be a “dead parcel”) is an item of mail which can neither be delivered to its intended recipient nor returned to the sender, usually because the addresses are incorrect or the recipient has moved without leaving a forwarding address.  Within postal systems, there is usually a “dead letter office” a special department dedicated to identifying and locating the sender or recipient.  If neither can be found and the item is unclaimed after a certain time (and in many systems there are deadlines), it may be opened and examined for any identifying information that could be used to identify either and if this proves unsuccessful, depending on its nature, the item may be destroyed or sent to public auction.  Beyond the Pauline and the postman, “dead letter” is a phrase which refers to (1) a law or regulation which nominally still exists but is no longer observed or enforced and (2) anything obsolescent or actually obsolete (floppy diskettes, fax machines etc).  In law, some examples are quite famous such as jurisdictions which retain the death penalty but never perform executions.  There have also been cases of attempting to use the “dead letter” law as an expression of public policy: In Australia, as late as 1997, the preferred position of the Tasmanian state government was that acts of homosexuality committed by men should remain unlawful and in the Criminal Code but that none would be prosecuted, the argument being it was important to maintain the expression of public disapproval of such things even if it was acknowledged criminal sanction was no longer appropriate.  There may have been a time when such an approach made political sense but even before 1997, that time had passed.  As is often the case, law reform was induced by generational change.

Founded in 2009 (an earlier incarnation Deadline Hollywood Daily had operated as a blog since 2006), deadline.com is a US film and entertainment news & gossip site now owned by Penske Media Corporation.

Simile, Metaphor & Analogy

Simile (pronounced sim-uh-lee)

(1) A figure of speech expressing the resemblance of one thing to another of a different category usually introduced by as or like.

(2) An instance of such a figure of speech or a use of words exemplifying it.

1393: From the Middle English simile, from the Latin simile (a like thing; a comparison, likeness, parallel), neuter of similis (like, resembling, of the same kind).  The antonym is dissimile and the plural similes or similia although the latter, the original Latin form, is now so rare its use would probably only confuse.  Apart from its use as a literary device, the word was one most familiar as the source of the “fax” machine, originally the telefacsimile and there was a “radio facsimile” service as early as the 1920s whereby images could be transmitted over long-distance using radio waves, the early adopters newspapers and the military.

The simile is figure of speech in which one thing is explicitly compared to another, usually using “like” or “as”; both things must be mentioned and the comparison directly stated.  For literary effect, the two things compared should be thought so different as to not usually appear in the same sentence and the comparison must directly be stated.  Dr Johnson (Samuel Johnson (1709-1784)) thought a simile “…to be perfect, must both illustrate and ennoble the subject." but many long ago became clichéd and far removed from nobility.

It went through me like an armor-piercing shell.
Slept like a log.
Storm in a tea cup.
Blind as a bat.
Dead as a dodo.
Deaf as a post.

Metaphor (pronounced met-uh-fawr)

(1) A figure of speech in which a term or phrase is applied to something to which it is not literally applicable in order to suggest a resemblance.

(2) Something used, or regarded as being used, to represent something else; emblem; symbol.

1525-1535:  From the Middle French métaphore & the (thirteenth century) Old French metafore from the Latin metaphora, from the Ancient Greek μεταφορά (metaphorá) (a transfer, especially of the sense of one word to a different word; literally "a carrying over”), from μεταφέρω (metaphérō) (I transfer; I apply; I carry over; change, alter; to use a word in a strange sense), the construct being μετά (metá) (with; across; after; over) + φέρω (phérō, pherein) (to carry, bear) from the primitive Indo-European root bher- (to carry; to bear children).  The plural was methaphoris.  In Antiquity, for a writer to be described in Greek as metaphorikos meant they were "apt at metaphors”, a skill highly regarded: “It is a great thing, indeed, to make a proper use of the poetical forms, as also of compounds and strange words. But the greatest thing by far is to be a master of metaphor. It is the one thing that cannot be learnt from others; and it is also a sign of genius, since a good metaphor implies an intuitive perception of the similarity in dissimilars" (Aristotle (384-322 BC), Poetics (circa 335 BC)).

The words metaphor, simile and analogy are often used interchangeably and, at the margins, there is a bit of overlap, a simile being a type of metaphor but the distinctions exist.  A metaphor is a figure of figure of speech by which a characteristic of one object is assigned to another, different but resembling it or analogous to it; comparison by transference of a descriptive word or phrase.  It’s important to note a metaphor is technically not an element or argument, merely a device to make a point more effective or better understood.  It’s the use of a word or phrase to refer to something other than its literal meaning, invoking an implicit similarity between the thing described and what is denoted by the word or phrase.  It has certain technical uses too such as the recycling or trashcan icons in the graphical user interfaces (GUI) on computer desktops (a metaphor in itself).  The most commonly used derivatives are metaphorically & metaphorical but in literary criticism and the weird world of deconstructionism, there’s the dead metaphor, the extended metaphor, the metaphorical extension, the mysterious conceptual metaphor and the odd references to metaphoricians and their metaphorization.  Within the discipline, the sub-field of categorization is metaphorology, the body of work of those who metaphorize.  

This royal throne of kings, this sceptred isle,
This earth of majesty, this seat of Mars,
This other Eden, demi-paradise,
This fortress built by Nature for herself
Against infection and the hand of war,
This happy breed of men, this little world,
This precious stone set in the silver sea,
Which serves it in the office of a wall
Or as a moat defensive to a house,
Against the envy of less happier lands,--
This blessed plot, this earth, this realm, this England.

William Shakespeare (1564-1616), Richard II (circa 1594), Act 2 scene 1.

Analogy (pronounced uh-nal-uh-jee)

(1) A similarity between like features of two things, on which a comparison may be based:

(2) A similarity or comparability.

(3) In biology, an analogous relationship; a relationship of resemblance or equivalence between two situations, people, or objects, especially when used as a basis for explanation or extrapolation.

(4) In linguistics, the process by which words or phrases are created or re-formed according to existing patterns in the language.

(5) In logic a form of reasoning in which one thing is inferred to be similar to another thing in a certain respect, on the basis of the known similarity between the things in other respects.

(6) In geometry, the proportion or the equality of ratios.

(7) In grammar, the correspondence of a word or phrase with the genius of a language, as learned from the manner in which its words and phrases are ordinarily formed; similarity of derivative or inflectional processes.

1530-1540: From the Old French analogie, from the Latin analogia, from the Ancient Greek ἀναλογία (analogía), (ratio or proportion) the construct being ἀνά (aná) (upon; according to) + λόγος (logos) (ratio; word; speech, reckoning), from the primitive Indo-European root leg- (to collect, to gather (with derivatives meaning “to speak; to pick out words”).  It was originally a term from mathematics given a wider sense by Plato who extended it to logic (which became essentially “an argument from the similarity of things in some ways inferring their similarity in others”.  The meaning “partial agreement, likeness or proportion between things” fates from the 1540s and by the 1580s was common in mathematics; by the early seventeenth century it was in general English use.  The plural is analogies and the derived forms include the adjective analogical and the verbs analogize & analogized.  In critical discourse there’s the “false analogy” and the rare disanalogy.

An analogy is a comparison in which an idea or a thing is compared to another thing that is quite different from it, aiming to explain the idea or thing by comparing it to something that is familiar.  Further to confuse, metaphors and similes are tools used to draw an analogy so an analogy can be more extensive and elaborate than either a simile or a metaphor.

The day is done, and the darkness

Falls from the wings of Night,

As a feather is wafted downward

From an eagle in his flight.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882), The Day Is Done (1844).

“They crowded very close about him, with their hands always on him in a careful, caressing grip, as though all the while feeling him to make sure he was there. It was like men handling a fish which is still alive and may jump back into the water.”

George Orwell (1903-1950), A Hanging (1931).

The Mean Girls mall scene, at the water hole in the jungle clearing where the “animals gather when on heat”.

Similes, metaphors & analogies are used frequently as devices in fiction including in Paramount Production’s Mean Girls (2004) and the similes were quite brutish including “You smell like a baby prostitute”; “She's like a Martian”; & “Your face smells like peppermint”.  The metaphors were obvious (this was a teen comedy) but worked well.  The “Plastics” implied the notion of things artificial, superficial, and shiny on the outside but hollow inside while “Social Suicide” would to the audience have been more familiar still.  The idea of the “Queen Bee” (a metaphorical position of one individual as the centre of the hive (school) around which all dynamics and activities revolve) was one of several zoological references.  The idea of it being “…like a jungle in here” was a variation of the familiar metaphorical device of comparing modern urban environments (the “concrete jungle” the best known) with a jungle and in Mean Girls stylized depictions of wild animals do appear, the school’s mascot a lion, a link to the protagonist having come from the African savanna.  There was also the use of a malapropism in the analogy “It's like I have ESPN or something”, the novelty being it used an incorrect abbreviation rather than a word.  The Mean Girls script is not the place to search for literary subtleties.

Of Pluto

The New Zealand physicist Lord Rutherford (1871-1937), who first split the atom (1932), explained its structure by drawing an analogy with our solar system.  Rutherford always regarded physics as the “only true, pure science” while other disciplines were just expressions of the properties or applications of the theories of physics.  In 1908, he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry “…for his investigations into the disintegration of the elements, and the chemistry of radioactive substances.”  It was said he was amused by the joke.

This image includes Pluto as a planet.  Historically, the Galileian satellites of Jupiter were initially called satellite planets but were later reclassified along with the Moon.  The first observed asteroids were also considered planets, but were reclassified when became apparent how many there were, crossing each other's orbits, in a zone where only a single planet had been expected.   Pluto was found where an outer planet had been expected but doubts were soon raised about its status because (1) it was found to cross Neptune's orbit and (2) was much smaller than had been the expectation.  The debate about the status of Pluto went on for decades after its discovery in 1930 and the pro-planet faction may have become complacent, thinking that because Pluto had always been a planet, it would forever be thus but, after seventy-six years in the textbooks as a planet, the International Astronomical Union (IAU) in 2006 voted to re-classify Pluto as a dwarf planet on the basis that the icy orb failed to meet a set of criteria which the IAU claimed had for decades been accepted science.

To be a planet, the IAU noted, the body must (1) orbit a star, (2) be sufficiently massive to it pull itself into a sphere under its own gravity and (3), “clear its neighbourhood” of debris and other celestial bodies, proving it has gravitational dominance (cosmic hegemony in its sphere of influence by political analogy) in its little bit of the solar system.  Pluto fails the third test.  Because it orbits in the Kuiper Belt (a massive ring of asteroids and planetoids that stretches beyond the orbit of Neptune), Pluto is surrounded by thousands of other celestial bodies and chunks of debris, each exerting its own gravity.  Pluto is thus not the gravitationally dominant object in its neighborhood and therefore, not a planet and but a dwarf (a sort of better class of asteroid).  The IAU’s action had been prompted by the discovery in the Kuiper Belt of a body larger than Pluto yet still not meeting the criteria for planethood.  Feeling the need to draw a line in the sky, the IAU dumped Pluto.

However #plutoisaplanet is a thing and Pluto’s supporters have a website, arguing that while it’s universally accepted a planet should be spherical and orbit the Sun, the “clearing the neighbourhood” rule is arbitrary, having appeared only in a single paper published in 1801.  The history is certainly muddied, Galileo having described the moons of Jupiter as planets and there are plenty of other more recent precedents to suggest the definitional consensus has bounced around a bit and there are even extremists really to accept the implications of loosening the rules such as the moons of Earth, Jupiter and Saturn becoming planets.  Most however just want Pluto restored.

The most compelling argument however is that the IAU are a bunch of humorless cosmological clerks, something like the Vogons (“…not actually evil, but bad-tempered, bureaucratic, officious and callous.”) in Douglas Adams' (1952–2001) Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (1979-1992) and that Pluto should be restored to planethood because of the romance of the tale.  Although lacking the lovely rings of Saturn (a feature shared on a smaller scale by Jupiter, Uranus & Neptune), Pluto is the most charming of all because it’s so far away; desolate, lonely and cold, it's the solar system’s emo.  If for no other reason, it should be a planet in tribute to the scientists who, for decades during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, calculated possible positions and hunted for the elusive orb.  In an example of Donald Rumsfeld's (1932–2021; US secretary of defense 1975-1977 & 2001-2006) “unknown knowns”, the proof was actually obtained as early as 1915 but it wasn’t until 1930 that was realized.  In an indication of just how far away Pluto lies, since the 1840s when equations based on Newtonian mechanics were first used to predict the position of the then “undiscovered” planet, it has yet to complete even one orbit of the Sun, one Plutonian year being 247.68 years long.