Saturday, November 16, 2013

Automobile is a convenient lie and traffic is exactly what it was meant to be

From wikipedia:
The word automobile comes, via the French automobile from the Ancient Greek word αὐτός (autós, "self") and the Latin mobilis ("movable"); meaning a vehicle that moves itself.
We are still struggling with artificial intelligence. Do you really believe a vehicle moves itself? Then what exactly do you do sitting in that vehicle?

Let's say you don't move the vehicle. Do you still believe that the vehicle is moving itself?

Read more from wikipedia:
The loanword was first adopted in English by The New York Times in 1899.
If the belief of/in the word 'automobile' has resulted in losses to you (I can't think of a loss that's well-articulated and measured though), time to sue the NYT :).

Wikipedia has more on the origins of the word 'car':
The alternative name car is believed to originate from the Latin word carrus or carrum ("wheeled vehicle"), or the Middle English word carre ("cart") (from Old North French), in turn these are said to have originated from the Gaulish word karros (a Gallic Chariot).
Now the concept of wheeled vehicle sounds like the true description, isn't it?

And we are also unnecessarily bothered by 'traffic'. It's meant to be just what it is. Flow but slow. Again from wikipedia:
Traffic in English is taken from the Arabic word taraffaqa, which means to walk along slowly together.
And yet we keep cursing. May be they never told us about company in traffic. We've got some nasty teachers :).

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