Books Blog: English Literature & Linguistics

It’s interesting to read this article about fake words inserted into dictionaries to detect their wholescale plagiarism:

A call was placed to Erin McKean, the editor-in-chief of the second edition of NOAD. Upon being presented with the majority opinion, McKean confirmed that “esquivalience” was a fabricated word. She said that Oxford had included it in NOAD’s first edition, in 2001, to protect the copyright of the electronic version of the text that accompanied most copies of the book. “The editors figured, We’re all working really hard, so let’s put in a word that means ‘working really hard.’ Nothing materialized, so they thought, Let’s do the opposite.” An editor named Christine Lindberg came up with “esquivalience.” The word has since been spotted on Dictionary.com, which cites Webster’s New Millennium as its source. “It’s interesting for us that we can see their methodology,” McKean said. “Or lack thereof. It’s like tagging and releasing giant turtles.”

Freakonomics, by Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner, might be one of the best economics / scientific method, explore the world around us books that I’ve read in a long time. It’s got 4 star reviews on Amazon.com, and the authors have their own blog. There’s nothing more that I can say except that this book is a must read book. Just buy it.

If you want to read about how legalized abortion cut crime rates, on the co-dependent cheating of sumo wrestlers across win-lose lines and teams, or about why selling crack really isn’t that profitable, this is the book for you. You who ask why until a reasonable explanation is found.

There is beauty in randomness; it is art: