- globe
- 1550s, "sphere," from L. globus "round mass, sphere," related to gleba "clod, soil, land." Sense of "planet earth," or a three-dimensional map of it first attested 1550s. Global village first attested 1960, popularized, if not coined, by Canadian educator Marshall McLuhan (1911-80).
"Postliterate man's electronic media contract the world to a village or tribe where everything happens to everyone at the same time: everyone knows about, and therefore participates in, everything that is happening the minute it happens. Television gives this quality of simultaneity to events in the global village." [Carpenter & McLuhan, "Explorations in Communication," 1960]
- sphere
- 1530s, restored spelling of M.E. spere (c.1300) "space, conceived as a hollow globe about the world," from O.Fr. espere (13c.), from L. sphæra "globe, ball, celestial sphere," from Gk. sphaira "globe, ball," of unknown origin. Sense of "ball, body of globular form" is from late 14c. Medieval astronomical meaning "one of the 8 (later 10) concentric, transparent, hollow globes believed to revolve around the earth and carry the heavenly bodies" is from late 14c.; the supposed harmonious sound they made rubbing against one another was the music of the spheres (late 14c.). Meaning "range of something" is first recorded c.1600 (e.g. sphere of influence (1885), in reference to British-German colonial rivalry in Africa). A spherical number (1640s) is one whose powers always terminate in the same digit as the number itself (5,6, and 10 are the only ones).
- Pulitzer
- annual awards for distinguished work in U.S. journalism, letters, music, etc., 1918, named for U.S. journalist Joseph Pulitzer (1847-1911), publisher of the "New York Globe," who established them in 1917 through an endowment to Columbia University.
- globalisation
- British spelling of globalization (see globe); for suffix, see -ize.
- eastern
- O.E. easterne "of the east, from the east; of the Eastern Orthodox Church; of the eastern part of the globe;" see east. Eastern Shore of Maryland and Virginia so called from 1620s.
- orb
- c.1420 (implied in orbicular), "sphere, globe," also "emblem of sovereignty," from O.Fr. orbe (13c.), from L. orbem (nom. orbis) "circle, disk, ring," probably related to orbita "wheel track, rut," of unknown origin. Some suggest a connection with the root of orchid (q.v.). A three-dimensional extension of a word originally describing two-dimensional shapes. Astronomical sense is from 1526, in ref. to the hollow spheres that carried the planets and stars in the Ptolemaic system. Orb weaver spider is first recorded 1889.
- butterfly
- O.E. buttorfleoge, perhaps based on the old notion that the insects (or witches disguised as butterflies) consume butter or milk that is left uncovered. Or, less creatively, simply because the pale yellow color of many species' wings suggests the color of butter. Another theory connects it to the color of the insect's excrement, based on Du. cognate boterschijte. A fascinating overview of words for "butterfly" in various languages can be found here. The swimming stroke so called from 1936. Butterflies "light stomach spasms caused by anxiety" is from 1908.
The butterfly effect is a deceptively simple insight extracted from a complex modern field. As a low-profile assistant professor in MIT's department of meteorology in 1961, [Edward] Lorenz created an early computer program to simulate weather. One day he changed one of a dozen numbers representing atmospheric conditions, from .506127 to .506. That tiny alteration utterly transformed his long-term forecast, a point Lorenz amplified in his 1972 paper, "Predictability: Does the Flap of a Butterfly's Wings in Brazil Set Off a Tornado in Texas?" [Peter Dizikes, "The Meaning of the Butterfly," The Boston Globe, June 8, 2008]
- so long
- parting salutation, 1860, of unknown origin, perhaps from a Ger. idiom (cf. Ger. parting salutation adieu so lange, the full sense of which probably is something like "farewell, whilst (we're apart)"), perhaps from Heb. shalom (via Yiddish sholom). Some have noted a similarity to Scand. leave-taking phrases, cf. Norw. Adjø så lenge, Farvel så lenge, Mor’n så lenge, lit. "bye so long, farewell so long, morning so long;" and Swed. Hej så länge "good-bye for now," with så länge "for now" attested since 1850 according to Swed. sources. Most etymology sources seem to lean toward the Ger. origin. Earlier guesses that it was a sailors' corruption of a South Pacific form of Arabic salaam are not now regarded as convincing. "Dictionary of American Slang" also adds to the list of candidates Ir. slan "health," said to be used as a toast and a salutation. The phrase seems to have turned up simultaneously in Amer.Eng., Britain, and perhaps Canada, originally among lower classes. First attested use is in title and text of the last poem in Whitman's "Leaves of Grass" in the 1860 edition.
An unknown sphere, more real than I dream’d, more direct, darts awakening rays about me—So long!
Whitman's friend and fan William Sloane Kennedy, wrote in 1923:
Remember my words—I may again return,
I love you—I depart from materials;
I am as one disembodied, triumphant, dead."The salutation of parting—‘So long!’—was, I believe, until recent years, unintelligible to the majority of persons in America, especially in the interior, and to members of the middle and professional classes. I had never heard of it until I read it in Leaves of Grass, but since then have quite often heard it used by the laboring class and other classes in New England cities. Walt wrote to me, defining ‘so long’ thus: ‘A salutation of departure, greatly used among sailors, sports, & prostitutes—the sense of it is ‘Till we meet again,’— conveying an inference that somehow they will doubtless so meet, sooner or later.” ... It is evidently about equivalent to our ‘See you later.’ The phrase is reported as used by farm laborers near Banff, Scotland. In Canada it is frequently heard; ‘and its use is not entirely confined to the vulgar.’ It is in common use among the working classes of Liverpool and among sailors at Newcastle-upon-Tyne, and in Dorsetshire. ... The London Globe suggests that the expression is derived from the Norwegian ‘Saa laenge,’ a common form of ‘farewell,’ au revoir. If so, the phrase was picked up from the Norwegians in America, where ‘So long’ first was heard. The expression is now (1923) often used by the literary and artistic classes."