- Words
- Words communicate thoughts,
but new words also make new thoughts possible. An enriched
vocabulary broadens and extends the qualia of consciousness (compare
with the
Sapir-Whorf
hypothesis).
The following important words appear to have no precise English equivalents,
or reveal a distinction which is not usually made in English.
Consequently, the following "definitions" are crude approximations.
- poshlust (Russian): smug philistinism
- ikikata (Japanese): how one should live/behave (in opposition
to the rational consumer who maximizes utility)
e.g. if I prove
an important theorem, but publish it in the Oosaka journal of mathematics
instead of the Annals, this is an example of iki behaviour
- wabi/sabi (Japanese): the Japanese esthetic of imperfection
- pudeur/honte (French): pudeur is shame felt before,
and warning against an action; by contrast, honte is felt after an
action
- connaitre/savoir (French): savoir is "to know" in the sense
of factual knowledge, whereas connaitre is "to know" in the sense of
to intuit or understand, and has an emotional connotation (or connaitretation . .).
- Sitzfleisch (German): literally "sitting meat"; the ability
to sit patiently for a prolonged period of time (e.g. during an opera,
a lecture, a ceremony, church, etc.)
- musaceous (English): the adjectival form of banana