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Saturday, April 11, 2009

Presbycusis?

I found a very nice vocabulary word while shopping on ThinkGeek.com (specifically, the Annoy-a-tron 2.0): presbycusis. It is a noun referring to the hearing loss in elderly people in the high-frequency sound range. Presbycusis is what makes the "mosquito noise" ringtone so popular amongst us younguns: the old people can't hear it.
Immediately after I read the word, it reminded me of the protestant denomination called Presbyterianism. The word was derived from presbytery, a name for a group of Elders (presbyters) that govern the church. These words and presbycusis (hearing loss) are all etymologically derived from the Greek word presbys, meaning 'old man.'
Wait, so Presbyterians are a bunch of old men? Well, that actually sounds about right.
A few more words that come from the same Greek root are presbyopia (farsightedness due to old age), priest (a holy man), and Presbytis (a genus of lanky Old World monkeys with big, bushy eyebrows and prominant chin tufts).

~ROBO~

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