Eavesdropping

Eavesdropping is secretly listening to the private conversation of others without their consent.

In order to understand about the etymology of the given word you have to understand about the Back formation and lexeme.

Lexeme:

A lexeme is a unit of lexical meaning that exists regardless of the number of inflectional endings it may have or the number of words it may contain. It is a basic unit of meaning, and the headwords of a dictionary are all lexemes. For example, in the English language, run, runs, ran and running are forms of the same lexeme, conventionally written as run.

Backformation:

In etymology, back-formation is the process of creating a new lexeme, usually by removing actual or supposed affixes. Back-formation is different from clipping – back-formation may change the part of speech or the word's meaning, whereas clipping creates shortened words from longer words, but does not change the part of speech or the meaning of the word.

Examples:

1.       Babysit from babysitter.

2.       Bicep from biceps.

3.       Biograph from biography.

4.       Burger from hamburger.

From the above examples it just means that the word ‘burger’ has got originated from the word ‘hamburger’. So this was the example of back formation.

Etymology of the word ‘Eavesdropping’.

The verb eavesdrop was originally a back-formation of the noun eavesdropper ("a person who eavesdrops") which was formed from the unrelated noun eavesdrop ("the dripping of water from the eaves of a house; the ground on which such water falls"). An eavesdropper was one who stood at eavesdrop (where the water fell, i.e., near the house) so as to overhear what was said inside.

And I found it worth sharing.

References:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eavesdropping

https://www.google.co.in/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&espv=2&ie=UTF-8#q=eavesdrop

Did Neil Armstrong landed on the moon? Are you serious!

History has recorded the fact that Neil Armstrong and Edwin Aldrin were the first human to walk on the moon on July 20, 1969. But some people believe that the moon landing was a hoax carried out by NASA. They have studied the photographs and they are convinced that they are fake. Why do they say this? Here are some arguments in support of this theory.

1.       Thousands of pictures were taken by the astronauts and not a single one was blurred. This is quite unbelievable, considering the fact that the astronauts were wearing heavy gloves that would make handling a camera awkward. Moreover some of the still photos matches the film footage, though NASA claims that they were taken at the same time.

2.       We know that outer space is awash with deadly radiation from the sun. You will need a shield of at least 2 m thickness to be protected against this radiation. Yet the walls of the lunar module were only the thickness of a duty aluminum foil.

3.       We know that there is no atmosphere on the moon, and since there is no air, there can be no wind. Yet the American flag is shown fluttering in the wind.

4.       It is strange to notice that the dent made by the astronaut’s feet on the moon was deeper than dent made by the module which weighed 14 tons.

5.       There was no delay in the answers that came from the astronauts to the questions asked by NASA. This again seems strange, because there is always delay even today when you are making a telephone call to another continent via satellite.






Thanks for reading. I hope that the content might have gone fine. Please don't forget to leave a comment. Your views and reviews always matter. :-)

Cinderella effect

In order to understand this effect you need to know the story. I know that you had read it in your childhood day but I need you to read it one more time to understand it better.

Once upon a time, there was a beautiful girl named Cinderella. She lived with her wicked stepmother and two stepsisters. They treated Cinderella very badly. One day, they were invited for a grand ball in the king’s palace. But Cinderella’s stepmother would not let her go. Cinderella was made to sew new party gowns for her stepmother and stepsisters, and curl their hair. They then went to the ball, leaving Cinderella alone at home.

Cinderella felt very sad and began to cry. Suddenly, a fairy godmother appeared and said, “Don’t cry, Cinderella! I will send you to the ball!” But Cinderella was sad. She said, “I don’t have a gown to wear for the ball!” The fairy godmother waved her magic wand and changed Cinderella’s old clothes into a beautiful new gown! The fairy godmother then touched Cinderella’s feet with the magic wand. And lo! She had beautiful glass slippers! “How will I go to the grand ball?” asked Cinderella. The fairy godmother found six mice playing near a pumpkin, in the kitchen. She touched them with her magic wand and the mice became four shiny black horses and two coachmen and the pumpkin turned into a golden coach. Cinderella was overjoyed and set off for the ball in the coach drawn by the six black horses. Before leaving. The fairy godmother said, “Cinderella, this magic will only last until midnight! You must reach home by then!”

When Cinderella entered the palace, everybody was struck by her beauty. Nobody, not even Cinderella’s stepmother or stepsisters, knew who she really was in her pretty clothes and shoes. The handsome prince also saw her and fell in love with Cinderella. He went to her and asked, “Do you want to dance?” And Cinderella said, “Yes!” The prince danced with her all night and nobody recognized the beautiful dancer. Cinderella was so happy dancing with the prince that she almost forgot what the fairy godmother had said. At the last moment, Cinderella remembered her fairy godmother’s words and she rushed to go home. “Oh! I must go!” she cried and ran out of the palace. One of her glass slippers came off but Cinderella did not turn back for it. She reached home just as the clock struck twelve. Her coach turned back into a pumpkin, the horses into mice and her fine ball gown into rags. Her stepmother and stepsisters reached home shortly after that. They were talking about the beautiful lady who had been dancing with the prince.

The prince had fallen in love with Cinderella and wanted to find out who the beautiful girl was, but he did not even know her name. He found the glass slipper that had come off Cinderella’s foot as she ran home. The prince said, “I will find her. The lady whose foot fits this slipper will be the one I marry!” The next day, the prince and his servants took the glass slipper and went to all the houses in the kingdom. They wanted to find the lady whose feet would fit in the slipper. All the women in the kingdom tried the slipper but it would not fit any of them. Cinderella’s stepsisters also tried on the little glass slipper. They tried to squeeze their feet and push hard into the slipper, but the servant was afraid the slipper would break. Cinderella’s stepmother would not let her try the slipper on, but the prince saw her and said, “Let her also try on the slipper!” The slipper fit her perfectly. The prince recognized her from the ball. He married Cinderella and together they lived happily ever after.

So this was the story part. Now let’s talk some business.

In evolutionary psychology, the Cinderella effect is the alleged higher incidence of different forms of child-abuse and mistreatment by stepparents than by biological parents. Background

In the early 1970s, a theory arose on the connection between stepparents and child maltreatment. "In 1973, forensic psychiatrist P. D. Scott summarized information on a sample of "fatal battered-baby cases" perpetrated in anger (…) 15 of the 29 killers – 52% – were stepfathers.” Although initially there was no analysis of this raw data, empirical evidence has since been collected on what is now called the Cinderella effect through official records, reports, and census.

For over 30 years, data has been collected regarding the validity of the Cinderella effect, with a wealth of evidence indicating a direct relationship between step-relationships and abuse. This evidence of child abuse and homicide comes from a variety of sources including official reports of child abuse, clinical data, victim reports, and official homicide data. Studies have concluded that "stepchildren in Canada, Great Britain, and the United States indeed incur greatly elevated risk of child maltreatment of various sorts, especially lethal beatings". Studies have found that not biologically related parents are up to a hundred times more likely to kill a child than biological parents.

Powerful evidence in support of the Cinderella effect comes from the finding that when abusive parents have both step and genetic children, they generally spare their genetic children. In such families, stepchildren were exclusively targeted 9 out of 10 times in one study and in 19 of 22 in another. In addition to displaying higher rates of negative behaviors (e.g., abuse) toward stepchildren, stepparents display fewer positive behaviors toward stepchildren than do the genetic parents. For example, on average, stepparents invest less in education, play with stepchildren less, take stepchildren to the doctor less, etc. This discrimination against stepchildren is unusual compared with abuse statistics involving the overall population given "the following additional facts: 

(1) when child abuse is detected, it is often found that all the children in the home have been victimized; and

(2) stepchildren are almost always the eldest children in the home, whereas the general (…) tendency in families of uniform parentage is for the youngest to be most frequent victims."

References:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cinderella_effect

http://shortstoriesshort.com/story/cinderella-beautiful-girl/

Hyundai : A Message to Space

I liked this news


Hyundai has helped a 13-year-old girl named Stephanie send a message to her father. The reason sending a message is so hard is that the girl's father is an astronaut aboard the ISS. To send the message, Hyundai sent a fleet of 11 Genesis cars to write a message that spanned a space as large as about half of New York's Central Park.


The message was written using tire tracks from the cars and the finished message spanned 5.55 square kilometers and could be seen from the ISS. The massive message received a Guinness World Record for the largest tire track image ever created.

The message was written at Delmar Dry Lake in Nevada. Making the message took more than 11 cars and drivers able to synchronize movements; it required a large number of support personnel. The message also had to be planned out meticulously because one mistake could ruin the entire plan.
Hyundai's team went on expeditions to several locations seeking an area to write the message that would have the ideal weather and visibility. Eventually the location in Nevada was chosen. Check out the video to see how Hyundai and its team created the message.

source:  1. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3EOAXrTrsOE
              2. http://www.slashgear.com/hyundai-helps-astronauts-daughter-send-a-message-that-could-be-seen-from-space-17379640/