Spending my time off doing some word-geeking. Decided to look up the words "metaphor", "decide", "problem", "solve".
METAPHOR: Greek: metaphora, metapherin. "to transfer alter, user word in strange sense". Meta- "over, across" + pherein- "to carry, bear"
PROBLEM: Greek: problema. Literally "thing put forward". From 'proballein'. Pro- (forward) + ballein "to throw" (see: ballistics).
SOLVE: Latin solvere "to loosen" – from PIE *se-lu: *s(w)e- (3rd person reflexive pronoun) + root *leu- "to divide, cut apart" (see lose).
DECIDE: Latin decidere, literally "to cut off". De- ("off") + caedere ("to cut"). Obvious on hindsight. We use "de-" and "-cide" a lot.
I think what's interesting to me is how many "cognitive" words have such "spatial" origins. Consider words like "understand" (literally)
Another thing that's really interesting to me is how much of language is based on variations and remixes of surprisingly few root words.
It's like how "most music is just 12 notes", and actually often even less than that. Most words are just remixed assemblages of other words.
What I find almost ecstatically exciting is the idea that if you have a deep understanding of how/why words work, you can think new thoughts
Not entirely new, of course, but novel. Which is what Shakespeare did! Play around with language enough and you start remixing it yourself.
