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Google Search Now Includes Etymology
- kmfrk 13y agoHas done for a while, but wasn't aware of using the "etymology" query; I used to hit the drop-down on "define:" queries.
- Jongseong 13y agoSome initial remarks after playing around with this for a bit: Currently, this seems to only include the etymology for English words. Proper nouns are not included, except those also used as common nouns, like Newton. Nor are most compound words made up of simpler words or affixes such as mainland, snowman, simply, or even disuse. This is understandable because covering all these cases will dramatically expand the number of words that have to be dealt with, and this is probably the limitation of the original source used by Google for the etymology information, which was probably an etymological dictionary with the usual space constraints. But freed from such constraints, it should be feasible in the future to add in the etymological information for such compounds. What I like is the tree structure of the presentation. This covers not only compound words but weirder cases of combination of disparate etymological sources—check out discombobulate or typhoon. But the tree structure is misleading in cases like apple, where Dutch appel and German Apfel are indicated as if they were parent forms instead of sister forms to the English apple. The branching should occur between Germanic and the daughter languages to make the relationship clearer. Also, note that this doesn't show the Germanic form for apple—it looks like it doesn't do hypothetical forms, restricting itself to attested forms. A welcome feature would be being able to click through to different words at each stage of the etymology, to be able to trace through to even earlier stages or to see what other words are descended from the same roots.
- DanBC 13y ago> Proper nouns are not included, except those also used as common nouns, like Newton It has Pyrex, but just says it's an invented word. Pyrex is invented, but comes from Pyro (Fire) + Rex (King), which makes the use of it for heat proof glass easier to understand. The new Google feature is really neat. I'm uneasy about these things being built into Google rather than Google pointing people to other websites.
- gibwell 13y agoGoogle building more and more stuff directly into search has been going on since the early 2000s. Why are you uneasy now?
- DanBC 13y agoI've always been uneasy about it. Google providing me with definitions was troubling, but online dictionaries are sub-optimal. Google giving me instant conversions was so handy that I didn't care. But etymologies are handled nicely by http://www.etymonline.com/ http://www.etymonline.com/ and it's sad to think they're going to get a lot less traffic now.
- skj 13y agoI think it would be neat if Google provided some crowd-sourcing to supplement the data it already has. Maybe modify the graph widget that allows you to suggest a root for any word in the graph.
- Jongseong 13y agoAnother example where the tree diagram is incorrect: https://www.google.com/search?q=etymology+oligarchy https://www.google.com/search?q=etymology+oligarchy The current tree diagram makes it look like the Greek oligarkhia came from Medieval Latin, not the other way round. The etymological information given below is "late 15th cent.: from Greek oligarkhia (probably via medieval Latin)", so it looks like a bug in generating tree diagrams from the information. It would be helpful to have the Greek, Persian, Hebrew etc. forms in the original language orthography as well instead of just the romanized transcriptions.
- sz4kerto 13y agoThe compiler cannot compile itself yet. https://www.google.com/search?q=etymology+etymology https://www.google.com/search?q=etymology+etymology :(
- alberto_rico 13y agoTry again. That was fast.
- sz4kerto 13y agoI mean it does not display that nice graph.
- BrandonMarc 13y agoYes, I was under the impression the graph was the feature. The textual description of the etymology, I thought, was already often an included part of the snippet.
- FreeFull 13y agoGoogle gives me "late Middle English: from Old French ethimologie, via Latin from Greek etumologia, from etumologos ‘student of etymology,’ from etumon, neuter singular of etumos ‘true.’". It doesn't give the fancy tree diagram though.
- NKCSS 13y agoIt works for me using Opera Next. Chrome, FireFox and IE: No go :)
- jlgreco 13y agoIt won't do the word "computer" either, though it does do "compute".
- ankit84 13y agoNow I'll wait for a blog post from etymonline.com and wiktionary about how their traffic went to zero.
- aaronetz 13y agoAs a native Hebrew speaker, I would love to see the reverse lookup. Enter a biblical Hebrew word and see how it propagated to other languages. Two words that I could come up with were leviathan and behemoth, but that was easy since these sound almost the same in Hebrew.
- Bharath1234 13y agoIt seems they have pre-processed images of etymologies of most of the words and just indexing it.
- personlurking 13y agoThere's also the good ol' Etymonline (http://www.etymonline.com/ http://www.etymonline.com/) which I prefer over the Google search.
- sz4kerto 13y agoThere were other good ol' sites, calculators, FX rates, maps, dictionaries, timers. If the easiest one is 'good enough', it's going to destroy the rest.
- personlurking 13y agoAnd just as they merge, so must the ways in which we connect to that information. Type > touch/voice > intuitive/AI/chipped. 'Resistance is futile' ;)
- nate_meurer 13y agoChipped! Funniest thing I've read all morning, thanks. Edit: Incidentally, I've been thinking a lot recently about how anxious I am for a really good wearable machine for time tracking and management. I've checked out FitBit et al., but I haven't found the one yet. It's not quite a chipping, but only insofar as the device is to be on the outside of my skin.
- DanielStraight 13y agoWhich of course has a !bang on DuckDuckGo: !etym or !etymology For a good comparison of how much more information Etymonline has, look up the word "silly". Etymonline gives a much better sense of the almost unbelievable shift in meaning over time.
- personlurking 13y agoand, of course, "nice". http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?allowed_in_frame=0&search=nice&searchmode=none http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?allowed_in_frame=0&searc...
- thom 13y agoYou've always been able to search for bugs on Google, silly.
- alecsmart1 13y agoIt really worries me that whenever Google rolls out a feature within their search results, it destroys a business. For example, earlier currency conversion and dictionary word meanings required using third party sites. Now it can be done directly via their search. I no longer visit the old sites. Now with this, I will be less likely to visit etymonline.com. Quite similar to how including IE by default in Windows lead to lawsuits of unfair competition/monopoly. Is it wrong to believe something similar may happen with Google search.
- gibwell 13y agoGoogle is in the business of organizing the worlds information and monetizing it through advertising. If you are in the information business, Google is in competition with you.
- ryanhuff 13y agoWhile I think this is beyond dispute (gathering information for indexing), with some of their more recent moves, we may want to extend that to recognize that Google is also in the content production business.
- gibwell 13y ago...and the hardware business, and the OS business, and e-commerce, and cloud services.
- the_watcher 13y agoGoogle's job is not to keep those other sites in business. They serve their own users (this is arguable, I know, but I think my point here is clear), by making it easier to access information. This makes my life as a Google user easier, so it's something they should pursue.
- austinz 13y agoLooking forwards to the day Google includes electronic component datasheets in its search results and puts all those stupid unusable SEO-gaming datasheet repository websites out of business.
- xatnys 13y agoNeat. Wonder how they're generating those images. Using go + doing it as they're queried maybe (similar to http://blog.golang.org/from-zero-to-go-launching-on-google http://blog.golang.org/from-zero-to-go-launching-on-google )?
- af3 13y agostartpage.com does not have this "feature".
- vermillion 13y agoIt seems more and more clear with every new announcement, that Google has adopted the "embrace, extend and extinguish" strategy and it's taking it farther than what we thought possible in the past. These are worrisome news for every believer in choice and freedom. Google, a former supporter of free software, is now determined to exert its power to get rid of competitors and then lock us in. Our only option is to not give in to momentary convenience, but to cultivate the habit of comparing alternatives and choosing by ourselves instead.
- hajderr 13y agoYou mean www.duckduckgo.com ?
- vermillion 13y agoI actually have DuckDuckGo as my default search engine, but as Google extends its reach, we have to find alternatives for other services too. Google's decision to display its own products prominently and bury the rest is downright evil in my book.
- gibwell 13y agoThere are many googlers who sincerely support free software, but Google the company is a business that has no particular interest in preserving other businesses or even business models. Why would anyone expect Google not to eliminate its competitors?
- vermillion 13y agoYou're attacking a straw man. I don't object to Google fighting its competitors, but it must play by the rules. Google is not a country, but part of society and this imposes certain obligations.
- icebraining 13y agoAnd what rule is Google violating?
- mariuolo 13y agoLooks like a normal search to me...
- drmarianus 13y agoI'm a little sad it doesn't include the Proto-language root.
- shiftb 13y agoMy wife has been using this for about a month to help teach Greek and Latin roots to her 7th grade language arts students. It's a great tool for them to use since they already know how to google.
- agumonkey 13y agoAll in all, people really seeking etymology data won't use this, I don't think a single website is a reference, so one needs to combine many sources. Personally I blend etymonline.com, http://www.lexilogos.com/etymologie.htm http://www.lexilogos.com/etymologie.htm, http://www.cnrtl.fr/etymologie/ http://www.cnrtl.fr/etymologie/, www.wiktionary.org, and others to get a broader view. This news will be little free publicity for them too, although I'd wish google to include a little set of premade links into his in-search proxy box. That would be a nice little touch, or maybe a commercial pain.
- BrandonMarc 13y agoThat would be nice, though I wonder if it would last if the even did it. It used to be, if you searched for a map, Google would show a link to its own map (with thumbnail) + links to other mapping services (mapquest, maporama, etc). It used to be ...
- deleted 13y ago[deleted]
- notjustanymike 13y agoI googled war. https://www.google.com/search?q=etymology+onomatopoeia#q=etymology+war https://www.google.com/search?q=etymology+onomatopoeia#q=ety... War never changes.