"That's a great deal to make one word mean," Alice said in a thoughtful tone. "When I make a word do a lot of work like that," said Humpty Dumpty, "I always pay it extra."

Saturday, 2 March 2013

Ephemeromorph



The term ephemeromorph is used in biology to describe the lowest forms of life imaginable, so low they cannot even be classified as vegetable or animal.  I think it would make a wonderful insult and there are a few people who I think I could put in that category….   
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2 comments:

  1. Librarian2 March 2013 at 17:26

    What are they, then? Bacteria?

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  2. Scriptor Senex3 March 2013 at 04:04

    I don't know if bacteria are ephemeromorphs or not. And I can't find a further definition than that. Presumably one would have to read the source book - The Beginnings of Life: being some account of the nature, modes of origin and transformation of lower organisms, I–II (1872) by Henry Charlton Bastian (April 26, 1837 in Truro, Cornwall, England – November 17, 1915 in Chesham Bois, Buckinghamshire). Bastian was an English physiologist and neurologist. Fellow of Royal Society in 1868.

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