Origins of the Specious: Myths and Misconceptions of the English Language
Patricia T. O’Connor and Stewart Kellerman
Random House (2009)

“What’s another word for ‘thesaurus’?” Steven Wright

Patricia O’Connor and Stewart Kellerman have co-authored a book in which they examine all manner of “myths and misconceptions of the English language,” a language renowned for the scope and depth of its linguistic diversity, exceptions, inconsistencies, and (yes) abuses.

Etymology is a discipline that determines word origins. For example, the word specious:

“Late 14c., “pleasing to the sight, fair,” from Latin specious “good-looking, beautiful, fair,” also “showy, pretended, plausible, specious,” from species “appearance, form, figure, beauty”. Meaning “seemingly desirable, reasonable or probable, but not really so; superficially fair, just, or correct” in English is first recorded the 1600s.

“Specious is superficially fair, just, or correct, appearing well at first view but easily proved unsound. Plausible is applied to that which pleases the ear or the superficial judgment, but will not bear severe examination.” [Century Dictionary, 1895]

As you may already know, Joseph Luft and Harrington Ingham introduced a concept in 1955 that they aptly characterized as “the unknown unknowns.” In essence, ignorance of one’s ignorance. This is probably what Mark Twain had in mind when observing, “It ain’t what you don’t know that gets you into trouble. It’s what you know for sure that just ain’t so.”

Yes, it is very important to recognize what our specific knowledge needs are, relevant to the given situation. It is even more important to recognize that we may think we know — but in fact do not know — especially what needs to be known when a serious question must be answered or a complicated problem must be solved. For me, the greatest challenge with specious statements is that they seem eminently sensible but in fact are not. In this sense, they are impostors.

NOTE: O’Connor and Kellerman invoke a first-person singular pronoun throughout the narrative because two persons can talk at the same time but cannot communicate in writing at the same time with a single “voice” unless using third-person plural pronouns.

For me, these are among their most interesting examples of specious origins:

o The first recorded use of the letter X for “Christ” was in 1021 AD.
o An 11-century French monk was the first to observe that he was a midget standing atop the shoulders of giants.
o The term”bitch” was first used in a negative way (“son of a bitch”) to put down men, not women, in 1325 AD.
o The British (not French) adopted the term nom de plume from the French term nom du guerre. 
o The term “politically correct” appeared in 1793 and meant politically accurate. The modern meaning emerged in the 1930s.

o The term “thumbs up” can be traced to 1782 when a judge decided that a man could beat his wife with a rod or stick if it were no thicker than his thumb.
o The phrase “horns of a dilemma” (NOT “dilemna”) has been traced back to the 1500s and refers to having two or more unfavorable options.
o “Data”: singular or plural? The word is plural in Latin but, given the nature and extent of current usage, either singular or plural (as with “media”) is acceptable. Ditto “they” when used with a single noun or pronoun.
o The word “comptroller” was borrowed (and misspelled) from the French “countreroullour” in 1200s.  Today, “controller” is usually preferred despite the negative connotations of “contra.”
o “Enormous” (from”enormity”) is among words so over-used (and abused) that it may become meaningless, like “very,” “really,” and “just.”

They add: “Someday the old meanings of ‘ironic’ and ‘unique’ and the rest will no doubt be lost forever, mere footnotes in the history of English.”

Given the diversity of relocations from all over the world to what became thirteen colonies and then a new nation during the last (let’s say) three centuries, I think Oscar Wilde’s observation in 1887 remains true: “We have really everything in common with America nowadays, except, of course, language.”

Those who share my high regard for this book are urged to check out The Yale Book of Quotations edited by Fred Shapiro as well as John Ayto’s Dictionary of Word Origins: The Histories of More Than 8,000 English-Language Words.