Meaning of goropism | Babel Free

Definitions

1. A hypothesis, similar to the one originally propounded by Goropius which is now discredited, that some attested or modern language such as Dutch, Hebrew, or Turkish was the original language of human beings.
   uncountable, usually
2. An absurd etymology proposed as part of such a hypothesis.
   uncountable, usually

Equivalents

Examples

“In Book III of G[ottfried] W[ilhelm] Leibniz's New Essays on Human Understanding […] there is a statement on the subject of the so-called goropism, which provided the basis for the principle that is referred to by some scientists and scholars as the Leibniz-Einstein's principle (or postulate)[…]. Leibniz uses the term "goropism" to refer to the procedure of correlating a false theory with any feasible experiment by means of reacting to empirical results which contradict the theory with the continual introduction of newer and newer assumptions[…].”

“[B]ased upon a helio-centric view of the origin of civilization and human languages, the theory claimed that the Turkish language was the language which all civilized languages derived from. Thanks to goropism, some remarkable results were obtained: the word for school is derived from Turkish okul (school). God is from Turkish kut (luck). Bulletin is from belleten^([sic – meaning belletmek]) (to learn by hearth^([sic – meaning heart])). Electric is from Uyghur yaltrik (shine).”

“He [Johannes Goropius Becanus] produced a string of arguments whose level of etymological wishful thinking matched those of Isidore and [Estienne] Guichard; they later became known as ‘becanisms’ or ‘goropisms’.”

“But lest we be accused of textual goropism, we should take a closer look at the evidence.”

CEFR level