Skip to main content

Mikhail Epstein's definitions

humy

humy n (abbreviated and affectionate name of a human being implying smallness) - a human being as a partner or a pet of creatures with artificial intelligence. The term also resonates with "humiliated," the role humans might assume in a technosociety dominated by the humanoid machines.
For somebody as smart as this humy, you have to wonder why it cannot escape death.
by Mikhail Epstein November 2, 2003
mugGet the humy mug.

inventure

inventure (invention+adventure) Ð an adventure of mind, creative and engaging intellectual action.
This book is about the invention of radio, but it reads like a thriller, with one inventure piled upon another.

By cutting reason down to size and establishing its ÒproperÓ limits, Kant encouraged subsequent inventures, a never-ending quest to reach beyond the limits of rational thought.
by Mikhail Epstein November 6, 2003
mugGet the inventure mug.

ambipathy

ambipathy n (Latin, Greek ambi- (or amphi), both, on both sides + Greek pathos, feeling) - a mixture of sympathy and antipathy, of attraction and repulsion; a condition of being torn apart by conflicting feelings and aspirations.
"... At once I hate and love as well," - this line by Catullus, Roman poet of the first century BC, is one of the first literary expressions of ambipathy.

Dmitry Karamazov in Dostoevsky says that "a man is too broad" and is equally attracted by the two abysses--the upper and the lower ones, the ideal of Madonna and the ideal of Sodom. In this sense, Dmitry and perhaps Dostoevsky himself are the brightest manifestations of this common trait of ambipathy.
by Mikhail Epstein November 6, 2003
mugGet the ambipathy mug.

chronosome

chronosome n (Greek khronos, time + Greek soma, body; cf. chromosome) Ð a unit of historical heredity, in contrast with a chromosome as a unit of biological heredity; a mental code of a historical period that is transmitted to next generations through styles, traditions and unconscious influences ("cultural air").
The chronosomes of the early 20th c. avant-garde have reached the generation of the 1960s and shaped its political views and artistic styles.

Nabokov's novel "Invitation to a Beheading" bears many Kafka's chronosomes, even if the author claims to have never read Kafka.
by Mikhail Epstein November 13, 2003
mugGet the chronosome mug.

happicle

happicle n (happy + diminutive suffix Ðicle, like in "particle," "icicle") Ð a particle of happiness, the smallest unit of happiness; a single happy occurrence or a momentary feeling of happiness.
There is no happiness in this world, but there are happicles. Sometimes we can catch them, fleeting and unpredictable as they are.

Like photons, happicles have zero mass at rest--the inertial mass that we identify with happiness. Happicles just flash and go out in passing. They may be as transitory as a fragrance in the air, or a yellow falling leaf, or a glance of a passerby on the street.

Happicles make life worth of living, even in the absence of stable happiness.
by Mikhail Epstein November 8, 2003
mugGet the happicle mug.

polypath

polypath n. ( Gr. polys, much, many + patheia, suffering) Ð a person with multiple disorders, such as neuropathy, myopathy, sociopathy, chronopathy, etc.
A polymath is a universal genius, a polypath is a universal idiot.
by Mikhail Epstein November 13, 2003
mugGet the polypath mug.

slavior

slavior (to (en)slave + suffix ior, like in savior) Ð the prince of this world, the one who imitates the Savior and promises to save people but makes them slaves.
Outwardly the distinction between Savior and Slavior may be as subtle as one letter difference in their names.

For many old-believers, the Slavior is already here, in our very midst, and they refuse to serve this self-appointed sovereign.
by Mikhail Epstein November 2, 2003
mugGet the slavior mug.

Share this definition

Sign in to vote

We'll email you a link to sign in instantly.

Or

Check your email

We sent a link to

Open your email