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I was looking up the word boson, a newsworthy sub-atomic particle, to discover its origin. A quick search revealed that the word also appeared in both the online version of the 1913 Websters AND even the 1828 edition!
As it turns out, the word boson as I was looking it up was, according to the online OED, coined in the 1940s: named after S. N. Bose (see Bose, Satyendra Nath) + -on. Bose was a luminary mathematical physicist. Who knew?
The pre-1940s boson was a corrupted pronunciation spelling of the word boatswain. c.f. cockswain, coxswain, usually pronounced as ending in /-sən/ /kɑ:ksən/ One could easily imagine a spelling of *coxon.
While I didn't exactly think that boson was borrowed from an old term, I still feel a little foolish for following the red herring. Thus, I leave you with this delightful Larson thought:
Yep, looks like you got yourself two different bosons there. I was not aware of that earlier corrupted meaning. But I remember that cartoon … used in on my bulletin board back when I taught science.
And talk about "newsworthy," that discovery was a real watershed for physics. Pity the popular media couldn't communicate the significance. When I heard the news, I went online to my favorite physics blog and found a great explanation of exactly what transpired. As you'd expect from a good blog, it has links to source material (some of which gets a bit technical).
If anyone is interested, you can check it out at blog: http://www.physicstoday.org/daily_edition/physics_update/a_higgs_particle_has_been_spotted
Martha Barnette
Grant Barrett
Grant Barrett
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