Do you suffer from FOMO? That’s an acronym fueled by Facebook and Twitter and other social networking sites. It stands for “fear of missing out.” This is part of a complete episode. Transcript of “FOMO” Greg, I have a new to me word you probably...
A Fort Worth listener wonders about a claim she saw in a 1930s magazine. The article said that traditionally, a picket line was an area between the front lines of two opposing armies where soldiers might safely venture out to pick berries without...
A Wellesley College student has been reading about the Victorian fear of being buried alive—also known as taphophobia—and the bizarre 19th-century burial practices associated with it. She’s heard that they gave rise to such expressions as dead...
cohort v.— «As patients entered, they were “cohorted,” in medical lingo, meaning that they were separated from the general population and quarantined in a 40-foot hallway (normally a psychiatric emergency area), lined with molded plastic chairs...
infodemic n.— «Is it an abundance of caution, or an abundance of panic and fear? An epidemic or an “infodemic?” What constitutes responsible action at a time when fear prevails?» —“The Travel Detective Responds to Joe Biden and the Swine Flu...
micro-expression n.— «The TSA aims to have 500 “behavior detection officers” (BDOs) in airports by the end of this year. The job of the BDOs will be that of examining passengers for “body language and facial cues… for signs of bad intentions.” They...