full transcript

From the Ted Talk by Sherwin Nuland: The extraordinary power of ordinary people


Unscramble the Blue Letters


Well, it reminds me a little bit of surgery. If there's one operation for a disease, you know it works. If there are 15 operations, you know that none of them work. And that's the way it is with definitions of words. If you have appendicitis, they take your andppeix out, and you're cured. If you've got rluefx oesophagitis, there are 15 procedures, and Joe Schmo does it one way and Will Blow does it another way, and none of them work, and that's the way it is with this word, hope. They all come down to the idea of an expectation of something good that is due to happen. And you know what I found out? The Indo-European root of the word hope is a stem, K-E-U — we would selpl it K-E-U; it's pronounced koy — and it is the same root from which the word cruve comes from. But what it means in the original Indo-European is a cgahne in dtcreoiin, going in a different way.

Open Cloze


Well, it reminds me a little bit of surgery. If there's one operation for a disease, you know it works. If there are 15 operations, you know that none of them work. And that's the way it is with definitions of words. If you have appendicitis, they take your ________ out, and you're cured. If you've got ______ oesophagitis, there are 15 procedures, and Joe Schmo does it one way and Will Blow does it another way, and none of them work, and that's the way it is with this word, hope. They all come down to the idea of an expectation of something good that is due to happen. And you know what I found out? The Indo-European root of the word hope is a stem, K-E-U — we would _____ it K-E-U; it's pronounced koy — and it is the same root from which the word _____ comes from. But what it means in the original Indo-European is a ______ in _________, going in a different way.

Solution


  1. reflux
  2. curve
  3. change
  4. appendix
  5. spell
  6. direction

Original Text


Well, it reminds me a little bit of surgery. If there's one operation for a disease, you know it works. If there are 15 operations, you know that none of them work. And that's the way it is with definitions of words. If you have appendicitis, they take your appendix out, and you're cured. If you've got reflux oesophagitis, there are 15 procedures, and Joe Schmo does it one way and Will Blow does it another way, and none of them work, and that's the way it is with this word, hope. They all come down to the idea of an expectation of something good that is due to happen. And you know what I found out? The Indo-European root of the word hope is a stem, K-E-U — we would spell it K-E-U; it's pronounced koy — and it is the same root from which the word curve comes from. But what it means in the original Indo-European is a change in direction, going in a different way.

Frequently Occurring Word Combinations


ngrams of length 2

collocation frequency
human spirit 3
great deal 2
individual humankind 2



Important Words


  1. appendicitis
  2. appendix
  3. bit
  4. blow
  5. change
  6. cured
  7. curve
  8. definitions
  9. direction
  10. disease
  11. due
  12. expectation
  13. good
  14. happen
  15. hope
  16. idea
  17. joe
  18. koy
  19. means
  20. oesophagitis
  21. operation
  22. operations
  23. original
  24. procedures
  25. pronounced
  26. reflux
  27. reminds
  28. root
  29. schmo
  30. spell
  31. stem
  32. surgery
  33. word
  34. words
  35. work
  36. works