Since today is Saturday, let’s take some time out to play with words. An acronym is an abbreviation of a phrase or concept that is usually based on the first letters of a series of words and is pronounced as a separate word. The practice of using acronyms emerged in the twentieth century and in English the word “acronym” dates to 1940.
Listed below are a few acronyms from science and computer programming to help get the creative juices flowing.
PEBKAC: Problem Exists Between Keyboard and Chair. In other word, it was made by the human user of the computer
BASIC: Beginner’s All-purpose Symbolic Instruction Code. When I got my first computer back in the 70s, there weren’t any programs to make it do what I wanted, so I spent the next couple of decades writing all of my programs in BASIC.
BIGASS: Bright Infrared Galaxy All Sky Survey
WEIRD: Western, Educated, Industrialized, Rich, and Democratic. Unfortunately, many of the popular reports about psychology and human behavior are WEIRD, that is, they are based on studies of U.S. undergraduate students who have little in common with most of the 7 billion people on the planet.
Today’s question: What acronyms do you frequently use?
Today’s challenge: Can you create some new acronyms for us?
This is an open thread. Feel free to ignore acronyms and talk about what’s on your mind, what’s happening in your life, and what’s for dinner.