There are many things that surprise me by never crossing my mind until they surprise me by crossing my path (or I theirs).
Today I was thinking about how I like the word “teleological”—directed towards an end result. (Teleology is then the study of purpose or design.) That thought passed as I remembered I wanted to look up baking soda (sodium bicarbonate) to figure out chemically why it’s just so ubiquitously useful. I got distracted from that goal when I discovered that baking soda is actually an ingredient in some baking powder, which reminded me that in kindergarten our teacher used to add water to cornstarch and let us play with it. (This is more fun than it sounds because this mixture creates a non-Newtonian fluid. Try it.) Anyway, from there I learned that there is a medical condition where you compulsively eat cornstarch (amylophagia), which “can be an often-overlooked etiologic factor in gestational diabetes.”
Etiology, it turns out, is basically the opposite of teleology—it’s the study of causation or origin. Of course teleology would have a partner; I’d just never thought to look before.
Lessons: I may have ADD. I may be a nerd. Cornstarch is one of the more-fun food-related things.
August 24th, 2009 at 8:27 am
yeah! baking powder is baking soda with cornstarch and salts. it confuses me every time when i add baking powder and baking soda to mixes. somehow, it all works and someone figured it out before i even started to wonder.
August 30th, 2009 at 11:38 am
I like etiology. i find it fastinating and important…but i didn’t know that it’s opposite is teleology (i admittedly didn’t know what teteology is) now i know.
You may have ADHD…you ARE a nerd…cornstarch is fun (as is the mixture of water and corn starch…i remember doing that too!)