ecdysis

Pronounced: EK-duh-sis, noun

Notes: I’m pretty sure I have run across this word, but I could not recall the definition

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Yesterday’s word

The word meliorism means “the belief that the world can be made better and improved by concentrated effort and diligent work”

First usage

Our word came into English in the mid-1800s

Background / Comments

Our word came from the Latin word melior (better) with the ending -ism. The definition I quoted above is a more “friendly” definition; I have also seen “the doctrine that the world becomes better (or may be made better) by human effort”. One would probably write quite an essay on this topic. It is certainly true that we have amazing technology these days. Our mobile phones have more power than the computers they used to get to the moon. Ordering something is speedy; many things are delivered within a day or two. At the same time, people’s behavior seems to be worse, and there is much less freedom: listen to an older person describe the things they did; it almost sounds like another word. This is not a good place