"Neutronyms" for words referring to the past or future
October 3, 2019 8:30 PM Subscribe
I recently needed a word that is like "retrospect" but for the present instead of the past.
Antonyms like "forethought" and "prospect" are easy to find, but what about the English word meaning a recognition of a present event? I realize the word "recognition" implies seeing a past event, so I am not sure I even have the vocabulary to describe what I am looking for. Like the continuous perception of a thing happening that has some meaning?
Antonyms like "forethought" and "prospect" are easy to find, but what about the English word meaning a recognition of a present event? I realize the word "recognition" implies seeing a past event, so I am not sure I even have the vocabulary to describe what I am looking for. Like the continuous perception of a thing happening that has some meaning?
inspect, introspect
posted by supercres at 8:45 PM on October 3, 2019 [2 favorites]
posted by supercres at 8:45 PM on October 3, 2019 [2 favorites]
savvy
lucid
understanding
apprehensive
percipient
observant
aware
conscious
clear-eyed
perspicacious
woke
posted by Rhaomi at 8:50 PM on October 3, 2019
lucid
understanding
apprehensive
percipient
observant
aware
conscious
clear-eyed
perspicacious
woke
posted by Rhaomi at 8:50 PM on October 3, 2019
Awareness.
posted by pompomtom at 8:57 PM on October 3, 2019 [3 favorites]
posted by pompomtom at 8:57 PM on October 3, 2019 [3 favorites]
Best answer: cognizant
adj. Fully informed; conscious. synonym: aware.
posted by katra at 9:21 PM on October 3, 2019 [12 favorites]
adj. Fully informed; conscious. synonym: aware.
posted by katra at 9:21 PM on October 3, 2019 [12 favorites]
Observing
Noticing
Pondering
Analysing
Recognising
(I’ve put them all in gerund form because that makes the most sense to me for the present tense action, but most of them could be modified and still work.)
posted by iamkimiam at 9:22 PM on October 3, 2019
Noticing
Pondering
Analysing
Recognising
(I’ve put them all in gerund form because that makes the most sense to me for the present tense action, but most of them could be modified and still work.)
posted by iamkimiam at 9:22 PM on October 3, 2019
cognizance
noun. awareness, realization, or knowledge; notice; perception
posted by katra at 9:48 PM on October 3, 2019 [5 favorites]
noun. awareness, realization, or knowledge; notice; perception
posted by katra at 9:48 PM on October 3, 2019 [5 favorites]
A survey?
posted by bq at 10:13 PM on October 3, 2019 [1 favorite]
posted by bq at 10:13 PM on October 3, 2019 [1 favorite]
I'm not 100% clear what you're looking for. Could you give a sentence with a blank where the word would go? Something like, "Antonia _________ Christmas, even though she never went to church."
posted by amtho at 1:52 AM on October 4, 2019 [2 favorites]
posted by amtho at 1:52 AM on October 4, 2019 [2 favorites]
I'm not sure whether you're looking for a noun, verb, or adverb, for example. Or whether a person would be experiencing the thing passively or causing it.
posted by amtho at 1:53 AM on October 4, 2019
posted by amtho at 1:53 AM on October 4, 2019
Respect - “In retrospect, x was a challenge,” “The prospect of doing x is daunting,” “With respect to x, I know it’s challenging.”
Synonyms like “the thought of” or “in consideration of” might sound better depending on the context.
posted by alusru at 4:52 AM on October 4, 2019
Synonyms like “the thought of” or “in consideration of” might sound better depending on the context.
posted by alusru at 4:52 AM on October 4, 2019
Best answer: This is pretty much the definition of mindfulness, though I suspect that’s not what you’re looking for, hah.
posted by brook horse at 5:17 AM on October 4, 2019 [3 favorites]
posted by brook horse at 5:17 AM on October 4, 2019 [3 favorites]
...exquisitely sensitive to cultural currents, as though in a perpetual state of contextual vigilance. See also: Cayce Pollard.
posted by MonkeyToes at 6:20 AM on October 4, 2019
posted by MonkeyToes at 6:20 AM on October 4, 2019
Assorted forms of "attention"?
posted by flabdablet at 7:18 AM on October 4, 2019
posted by flabdablet at 7:18 AM on October 4, 2019
Best answer: I read This Republic of Suffering this week, and in it Drew Gilpin Faust talks about the use of the word "realize" in the American Civil War era in a way that I think might be some of what you're going for: "For many bereaved, even assimilating the fact of a loved one's death was difficult. Civil War letter and diary writers confronting news of loss repeatedly proclaimed their inability to 'realize' a death--using the word with now antiquated precision to mean to render it real in their own minds." It's closest to definition 1b here.
posted by jocelmeow at 7:46 AM on October 4, 2019
posted by jocelmeow at 7:46 AM on October 4, 2019
Freakonomics used the word "pre-mortem" to describe thinking about things that could go wrong in the future.
posted by Ms. Moonlight at 7:47 AM on October 4, 2019
posted by Ms. Moonlight at 7:47 AM on October 4, 2019
I feel like kairos is what you are trying to capture here. From the Greek, but it's used in English as a rhetorical term.
posted by nakedmolerats at 8:47 AM on October 4, 2019
posted by nakedmolerats at 8:47 AM on October 4, 2019
Clocked (as in “I clocked that he never looked me in the eye during the interview.”)
Grokked (as in “I grokked that the boat’s cavitation at 3000 rpms meant that I’d never get it up on plane.)
Registered
Intuited
Inferred
posted by carmicha at 9:59 AM on October 4, 2019
Grokked (as in “I grokked that the boat’s cavitation at 3000 rpms meant that I’d never get it up on plane.)
Registered
Intuited
Inferred
posted by carmicha at 9:59 AM on October 4, 2019
Best answer: In retrospect, this was a terrible thing.
On consideration, this is a terrible thing.
With forethought, this will be a terrible thing.
posted by puffyn at 11:54 AM on October 4, 2019 [1 favorite]
On consideration, this is a terrible thing.
With forethought, this will be a terrible thing.
posted by puffyn at 11:54 AM on October 4, 2019 [1 favorite]
In forethought, they expected it to be like this.
In the moment, they thought of it like that.
In retrospect, they realized it was like some other thing.
I don't have a good one-word drop-in replacement for "in the moment," but there are plenty of concepts that, for no apparent reason, require two or three words, and that's okay.
posted by nebulawindphone at 4:12 PM on October 4, 2019
In the moment, they thought of it like that.
In retrospect, they realized it was like some other thing.
I don't have a good one-word drop-in replacement for "in the moment," but there are plenty of concepts that, for no apparent reason, require two or three words, and that's okay.
posted by nebulawindphone at 4:12 PM on October 4, 2019
This makes me think of the concept of anticipatory nostalgia, or the Japanese concept of mono no aware, but that may not at all be what you have in mind.
posted by pinochiette at 6:58 PM on October 4, 2019
posted by pinochiette at 6:58 PM on October 4, 2019
Response by poster: I'm not 100% clear what you're looking for. Could you give a sentence with a blank where the word would go? Something like, "Antonia _________ Christmas, even though she never went to church."
posted by amtho at 3:52 on October 4
I am not 100% clear what I am looking for either! I do not know how to fill in your blank. I am not sure there is a good answer to my question, but I have loved so many of these attempts to answer what I increasingly believe to be an unanswerable question.
It was interesting to me because it challenges our common notion of time. Unfortunately, because a particular instant of time is instantaneous, it causes a hardship in anyone trying to describe it in the present tense without reference to the past or future.
posted by jjray at 8:41 PM on October 4, 2019 [1 favorite]
posted by amtho at 3:52 on October 4
I am not 100% clear what I am looking for either! I do not know how to fill in your blank. I am not sure there is a good answer to my question, but I have loved so many of these attempts to answer what I increasingly believe to be an unanswerable question.
It was interesting to me because it challenges our common notion of time. Unfortunately, because a particular instant of time is instantaneous, it causes a hardship in anyone trying to describe it in the present tense without reference to the past or future.
posted by jjray at 8:41 PM on October 4, 2019 [1 favorite]
Best answer: a hardship in anyone trying to describe it in the present tense without reference to the past or future
It's at least arguable that any attempt to describe the present must be at least fractionally out of date, simply because words both refer to things and require time to assemble. The only way to get around this would be to begin constructing a description before that which is described has come into being, at which point the only way you'd actually be describing the present (as opposed to making a short-range prediction about what would necessarily be the future during the formulation of the description) would require that you had genuine certainty that the prediction would in fact be accurate.
There are some handy words that can indeed be used to construct such 100% accurate predictions, by virtue of having vague and/or context-dependent referents; there's a rather Heisenberg-like relationship between specificity and accuracy. My favourite description of the present, guaranteed 100% accurate in all circumstances, is "This is."
posted by flabdablet at 9:37 PM on October 4, 2019
It's at least arguable that any attempt to describe the present must be at least fractionally out of date, simply because words both refer to things and require time to assemble. The only way to get around this would be to begin constructing a description before that which is described has come into being, at which point the only way you'd actually be describing the present (as opposed to making a short-range prediction about what would necessarily be the future during the formulation of the description) would require that you had genuine certainty that the prediction would in fact be accurate.
There are some handy words that can indeed be used to construct such 100% accurate predictions, by virtue of having vague and/or context-dependent referents; there's a rather Heisenberg-like relationship between specificity and accuracy. My favourite description of the present, guaranteed 100% accurate in all circumstances, is "This is."
posted by flabdablet at 9:37 PM on October 4, 2019
Best answer: Does "insight" work? Hindsight/insight/foresight?
posted by sagc at 9:55 PM on October 4, 2019 [1 favorite]
posted by sagc at 9:55 PM on October 4, 2019 [1 favorite]
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Definition of circumspect
: careful to consider all circumstances and possible consequences
posted by bleep at 8:42 PM on October 3, 2019