OLIGARCHY (from) Greek, oligos, few, little. Government by the few. Best performed by the PLUTOCRACY.

OMEN (from) Latin omen, a prognostic sign, (from) o-, to announce, to hold as true. The single syllable "o" was probably intoned as a beginning or an ending to any prayer to any God by many groups. The Indians used "om" and the native Americans used "ho" and "o-sta." Amen is used by many at the end of a statement or petition to express approval. I assume it was canted first by those other than the reciter of the petition, as it seems redundant for the petitioner to seek approval from himself. My dictionary gives omen an ill definition and amen a holy one, yet I believe they have common origins. Return to AMEN

ONOMATOPOEIA (from) Greek onoma, name + poiein, to make. Words that sound like the referent, as buzz and snap. I thought of another one, slug; for example, "He moves like a slug." It then occurred to me that we use slug in reference to certain types of violence, for example, "Fire another slug into that bastard, sheriff!" and "Did you see those two cops slugging it out to see who would shoot the bastard?"

ORGANIC (from) Latin organan, implement, ORGAN. Having properties associated with living organisms. An adjective that also applies to the Earth and Her heavens, since they both have properties associated with living organisms.

"...he saw society as an organic whole, with the health of one part vitally necessary to the health of all the others" -- Richard B. Sewall

"I am more convinced than ever that 'space' is the inside of some great organism and that our solar system is an atom on a molecule of hemoglobin carrying oxygen through an artery to the organism's brain. When we give up the oxygen to assist thought, we are encompassed within that thought, and hence, we call the event 'enlightenment.' I am immediately guilty of thinking too big, for if we are on an electron, then the entire universe as we know it is only a single-celled organism. Curiously enough, optical sciences have estimated the number of stars in large galaxies to be about a trillion, the number of cells in an adolescent human to be about a trillion, the number of galaxies in the universe to be about a trillion, and I offer that the number of souls in the local heavens to top out at about a trillion. Incidentally, humans are the thinking organ of Earth, the noosphere, which is our involvement with the organism within which we live." -- Roger Henry

ORGANIZE (from) Latin organum, instrument, ORGAN. To develop or assume an organic structure.

"The industrial organization... it controls us all because we are all in it. It creates the conditions of our existence..." -- William Sumner

ORIENT (from) Latin oriens, east, where the sun rises. The countries of Asia. For example, "In Western education, students go first to orientation in order to be pointed in the right direction, and if they get a real education it is occidental."

ORIGINAL SIN (from) The Church. Deprivation from Grace. If you believe that we are created in the image of a god, and yet believe that we were born dirty and sinful out of the same god, isn't that some kind of admission of the fallibility of the god? Belief in original sin and belief in creation in the image of god are mutually devasting. Choose Grace for its own sake. Return to Karma.

OXYMORON (from) Greek oxy, sharp, + moros, foolish. A satirical twist created by the conjunction of incongruous or contradictory terms, the best example of which is "military intelligence."