New Software Helps Leverage the Paradigm

[James A. Landau]

In a message dated 6/18/03 2:54:37 PM Eastern Daylight Time,
rkmck at EARTHLINK.NET writes:

> However, I think synergy, paradigm, bandwidth, touch base - and even
>  leverage, are real words meaning real things.

Without using a dictionary:

synergy---two things work so well together that they are able to accomplish
more than if each was done separately.

paradigm---linguists should be familiar with the paradigm of a noun

bandwidth---a technical term from electrical engineering, referring to the
range of frequencies that a channel can carry.  In the US a telephone can handle
a frequency range from 30 hertz to 3,000 hertz (which is why telephones sound
so flat---they truncate all the higher harmonics), and hence is said to have
a bandwidth of slightly less than 3,000 "baud".  Used incorrectly by computer
people (but the usage is hopelessly cast in concrete) to mean "bits per
second".

touch base---originally from baseball, of course.  A standard colloquialism
for "get in touch with someone to give/receive the latest information".  I
don't know of any other meaning.

leverage---in the stock market, you are permitted to borrow 50% of the price
of the stock you buy.  Hence if you put up $500 of your own money you can
borrow enough ("buying on margin" it's called) to buy $1,000 of stock.  Hence your
$500 has "leveraged" itself into $1,000 of purchasing power.  Think of
Archimedes's lever with a two-to-one advantage.  "Leveraged" is used in finance to
mean a deal in which you put up only part of the money and borrow or otherwise
pledge the rest to close the deal.
    I suppose you could say, when you get a mortgage to buy a house, that you
have perpetrated a "leveraged deal" but generally only businessmen use the
term.  The related term "on margin" is used only in the stock market and
commodities market.

At one time or another I have used all five of these terms in conversation,
with their original meanings.

        - James A. Landau
          systems engineer
          FAA Technical Center (ACB-510/BCI)
          Atlantic City Int'l Airport NJ 08405 USA