[projectaon] Re: 25totw errata
- From: Timothy Pederick <pederick@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: projectaon@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Thu, 28 Apr 2011 13:50:22 +0800
On 27 April 2011 21:10, Jonathan Blake <blake.jon@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> My understanding of "endemic" - and the one that I generally find in
> the dictionaries ;) - is not that something is just prevalent in an
> area but restricted to the area. So for example the Mt. Charleston
> Blue butterfly is endemic to the Spring Mountains near where I live,
> living nowhere else in the world.
>
Both are correct, at least in my idiom. I believe that living creatures are
more likely to be endemic-native ("this butterfly is endemic to the Spring
Mountains"), whereas problems are more likely to be endemic-pervasive
("corruption is endemic in this government"). "Endemic in" and "endemic to"
also bear notice as possible phrasal hints to the intended meaning...
(Diseases, being problems that are often caused by living organisms, could
quite possibly be either: sleeping sickness is endemic in/to sub-Saharan
Africa, and chicken pox is endemic in the population of Australia. Either
can become epidemic when its rate of occurrence or spread rises suddenly.)
</languagegeekery>
--
Tim Pederick
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