See the complete Devil’s Dictionary of Scientific Words and Phrases here.
all entries in the Devil’s dictionary are copyright 2017 by Russ Hodge.
abductor pollicis (from the Latin) a person who goes around stealing thumbs. Not to be confused with abductor policies, which are contracts issued by health insurance companies to pay the legal fees of anyone who has been accused of organ theft.
accessoire a technical term for anything that must be removed from the body before undergoing an examination with a magnetic resonance imaging machine. The term has been extended to refer to anything superfluous on the machine itself or anything around the lab that you want to get rid of, which is accomplished by turning on the magnet so that it will be sucked in and transported to an alternate universe.
biota a pair of iotas (also known as smidgens) that have become fused together and pledge from that point on to pursue a strictly monogamous relationship. Biota can be dissolved by antibiotics, but only when prescribed by someone with dual degrees in medicine and theology.
basement membrane a layer of fat molecules which anchors cells to a surface in hopes that they will not fly off during a tornado. If they can’t maintain a grip, they are advised to crawl under cars or heavy organs.
blepheronous any regrettable event involving eyelids.
catheterization the penetration of a cheek, the soft palette, tonsils or throat by a drinking straw which was in a soft drink until the automobile accident, which was caused by a driver texting on a cell phone. At the moment the straw penetrates living tissue it becomes a catheter. In medicine the term has generalized and is now widely applied to any hollow tube inserted by force into a place in the body, either intentionally or by accident, that causes pain and an inappropriate release of fluids that belong there, or an introduction of fluids that do not. In medical practice cell phones often play some role in catheterization as well, but their involvement is not a defining criterion.
disblepheronia a major disease diagnosed in anywhere from 14 to 1 billion people per year, whose mechanisms are poorly understood and for which there is an urgent need for the development of novel, rational, effective, global, inexpensive therapies, which hopefully don’t cause more trouble than the problem they aim to solve. A person suffering from disblepheronia loses the coordination between the blinking of the eyelids, which is often interpreted as winking in inappropriate and offensive situations.
first in a list, the word used to introduce the item that lies between zeroth and secondly. If at a later point in time the author discovers that an item which belongs higher on the list has been omitted, the use of negative numbers is permitted: negative secondly, negative first, negative 0.5, etc.
flavonoid secret substances invented by chemists in laboratories of the Ronald McDonald Corporation that render people addicted to fast food and trigger the onset of diabetes, or simply inflate them to the point that the only vehicle they will fit into is a Humvee, which they purchase as a means of traveling to the next fast food restaurant. Flavonoids have made hamburger joints major contributors to global warming: on one end through the vast quantities of methane produced by cows, and on the other through the fossil fuels used to transport addicts to their next fix.
founder effect also known as the confounder effect. The behavior of the parent, creator or inventor of something (such as a child, a machine or an institute) who continues to meddle with it long after he or she has supposedly left it in the hands of successors. Should not be confused with flounder effect, which refers to schools of fish that have lost their way and just swim aimlessly around until one of them finds the exit. There is, however, a connection: founders often intervene in the activities of their creations after developing the impression that they are floundering.
gap junction a sort of trailer hitch device on the exterior of cells which evolved to permit them to tow around recalcitrant neighbors. If the cell tries to tow a heavy partner and is unable to achieve the force and traction necessary to move it, then the rules of physics apply and the gap junction has an anchoring function. Gap junctions played a crucial role in the development of multicellular organisms because at some point a tissue achieves the critical mass that makes it inert, and it can no longer be dragged from the sofa.
gel a product used to cultivate bacteria in a person’s hair, designed so that they can carry their work with them and don’t have to go to the lab on weekends
glossalgia a thick formation of algae on the tongue, usually transferred there by a finger which has been licked to turn the pages of a moldy lexicon.
Magnetic resonance imaging a tool widely used in medical diagnosis to detect whether you have swallowed something made of metal, or have a metal implant, or are holding up your pants with safety pins, or if the government has implanted a microchip in your brain, or if you are trying to smuggle a cell phone into a hospital by hiding it under your gown. The instrument is also useful for completely erasing the hard disks of computers when, for example, you wish to retract an email that you sent to colleagues without due reflection.
metacarpal having to do with abstract, highly theoretical reflections on the nature of carp or the role of this fish in an ecosystem or the universe as a whole.
mucin a glibberous substance produced by snails which enter the body, generally during the night, and leave trails in the lining of the nose and across other surfaces of bodily membranes. Mucin has antibacterial properties because microorganisms find it equally disgusting.
multigene family a group of individuals related by heredity who have had so many children they are too tired to think up new names and simply end up calling everyone “Gene”. Sometimes seen in the forms multieugene or multieugenia.
multiplexing a psychological trauma which occurs when visitors to a Cineplex are (usually inadvertently) shown multiple 3D films at the same time. This causes collisions of plots in which, for example, space ships buzz around the heads of cartoon characters until they are dismembered by chain-saw wielding psychopaths, and then the fragments are served to visitors in a diner at night, in a submarine, just before the ship is consumed by mutant zombie macrophages from Mars.
myalgia a chronic condition in which something that happened millions of years ago (mya) continues to cause pain, generally in the muscles. Myalgia is commonly found among paleontologists who try to lift dinosaur bones after forgetting that they have become mineralized and weigh more than you’d think.
ooopossum the oocyte of an opossum
polycarpic any process in which several carp, a species of fish, engage in a mutual activity, such as feasting on toes that have been inserted into the water by people sitting on the bank of a river or lake.
rhinoviruses viruses whose natural hosts are rhinoceroses, typically migrating to the highest point of the horn, where they cluster and wait for someone to grind it into powder. When eaten, this powder causes an infection and fever that are sometimes mistaken for a temporary increase in sexual potency.
smudge a subpopulation of a microbiome that is deposited on a surface such as glass, usually by a finger or nose, where it forms an oily colony that is visible to the naked eye.
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