So should I have used the words philology and panegyric when speaking to my father, a factory worker with a seventh grade education who came to this country in 1924? He passed away in 1997. He always told me he didn't like school, and I think he would have thought me condescending if I had expected him to know the meanings of those words. Philology, however, was known to most college students-- even when I was a student at Hope during the 1970's.
I use the dictionary a lot too, but I will sometimes use it for scientific words such as the names of birds, plants, animals, and astronomical terms.
Since you are a creationist, who do you think created the beautiful song of the wood thrush? Was this bird somehow found in the garden of Eden at the time of Adam and Eve? Today it lives only in North America-- mainly in woods instead of the more suburban habitat of the robin, which it resembles in many ways. Did the robin and wood thrush evolve from one bird, or did God create them separately to live in their own habitats? You may have guessed that I am a birder.
Here is a link to a recording of a wood thrush's song:
Larry W.
