Kate Fulton
Definition: The word fidimplicitary means to put one’s faith in the word of another, without examining the facts oneself.
Pronunciation: Fid-im-pliss-it-airy
Origin:
Fidimplicitary was created by Sir Thomas Urquhart in 1652 in his work, Logopandecteision within its first book, the Neaudethaumata. He constructed it from the Latin words fides (faith) and implicita (implicit). The original use was to refer to professors who accepted the findings of their predecessors without question or investigation of their own, building upon findings that may not have a stable basis.
Why this word?
This word appeals to me because of the way I see it reflected in the culture of unquestioning belief that surrounds many of the news organizations. It is not uncommon to encounter people who cannot support their beliefs with any hard facts but the mere statement that they heard it from X news station. While to me the behavior is akin to that of sheep blindly following the pack, this word seems to accurately depict this unfortunate tendency.
How to use the word fidimplicitary?
“The fidimplicitary beliefs of the masses led to a culture devoid of questions or accountability, as spin became a greater master than truth.”
Here is the original usage of fidimplicitary:
“61. That I should hit upon the invention of that, for the furtherance of Philosophy, and other Disciplines and Arts, which never hitherto hath been so much as thought upon by any; and that in a matter of so great extent, as the expressing of all the things in the world, both in themselves, actions, ways of doing, situation, pendicles, relations, connexions, pathetick interpositions, and all other appurtenances to a perfect elocution, without beholding to any Language in the world insomuch as one word, will hardly be believed by our fidimplicitary Gown-men, who, satisfied with their predecessors contrivances, and taking all things literally, without examination, blaterate, to the nauseating even of vulgar ears, those exotick Proverbs, There is no new thing under the Sun, Nihil dictum quod non dictum prius, and Beware of Philosophers, authorizating this on Paul, the first on Solomon, and the other on Terence.”
