Specialization:

By Robert L. Birch & John R. Birch, 1988

As human knowledge grows (a presumption on my part), our tendency is to subdivide that knowledge in a fractal way, and discount the complex ways in which far flung topics might interact to produce fun, insight, or even understanding. My firefighter son mentioned that the blood he sometimes draws (extracts with a hollow needle) is mostly water and albumins. As a phlebotomist, he prepares the patient, removes the sample, prepares the sample according to the patients needs, (using reagents and equipment developed by other specialists), for transport to the laboratory. There, other technicians use processes (developed by other specialist), to produce results, which are evaluated by other specialists so the physician can advise the patient. This complexity of procedure pervades our lives, not just in medicine, and other health fields, but also in housing, food, utilities, transportation, education, religion, government, etc.

As a bibliographic librarian at the USDA, I was exposed to this aspect of modern life, but was only vaguely aware of it’s implications. As a wordsmith of many decades (decadence?), I invent and coin new words for fun. One is verbal outlier, a word that is unique, in that it has three consecutive triple letters, and I gave it a meaning, not realizing there could be a real application. My son pointed out to me that there are at least two fields of human endeavor, needing this word. There are commercial cooks who have invested remarkable time in developing their knowledge, understanding, and skills in handling egg whites, to produce edible delicacies. Not Very similarly, there are public health scientists who specialize in virology to produce vaccines (to protect our children), using eggs. There are also technicians working for them, who, with utmost care, inject the whites of those eggs with cultured virus strains. These folk are experts in albumen, the white goop of chicken eggs, and may now be known as ovalbumenologists, or preferably as chickadeeegggooologists. (Silly word processor.) Uhoh, we have three specialists, and only 2 words so far…