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Grimm's law

(Encyclopedia)Grimm's law, principle of relationships in Indo-European languages, first formulated by Jakob Grimm in 1822 and a continuing subject of interest and investigation to 20th-century linguists. It shows t...

analog-to-digital conversion

(Encyclopedia)analog-to-digital or A/D conversion, the process of changing continuously varying data, such as voltage, current, or shaft rotation, into discrete digital quantities that represent the magnitude of th...

Kahneman, Daniel

(Encyclopedia)Kahneman, Daniel, 1934–, Israeli-American psychologist, b. Tel Aviv, Ph.D. Univ. of California, Berkeley, 1961. Born to Lithuanian parents, he spent his youth in France, and immigrated to what soon ...

Motley, John Lothrop

(Encyclopedia)Motley, John Lothrop, 1814–77, American historian and diplomat, b. Dorchester, Mass. Author of two novels concerning Thomas Morton (1839 and 1849), as well as a number of articles for the North Amer...

langue d'oc and langue d'oïl

(Encyclopedia)langue d'oc dôēlˈ [key], names of the two principal groups of medieval French dialects. Langue d'oc (literally, “language of yes”) was spoken south of a line running, roughly, from Bordeaux to ...

Le Brun, Charles

(Encyclopedia)Le Brun, Charles lə bröNˈ [key], 1619–90, French painter, decorator, and architect. He studied with Vouet and in Rome. Strongly influenced by Poussin, he returned in 1646 to Paris, where he grad...

Landis, Kenesaw Mountain

(Encyclopedia)Landis, Kenesaw Mountain kĕnˈəsôˌ [key], 1866–1944, American jurist and commissioner of baseball (1921–44), b. Millville, Butler co., Ohio, grad. Union College of Law (now Northwestern Univ. ...

Banerjee, Abhijit Vanayak

(Encyclopedia)Banerjee, Abhijit Vanayak, 1961–, Indian-American economist, b. Mumbai, Ph.D. Harvard, 1988. He taught economics at Princeton (1988–92) and Harvard (1992–93) before moving to the Massachusetts I...

Butler, Joseph

(Encyclopedia)Butler, Joseph, 1692–1752, English bishop and exponent of natural theology. Butler held a series of church offices, ending his career as bishop of Durham. His principle writings are Fifteen Sermons ...

bird of paradise

(Encyclopedia)bird of paradise, common name for any of 43 species of medium- to crow-sized passerine birds of New Guinea and the adjacent islands, known for the bright plumage, elongated tail feathers called wires,...