the.com/principle
The thing you swear by until it costs you something inconvenient.
means A fundamental rule, belief, or truth that guides how something works or how a person decides to behave.
from From Latin principium, meaning 'a beginning' or 'foundation,' built on princeps, 'first' or 'chief' (literally the one who takes first place — primus, 'first,' plus capere, 'to take'). It reached English via Old French principe, carrying the sense of a starting point from which everything else follows. Note the family resemblance to 'prince' and 'principal,' all sprung from that same idea of being first.
- latin root
- From principium, meaning first or beginning.
- vs principal
- One's a rule, one signs your paycheck.
- physics
- Pauli's exclusion keeps your atoms from collapsing.
- famous line
- Groucho offered to swap his if you disliked them.
- the cost
- A principle untested is just an opinion.
archimedes principle — buoyancy law: object displaces fluid weight equal to its own weight, discovered ~250 bce
uncertainty principle — heisenberg 1927: cannot simultaneously know particle position and momentum with precision
peter principle — laurence peter 1969: employees promoted until reaching incompetence level