the.com/stimulus
the poke that makes biology twitch, economies lurch, and dogs drool on cue.
means A thing or event that prompts a reaction in a body, a mind, an economy, or any system primed to respond.
from Straight from Latin stimulus, a 'goad' or 'prick' — the pointed stick farmers jabbed into oxen to make them move. Romans also used it figuratively for anything that spurred you on, and that double life stuck: from a literal poke in the flank to the abstract jolt that gets a reflex, a market, or a salivating dog going. Likely related to the same root that gives us 'stick' and 'stigma,' all clustered around the idea of a sharp point.
- pavlov's bells
- Dogs salivated at sounds, founding behaviorism on dinner anticipation
- plural confusion
- Stimuli is plural; people forget it constantly
- economic jolt
- Governments spend trillions to shock spending back alive
- threshold rule
- Too weak and neurons simply ignore the signal
- reflex bypass
- Some stimuli trigger movement before the brain knows
japan's lost decade stimulus — massive government spending programs from 1990s-2000s failed to revive japanese economy
covid-19 cares act — $2.2 trillion us stimulus package signed march 2020 with direct payments to citizens