Percipient

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Dr. Goodword
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Percipient

Postby Dr. Goodword » Mon Jul 18, 2022 8:15 pm

• percipient •


Pronunciation: pêr-sip-i-ênt • Hear it!

Part of Speech: Adjective

Meaning: Able to perceive, perceptive, discerning (keenly).

Notes: Since all humans can perceive, when referring to people this word usually means "keenly perceptive, more perceptive than most". In philosophy and parapsychology this word may be used as a noun meaning "someone or something that perceives" and "someone who perceives things outside the normal range", respectively. We may use either percipience or percipiency as a noun referring to the percipient quality.

In Play: Percipient is simply a more exotic word for perceptive: "Seamus Allgood is a percipient standup comedian, a master of interacting with his audience." As a noun, this word refers to someone who claims to be able to perceive beyond the realms of perceptions of other mortals: "The percipient picked the correct card his partner had shown the audience but not him and put back into the deck two out of five times."

Word History: Today's Good Word came from the same source as perceive. Perceive was taken from Old French perceivre "to perceive, see, notice", inherited from Latin percipere "to seize entirely, take wholly, occupy; to see, perceive". The present participle of percipere is percipien(t)s, the source of today's word. This verb consists of per- "through, thorough" + cip-, the combining form of capere "to grab, take". Capere was made from PIE kap- "to grasp, grab", source also of Sanskrit kapati "two handfuls", Greek kaptein "to gulp down", and Latin capax "capacious". We also see evidence of kap- in Welsh caeth "captive", Albanian kap "grab, catch", English have and German haben "to have". (Now a word of thanks to wordmaster William Hupy, a most percipient collector of exciting Good Words like today's.)
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David Myer
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Re: Percipient

Postby David Myer » Tue Jul 19, 2022 7:31 pm

I think I shall continue to use the word perspicacious when looking for a more pompous word than perceptive, although it is about seeing clearly, rather than grasping. But if you get my point, it doesn't make any difference whether you have grabbed it or seen it; you've got it.

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Slava
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Re: Percipient

Postby Slava » Sat Dec 30, 2023 12:18 pm

I see that in legalese this word has a role; percipient witness. Not an eyewitness, nor expert witness, but percipient. I took a few shots at wiggling out just what this means, but didn't quite get there. Does anyone out there speak lawyer?
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