A Speccie reader in Canberra (what has he done to deserve capital punishment?) asks the origin of the latest label applied to our Prime Minister: ‘beta male’. It comes from the Greek alphabet—‘alpha’ being the first letter and ‘beta’ the second. ‘Alpha male’was coined by zoologists in 1938 to describe herd behaviour. It captures the notion that in any group there is a dominant male leader. The new expression is yet to appear in the main lexicons although the Collins Dictionary includes it in a tentative list of possible new entries with the definition: ‘a submissive, feeble-minded and weak man’. (So not something to include on a birthday card to the PM.) The Collins people can’t find a citation before 2022 but I’ve tracked down a reference in an Aussie newspaper in 2002 – so perhaps this is yet another Aussie contribution to the English language.

The ARC Conference in London put a new expression into our language: ‘civilisational moment’. The idea is that we are facing a tipping point between civilisation and savagery, not just in the war in the Middle East but in our streets and suburbs. When the balance tips from civilisation to savagery it happens in a moment. The word ‘civilisation’ means ‘human cultural, social, and intellectual development’ and for well over a thousand years Western civilisation has been based on the Judeo-Christian world view. This is being turned on its head by the raging savagery seeking to replace it. Everything that was good is called bad, and vice versa. The Judeo-Christian worldview said two things. First, we live in a two-storey universe and beyond the material world that we can see is the spiritual realm which is the source of life and the moral compass that should guide us and to which we are answerable. Second, that life is about others, not just about us. Both of these are now rejected, and we are told it is morally good for Hamas to kidnap a nine-month-old baby and hold him hostage because he is a ‘Jewish coloniser’ and should be punished. That’s savagery and unless we speak up, the ‘moment’ will come when we will be plunged into a new dark age.

‘Dog days’ is an almost forgotten expression that refers to the ‘hottest days of summer’. It was first recorded in English way back in 1538. The Oxford says it was associated, in ancient times, with the ‘helical rising’ of the Dog Star, Sirius. In Greek mythology Sirius is the hunter Orion’s dog. The ‘helical rising’ of a star occurs when it first becomes visible above the eastern horizon at dawn just before sunrise. The whole idea of the hottest weather of the year being the ‘dog days’ of summer goes back to the ancient world. English borrowed the phrase from the post-classical Latin caniculares dies (dog days), which was borrowed from Hellenistic Greek. Originally, the idea was that when it was blisteringly hot in Mediterranean countries in the middle of summer everyone became enervated – and life was marked by stagnation and inactivity. From this the notion grew bigger until ‘dog days’ meant evil times, when things were inclined to go wrong. This was coined (of course) in the northern hemisphere, so the ‘dog days’ were assumed to be from around July 7 to September 5. In current calendars, the Oxford says, ‘they are often said to begin on 3 July and end on 11 August’. So, when would that be in the southern hemisphere? Perhaps from early January until the end of the month. The extended meaning of ‘dog days’ is of unhealthy and evil times in the life of a nation. When politicians lose our trust, the economy is struggling, and life becomes difficult for ordinary citizens it is possible to say these are the ‘dog days’ of a nation.

Happy New Year!