I know the dictionary says:
«the point on the earth’s surface vertically above the focus of an earthquake«
But there are other usages too. To me it seems that it is sometimes used to replace the word center, but egen exactly is it used. Does it have a specific meaning?
I think it’s basically used for a geographical location to show the center (for lack of a better word) from where things spread. Epicenter of an earthquake, epicenter of a disease outbreak etc.
Its expanded use as a synonym for center is probably related to the widely held belief that more syllables are better than fewer syllables.
Don’t you mean that polysesquipedsyllabic words are better?
“Epi” it still a preposition, though, so it cannot be completely synonymous with “center”. People refer to “the centre of the Earth”, not the “epicenter of the Earth”.
“Epicenter” is a technical term that people hear in reference to a geographic location related to large and disastrous events - earthquakes. It’s natural that it gets applied in a non-technical sense to refer to geographic locations related to other large and disastrous events like epidemics, etc.
Have you seen those clothes. What a disaster!
“In” is a preposition, and “flammable” and “inflammable” mean the same thing.
Not sure you meant preposition rather than prefix, so I’ll add “ravel” and “Unravel” mean the same thing. As do “loose” and “unloose” and “thaw” and “unthaw”.
You’re right; we should say it is a prefix derived from a preposition. Not eo ipso, but nevertheless, “epicenter” is not just another word for “center”. I agree with Andy L’s analysis.
ETA nor does “demic” equal “epidemic”…
The center of the earthquake is usually deep in the earth. The general population generally doesn’t travel miles below the earth, we’re much more interested in where the effects peaked on the surface of the earth. In other words, the epicenter - “above center”. AKA “surface zero”.
Compare with nuclear weapons, which we normally expect to burst in the air. The physical aerial center of such a burst is meaningless to humans, but we are very concerned about the area directly below the event - the hypocenter, or “below center”. AKA “ground zero”.
So that’s what ‘epicenter’ and ‘hypocenter’ are all about.
As an aside for nuclear weapons, “ground zero” is not necessarily very close to the blast, if the blast was at very high altitudes. There have been tests where scientists were standing right at ground zero to make measurements.
I think “epi” something means “on top of” something. An epicenter for an earthquake is the point on the surface of the earth that is on top of the location the earthquake happens down inside the earth.
What others have said. Technicall, the epicentre is the point on a plane nearest to a given point that is off the plain. The word (in this sense) dates only from about 1880.
But it pretty soon developed a looser, secondary sense: a centre of activity, energy, or disturbance. This is recorded as early as 1908.
Flammable was a word invented to resolve the confusion by those who misunderstood the word to mean its opposite. Non-inflammable is also rather clumsy for such an important distinction, so “flammable” and “non-flammable” were coined.
We need not “think” about these things. There is an actual formal meaning for “epi-”, and it’s this:
Epidermis is the outermost layer of skin. Epitaxial growth is the deposition of new crystalline material on an existing layer. Epistaxis is a nosebleed (meaning basically “to drip from above”).
Since the word was coined by seismologists, the “vertical point on surface above the actual earthquake focus” is the proper meaning.
Using “epicentre” when you mean “centre” is just dumb. The same flavour of dumb that says “utilize” when “use” is right there.
Only two? The old Greek-English dictionary gives well over a dozenpi/2) meanings.
Not always. Some people metaphorically use ‘seismic’ to mean ‘major’ or ‘significant’ for things that aren’t literally earthquakes. Substituting ‘epicenter’ for ‘center’ can be a similar thing.
But to be clear, ‘epicenter’ only has one literal meaning, and it’s the point on the earth’s surface above the center of some subsurface event, which is always (I think always) an earthquake.
Because it is used to describe earthquakes, “epicenter” to me has a connotation of something dynamic happening, with its effects emanating outwards from that point and affecting surrounding areas. “Center” is just an indicator of a central point, which could be inactive, inert or static.