Sadly, the story was a casualty in a causality of ignorance. A most sad word confusion, as it was caused by hubris.
Casualty is a noun that warns you of bad things having happened. It could be an accident, illness, or war in which the person is injured or killed.
Causality is also a noun that immediately indicates cause and effect, leading to or believed to lead to, certain outcomes.
Word Confusions . . .
. . . started as my way of dealing with a professional frustration with properly spelled words that were out of context in manuscripts I was editing as well as books I was reviewing. It evolved into a sharing of information with y’all. I’m hoping you’ll share with us words that have been a bête noire for you from either end.
If you found this post on “Casualty versus Causality” interesting, consider subscribing to KD Did It, if you’d like to track this post for future updates.
| Casualty | Causality |
|---|---|
Casualty Evacuation Training by US Army Europe is under the Public Domain Mark 1.0 license, via Flickr. |
Causality and the Domino by Peggy Marco is in the public domain, via Pixabay. |
| Part of Grammar: | |
| Noun
Plural: casualties |
Noun
Plural: causalities |
A person killed or injured in a war or accident through death, wounds, injury, sickness, internment, capture, or through being missing in action
[Archaic] Chance, fortune |
The relationship between cause and effect or between regularly correlated events or phenomena
The principle that everything has a cause, a.k.a. the principle that nothing can happen without being caused A causal agency, force, or quality |
| Examples: | |
| The shelling caused thousands of civilian casualties.
The army sustained heavy casualties. The ex-senator was a casualty of the last election. The building industry has been one of the casualties of the recession. The Insurers acquire all the Policyholder’s rights in respect of the casualty which caused the loss. “IRC Section 165 specifically permits a casualty loss deduction for fire, storm, shipwreck, or ‘other casualty'” (Byrnes). “Men endure the losses that befall them by mere casualty with more patience than the damages they sustain by injustice.” — Sir Walter Raleigh |
“It establishes the concept of causality — the relationship between cause and effect that all human knowledge depends on” (Cart).
“But as wonky as the concept of now becomes in relativity, some things — like causality — are preserved” (Sutter). “This theory relies less on causality and more on the idea that everything is simply predetermined” (George). “To counter misinterpretation of its data, the VAERS website prominently notes the reports do not imply causality and that any event could have happened by coincidence” (Wadman). |
| Derivatives: | |
| Adjective: causal Adverb: causally |
|
| History of the Word: | |
| Late Middle English in the sense chance, a chance occurrence, from the medieval Latin casualitas, from the Latin casualis, from casus meaning fall, casual, on the pattern of words such as penalty. | Late 15th century, from the French causalité or the medieval Latin causalitas, from the Latin causa meaning cause. |
C’mon, get it out of your system, bitch, whine, moan . . . which words are your pet peeves? Also, please note that I try to be as accurate as I can, but mistakes happen or I miss something. Email me if you find errors, so I can fix them . . . and we’ll all benefit!
Satisfy your curiosity about other Word Confusions on its homepage or more generally explore the index of self-editing posts. You may also want to explore Book Layout & Formatting Ideas, Formatting Tips, Grammar Explanations, Linguistics, Publishing Tips, the Properly Punctuated, Writing Ideas and Resources, and Working Your Website.
Resources for Casualty versus Causality
Apple Dictionary.com
Byrnes, William H. and Robert Bloink.”Deducting Casualty Losses After a Natural Disaster.” Property Casualty360. 24 Sept 2019. Accessed 21 Aug 2023. <https://www.propertycasualty360.com/2019/09/24/deducting-casualty-losses-after-a-natural-disaster/?slreturn=20230721234537>.
“The Cart Before the Horse: A new model of cause and effect.” ScienceDaily. 28 Sept 2018. Accessed 21 Aug 2023. <https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2018/09/180928131340.htm>.
The Free Dictionary: causality
George, Stephen C. “What Is the Grandfather Paradox of Time Travel?” Discover Magazine. 27 Mar 2023. Accessed 21 Aug 2023. <https://www.discovermagazine.com/the-sciences/what-is-the-grandfather-paradox-of-time-travel#>.
Merriam-Webster: casualty, causality
Sutter, Paul M. “What Did Einstein’s Theories Say About the Illusion of Time?” Discover Magazine. 7 July 2023. Accessed 21 Aug 2023. <https://www.discovermagazine.com/the-sciences/what-did-einsteins-theories-say-about-the-illusion-of-time#>.
Wadman, Meredith. “Antivaccine Activists Use a Government Database on Side Effects to Scare the Public.” Health. Science. 26 May 2021. Accessed 21 Aug 2023. <https://www.science.org/content/article/antivaccine-activists-use-government-database-side-effects-scare-public>.
Pinterest Photo Credits
International Champions Cup at Friends Arena, 10 August 2019, by Greger Ravik is under the CC BY 2.0 license, via Wikimedia Commons.
