Wordsmith.org
Posted By: fg2g Please help. - 11/14/06 02:30 PM
Is there a word which means to have known the meaning of a word but to have forgotten it?
Posted By: ParkinT Re: Please help. - 11/14/06 02:53 PM
Yes.
Old Age .
I have been stricken with this disorder. The ratio of things-I-have-forgotten to things-I-know seems to be shifting balance.

"There are two sure signs of old age,
First, you start to forget things
Secondly, ...I can't remember the second one"
Posted By: fg2g Re: Please help. - 11/14/06 03:01 PM
I appreciate the sentiment but I'm only thirty two.
Posted By: tsuwm Re: Please help. - 11/14/06 04:49 PM
well, let's see..

lethologica - the inability to remember the right word

anomia - a difficulty in finding the right words for objects or the inability to remember names

paramnesia - a condition in which the proper meaning of words cannot be remembered

aphasia - partial or total loss of the ability to articulate ideas or comprehend spoken or written language, resulting from brain damage due to injury or disease. Also called logagnosia, logamnesia, logasthenia

aphrasia - inability to speak, or to make intelligible phrases

I may, however, be suffering from loganamnosis..
Doesn't that give you the runs?
Posted By: fg2g Re: Please help. - 11/15/06 02:02 PM
That's an impressive list of possibilities.

As far as I can see they are all disorders of one sort or another. The word I am looking for would be appropriate to an isolated incidence of forgetting a words meaning.

The perfect example is with this word that I have forgotten but not as a consequence of my having a disorder - or at least I hope not!
Posted By: AnnaStrophic Re: Please help. - 11/15/06 02:18 PM
Again, this wouldn't apply to you, young whippersnapper, but what immediately comes to what mind I have left is senior moment.
Posted By: fg2g Re: Please help. - 11/15/06 02:31 PM
Quote:

That's an impressive list of possibilities.

As far as I can see they are all disorders of one sort or another. The word I am looking for would be appropriate to an isolated incidence of forgetting a words meaning.

The perfect example is with this word that I have forgotten but not as a consequence of my having a disorder - or at least I hope not!




Only joking
Posted By: consuelo There is no help - 11/15/06 04:33 PM
Well, examples one and two are not necessarily the result of a medical condition. They are just part of being alive. I suffer from them more as each year passes. I blame it on a virus in my retrieval system...
Posted By: Hydra Re: Please help. - 11/16/06 10:29 AM
Quote:

anomia - a difficulty in finding the right words for objects or the inability to remember names




I think it should be pointed out that anomia is a medical term which describes "an aphasia ... due to lesions in various portions of the language area", i.e., brain damage, and not just ordinary forgetfulness.
Posted By: Hydra Re: Please help. - 11/16/06 10:33 AM
Quote:

paramnesia - a condition in which the proper meaning of words cannot be remembered




A somewhat logocentric definition. My dictionary gives: "a condition or phenomenon involving distorted memory or confusions of fact and fantasy, such as confabulation or deja vu." And the On-line Medical Dictionary defines it as a form of confabulation, or "false recollection, as of events that have never occurred."
Posted By: fg2g Re: There is no help - 11/16/06 01:43 PM
Quote:

Well, examples one and two are not necessarily the result of a medical condition. They are just part of being alive. I suffer from them more as each year passes. I blame it on a virus in my retrieval system...




'Lethologica' is the nearest to the sense I had in mind but it's also a noun. I was thinking more of the word as a verb or an adjective.

I may never get to the bottom of this one.
Posted By: tsuwm Re: Please help. - 11/16/06 04:45 PM
Quote:

Quote:

paramnesia - a condition in which the proper meaning of words cannot be remembered




A somewhat logocentric definition.




logocentric, eh?

"To further add to the confusion, Pickford suggested that paramnesia describes a recognition failure for a specific item (object, picture [word?]), whereas deja vu consists of an amorphous familiarity for an entire setting, and a paramnesia can be traced back to a prior experience, whereas a deja vu can not. - Alan S. Brown, The Deja Vu Experience
© Wordsmith.org