Why is it called the 'Universe?'

[EndlessTime]

I was having a discussion the other day with a close friend of mine and we started talking about the universe. Which eventually led me to the question as to why the universe is called well universe. Specifically, I wanted to know, why is there a uni - meaning one - at all? And, for the life of me I can't remember exactly why, but we came to reason that it was wrong to give it a numerical value at all. Anyway, I was wondering if you could tell me of why they named it the 'universe' specifically and not something else or if you could give me a link to something that might?

 

[phinds]

Do you think there's more than one?

 

[EndlessTime]

I think there is a possibility of there being multiple realities but even so I'd still want to know why they called it 'uni'verse instead of say just the verse.

 

[phinds]

I think there is a possibility of there being multiple realities but even so I'd still want to know why they called it 'uni'verse instead of say just the verse.

Well, I guess not everyone agrees with you. There are a lot of "multiverse" theories around now but I don't think any of them were around when the name was given.

 

[Ryan_m_b]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universe#Etymology.2C_synonyms_and_definitions

The word universe derives from the Old French word Univers, which in turn derives from the Latin word universum.[10] The Latin word was used by Cicero and later Latin authors in many of the same senses as the modern English word is used.[11] The Latin word derives from the poetic contraction Unvorsum — first used by Lucretius in Book IV (line 262) of his De rerum natura (On the Nature of Things) — which connects un, uni (the combining form of unus, or "one") with vorsum, versum (a noun made from the perfect passive participle of vertere, meaning "something rotated, rolled, changed").[11]

[Artistic rendition (highly exaggerated) of a Foucault pendulum showing that the Earth is not stationary, but rotates.]

An alternative interpretation of unvorsum is "everything rotated as one" or "everything rotated by one". In this sense, it may be considered a translation of an earlier Greek word for the universe, περιφορά, (periforá, "circumambulation"), originally used to describe a course of a meal, the food being carried around the circle of dinner guests.[12] This Greek word refers to celestial spheres, an early Greek model of the universe. Regarding Plato's Metaphor of the sun, Aristotle suggests that the rotation of the sphere of fixed stars inspired by the prime mover, motivates, in turn, terrestrial change via the Sun. Careful astronomical and physical measurements (such as the Foucault pendulum) are required to prove the Earth rotates on its axis.

A term for "universe" in ancient Greece was τὸ πᾶν (tò pán, The All, Pan (mythology)). Related terms were matter, (τὸ ὅλον, tò ólon, see also Hyle, lit. wood) and place (τὸ κενόν, tò kenón).[13][14] Other synonyms for the universe among the ancient Greek philosophers included κόσμος (cosmos) and φύσις (meaning Nature, from which we derive the word physics).[15] The same synonyms are found in Latin authors (totum, mundus, natura)[16] and survive in modern languages, e.g., the German words Das All, Weltall, and Natur for universe. The same synonyms are found in English, such as everything (as in the theory of everything), the cosmos (as in cosmology), the world (as in the many-worlds hypothesis), and Nature (as in natural laws or natural philosophy).[17]

 

[Perchie]

I guess you can take uni (or one) to mean 1 or 100% - the totality of everything (including constituent multiverses) ... rather than 1 as the indivisible unit.

That said - conceptually, 100% or 100/100 (everything) is not the same as 1 (the individisible unit) - even if they can't be differentiated arithmetically.
But then, arithmetic is just a simple mathematical tool.

 

[audioloop]

I was having a discussion the other day with a close of mine and we started talking about . Which eventually led me to the question as to why is called well universe. Specifically, I wanted to know, why is there a - meaning one - at all? And, for the life of me I can't remember exactly why, but we came to reason that it was wrong to give it a numerical value at all. Anyway, I was wondering if you could tell me of why they named it the 'universe' specifically and not something else or if you could give me a link to something that might?

"Verse" truly comes from latin "versus", which means "towards".
"towards the One".

 

[Xyooj]

any other language for the english word "universe" ?

i rather prefer the word "cosmo" :)

 

[featherheart]

well i think so bcoz any multiverse theory has not been proven yet nd besides wen d term was coined dere were no such theories ..nt a slightest idea of multiverse

 

[Chronos]

Most 'multiverse' concepts are inherently undetectable in our universe by definition. On that basis, I consider them irrelevant from a scientific point of view.