Is Timidity Even a Word?

 Word of the Episode: Timidity

• Definition (Oxford): Lack of courage or confidence.
• Usage: More common historically (esp. 1800s), in decline until a slight uptick since 2019—possibly linked to its appearance in modern Bible translations (e.g., NLT). Example usage: “She believes everyone can overcome their timidity.”
• Etymology: From Latin timidus (“fearful”) ← timere (“to fear”). Related to timid, intimidate, etc.
• Comparison: Timidness exists, but AI claims timidity is more established—a claim the hosts dispute, saying they had never encountered it until now.
• Biblical Connection: Appears in 2 Timothy 1:7 in NLT (“spirit of timidity”), contrasted with KJV “spirit of fear.”
  • Greek root deilia: cowardice, shrinking back.
  • Discussion of translation nuances—“spirit of fear” preferred by hosts for theological clarity.

Name Tangent

• Timothy: From Greek Timotheos (“honoring God”), unrelated in meaning to timidity despite phonetic similarity.
• Interesting contrast: Timothy = honor; timidity = fear.

Language and Teaching Anecdotes

• Story about teaching reading: oldest child insisted the letter “C” was unnecessary (preferred K for hard sounds, S for soft sounds).
• Hosts reflect on English language idiosyncrasies and societal norms—sometimes you must teach or conform to standard usage even if logically flawed to maintain group consistency (e.g., scripture memorization in one translation).
• Discussion of debate skills:
  • One host enjoyed logical fallacy education but disliked formal debate constraints.
  • Questioning realism of debate rules in everyday argumentation (should everything be allowed?).

Fun Debates

• Waffles vs. pancakes:
  • She: waffles for crunch and syrup pockets.
  • He: soft, cake-like waffles preferred; long-term choice would be pancakes.
• Crunchy vs. soft dessert preferences and cookie texture differences.
• Crunch in food: she likes chips in sandwiches; he prefers only certain crunchy foods.

Cultural Reflection

• On language reform: can’t rewrite every word/book; sometimes must “share empathy” about constraints.
• Suggestion: learn languages without English’s “C” problems (e.g., Russian, Asian languages).

Closing Notes

• Core lesson: functioning in society often means aligning with group standards (like using C in spelling or reciting scripture in a shared translation), even if logically imperfect.
• Encouragement: “Need not have a spirit of timidity” in learning or sharing—be bold, though the hosts admit they’re still working on that confidence.

Tone & Takeaway:

• This episode is playful, linguistic, and philosophical—mixing etymology with personal stories about teaching, language quirks, group conformity, and confidence. It ties biblical language curiosity to everyday communication and social norms.

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Any views expressed on this podcast are those solely of the hosts and is for entertainment purposes only. None of the content is medical advice or financial advice.

Special thanks to Tim Wright aka CoLD SToRAGE for his permission to use the song Operatique.

Transcript

I Hate Talking: 0:29

Welcome to episode 79 of I Hate Talking. Hi everyone. So we have a choice between two words. I guess we'll probably go with the word that came up in conversation, in fact, this very evening. Timidity. OK. Cause it's not a real word, right? I, I don't think it's a word. I don't know. We'll find out. I've never encountered the word before until this particular experience. Obviously I've heard of the word timid, but not the word timidity, right, timid. Oh yeah, Timothy, she sounds like Timothy. I suppose so. Now, I think probably most people do use the root word timid, which would also be the root word in like intimidate and things of that nature, but you, our listeners will have to let us know if you've ever heard the word timidity up until this point. But if you're listening right now, now you have, right. So let's look up first the definition, if we can find it, because we're not sure if this is actually a word or not. OK, while you're looking it up, I'll say that this is something that we were given a a photo of, and it's like a scripture and it has that word in it, but it has a lot of designs and characters, and next to it is a stick that you're shaking. So then when you mentioned, I don't think that's the word. I was like, well, is it intimidity, cause maybe the stick figure is supposed to be like an eye, like you said, intimid, intimidity, you're like, I don't think that's even better. I was like, yeah. I guess not, but I wasn't sure if it was intimidity or just timidity. That both sounded wrong to me. Yes, and that particular scripture is 2 Timothy chapter 1 verse 7, which I guess we found that that particular photo is using the NLT or New Living Translation. Yes, I believe so, because we had to look it up. But that is the translation, that word that comes up in it. So our favorite Oxford language dictionary does have this listed as a word, timidity, and it defines it as lack of courage or confidence. So using it in a sentence, the example sentence given is she believes everyone can overcome their timidity. I would use the word timidness in that particular sentence, not timidity. Yeah, for the usage over time, it apparently was very popular in the 1800s and then had a steady decline over that century and now is not used very much, but it has had a very slight uptick starting in 2019. And more people started reading that translation of the Bible. Perhaps so. So, but I agree because I'd say like the sentence, I had a lot of timidness. No, I was very timid and I'd say I'm very timid. I'm trying to think of how to use it, but can you look up timidness sounds better. It sounds more accurate to me. Is that a word? Are they the same? So according to AI, timidity is actually more common and established term for the quality of being easily frightened, lacking in confidence, or fearful, and it does say timidness is also a valid word, and it says, quote, often considered a synonym or less common variation of timidity, but not in my experience at all. No, I would think someone misspoke if they said that word to me. I wouldn't think much of it, cause, as everyone knows that listens to me, I misspeak all the time. So I would not think anything like poor of them, but I would think it was like a stutter type mispronunciation. And I don't even know if I heard that word that I would associate it with the word timid unless it was by context when they were speaking about something that maybe would be fearful or some particular hard situation. So for our etymology, it is a Latin word. It comes from timidus. Or Tidus, I suppose. And that originally came even before that from Tamir, which means to fear. So basically if you are timid or you have the quality of timidness or you have a particular outlook of timidity that you may be fearful, especially of the unknown or not knowing what to do according to this vocabulary.com. Website that lists out some of the etymology. OK, can I just say, I really enjoy that the word Timothy is in the book of Timothy. But on that note, like, is Timothy or Tim? Does the meaning of that name mean timid or mean afraid? To all you Tim's out there, I really like the name Timothy, but I've never looked up what what the meaning is. So, according to some baby naming websites, The literal meaning of Timothy means God's honor, and that would have come about because of Timotheos, so honoring God, that root word Theos there, and I guess Timo meaning honor. It's interesting that that means honor when Timmady means fear. I suppose so. Some perhaps very similar root words, but very slight variations that have very different meanings. So now we know the word timidity is a real word. We know the definition, the etymology, and supposedly the fact that it's more common than timidness, -- but maybe it -- is. Maybe you and I are out on our own little island over here. But do you think you're gonna start using the word? No, I don't think I use the word timid or timidness very much. I think I do. Like when I talk to people, I feel like I was very timid. And things like, I'll say words like that. He's a timid kid. We have a timid kid. I suppose so. The version that I learned, King James Version, would have been Spirit of fear, which is Not all that dissimilar to what is being described with Timothy. And actually maybe is a little bit more nuanced. I don't know if that was what the original authors in the Greek were going for, but Timidity being that specific fear of the unknown or not knowing what to do. Right? Well, obviously I'm not a Greek expert and I don't know what they mean, but yes, I learned it as a spirit of fear also, we do not have a spirit of fear, and I like that better. Maybe it's just because that's how I'm programmed and conditioned. But I like the idea of, it's not saying you're never afraid, because sometimes there are good reasons to be afraid. If a bus is coming at you, you need to be afraid and get out of the way, you know, but it's the spirit, the constant fear that we don't need to have. That's very true. Now it's interesting to note as I'm searching for what the Greek word is. That the AI brings in some references from the Institute for Creation Research, Crosswalk.com, and Bible Hub that describe the Greek word used in the phrase spirit of fear as Delia, which means cowardice, Tiddy or shrinking back. You have the concordance right next to you. You should look it up, Timothy. It's not gonna be in there because it's not in the King James. Well, we can check. We'll double check. I'm sure timid is, maybe, maybe not. I don't know. We'll find out. This is all fun research that is happening real time, at least for us. You're getting to listen to it after the fact, but we are doing this on the fly. So there are a lot of words in the Bible apparently. But it does not appear that timid or timidity is in the strongest concordance because it goes directly from times to Timna, which is a name, not a word. So no timid, no timidity, no timidness in the strongest concordance. Now I'm curious if it's in our 1828. Merriam-Webster's dictionary, which I guess it would be because of the popularity during the 1800s that we saw in the usage over time. Well, let's find out is AI right? I don't see how AI is correct because I've never heard this word before, Timidity, until this particular experience with this photo that has the NLT version Bible verse in it. I don't know. So I disagree with AI that this is more common than timidness. And that it's common at all, but -- let's check the 1828 Merriam-Webster's -- it. I don't think it's uncommon to disagree with AI. That's not a novel concept. Today, I was, my one of my children was teaching me how to use AI to generate a cartoon photo. And it was actually pretty fun. I was enjoying it and learning a lot from him, but I was doing a cartoon of a person with a veins. I did not want them to have veins, and they kept giving them veins for their hair. And so I said, remove the veins in one prompt and it removed their entire head. It was a headless person. And then, so then I said revert back to original photo, and they were like, I'm sorry, I misunderstood your request. OK, so AI is not all knowing, in the true sense. So the Merriam-Webster's 1828 dictionary has timid and timidness, but in the definition of timidness, it says refer to timidity. So it says here, the definition of timidity is quote, fearfulness, want of courage or boldness to face danger, habitual cowardice. Timidity in one person may be a good trait of character while in another is a deep reproach. Hm OK, well, there you go. So, an interesting dive into the word Timmody from that particular experience with that Bible verse, and you, our listeners can let us know, leave a comment, send us an email, send us a text, let us know if you have ever heard of the word Timidity or not. Because we have not till now, but now you have as well, one way or the other. Yeah, so we don't have any intimidity about asking if we were wrong, right? Yeah, see, I would have used the word timidness or another word altogether. I'm not intimidated is what I would say. They're not intimidated to using the negative timid. So essentially using a double negative rather than intimidate, yeah, I guess what I'm getting at is that it's not a double negative. I would use a positive term that we're bold enough to ask. I guess that makes me feel uncomfortable. You would rather use a double negatives and say you're -- not apprehensive or you're not -- timid or you're not unafraid. Yeah, it sounds nicer saying I'm bold. Like I just, that sounds haughty or full of yourself or confident. Yeah, I don't like confidence. Well then, perhaps you have too much timidity. Maybe, or everyone else in the world, so many people have too much confidence, overconfidence. Well, I suppose so, but now we can be confident in using the word timidity. As a real word. I'll still be intimid using it though. Intimidated, intimidated. Oh, it's all complicated. That's English for you. So that is our word, Timothy. And now I suppose we will move on to any other particular topics that we have on our minds at this time. Mhm. Well, it reminds me when you're saying like that's English for you. I was having a conversation with my children and their chiropractor the other day, and we were reflecting on when our oldest, I was teaching our oldest to learn how to read. And he would fight me all the time because he was convinced the letter C. Was useless. And I didn't really have a good argument for why we have to learn the letter C. When he'd spell, he would intentionally, if it was a hard C. He would do a K, soft C, he would do an S, and I'd be like, no, it's actually a C, and I try to correct him, cause, you know, mistakes happen, that's confusing, but it was intentional. He'd be like, no, and he'd argue with me on why this is better or more accurate. So we were telling the chiropractor that he still stands by that stance, but he also is older now and understands that he alone cannot change the English language and concedes to doing it the way we do. But our chiropractor is talking about like, you need to get these kids in debate, because they're very good at debating, and they can have a career in it or could flourish. And so I have not yet, but I've been thinking about maybe looking up local children's debate groups. I don't know, what do you think of that? Yeah, I think it could be interesting. I tried that as a child and didn't necessarily enjoy it. Debating or changing the letter C. Well, both actually, no, debating because even within debate there was like rules that you had to follow and certain things that you had to do and not only just the things that you had to do from like the procedural perspective where you had like 5 minutes and then 2 minutes and then 2 minutes and then 3 minutes in terms of the back and forth, but even like certain ways that you had to speak or stay on topic and things like that. I did learn a lot about particular logical fallacies like ad hominem attacks and things like that that were, I think useful, but You still had to have a lot of rules around the debate, which to me felt a little bit counterintuitive. Like if you're going to debate somebody, then everything should be allowed. Hm, what do you mean by that? Like you can commit logical fallacies all day long. And I guess the point was that like, if somebody that you're debating knew these particular logical fallacies that they would point you out and then you would lose the debate. But I don't think that's how it works in real life, so I didn't feel like debate was a realistic representation of argumentation in real life. So in debates, do you think you can lie? Can you lie? Yes, you can lie. Should you lie? No, probably not. Well, you're just saying that everything should be allowed, so I was just trying to say like. Even, you know, you were saying that they should be able to prove you wrong, but what if I even said something like, as we're debating and I say for breakfast, I had a waffle. You weren't here at breakfast, so you don't know if I did or not. There's really no way to prove me wrong. But I didn't. That was a lie. Well, that's why you have your fact checkers in the background, but no one could fact check that. No one saw me eat breakfast, I suppose. So I was up before. I don't really know what the waffles have to do with the bigger topic in the debate. I don't know. Maybe in the debate there was it had a point, and I was trying to divert you to something else. Best breakfast foods and you're on the waffle side and you're lying that you ate a waffle as a support to the fact that waffles are the best. I am on a waffle. I'll eat a waffle every day over a pancake, no questions asked. I do enjoy a good waffle, but if I had to choose one over the other for the rest of my life, it would definitively be a pancake. No, I know, I know you think that, and you're wrong. Well, there you go, we can have our own pancake and waffle debate. Let us know if you like pancakes or waffles because they're the same, but a waffle crunchier and it gives you that extra sensation of that crunch you need in the morning. Well, the waffles that I enjoy are not crunchy. They're like the home style cooked ones that are sort of more like just a pancake in a waffle shape. Exactly, it's just the same pancake then. No, the waffle, it's nice and crunchy, and it holds the little syrup and butter in just perfect little bite size treats. Which is odd because I enjoy the crunchy Chips Ahoy, and you like the chewy ones, which I find disgusting. I don't know why you think that, cause again, I, I like both. The blue wrapper crunchy ones or the red wrapper soft, but I do love, oh man, it's so good that soft when you just put in your mouth and it just all melts in there. Mhm. Maybe I like crunchy desserts and soft foods. Maybe. What other crunchy desserts do you like? Oh, but I guess you do like crunchy cookies because you always, I like the really soft, chewy cookies. This week I made chocolate chip cookies and I intentionally bring some less cooked for me and then cook them longer for you. That's true, and that's true for all cookies that I like, sandies and the shortbread cookies, they are all very firm and crunchy. Hm, I wonder, -- I don't think -- I hard candies, I'll typically like. Hard candies like peppermint sticks or something like that versus a Chewy type confection. But I don't like chewy, I like the soft, like melt chocolate that melts in your mouth, ice cream. Yeah, I think every dessert I love. It's very soft and almost dissolvable. Some of my favorite ice creams have crunchy bits in them, like chocolate chips or chocolate covered peanuts or things of that nature. Hm. I don't dislike those, but I love all ice cream, but no, I prefer like butter pecan. The only particular crunchy food that I like as a food is probably potato chips. And corn chips to some degree, things that are fried. But see, I like all, I like all my other food crunchy. My life turned around in elementary school, when my friend taught me that you could put chips in your sandwich. To make it crunchy And I will forever remember being shocked and amazed, and like forever, like my life has changed. I can put these potato chips in here and have that crunch I want. No, see, I don't think I like crunchy sandwiches, maybe a tiny bit of like toasted bread, crunchy bacon to some degree, but it can't be like super crunchy, even. I think that's why in the history, when we go back and forth between being keto diet, some kind of thing, I have a hard time because I miss that crunch. I'll often have to cook bacon or something to add it to my food. To provide that crunch I need. That's true. Occasionally on keto, I'll miss potato chips, but sometimes pork rinds will fit that need. I hate pork rinds, they're so gross. And then I think really the only use of the letter C. Is for the CH sound, right. Right, which can be used at the beginning of the word such as chuck or at the end of the word like much, but in terms of words like sight. You could use theoretically the letters or in the words of sight is with us. No, it's not. Oh, like site, like I'm citing, uh, I see. I was like site as vision. You're saying site like site your resources. Correct. We cited the Merriam-Webster's Dictionary and Strongest Concordance and Oxford Language Dictionary. -- Those are things -- that we cited. So what do we say then, because I fully agree with you, and I gave these arguments to a five year old kindergartner a long time ago and He just brought back, we'll just make the sea, make the chest sound then. Well, I think that's how it used to be. I think the C was only the just sound in very olden times. So what do you say when you actually agree with someone? But Also, so basically in that stance, I had to just throw up my hands and say, you're right, I agree with you. But in society, this is how we do it and that's what you have to do because this is a society we live in. So what do you do, Adam, when you disagree with someone or you're trying to convince them of something and they disagree with you? But once again, this is just the society we live in. We cannot rewrite every book and every word in the US. So, yeah, I think there could be some sort of perhaps shared. Empathy in terms of the situation that we find ourselves in if we are disagreeing about something that is done or the way certain things are performed. That it is sort of just the way it is and you sort of have to resign yourself to that. I'd also perhaps suggest some alternatives. So I don't think Russian, the language, has as much of this particular problem because they will typically use a lot of S's and K's and not so many C's because of this very pronunciation thing. So you could go learn Russian if you don't want to have to deal with all the odd uses of C within the English language. And I guess You could also probably do the same for a lot of Asian languages. Where they're going to have a completely different alphabet and therefore not really have this particular issue either. OK, yeah, I buy that. But also you can't tell a 5 year old will go move across the ocean. No, I'm not saying that. I'm saying just learn Russian and then you speak Russian and read Russian. I really hate the sea that much. So we did start, uh, like I said, this conversation rekindled in my memory as we were talking to the chiropractor because our kids love to debate him on stuff, and I think he definitely enjoys it also. So they have a fun time together. And I was telling him that I'm thankful actually that this is my first child. The first time I taught anyone to read, because I was so overwhelmed at that point cause I was like, I don't know what to do, cause you're right, but this is society, and like teaching's way harder than I thought if you're going to fight me on things like this. Luckily, all my other kids I had better answers for, and also none of them are so strict and particular that it was easier to teach them. We almost have everyone in our house is almost a reader. Our littlest now goes around and he starts, he's at that really fun stage where he starts reading everything he sees. And sometimes they're like, oh, don't read that. Don't, you don't need to read that. It's OK. So that's a fun age and it's really fun that we have a house full of readers now. That's true. So, I mean, that is part of what we cover in this podcast is some of the idiosyncrasies of the English language, so. And that is in fact is the child that requested we do the word Timothy for our episode. It doesn't surprise me. I think because he was arguing, right, not to learn that scripture. And you also, if we're going back to that word, wanted to teach them the other way, right? Do you want to explain why I said we have to learn it this way? I suppose so, and that will probably be our final topic for this episode is that I did recommend that we learn it in the King James or at least the SV as more standard language in my opinion, apparently not AI's opinion, but that we learn the spirit of fear phrase rather than the spirit of timidity phrase. But it was something that we had to resign ourselves to because the larger group was learning it in this particular version and we needed to align for the memorization sake as well as just particular alignment with the group. Right, so the kids will have to say this in a group, they can't learn a different version that says different words cause then when they're all saying it together, they're not gonna line up with it. And so they need to learn it that way, just like how sometimes we have to use the C for the or sound, even though we have very good appropriate letters that would cover that. I suppose so. And then once you learn all these things, you need not have a spirit of timidity when using the English language. I guess not. So you, our listener, need not have a spirit of timidity either. You can always like, share and subscribe and be bold and confident in sharing this with just one other person if you think they would enjoy this particular episode. Or you don't have to be intimidated to share this and tell the people that you enjoy listening and you're learning something. Cause I don't like being bold about telling people about the podcast, but I'm getting better at not being intimidated about telling them. That's true. We are all on the journey to understanding. Yeah. So, from your friends at I Hate Talking, until next time, remember, it is only through talking that we begin the journey to understanding.