Debate rages over whether the "o" in "Nomic" is long or short. The short "o" seems to have been the inspiration of such online games as "EcoNomic?" and "AutoNomic?", but the long "o" persists in such games as "GardenNomic".
I put this question to PeterSuber himself. I quote his response in full:
- I followed the discussion with interest over the weekend and decided not to intervene. I didn't want to contradict half the Nomic world. But since you ask, I've always used a long "o".
- To me both pronunciations are perfectly acceptable. The Greek "o" is short (omicron, not omega), and in English it is short in words like "astronomic", "autonomic", and "economic". So I see a case to be made on that side. But I like the sound of the long "o" better. I analogize "nomic" in "astronomic" to "wise" in "wisdom": the root word may take a long vowel when standing alone, but it becomes short when it joins a compound. There are many other examples in English, both when the original long vowel becomes part of a stressed syllable (as in wise --> wisdom, break --> breakfast) and when it becomes part of an unstressed syllable (as in able --> ability, fate --> fatality).
- By the way, I discuss the phonetic rules above in more detail at
http://www.earlham.edu/~peters/writing/freiburg.htm. -- 'PeterSuber'
That should end the debate, since everyone knows (and the author agrees) that it is pronounced "Nome-ic". :)
RichHolmes notes:
- $ grep 'omic$' /usr/dict/words
- anatomic
- anomic
- atomic
- autonomic
- comic
- economic
- palindromic
- socioeconomic
- subatomic
- taxonomic
- uneconomic
- $
and rests his case.
<<<<<<< Your version anatomic - short o. Economic - long o. It's still undecided :) -- bd Um, Economic has a short o. - CraigDaniel
KevanDavis's dictionary file notes:-
- anomic (pronounced either way)
- bromic
- chromic
- disomic
- domic (?)
- genomic (either)
- rhizomic
- telomic (?)
And, um:-
- gnomic
Have your say in the NomicOrNomicPoll.