Session 2

This session describes words originating from two roots that are entirely opposite to each other - ego and alter, i.e., yourself and others.

EgoIst and EgoTist that we learnt in session 1 are derived from ego - NL advises us to differentiate between them by remembering that the former contains ‘I’, and refers to the person who constantly thinks about his own welfare, a conceited, selfish person(I, me, mine), and the former contains ‘T’, so this person constantly ‘Talks’ about himself.

Two more words derived from Ego are Egocentric and Egomaniac.
Ego-centric is a person who considers himself in the centre of the universe, and everything else for him just revolves around himself. He means the world, all wrapped up in himself, who are others?
Ego-maniac is someone who is self obsessed to the extent of being dangerous, an abnormally egotistical person.

At this point, I’d like to ask you something… has anyone read or seen Harry Potter, Chamber of secrets? There’s a professor in it, whose name I forgot, who keeps telling the students his achievements, discoveries, gallant stories, not to mention most, rather all, of which are false. The most comic part is when he distributes the question paper of an exam to the class, and ALL the questions asked are about himself. Where was Prof. _ born? When did Prof. _ do _ ? etc. This guy was surely an ego-maniac. Now I know half of you must be mad at me for mentioning Potter… Lets move on and start with the ‘alternate’ words…

Alternate is to skip one and take the other,
Alternative is the other choice,
Alteration is making a change, changing to something other,

Similarly, all words with ‘alter’ in them are concerned with something ‘other’.

Altercation is a bitter quarrel you have with someone, because of difference of opinion; the two parties have ‘other’ ideas, opinions, intentions. It is a heated, noisy, or angry dispute; noisy controversy or argument. The verb form is altercate.
[Usage: Like Epaminondas, he fought continuously with his fellow generals and was nearly court-martialed for his altercations with his superiors -- like Epaminondas he was relieved of command after his greatest victories]

Altruism refers to the act of helping others, a word associated with social service. Also, people like Mahatma Gandhi are many a times called altruists for their altruistic actions. It’s supposed to have a very positive connotation. Perhaps the only place you’ll hear Altruism not being used as a virtue but as a curse is in the works of Ayn Rand. Her central character is always individualistic and altruism is something to be hated, for each man must stand up for himself, and take on the world with his or her own abilities, not with the help of ‘others’.

The interesting end of the story is the word that is formed by combining the two roots we explored - alter ego. What does that translate to? Other self? - precisely. Alter ego is someone you find so similar to yourself, you can talk to them like you are talking to yourself, share ideas, thoughts, feelings, coz obviously, you can't hide anything from yourself. He/she is your best friend, your alter ego.