How can you describe in one word a problem that is caused by ourselves?
Although the word is a noun and not a verb, it would be a kind of reflexive problem? I think that if we had noun cases in English, it would be the noun problem in the causative case. There are no such cases in English, and to my knowledge there is no single word that means a problem caused by ourselves.
I could borrow from Latin, and use less words, perhaps three words by saying problema a nobis, meaning “problem from us” in Latin, or perhaps I could use problema ab homine (ab homine meaning “from a person” or Man).
If I accept problema a nobis, should the opposite be problema ab alia (meaning “from another”)? It has a nice ring to it, but is a little cumbersome, and it would be ideal to have a single word for the concept. Furthermore I do not know Latin so this information, sourced from Google Translate[1], and checked with Claude[2] may be incorrect. There certainly isn’t a single word that precisely means a problem caused by a third party in classical Latin. Latin legal and philosophical texts would typically used descriptive phrases like culpa aliena (“fault of another”).
Also according to Claude – the word Eigenverschulden, in German, can refer to a problem directly caused by the person in question. It translates to “fault” or “culpability” and specifically implies that the problem originated from the actions of the individual being discussed. In contrast Fremdverschulden refers to a problem caused externally or a third party fault. However I understand that this word really relates to culpability, rather than problem. It seems to be more closely related to the word “fault” than “problem” in English.
In Polish, przytrafiło się (literally “happened to”) is used to describe a problem that arose externally, not due to the person’s own actions. It implies something occurred to someone without their direct responsibility or cause.
In Russian, проблема по вине (problema po vine) translates to “a problem caused by” or “a problem due to,” directly indicating external causation. The phrase по вине literally means “by fault of” and specifies an external source of the problem.
I have decided to invent two new words for problem, one when the cause is attributed to the subject or person speaking, and other when the cause is external, and cannot possibly be attributed to the subject. My main reasons are that the concepts are not hard to envisage and I think this distinction matters, especially today.
From now on I will use anobis and abalia for the two concepts. If anyone knows words for these in English or ones in another language, or detests my Latin and has a better idea, please send me a suggestion.
Here are my definitions –
Anobis n. – A problem caused by oneself or one-selves.
plural anobis
- Anobis pile up for Boeing as 737 Max delays continue . The timing is as precarious as ever. Global regulators still need to approve a software fix.
- Climate change is one of the most challenging anobis that humanity has ever faced.
Anobis would include any problem related to war, racism, genocide, reliance of few species of crops for food, over-fishing, wastage, and over-population. Viral epidemics could be anobis due to Man’s activities living close to livestock, or living in crowded conditions, or cutting down rainforests and becoming exposed to new pathogens as a result.
Many, although not all, anobis would cease to be so if Man became vastly reduced in number and lost his technological knowledge and skills.
Abalia n. – A problem externally caused. A problem wherein the cause cannot be attributed to the subject.
plural abalias
- I had an abalia with the police because a thief had stolen my wallet and I was not able to identify myself to them.
- The impact of the Chicxulub meteorite would have caused a megatsunami over 100 metres high that would have reached well over 500 kilometres from the impact point. The emission of dust and particles could have covered the entire surface of the Earth for several years, creating severe abalias for living things.
Abalia would include problems related to the seasons (winter, summer), earthquakes, and meteorites colliding with Earth, weather related ones, and could be climate change when argued to be caused by other things such as sunspots, or the tilt of the Earth, or how close we are to the sun or moon.
Along with elephants and termites Man is part of Nature. We cannot avoid interacting in some way with our environment, but under natural circumstances would be able to adapt to the changes and become part of them. Normally these interactions would not drastically effect Nature, and if Man were eradicated abalia would not disappear.
In this news report both words could be used, emphasising different causes – The airline claimed that the delay was due to the weather in the destination, resulting in an abalia here, but I think they had personnel anobis, resulting in shortage of staff.
The choice of word to use would naturally depend on the emphasis the writer or speaker wishes to make. Soil erosion in many cases could be a result both of environmental natural causes and human ones. Either of these words or a non-specific one could be used, depending on the situation, the facts, or perhaps the point of view. Luckily, we have many words for non-specific issues including bother, difficulty, dilemma, hassle, hitch, issue, matter, pitfall, predicament, quandary, trouble and of course, problem.
[1] Google Translate is a multilingual neural machine translation service developed by Google to translate text, documents and websites from one language into another.
[2] Claude AI is a generative artificial intelligence chatbot developed by Anthropic