It occurred to me to look up the word meretricious and, lo and behold, it is ultimately from another sense of the same root as merit and meritocracy. In its passage, though, it went through *meretrix*, a whore. Thus the showily but falsly attractive meretricious is ornament befitting a prostitute. The common root is *mereri*, which inflected toward 'earn' or 'deserve' for merit and 'being hired' for meretrix. Education has several definitions, but I would draw attention to the tension between 1. the *act or process* of imparting or acquiring knowledge, the powers of reasoning and judgment and 2. the credential that one obtains by from an educational institution. Over-emphasizing the latter debases the former. When the degree or diploma is sought solely because it is a condition of being hired rather than for the intrinisic value of the knowledge, reasoning and judgement, education thereby becomes meretricious. Perhaps the spelling of meritocracy should be amended to meretocracy to more adequately reflect the increased emphasis, especially over the last 20 years or so, on turning out knowledge workers for hire. Tom Walker Bowen Island, BC 604 947 2213
