Editing Ontology:Q291 (section)

=== Name ===

The name <i>'pataphysics</i> is a contraction of the Greek phrase "'epi meta physics", which from the first word specifically opts to take the <i>p</i> and the smooth or unaspirated breath mark. Within the Greek language, the smooth breath mark is used to differentiate written words that have swallowed their <i>h</i> consonant but are still pronounced with one from words that were never meant to have one; in later periods of Greek where all of these words had lost such sounds -- which logically includes uses of Greek in English and French -- the breath mark came to mean basically nothing. What this effectively means is that the apostrophe in 'pataphysics has never been pronounced, and instead is used to mark it "as Greek". <cite>Exploits and Opinions of Dr. Faustroll</cite> states that the apostrophe is "to avoid a simple pun", although the consensus among speakers of French has been that the key word in this statement is not "pun" but "simple" and the apostrophe in <i>'pataphysics</i> actually implies that in addition to a Greek phrase it is composed of multiple puns.