Disposable's blog: "Thoughts"

I was having a discussion the other day with an Etomologist. The conversation had come around to the subject of the most misused word in the English language.The word that I was putting forth was 'prejudice'.
prej·u·dice
  –noun
1.
an unfavorable opinion or feeling formed beforehand or without knowledge, thought, or reason.
2.
any preconceived opinion or feeling, either favorable or unfavorable.
3.
unreasonable feelings, opinions, or attitudes, esp. of a hostile nature, regarding a racial, religious, or national group.
4.
such attitudes considered collectively: The war against prejudice is never-ending.
5.
damage or injury; detriment: a law that operated to the prejudice of the majority.
–verb (used with object)
6.
to affect with a prejudice, either favorable or unfavorable: His honesty and sincerity prejudiced us in his favor.
—Idiom
7.
without prejudice, Law . without dismissing, damaging, or otherwise affecting a legal interest or demand.
When I grew up the second definition was the one that I was use to, these days it has shifted to the first one, but most seem to use it to mean 'bigot'.
    The conversation continued as I was explaining that I think it is a shame that the second definition is not used more widely, since it is a primary part of assumption. He was a surprised that I think assumption is a good thing. The old saying that "Assumptiom makes an ass out of you and me, ASS-U-ME", had come to be true in his mind. I spent an hour explaining how assumption is one of the top reasons for the advance of mankind. For most of us almost 90% of our thoughts are assumptions or based on them.The assumptions save us all a great amount of time and energy. When we throw a stone, we do not have to wait for it to land to know where it will go, we assume from previous experience that it will go where we meant for it to go.
  We draw conclusions based on it, even make plans on assumptions and the strength of our assumption is directly related to strength of the prejudice we used to make them. We make assumptions so often that they are more than second nature, they are assumed to fact. The alarm will wake you up in the morning--it could fail, you could sleep through it, you do not even know if it truly does wake you; it could be that your biological clock is waking you up and you think it the clock. We assume we will wake up or even be alive, that the car will start, that you will not get in a wreck. These assumptions all based on the prjudices acquired through repaeting the action time after time, but each could be wrong on any given day. These assumptions help us go on and not have to rethink the same part of each new day. it unfortunately has the side effect of making people take for granted that they will happen and in doing so, take for granted much in their lives. People will take for granted that their mate will be there for them, that they will be faithful, that they even love them, instead of appreciating them for the blessing that they are. The human brain is an amazing thing and more complicated than even the experts know. Most never take the time to try to figure out how their mind works, let alone why; but knowing this can help to avoid most of the pitfalls that are encountered in relationships and in life. If people would observe others and see commonalities in them, they could be aware of such behaviors and avoid the bad ones. Taking a Euclidian approach to our own behavior as well we do to the surroundings would make us more prepared for the future.