From the Notes on Amateur Linguistics

In modern publications, there has been a noticeable spread of amateur speculations about the origin of words, based not on the science of language history, but on a naive belief that no special knowledge is required for such speculations, just... simple guesses. Based on these amateur guesses about the origin of words, such writings often construct completely fantastical conclusions about the history of whole nations. In the work of A.A. Zaliznyak "From the Notes on Amateur Linguistics," it is shown how such speculations differ from professional linguistics and why they have no chance of revealing the true history of words. Special attention is given to the most striking example of using amateur linguistics to construct a fictitious history of many countries — the so-called "new chronology" of A.T. Fomenko. The second edition also includes the article "On the Book of Veles"