When Michael Faraday was working on electrolysis, he needed, as all scientists need, new words. What Faraday did was walk across campus to consult the Master of Trinity College, Cambridge, the vastly accomplished Dr William Whewell. And Whewell would say, "You ought to make these words out of Greek." Between them they came up with ion, electrode, anode, cathode. The ghost of Heraclitus attended these sessions. He had said you can go either way on a road, up it or down it, ana the hodos or kata the hodos, contracting into anodos and kathodos. One would like to hear these conversations, the continuation of Adam's naming the animals.

from 'The Scholar as Critic,' in Every Force Evolves a Form


(incidentally some of the whewell-faraday correspondence is preserved at trinity college library. wouldn't one love to look at them!)