Average Loss

[BLAND - VI]

“Average” comes from the maritime concept of the Law of General Average, which requires all stakeholders to share the cost equally should cargo get lost or destroyed in an emergency. You can see how "proportionally shared loss” is retained in it’s mathematical meaning.

But there’s another etymological piece here.

Average has a non-mathematic meaning:
Ordinary.
Bland.
Common.

And when we do average work, accept average engagement, consume average media, and allow ourselves to do average critical thinking . . . there is still “proportional shared loss”.

When we accept average, we all lose.