Omega

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Omega /ˈəʊmɪɡə/ (n.)

1. (Cosmology): Ω. The last in a series. The conclusion. The ultimate limit of a set. The end of days. The space beyond The Restaurant at the End of the Universe. The Battle of Tannhäuser Gate. The point at which the Abyss looks back into you, the Dark Lord of the Swaps and his army of Undead ISDAs will rise up from the salted Earth and purge the cosmos of light and sound. The kind of derivative exposure one or more of the four horsemen of the Apocalypse might like - namely, one where you can use backtesting with 100% confidence because for the first and only time in the history of the universe you will have all possible data — no doubt will remain — but it still won’t be any use BECAUSE THERE WILL BE NO FUTURE LEFT.

2. (In Germany): The arrival of a private equity firm on one’s shareholders register).

The end of days

Look on the bright side: at least you can tell Compliance to get stuffed if they ask you to insert the usual disclaimer that “past results are no guarantee of future performance”. The rapture is also the point at which, finally, the doctrine of precedent can be justified on logical grounds; the space-time continuum having reached its outer bounds, it finally being true that there is no infinity of events yet to take place, any of which could (and probabilistically speaking, will) utterly undermine the intellectual assumptions on which the stream of authorities to date has built its momentum.

Not the apocalypse

Not to be confused with:

• The global financial crisis which, though it certainly felt like the end of days at the time, was instead a subtle shift in planetary vector, setting the world on an inevitable course for entropic boredom heat-death, a fate so much grimmer as to make one pine for a good hearty Apocalypse.
• The 2020 coronavirus pandemic although the outbreak of planetary hysteria about coronavirus may have all the makings of a good end of days if people don’t get a grip and satisfy themselves they have enough low-calorie soya milk and don’t need to warehouse the stuff.

See also

• Greeks
• Profound ontological uncertainty
• The rapture
• The global financial crisis
• Coronavirus
• Beyond Good and Evil: Prelude to a Philosophy of the Future
• Locusts