If any of the above terms has ever been applied to you and your immediate group of friends, you've probably had The Argument. Let me set one of the many possible scenes: you, your friends and at least two laptops, sitting round and rolling dice to see if you're getting drunk of a lazy afternoon. Conversation turns to Magic: The Gathering, or perhaps Munchkins, and before you know it one of your party has cracked a joke about six foot square Gelatinous Cubes, Celestial Badgers or their housemate's alleged Fridge Of Holding. Once the laughter has died down, however, someone - and fingers will be pointed - has the hypocritic temerity to call the joker a dork. Heatedly, the accused will reply that while they are most certainly not a dork, they are - quite proudly - a geek. Matters might end here, but inevitably some would-be Cicero chimes in that nerd is the more culturally applicable term - and then The Argument rapidly goes downhill.
Sides are taken in earnest: what defines geekhood as opposed to dorkhood or nerdliness? Which term presents the most accurate description of those present? After many countless hours, my friends and I eventually agreed upon the following definitions:
Dork: Any awkward and socially unskilled introvert.
Nerd: Any individual with a stance on Linux routinely called upon by the rest of their friends and family to perform tech support duties.
Geek: Anyone who can recite, at random, the names of fifteen Buffy episodes, ten Star Wars races, eight anime shows and five webcomics. (Other permutations accepted.)
If the above definitions are taken as accurate, then it is possible for someone to be simultaneously a dork and a nerd and a geek, in varying ratios of dominance. These three spheres of classification - the unsociable, the technical and the subcultural - are often linked, but nonetheless distinct. Much of the confusion has come from a thoughtless bandying about of terms by the uneducated; cricketers, for instance, talk about 'bat nerds' or 'bat geeks,' meaning team members who, in the estimate of their fellows, know entirely too much about the different kinds and history of cricket bats for comfort. In this sense, the words 'nerd' and 'geek' are being used in their non-specific slang forms, as slightly disparaging terms to deliniate both intelligence and an in-depth, detailed knowledge about one or more (objectively) obscure or (subjectively) uninteresting topics.
During my many run-throughs of The Argument, much time was devoted to the question of whether or not obsessive affection should form part of the definition of any term. Eventually, it was decided not, as while the quirk is omnipresent across all types, it isn't a necessary condition of any.
I'm not dork: given half a chance, I can comfortably talk someone's head off; I'm married; and I only wear my ThinkGeek shirts every other weekend. It's up in the air as to whether I'm only a psuedo-nerd or the genuine article: although I do know enough about Linux not to freak out at a GUI-less screen and have been used as my family's tech support, I'm nowhere near as savvy as most of my friends.
But I am, quite undeinably, a geek. If asked, I would crew Serenity with Cap'n Mal Reynolds, walk the Dreaming of Oeniros, wield my Vorpal Blade against a crew of theiving gnomes, drop-kick Keitaro Urashima until he twinkled in the distance, thwart the Pointy-Haired Boss with Dilbert, fight alongside Aayla Secura and Quinlan Voss...
...but not bite the heads off chickens, as per the historical definition of 'geek' provided at dictionary.com
We've come a long way, baby.
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