The word "傻子" is formed by combining the character 傻 (shǎ), which means "foolish" or "stupid", with the character 子 (zi), a very common and unaccented suffix that is often attached to nouns. In this construction, 子 serves to nominalize the adjective 傻, transforming the abstract quality of "foolishness" into a concrete noun referring to "a foolish person" or "an idiot". The suffix adds no independent meaning but functions primarily to mark the word as a familiar, everyday term for a type of person.