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Spider World Records

I am rather taken by the names given to new species in one of the slides above - especially the one named after the cat!

Researchers and students at the University of Vermont gave six new species of Spintharus spiders names to honor those who had stood up for human rights and warned about climate change. These spiders are known for their distinctive markings, which look a bit like a happy face. The arachnid-honored individuals? Figure them out from these scientific names: Spintharus davidattenboroughi, S. barackobamai, S. michelleobamaae, S. davidbowiei, S. leonardodicaprioi, and S. berniesandersi. (The researchers also named one species, Spintharus skelly, after a pet cat.)
 
These people are no better than parents who give their children the whole lineup of their favourite team as middle names.

Would not some distinctive feature of these species be more helpful?
 
These people are no better than parents who give their children the whole lineup of their favourite team as middle names.

Would not some distinctive feature of these species be more helpful?
Ah but if they had named one of them S. rubicolor for example no one outside of the spider community would ever have heard about it, these names do generate a bit of publicity for taxonomy and the group in question.
 
These people are no better than parents who give their children the whole lineup of their favourite team as middle names.

The spiders don't grow up being bullied for it and then have to go through all the kerfuffle of changing it.

Getting to name something means you can have fun with it, in longstanding tradition. The names given are themselves cultural artifacts and can be studied and analysed :)
 
The spiders don't grow up being bullied for it and then have to go through all the kerfuffle of changing it.

Getting to name something means you can have fun with it, in longstanding tradition. The names given are themselves cultural artifacts and can be studied and analysed :)
There is one fossil the name of which when translated basically comes out as “Creature from the Black Lagoon”
 
These people are no better than parents who give their children the whole lineup of their favourite team as middle names.

Would not some distinctive feature of these species be more helpful?
The spider I was going to get was a Brachypelma albopilosum. Now, I am the proud possessor* of an A grade GCSE in Latin, and the only bone I can pick out of that is that albo has to do with white. Brachy, I think, relates to arms, so in context, legs. Couldn't tell you what the pelma means without googling. Nor the pilosum, although from what I know of the spider, I will guess that has something to do with hairs.

Also, naming species after their discoverers or someone you want to suck up to is a fine scientific tradition. About the only rule is that you can't name it after yourself, so props to the biologist who named a creature after his brother.
 
The spider I was going to get was a Brachypelma albopilosum. Now, I am the proud possessor* of an A grade GCSE in Latin, and the only bone I can pick out of that is that albo has to do with white. Brachy, I think, relates to arms, so in context, legs. Couldn't tell you what the pelma means without googling. Nor the pilosum, although from what I know of the spider, I will guess that has something to do with hairs.

Also, naming species after their discoverers or someone you want to suck up to is a fine scientific tradition. About the only rule is that you can't name it after yourself, so props to the biologist who named a creature after his brother.

Did you recently take GCSE Latin?

I did back in the day and I really enjoyed it.
 
Did you recently take GCSE Latin?

I did back in the day and I really enjoyed it.
No, mine was also acquired back in the day. Even then I remember baulking at the terribly clunky way of teaching translation. I suppose it did introduce me to the idea of cases in language, which helped when it came to studying Russian, and of course it would have given me a head start should I ever have gone in for the judging.
 
No, mine was also acquired back in the day. Even then I remember baulking at the terribly clunky way of teaching translation. I suppose it did introduce me to the idea of cases in language, which helped when it came to studying Russian, and of course it would have given me a head start should I ever have gone in for the judging.

As you say, it helped with general grammar (the teaching of English grammar being almost entirely neglected during the era I was at school), but to my surprise (I've forgotten most French) I have retained a lot of the vocabulary and now throw it back at EFL students!

We used the famous Cambridge Latin course (Caecilius est pater...), but I have since bought a much better course: So You Really Want To Learn Latin. Which is far more traditional in one sense and not afraid to give you rules and tables.

My slightly wonky grammar meant that I committed to memory huge swathes of the set texts for GCSE. I only came out with a B, but since then I've been able to memorise poetry and prose very well.

It little profits that an idle king...
 
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