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Comment by LtWorf

1 day ago

All academia used latin until quite recently. Because all books were written in latin.

Why do you think all animal species have a latin name? You think the ancient romans classified them?

17 comments

LtWorf

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GJim  7 hours ago

> Why do you think all animal species have a latin name?

Good god! This proves you have _completely_ missed the point!

The reason scientic names are in lattin, is BECAUSE it is a dead language. The scientific name can therefore never be confused with the many local/regional names for a species which will always be in a living langage.

  • LtWorf  4 hours ago

    Lol… It's because Linneus wrote in latin (a quick look on wikipedia will confirm)… because he wanted other intellectuals to be able to read his works.

    Also your theory fails flat in the entirety of south america, some parts of africa and europe where the "local/regional" names are just… the old latin names still used today.

    Thank you for the lecture!

dcminter  1 day ago

Genuinely bizarre comment. Why do you think the books were written in latin?

  • graemep  17 hours ago

    They were written in Latin until well into the modern era. Newton wrote his major work in Latin, for example.

    • dcminter  17 hours ago

      Yes, I know. Why the confidence that this contradicts anything I said?

      Edit: Re-reading I realise you were reading that as me thinking the books weren't written in Latin, whereas I was trying to get the parent poster to think a bit beyond "the books were written in Latin" to wonder why they might be written in Latin long, long after the fall of the Roman Empire.

      2 replies →

    • GJim  7 hours ago

      > Newton wrote his major work in Latin, for example.

      Newton wrote in Latin because he was, famously, an arrogent bellend. The rest of the sensible scientific community had long since swiched to living langauges.

      2 replies →