this post was submitted on 25 Apr 2024
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Science Memes

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[–] [email protected] 30 points 4 months ago (3 children)

Like today's computer scientists, early biologists sucked at inventing new words, and simply reused existing ones. "Berry" in common language is a small, usually sweet and edible, fruit. Strawberries, blueberries, blackberries and raspberries are all berries.

Then biologists came along and decided, actually, strawberries, raspberries and blackberries are out, but watermelon and bananas are in, because the size of the fruit doesn't matter, only the placement of the seeds decides whether something is a proper, scientific berry.

A similar thing has happened with "fruit" and "vegetable", where scientific fruits include cucumbers, eggplants, and pumpkins. Luckily, all three of these are also berries.

I say we ignore them, and use words to mean sensible things.

[–] [email protected] 19 points 4 months ago

Or we move on with our lives and accept that fruit don't have to be sweet and vegetables don't have to be savory. Life is beautiful and nature constantly challenges expectations.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 4 months ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 4 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (1 children)

If a new berry was invented, computer scientists will probably call them "βerries", next one "ϐerries" (cursive beta)

[–] [email protected] 5 points 4 months ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 3 points 4 months ago

Pronounced "cherries"

[–] [email protected] 5 points 4 months ago (1 children)

i prefer to classify all of what you said as simply "food"

simple yet accurate. I'm a scientist now.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 months ago

simple yet accurate

this describes engineers more in my experience. science embraces the chaos of discovery. engineers just want to make fruit salad.