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When a bug is not a bug

Professor Yaffle said:
Its like when someone calls a strawberry a fruit, and a scientist corrects them and says, actually, a strawberry is not a fruit as it has the seeds on the outside. But science co-opted the word fruit and gave it a much more limited definition than the colloquial one - then s/he insisst we are wrong to keep using it in the original sense.
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This is precisely the problem with the whole Biblical "inaccuracy" about bats being birds. The word being used for "bird" in the Bible isn't a reference to some cladistic grouping; it's a colloquial term for "flying vertebrates". In modern language we've shifted the term to colloquially mean "beaked/feathered vertebrates" -- including the non-flying feathered animals and excluding the flying non-feathered animals.
 
AvalonXQ said:
This is precisely the problem with the whole Biblical "inaccuracy" about bats being birds. The word being used for "bird" in the Bible isn't a reference to some cladistic grouping; it's a colloquial term for "flying vertebrates". In modern language we've shifted the term to colloquially mean "beaked/feathered vertebrates" -- including the non-flying feathered animals and excluding the flying non-feathered animals.
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Do you mean that that was the meaning of the word used in the original language and it was roughly translated to "bird", or that the word "bird" was the correct translation at the time and its meaning has since shifted?
 
AvalonXQ said:
This is precisely the problem with the whole Biblical "inaccuracy" about bats being birds. The word being used for "bird" in the Bible isn't a reference to some cladistic grouping; it's a colloquial term for "flying vertebrates". In modern language we've shifted the term to colloquially mean "beaked/feathered vertebrates" -- including the non-flying feathered animals and excluding the flying non-feathered animals.
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What "flying vertebrates" are being referred to here?

Leviticus 11:20
All fowls that creep, going upon all four, shall be an abomination unto you.
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To confuse things further, people who do microbiological research (typically microbial engineering) will refer to bacteria as "bugs".
 
:) every thread at the JREF eventually contains a post about th Bible or biblical accuracy. Still, I didn't expect a thread about the definition of "bug" to get there in just 24 posts.
 
madurobob said:
:) every thread at the JREF eventually contains a post about th Bible or biblical accuracy. Still, I didn't expect a thread about the definition of "bug" to get there in just 24 posts.
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Yeah, it's gotta be some kind of record.

You should add "biblical accuracy" to the tags. :D
 
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I'm often surprised at how some folks here in the JREF Forum, in so many other respects absolute sticklers for accuracy and clarity of expression, turn a blind eye to demonstrably inaccurate terms when it comes to matters of biological classification. We biologists and biology educators work with our students and the general public to promote use of the correct terms for various species, and it'd sure be nice to see an education forum get behind that effort when someone brings that information in for discussion.

Yes, when a biologist uses the term "bug" it refers to the hemiptera, an order within the class of insects. This is analogous to the order primates within the class mammalia. Although the comparisons are not absolute in terms of evolutionary divergence, a bug is as different from a beetle, a fly, or a bee as you are from a horse, a cat, or a rabbit. (And spiders - in the class arachnida - are as different from bugs as you are from a rainbow trout.)

Pedantic? Of course, but consider some other comparisons and how annoying you'd find them if perpetuated in society: Imagine a person referring to all flying machines as "helicopters" whether the machine in question is a prop plane, glider, jumbo jet, or an actual helicopter. Or how 'bout people using the term "Camaro" to apply to any sports car, or indeed, even pick-up trucks. Terms matter, and it's nothing but intellectually lazy to not use the right one once you're in the know.
 
You're right and the newspaper is wrong. "Insect' is a technical biological term. "Bug" is a colloquial term.
 
The Shrike said:
I'm often surprised at how some folks here in the JREF Forum, in so many other respects absolute sticklers for accuracy and clarity of expression, turn a blind eye to demonstrably inaccurate terms when it comes to matters of biological classification. We biologists and biology educators work with our students and the general public to promote use of the correct terms for various species, and it'd sure be nice to see an education forum get behind that effort when someone brings that information in for discussion.

Yes, when a biologist uses the term "bug" it refers to the hemiptera, an order within the class of insects. This is analogous to the order primates within the class mammalia. Although the comparisons are not absolute in terms of evolutionary divergence, a bug is as different from a beetle, a fly, or a bee as you are from a horse, a cat, or a rabbit. (And spiders - in the class arachnida - are as different from bugs as you are from a rainbow trout.)

Pedantic? Of course, but consider some other comparisons and how annoying you'd find them if perpetuated in society: Imagine a person referring to all flying machines as "helicopters" whether the machine in question is a prop plane, glider, jumbo jet, or an actual helicopter. Or how 'bout people using the term "Camaro" to apply to any sports car, or indeed, even pick-up trucks. Terms matter, and it's nothing but intellectually lazy to not use the right one once you're in the know.
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Did you read the thread? Bug was used (and still is) to refer to creepy crawlies in general, long before it was co-opted by scientists.
 
The Shrike said:
Pedantic? Of course, but consider some other comparisons and how annoying you'd find them if perpetuated in society: Imagine a person referring to all flying machines as "helicopters" whether the machine in question is a prop plane, glider, jumbo jet, or an actual helicopter. Or how 'bout people using the term "Camaro" to apply to any sports car, or indeed, even pick-up trucks. Terms matter, and it's nothing but intellectually lazy to not use the right one once you're in the know.
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Yes, terms matter. But I think Prof Yaffle has a valid point that it is not unusual for scientist to take a very general term in common use and apply it to something very specific... then insist the word only be used for the specific. Its a bizarre tyranny over the words we use everyday. As far as i can tell, the use of "bug" to describe any variety of little creepy crawly predates its use as an order of Insect. why in teh world would the biologists of the time choose a word that was commonly used to mean something else?

Its like if Renault suddenly claimed that "car" was by definition a Renault 5 built for the US market and everything else was some other sort of vehicle, but definitely NOT a "car".
 
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madurobob said:
As far as i can tell, the use of "bug" to describe any variety of little creepy crawly predates its use as an order of Insect.
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1) Not convinced this is the case.

2) Still, what's wrong with using a more accurate term for something once you know it? From the OP, isn't it better to say "I got chiggers from working in the garden" than "I got bugs from working in the garden"?

I don't make my kids say "odonates" when they mean "dragonflies", but they sure as heck don't use "bug" when they see a dragonfly. I guess the only thing wrong with doing so is that it's ignorant.
 
The Shrike said:
1) Not convinced this is the case.

2) Still, what's wrong with using a more accurate term for something once you know it? From the OP, isn't it better to say "I got chiggers from working in the garden" than "I got bugs from working in the garden"?

I don't make my kids say "odonates" when they mean "dragonflies", but they sure as heck don't use "bug" when they see a dragonfly. I guess the only thing wrong with doing so is that it's ignorant.
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You see, the thing is, we need a generalized term for creepy crawly critters. Just like we need a generic term like "car" to use instead of sedan, estate, coupe, etc... To redefine "bug" as only a very small subset of critters serves only to confuse. We need a term like "bugs" that loosely describes... exactly what everyone but a few pedantic biologists uses it to describe. So, either we need to come up with a new word for everyone to use in place of "bugs", or we need to chastise biologists for stealing and redefining a perfectly useful word. Or, perhaps both.
 
madurobob said:
You see, the thing is, we need a generalized term for creepy crawly critters.
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That's fine, and I don't have a problem with folks casually using "bug" for any number of things that aren't bugs. But I much prefer to at least keep that casual usage to within the insects, just like we might use "bird" for any kind of bird or "fish" whether we mean a bass or a trout or a minnow.

If some biting or stinging or otherwise annoying arthropod is bugging me, I use general terms like "I got chiggers" or "there's a spider on the wall" or "you kids need some bug spray before you go outside." But if there's a bee in my flowers I call it a bee. If there's a grasshopper in the field, I call it a grasshopper.
 
Thank you Shrike for making the argument I was too lazy to make. Though I don't really care too much what people call macroscopic invertebrates, provided they aren't squishing them for no reason.

(If one is inclined to eat them, then by all means....)
 
Mr. Purple said:
(If one is inclined to eat them, then by all means....)
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Bug folks at the local university suggested eating the periodical cicadas that are orgying by the zillions in the tree tops around here. They said they taste like asparagus. I don't intend to confirm for myself.
 
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