Antennae vs. antennas

[Pierre A Plauzoles]

In a previous article, philjs at mail.utexas.edu (Phil Schappert) says:

>On 18 Oct 1998 13:40:12 -0700, fnkwp at aurora.alaska.edu (Kenelm Philip)
>wrote:
>>	With exquisite timing, Jeffrey Glassberg (head of NABA) has just
>>produced an editorial in the fall '98 issue of 'American Butterflies'
>>entitled 'To Communicate or To Intimidate: That is the Question'. He
>>suggests that the Latin-derived terminology of entomology exists, in
>>part, to "set up entry barriers to outsiders."
>
>Ken, et al.
>
>I, too, found this editorial to be "objectionable" (for lack of a
>better word) and agree whole-heartedly with your assessment. I wrote a
>response, "To Communicate or To Intimidate: Is this a Question?", in
>my editorial column of the News of the Lepidopterists' Society. For
>those non-members reading this (why are you still a non-member?) I'll
>put a copy of it up on the NEWS website, look under contents of Vol.
>40(4), at http://www.esb.utexas.edu/philjs/News/news.html
>
>Phil

You are asking Ken?  He can answer for himself, but I would appreciate 
the opportunity to give you my own answer as well.  As things stand, you 
have the answer in your paragraph quoted above.  I strongly object to 
such an attitude.  It caters to those interests whose desires include the 
reduction of the educational level of the public.  I, personally, would 
**much** rather see people learn as much as they need to feel comfortable 
using what scientific names they need to use.  Time spent on education is 
never time wasted.  Not only that, but it also says that people are 
stupid or too lazy to learn, something that I am not willing to accept as 
true.  I started out as a teenager learning about entomological taxonomy, 
and began learning about scientific nomenclature in college.

The whole "common v scientific names" debate - if you want to call it 
that - arises, in my opinion, from the lack of emphasis on the sciences 
in American educational institutions, especially in the earlier years.  
When I was in school, I actually had to do some real work to get where I 
wanted to be, and I did it.  Many years ago, I was dating a young lady from 
the eastern part of the Mid-West, and she one day told me that she did not 
want to go back to school (to take an Extension class) because she "was 
through with school" - school, to her, was like a book: closed and never 
to be reopened (???!).  I believe very strongly that learning is a 
lifelong experience.  What is wrong with doing some work in order to 
learn something and then using it later?  As far as I am concerned, you 
roll with the punches, and if some given situation calls for learning 
something new, ***you learn it!!***  **PERIOD!!**  Case closed.

-- 
Pierre Plauzoles   ae779 at lafn.org
Canoga Park, California