What is a tree?

[MonkeySage]

Seems like a weird question, but it is something I've been thinking about(had a lot of time on my hands).

Long ago, we had forests filled with gigantic ferns. From what I understand, these aren't classified as trees, even though they look like trees.

And palms have more in common with grass than they have with most trees. (They're monocots like corn, wheat, or barley)

So, does that make a palm a tree, or a grass?

The thing that makes this more confusing for me; most angiosperm trees are dicots. But not all trees are dicots; gymnosperms are not.

[Eldan]

There's no proper botanical definition of tree. It's a plant with a woody stem and branches, but it's not a monophyletic group and what's included and excluded is often a bit arbitrary.

All definitions that people have come up with are post-fact, really. We know what trees are, now we need to define it.

One mostly accepted definition is that they have secondary woody growth. They have a persistent stem that gets thicker each year.

[factotum]

Yeah, "tree" is one of those definitions that basically comes down to, "If it's commonly called a tree, then it's a tree". Bamboo is called a tree, for instance, despite actually being a member of the grass family (unlike palms, which I believe are part of their own family of plants).

[The Glyphstone]

And banana trees are technically really big berry bushes, right?

[Togath]

And at one point in the far distant past, earth had massive fungi instead of "trees"

[Tvtyrant]

I always thought a tree was a plant with distinct roots and branches separated by a single trunk. This isn't actually true, since some trees have multiple trunks off a single root system, but that is how I tend to think of them.

[Grinner]

I like to think of them as well-behaved woody vines. I once saw a picture on the Internet of a tree which had fallen over, but instead of dying, it sprouted some other trees from its side. It's probably highly unusual, but the ability of that tree to convert its stem into root strikes me as being uncannily vine-like behavior.

[Jeff the Green]

Paging Justice Stewart! Paging Justice Potter Stewart (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_know_it_when_I_see_it)!

[Murk]

Even worse is that there's plants who can be trees depending on their growth and location, but can also be bushes/shrubberies. If you put them in a forest or high-density growth area, they'll grow high, spindly and woody, with leaves on top, and be a tree. If you put them in a solitary location without any competition, they'll stay low, without a clear trunk, and grow as a round bush.
Which means "tree" isn't even always a definition of species but of individuals.
Which is weird.

[Acanous]

Not to mention that "Tree" is a slang term for a group of arbors. Technically "Tree" was a multi-inclusive term for any food bearing plant that didn't die in the process of that food being eaten.

It's just evolved as a term for "any cylindrical stemmed plant taller than a man which has branches, roots, and a trunk"

Pretty sure that trees must have bark as well.

[Flickerdart]

What is a tree? A miserable pile of roots! But enough talk. Have at thee! (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OMTizJemHO8)

[Yuki Akuma]

What is a tree? A miserable pile of roots! But enough talk. Have at thee! (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OMTizJemHO8)

Damn you I just came into this thread to do that joke.

[cobaltstarfire]

And banana trees are technically really big berry bushes, right?

I think bananas (the plant) are considered herbs?

Then again herb might as well be just as generic as "tree"

Meanwhile poking the wikipedia page for palms describes them as trees, shrubs, or vines dependent on their growth style.


Plants are just weird, and a lot of words for them are really generic aren't they?

[Flickerdart]

Plants are just weird, and a lot of words for them are really generic aren't they?

There's no such thing as fish. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No_Such_Thing_as_a_Fish)

[Eldan]

There are fish. Fish are vertebrates that aren't in that oen group that aren't fish. :smalltongue:

It's not a monophyletic group. That doesn't mean it's not a group.

But again. As I said, there is a definition for tree. Secondary growth. It's just not universally accepted and a bit post-hoc.

[BannedInSchool]

I'm a hairy, tree-dwelling land fish, so there. But wait, if there are no trees then what am I? :smalleek:

[Maryring]

Delusional.

[Fri]

Okay, what about vegetables. What are vegetables. Potato is totally a vegetable right? I'm eating vegetable regularly right?

[SirKazum]

As far as I'm concerned, a "vegetable" is anything in the Plant kingdom (as in "animal, vegetable or mineral"). I don't know about the idiomatic usage, which is probably much more practical than academic, so I guess a vegetable in that sense would be whatever people traditionally call vegetables (that ol' "I know it when I see it" criterion).

The problem is with biological categories that have traditional roots from a time before there was any serious study of biology, and are too deeply rooted in our culture to do away with. "Tree" certainly seems like one of those. "Fish" might be one as well, although at least it's been mostly trimmed down to a somewhat sensible "non-tetrapod vertebrate" - I bet, if you asked people before Linnaeus's time, they'd say a whale is a fish, which it most definitely is not by today's standards. I guess that notion of "fish is anything from underwater that's not a plant or a bug" survives in names such as "jellyfish" and "starfish".

Speaking of which, the noun "bug" also bugs me. What's a bug? Any kind of arthropod? So are people just using a simile or metaphor or whatever (let's not even go down that road) when they call microbes "bugs", as in "I'm so sick, must've caught a bug"? I guess it bugs me so much because, in my native Portuguese, there's no translation for the word "bug" - there are words for "insect", and "arachnid", and "crustacean", and so on, but not "bug".

[Grinner]

Okay, what about vegetables. What are vegetables. Potato is totally a vegetable right? I'm eating vegetable regularly right?

A potato is a tuber, so it's like a plant's storage bin.

For my part, I'd say a vegetable is a plant or portion thereof that I can eat, although this may bring up issues with distinguishing fruits and vegetables.

[Arcane_Secrets]

Speaking of which, the noun "bug" also bugs me. What's a bug? Any kind of arthropod? So are people just using a simile or metaphor or whatever (let's not even go down that road) when they call microbes "bugs", as in "I'm so sick, must've caught a bug"? I guess it bugs me so much because, in my native Portuguese, there's no translation for the word "bug" - there are words for "insect", and "arachnid", and "crustacean", and so on, but not "bug".

"Bugs" still refer to a specific order within the Insecta called the Hemiptera, though, with an extensive definition far beyond just being used generically for microbes or insects in general.

[factotum]

I think bananas (the plant) are considered herbs?

The actual banana fruit is botanically a berry, though. Fun fact: strawberries and raspberries are *not* actually berries, despite being named such (they're both aggregate fruits, but "strawaggregate fruit" doesn't roll off the tongue quite as well).

[Kato]

A potato is a tuber, so it's like a plant's storage bin.

For my part, I'd say a vegetable is a plant or portion thereof that I can eat, although this may bring up issues with distinguishing fruits and vegetables.

I don't think there is a strict botanic definition of vegetables. The distinction with fruit is that.. well, vegetables are NOT fruit. Fruit are the things plants use to spread their seeds. Potatoes, carrots, etc are not the fruits of the respective plants.

[Hackman]

A tree is a connected forest.

[SirKazum]

"Bugs" still refer to a specific order within the Insecta called the Hemiptera, though, with an extensive definition far beyond just being used generically for microbes or insects in general.

So, say, spiders aren't "bugs"? Huh, weird. Do people popularly refer to them as "bugs" though? And I guess most people would call non-Hemiptera insects "bugs", such as say, houseflies. Popular, common-sense-based categories can be a pain in the ass when it comes to science :smalltongue:

[Eldan]

So, say, spiders aren't "bugs"? Huh, weird. Do people popularly refer to them as "bugs" though? And I guess most people would call non-Hemiptera insects "bugs", such as say, houseflies. Popular, common-sense-based categories can be a pain in the ass when it comes to science :smalltongue:

Bug is one of those words that has different meanings depending on whether we are talking science or common usage. In common usage "bug" is like "vermin". "Small animal I don't like". Science also uses the same word for the Hemiptera, which are insects that use a certain arrangement of sucking mouth parts and mostly feed on plants. Lots of things in the Hemiptera people might recognize, actually. Leafhoppers, aphids, shield bugs...

Another one of those is "fruit". In science, it's a structure that is made from certain tissues and contains seeds. In a culinary sense, it's a part of a plant that's sweet.

Lots of words do that. A dwarf is a mythological creature, or a small human, or a small star. A matrix is a mathematical arrangement or a computing term or a popular movie.

[Grinner]

I don't think there is a strict botanic definition of vegetables. The distinction with fruit is that.. well, vegetables are NOT fruit. Fruit are the things plants use to spread their seeds. Potatoes, carrots, etc are not the fruits of the respective plants.

I was thinking more along the lines of bell peppers, although Wikipedia now informs me that, strictly speaking, bell peppers are considered fruits.

[Eldan]

Oh, and yes, absolutely no botanical definition of vegetable. That's a purely culinary term that basically means "edible parts of a plant that are not (culinarily speaking) fruits".

That was actually one of the questions on my botany oral exam. (Then I got a list of vegetables and had to define what part of the plant they were in botany terms, tubers, stems, leaves, roots, etc.)

[snowblizz]

I don't think there is a strict botanic definition of vegetables. The distinction with fruit is that.. well, vegetables are NOT fruit. Fruit are the things plants use to spread their seeds. Potatoes, carrots, etc are not the fruits of the respective plants.

In Swedish vegetables are named "green things", literally, and potatoes and carrots etc are "root fruits" which is kinda accurate as to their function.

[cobaltstarfire]

The actual banana fruit is botanically a berry, though. Fun fact: strawberries and raspberries are *not* actually berries, despite being named such (they're both aggregate fruits, but "strawaggregate fruit" doesn't roll off the tongue quite as well).

Well yes, but I was talking about the plant part, glyphstone already mentioned that bananas are berries, and I never disputed it.

[SirKazum]

In Swedish vegetables are named "green things", literally, and potatoes and carrots etc are "root fruits" which is kinda accurate as to their function.

In Portuguese, aside from "fruta" (fruit), we've got "verdura" (literally "greenery"), which are leafy greens / edible leaves in general, and "legumes" which are... I don't know, I guess any edible part of a plant that isn't a fruit or a leafy green, though that might be other exceptions better known by other names.

[Arcane_Secrets]

So, say, spiders aren't "bugs"? Huh, weird. Do people popularly refer to them as "bugs" though? And I guess most people would call non-Hemiptera insects "bugs", such as say, houseflies. Popular, common-sense-based categories can be a pain in the ass when it comes to science :smalltongue:

Thinking about it, I've never seen anyone call a spider or a fly a "bug" in the generic sense. Having eight legs in the former case and the wing structure in the case of the latter (mosquitoes, while in the fly order Diptera, look kind of different) sort of makes them hard to confuse with "bugs" but perhaps that's just where I live.

[factotum]

and "legumes" which are... I don't know, I guess any edible part of a plant that isn't a fruit or a leafy green, though that might be other exceptions better known by other names.

Legumes in English refers to a specific family of plants which includes things like alfalfa, peas, lentils, and peanuts, amongst others. Basically, things whose seeds (generally the edible part) appear as multiples in an enclosed pod that splits along the sides. No idea if the Portuguese one is similar or not, though!

[Tvtyrant]

Thinking about it, I've never seen anyone call a spider or a fly a "bug" in the generic sense. Having eight legs in the former case and the wing structure in the case of the latter (mosquitoes, while in the fly order Diptera, look kind of different) sort of makes them hard to confuse with "bugs" but perhaps that's just where I live.

Pretty much everyone I know use "bug" to mean arthropods, as opposed to "vermin" which means rodents (this made Kafka a weird read in high school).

[SirKazum]

Legumes in English refers to a specific family of plants which includes things like alfalfa, peas, lentils, and peanuts, amongst others. Basically, things whose seeds (generally the edible part) appear as multiples in an enclosed pod that splits along the sides. No idea if the Portuguese one is similar or not, though!

When I typed my original response, my thinking was that carrots and eggplants sound like "legumes" (in Portuguese) to me. Looking it up online, yeah, the "official" definition of legume in Portuguese is the same as in English, but in popular usage, pretty much any plant food that's supposed to be cooked is a "legume". (Which makes it even weirder to me as I like carrots raw, but anyway). So scientific vs. popular definitions again.

[Knaight]

Pretty much everyone I know use "bug" to mean arthropods, as opposed to "vermin" which means rodents (this made Kafka a weird read in high school).

"Bug" and "vermin" are definitely distinct, but I've seen a much broader definition of "bug". I've never seen the term used for an actual vertebrate, but worms and similar usually aren't arthropods (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Worm) and get described as "bugs" all the time. Just look at that phylum listing there.

[Grey Watcher]

"In 1913, Joyce Kilmer speculated he would never see a poem as lovely as one of these."

[Murk]

Thinking about it, I've never seen anyone call a spider or a fly a "bug" in the generic sense.

Pokémon does.

[Kato]

Another one of those is "fruit". In science, it's a structure that is made from certain tissues and contains seeds. In a culinary sense, it's a part of a plant that's sweet.

Eh, still not accurate enough. Lemons are clearly fruit but rarely sweet. Many fruit in a culinary sense aren't fruit. Yeah, chefs often excludes things like tomatoes from the group of fruit but the sweet part is a really poor definition, both ways.


I was thinking more along the lines of bell peppers, although Wikipedia now informs me that, strictly speaking, bell peppers are considered fruits.
Bell peppers I feel are less of a problem, I have more of an issue with peas being fruit or strictly speaking flour being made from fruit, unless I'm getting something terribly wrong here.


Oh, and yes, absolutely no botanical definition of vegetable. That's a purely culinary term that basically means "edible parts of a plant that are not (culinarily speaking) fruits".

Hm... it seems there is still more of a distinction. We eat many parts of plants but do we really refer to everything not-fruit as vegetable? Like... Hm, good point. I felt like there were some standard things (of course some people eat flowers or "weed" but I felt there was something more main stream)
Not to forget the wonderful term "Obst" in German.... which kind of means "plant that makes edible fruits" but not quite. Chefs need to get scientific advisors and fix the terminology.


In Swedish vegetables are named "green things", literally, and potatoes and carrots etc are "root fruits" which is kinda accurate as to their function.
That's a pretty good approach. Isn't "greens" also used for a subset of vegetables on English? Like, well, green ones?

[Eldan]

Hm... it seems there is still more of a distinction. We eat many parts of plants but do we really refer to everything not-fruit as vegetable?

Plenty of things. Roots and tubers, for one, aren't fruit, but I'd call carrots vegetables. Leaves aren't fruit, but spinach is a vegetable. And so on.

[DavidSh]

Culinarily, I tend to think of edible plant matter as either fruits, nuts, vegetables, or grains. I guess herbs (dill, mint, oregano, etc) are yet another category.

[cobaltstarfire]

Eh, still not accurate enough. Lemons are clearly fruit but rarely sweet. Many fruit in a culinary sense aren't fruit. Yeah, chefs often excludes things like tomatoes from the group of fruit but the sweet part is a really poor definition, both ways.



I'd never considered that before, it kind of has my head stuck in a loop now trying to work out what makes a lemon a fruit and a tomato a vegetable, since usually the culinary definition is by sweetness.

Especially since they both can be sweet.

Could it be how they are used more than the flavor? Or maybe something to do with flavor ratio?

Lemons seem to be more often used in sweet things or to sweeten things more than tomatoes do...


I dunno, my own definitions of vegetables and stuff are really arbitrary when I sit and really look at them. For example non hollow squash are vegetables to me, but hollow squash are their own separate squash thing.

Also trying to figure out what a sunchoke is, because internally it's also its own thing, but I think a sunchoke is technically a tuber?

[BannedInSchool]

I was thinking that the vegetable/fruit distinction comes from the relative size of the edible portion of the plant, but that doesn't hold in all cases.

[Spojaz]

I define a fruit as something you wouldn't mind having for dessert, while a vegetable as anything you have to coerce a child to eat.

Human or Beast (http://lawandthemultiverse.com/2011/12/27/are-the-x-men-human-federal-court-says-no/), Biscuit or Cake (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jaffa_Cakes), these divisions are fun to discuss, and can be anything we want, as they are purely arbitrary. There is no platonic ideal of "Fruitness" or "vegetableosity" outside of whatever castle of language we feel like defending at that moment.

[SirKazum]

I define a fruit as something you wouldn't mind having for dessert, while a vegetable as anything you have to coerce a child to eat.

Human or Beast (http://lawandthemultiverse.com/2011/12/27/are-the-x-men-human-federal-court-says-no/), Biscuit or Cake (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jaffa_Cakes), these divisions are fun to discuss, and can be anything we want, as they are purely arbitrary. There is no platonic ideal of "Fruitness" or "vegetableosity" outside of whatever castle of language we feel like defending at that moment.

I wholeheartedly agree with your descriptivist stance, which is why I'm more interested in how people use the word "bug" in their daily lives than in the "official" version that says it's just Hemiptera.

That said, I'm replying to this because I'm really interested in those Jaffa Cakes you're linking to. They sound to me like the sort of thing you eat when you have an evil parasitic alien worm-thing living in a gash in your belly :smalltongue:

[Knaight]

I define a fruit as something you wouldn't mind having for dessert, while a vegetable as anything you have to coerce a child to eat.

Human or Beast (http://lawandthemultiverse.com/2011/12/27/are-the-x-men-human-federal-court-says-no/), Biscuit or Cake (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jaffa_Cakes), these divisions are fun to discuss, and can be anything we want, as they are purely arbitrary. There is no platonic ideal of "Fruitness" or "vegetableosity" outside of whatever castle of language we feel like defending at that moment.

This doesn't really work that well though. Lemons have already been mentioned, but citrus fruit in general aren't really dessert material (other than as an ingredient). Meanwhile the vegetable definition is highly dependent on which children are used as a metric. If you use people like me, then spinach, broccoli, artichoke, and a number of other vegetables aren't vegetables. If you pick the right kid, then almost everything is a vegetable because they won't eat anything.

[factotum]

This doesn't really work that well though. Lemons have already been mentioned, but citrus fruit in general aren't really dessert material (other than as an ingredient).

Plus you get things like carrot cake, which is totally something you'd eat as a dessert--so by that definition carrot must be a fruit, right? :smallwink:

[Knaight]

Plus you get things like carrot cake, which is totally something you'd eat as a dessert--so by that definition carrot must be a fruit, right? :smallwink:

Yep. That works for me in particular - I was a kid who loved carrots and didn't have to be coerced to eat them, and carrot cake has been my favorite cake since I was something like 10. That definition is way too variable by person.

[snowblizz]

Yep. That works for me in particular - I was a kid who loved carrots and didn't have to be coerced to eat them, and carrot cake has been my favorite cake since I was something like 10. That definition is way too variable by person.
I could eat carrots as a dessert. In fact, often I leave the shredded carrot for last in a meal at lunch restaurants as a dessert.

I also stubbornly maintain carrot cake is in fact a vegetable for the purposes of eating from the entire "nutritional circle". I'm fairly sure the wast majority haven't heard of that one? But those who have knows the pain of living under it's tyranny.:smallamused:



That said, I'm replying to this because I'm really interested in those Jaffa Cakes you're linking to. They sound to me like the sort of thing you eat when you have an evil parasitic alien worm-thing living in a gash in your belly :smalltongue:
Are you talking smack about the Jaffa cakes? Because I'll rip your parasite out of your belly and stuff it back in if you are. They are awesome.
The reason for the name is because they are filled with orange marmelade. Orange marmelade being made of oranges, which every one knows only come from the town of Jaffa (and is probably compeltely meaningless as a term nowadays), I think in Isreal nowadays? It's also a "brand" of oranges around here. Think Chiquita bananas. It's also lents its name to an orange-based soft drink.



Bell peppers I feel are less of a problem, I have more of an issue with peas being fruit or strictly speaking flour being made from fruit, unless I'm getting something terribly wrong here.
No peas is not fruit, they should to the best of my knowledge belong to other groups, in Swedish at least they are referred to as "pod-plants" as a group. Peas, beans on some others. Flour is usually made from grains, which would not be fruits in any definition, since those are actually (grass) seeds we are eating.




That's a pretty good approach. Isn't "greens" also used for a subset of vegetables on English? Like, well, green ones?
I think so yes. "Eat your greens" is something kids are told since many many vegetables are in fact green.


Most of these are just colloqial classifications basaed on similies or useage, which is why they are hard to classify.

[Domino Quartz]

That said, I'm replying to this because I'm really interested in those Jaffa Cakes you're linking to. They sound to me like the sort of thing you eat when you have an evil parasitic alien worm-thing living in a gash in your belly :smalltongue:

What?? :smallconfused:

[factotum]

No peas is not fruit, they should to the best of my knowledge belong to other groups, in Swedish at least they are referred to as "pod-plants" as a group.

They belong to the legume family, as mentioned earlier, but by the strict botanical definition peas *are* a fruit--they're the seed-bearing structures of a flowering plant.

[georgie_leech]

Scishow to the rescue! (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LybfPwCzs3g) Or at least the assistance for those confused by the technicalities.

[hamishspence]

What?? :smallconfused:

http://stargate.wikia.com/wiki/Jaffa

[cobaltstarfire]

Scishow to the rescue! (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LybfPwCzs3g) Or at least the assistance for those confused by the technicalities.

That was both illuminating and entertaining!

[SirKazum]

http://stargate.wikia.com/wiki/Jaffa

THANK YOU! I was beginning to think I was the only one to associate "Jaffa" with folks like Teal'c :smalltongue:

[snowblizz]

They belong to the legume family, as mentioned earlier, but by the strict botanical definition peas *are* a fruit--they're the seed-bearing structures of a flowering plant.

Wouldn't the pod be the seed (pea) bearing structure, and thus the fruit?

[mike201689]

Seems like a weird question, but it is something I've been thinking about(had a lot of time on my hands).

Long ago, we had forests filled with gigantic ferns. From what I understand, these aren't classified as trees, even though they look like trees.

And palms have more in common with grass than they have with most trees. (They're monocots like corn, wheat, or barley)

So, does that make a palm a tree, or a grass?

The thing that makes this more confusing for me; most angiosperm trees are dicots. But not all trees are dicots; gymnosperms are not.

Palma though monocotyledonous plant but this tree.

[Kato]

Sorry, somehow this thread dropped of my radar for... a week or so. :smallredface:



No peas is not fruit, they should to the best of my knowledge belong to other groups, in Swedish at least they are referred to as "pod-plants" as a group. Peas, beans on some others. Flour is usually made from grains, which would not be fruits in any definition, since those are actually (grass) seeds we are eating.



Wouldn't the pod be the seed (pea) bearing structure, and thus the fruit?

I think both with peas and grains (flour) it's a bit down to the fruit definition, in as far as how much "seed" qualify as fruits if there is not much more to it. Like, I think peas are strictly speaking the seeds inside the pod, but then with many beans you usually refer to the whole fruit as "Bohne" in German, not just the seeds. Lentils fall under the same problem as peas, I guess.
Grain... well, yeah, we ignore the rest of the fruit when collecting the seeds, but in the end, flour is made from seeds which are the main part of the fruit. But I'll admit my phrasing was quite off, saying it's made from seeds is much simpler and more precise.

[Bohandas]

There's no proper botanical definition of tree. It's a plant with a woody stem and branches, but it's not a monophyletic group and what's included and excluded is often a bit arbitrary.

A tall plant with a woody stem and branches, otherwise you've got a shrub.

[Rockphed]

A tall plant with a woody stem and branches, otherwise you've got a shrub.

What about Bonsai? They typically aren't tall. And does the 15 foot tall juniper growing by my parents' house count as a tree?


I wholeheartedly agree with your descriptivist stance, which is why I'm more interested in how people use the word "bug" in their daily lives than in the "official" version that says it's just Hemiptera.

In my usage, a bug is any small creature, normally exoskeleton bearing, that I either cannot identify or do not care to identify further. So, spiders are bugs, except when I call them out as spiders. Ants are bugs. Centipedes are bugs. Scorpions might be bugs.

Cretaceans, however, are rarely bugs. The only one that counts is the "Roly Poly" or "Pill Bug".

Vermin is any critter I don't want around. Rats, cockroaches, mice, voles, small children, attorneys, etc. all count.

[Bohandas]

I wholeheartedly agree with your descriptivist stance, which is why I'm more interested in how people use the word "bug" in their daily lives than in the "official" version that says it's just Hemiptera.


Plus I'm not sure how official that "official" version really is anyway. While I never took any classes specifically on entomology I never encountered the use of "bug" as a technical term during my college education in biology.


Pretty much everyone I know use "bug" to mean arthropods, as opposed to "vermin" which means rodents (this made Kafka a weird read in high school).

And both words can also refer to worms. Also, "bug" doesn't mean all arthropods as it generally excludes crustaceans (most likely due to the influence of big seafood)

[nyjastul69]

Plus I'm not sure how official that "official" version really is anyway. While I never took any classes specifically on entomology I never encountered the use of "bug" as a technical term during my college education in biology.



And both words can also refer to worms. Also, "bug" doesn't mean all arthropods as it generally excludes crustaceans (most likely due to the influence of big seafood)

While you may not be sure, science is... Hemiptera, are classified as true bugs. True bugs is a thing.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hemiptera

Also, Bugguide.net (http://bugguide.net/node/view/15740) is an excellent source of arthropod information.

[Eldan]

I find it more interesting that English never came up with a distinct word for Hemiptera.

[factotum]

I find it more interesting that English never came up with a distinct word for Hemiptera.

They tend to be referred to more as their specific species, such as cicadas or aphids. I think that might be because there's a much wider variation in appearance and behaviour among the group (at least, among the ones people speaking English commonly encounter) than there is in, say, the spider family.

[Kato]

I find it more interesting that English never came up with a distinct word for Hemiptera.

Wait, I thought those were bugs... Well, at least more tightly.
I know vaguely English use the term for many kinds of insects and even arachnids but I thought that was colloquial and they knew what "real bugs" were.

[georgie_leech]

Wait, I thought those were bugs... Well, at least more tightly.
I know vaguely English use the term for many kinds of insects and even arachnids but I thought that was colloquial and they knew what "real bugs" were.

At least where I am, if I corrected someone using the word bug, they wouldn't know what I was being pedantic about. Bugs are just 'creepy crawly things.' It's not exactly a firm definition.

[Bohandas]

Wait, I thought those were bugs... Well, at least more tightly.
I know vaguely English use the term for many kinds of insects and even arachnids but I thought that was colloquial and they knew what "real bugs" were.

The tighter definition of bugs is generally somewhere between the insect and hexapod level

EDIT:
And even that's sometimes considered an incorrect pedantic over-correction like not spiltting infinitives or exclusively plural "they"

EDIT:

At least where I am, if I corrected someone using the word bug, they wouldn't know what I was being pedantic about. Bugs are just 'creepy crawly things.' It's not exactly a firm definition.

Arthropods (excluding crustaceans), annelid worms, land molluscs, bacteria, and all pathogens. Also a significant portion of organisms meetig the criteria of small non-terrapin, non-bivalve creatures with an exoskeleton or shell

[nyjastul69]

The tighter definition of bugs is generally somewhere between the insect and hexapod level

EDIT:
And even that's sometimes considered an incorrect pedantic over-correction like not spiltting infinitives or exclusively plural "they"

EDIT:


Arthropods (excluding crustaceans), annelid worms, land molluscs, bacteria, and all pathogens. Also a significant portion of organisms meetig the criteria of small non-terrapin, non-bivalve creatures with an exoskeleton or shell

This is an excellent definition of a bug, not that bug is an actually defined thing, outside of true bugs of course.

[Jay R]

"Bug" is a common English word, pre-dating modern species classification. It's a mistake to try to map its actual usage onto a scientific distinction.

Common English words get meanings based on people's common observations. Those observationss are then studied, and eventually more careful distinctions are made. Then English may or may not change to match teh science.

Originally, a star was a bright light in the sky, including the sun, moon, Mercury, Venus, etc. Eventually, it was noticed that all the stars stayed in place except seven that wandered. Those seven became the wandering stars - "planetes asteroi" - eventually shortened to planets. A planet was one of the moon, Mercury, Venus, the Sun, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn.

Later observations determined that the moon and Sun weren't the same kind of thing as the other five, and Earth was. Then other planets were discovered. We've even re-defined the word "planet" in the 21st century, and we still aren't all happy with the definition.

"Bug" does not have, and will not have, a specific scientific definition, and will always include any small, multi-legged, carapaced beastie that might make us jump when it lands on us or crawls on us - because that's how we use the word.

[factotum]

"Bug" does not have, and will not have, a specific scientific definition, and will always include any small, multi-legged, carapaced beastie that might make us jump when it lands on us or crawls on us - because that's how we use the word.

Well, in the US that's how you use it. "Bug" is rarely used in the UK--what you call a ladybug we call a ladybird, for example. Not sure why we evolved the language to not use the word whereas the US kept it, unless it's just you have a lot more of that sort of thing flying or crawling around than we do.

[Knaight]

Well, in the US that's how you use it. "Bug" is rarely used in the UK--what you call a ladybug we call a ladybird, for example. Not sure why we evolved the language to not use the word whereas the US kept it, unless it's just you have a lot more of that sort of thing flying or crawling around than we do.

We do. Wet and hot is a combination that leads to lots and lots of bugs, and we have both wet and hot in abundance. The UK has wet, but hot is conspicuously absent.

[factotum]

We do.

I know you do. What I don't know is if that's the reason that you still use the word "bug" whereas it's fallen out of use in the UK.

[An Enemy Spy]

I know you do. What I don't know is if that's the reason that you still use the word "bug" whereas it's fallen out of use in the UK.

Probably because Americans don't use the word "bugger", so calling something a bug doesn't make people snicker.