That the names translated accurately describes the presence or absence of bears is a coincidence.
Except it’s nothing to do with that and comes from the Arctic being marked by Ursa Minor & Major in the Northern sky, and Antarctica being the opposite of that.
So there’s no sky bears in Antarctica then?
We have enough with the interdimensional bears. You cant take a shit in piece in here.
Sure but it’s also convenient that there are also no bears in Antarctica or as it shouldve been named Terra Australus but the Australian got that, really should’ve flipped the names when we had the chance.
what would be latin based names for penguins an no penguins.
Soon we can call them both Antarctica
Aww, I was annoyed but overall cheerful, then I read this and now I’m just sad.
I guess you have at least simplified my emotional spectrum, so … Thanks?
Petition to make the names less confusing by renaming the top one to “Bear” and the bottom one to “Twink”.
“Top” and “Bottom”.
Are we still talking about poles?
~The answer is yes!~I want you to know I understand the genius of this
Oh nice you talk to yourself when in public? Me toooo 😃😎
Chat, is this true?
The arctic isn’t named after polar bears, but after the greek bear constellations which hold the north star. And the Antarctica is named after being the opposite of where the bear constellations are. It’s just a coincidence that the correct one has bears and the correct one doesn’t.
It’s still mind blowing, even if it is a coincidence.
You’re going to name constellations after things that you know well, so the fact that there are a lot of bears relative to other megafauna in northern regions means that in a way the original idea still holds, just not quite as basic.
Some constellations, including the Great Bear, were named long before our languages even existed.
Etymology wise we might say it comes from ancient Greek, but it’s also called Great Bear in languages that have no origin in Greek.
I’m going out on a limb here, but I believe the Great Bear is actually named after a great bear.
Not all cultures though. In Brazil, the Big Dipper is also known as “large anus of the snake”.
Essa eu não sabia. Isso vem de alguma língua indígena?
i don’t think names in other languages is great evidence, because they could just have adopted the same name regardless, since they presumably adopted the greek constellations as well.
Most cultures used to have their own almost entirely different constellations, the only stuff i think has some overlap is the really obvious simple ones like the southern cross.
The thing is that native American didn’t get the name from Greek, yet, it is still reference to a bear.
which cultures are we talking about here? i kinda don’t feel like going through every single set of native american constellations looking for ones that are bears…
It’s a cool coincidence, though.
I mean, come on. The region called after the constellation with the north star, which aids with finding where the north pole is, has polar bears. Nice!
kinda, not really
arctic, from ancient greek ἀρκτικός did mean “of the bear” originally, probably as a reference to the constellation (cause i don’t think the ancient greeks ever went to the arctic to confirm if there were bears or not)
antarctica doesn’t mean “no bears”, it means “the opposite of the arctic”
the truth is less fun, but i guess you could still view arctic as “bear place” and antarctica as “not the bear place” and that’s still kinda funny i think
What would the equivalent be for “penguins” and “no penguins”?
Linux / Windows
Pinkouinos / antipinkouinos ?
Pink wieners / anti pink wieners?
There used to be a penguin like animal in the north, the Auk. Hunted to extinction.
GREAT auk is called puinguinis, while penguins have various latin names.
Well, it* is about the only actual predator to the human species so we make a big deal out of it.
*polar bear specifically I mean
Salt water crocodiles absolutely will hunt humans.
The hiphopopotomuses have rhymes that are dangerous.
Ha, I think I have a name for the south area where the aquatic cousins of bears live.
Austral Aqua Artic.
It has a nice ring to it.
Oh, that one is true, didn’t think of them old lizards, they even study the behavioural patterns of animals on land iirc.
We could accidentally release some polar bears in Antarctica, guess they could survive there.
Idk are there seals there? Because that’s the bear’s thing, ambushing seals coming up through their ice holes in the ince flows.
The polar bears would be fine. The penguins would be in for quite a comeuppance
Because the last time someone introduced an invasive species to a completely different environment worked extremely well.
Regular visitors to Sharks would like a word.
Not intentional prey, not eating the whole thing, not stalking.
You might as well say cows then too, they kill more ppl.
It was a joke. You see, I was suggesting that a place with lots of sharks might be called “Shark”, in keeping with the point of the original post.
I am aware that most shark attacks are due to mistaken identity, but it wasn’t meant to be taken too seriously.
Perhaps the reason sharks came to mind before any other animals is because I read this article a couple of days ago: https://www.standard.co.uk/hp/front/surfer-bitten-in-half-7232230.html
It stands out because the way it was reported makes it sound like the sharks executed a coordinated attack on the surfer. But, again, I didn’t expect to get cross-examined on what I intended to be a humorous remark.
Oh, sorry! :)
I got the joke, but seeing sharks as predators to humans always makes me think of the exaggerated story from the sinking of Indianapolis (wiki/USS_Indianapolis_(CA-35)) with all manner of bs added for fun, and a subsequent money grab books & movie (wiki/Jaws_(film)) that shaped entire generation’s minds bcs fear is so easily monetised.
Imagine being a 400 million years old species & then getting anti-propaganda from a species that live in an environment you can’t even move in (and die quickly). And they dump toxic trash all over your environment. And have been killing you en masse since the day they could.Similar to how made-up stories & fairy tales helped kill off the wolves in Europe even before their unsustainable habitation shrinkage/separation of areas.
It’s like when I see a place named “Westmoreland” I’m like "Ok, so someone thought, “there’s more land west of where I was, and I’m not very creative”.
if you dig deep enough that’s what almost all place names are, and as stupid as it feels it’s a great way to make fantasy place names feel not stupid.
There are a series of cities on the northeastern coast of sweden that all lie near the mouth of a long river, and those cities are quite literally named [Name of the river valley]-stream, while the rivers themselves are named [Name of the river valley]-river. It’s so profoundly stupid and yet no one ever thinks about it at all.
Luleå, on Lule älv. Piteå, on Pite älv. Umeå, on Ume älv. Etc etc…It could be a bastardization of moorland, a type of shrubby biome similar to heath
Wait until you find out about Greenland and Iceland!
Give Greenland is mostly ice I’m actually curious to know where it’s name comes from
Supposedly, its and Iceland’s discoverers named them thus to trick potential future conquerors into going for the wrong one.
Or Newfoundland.
or New York
new york (2) final.docx
new york (2) final.docx
Lol. I would need several extra hands to count the number of times I’ve had people email me documents with filenames like
Copy of new york (2) REVISED-final(1).docxif you need some extra fingers, you can just ask AI to generate some for you ;-)
America wants them renamed the 52nd and 53rd states. 🙄
