5 ms·
There's something great about physics and astronomy when it comes to naming things. What is it? An odd circle of radio waves. What are we going to call it? Wel
by mabbo 5y ago
There's something great about physics and astronomy when it comes to naming things.
What is it? An odd circle of radio waves. What are we going to call it? Well, if we call it an "odd radio circle" the initialization is the same as the monstrous bad guys from a classic fantasy novel.
ORCs it is then!
- wolverine876 5y agoAn hypothesis based on subjective experience: In the post-modern era (roughly 1945-20??) people were highly skeptical of their egos and of power, advertised humility, and consequently had a sense of humor about themselves and the world. Thus you get names like quark and Google. Now in the newly-born (reactionary?) era, ego is our God, and we get names like Uber. Physics perhaps hasn't quite joined the new era, yet.
- erdos4d 5y ago> Physics perhaps hasn't quite joined the new era, yet. I dunno, I've noticed that most physicists I've met have the "ego is God" vibe pretty well cooked in, and they will definitely let you know it.
- dddw 5y agoInteresting take. Might have something to do with the culture of science, which still adheres more to values like collaboration.
- wolverine876 5y agoAlso, the culture of science is inescapably post-modern. The new era aggressively rejects the Enlightenment bases of science such as the supremacy of fact, the weakness of subjectivity, resolving issues by reason, empowerment by our intellects, etc.
- beaconstudios 5y agoAs somebody who's interested in postmodern philosophy, I'm not sure I'd characterise it as being against reason or intellectual empowerment. It's primarily skeptical of metanarratives, like the idea of historical progress or the inevitable triumph of reason. The big one it expresses skepticism towards is the modernist project, but that doesn't mean a rejection of reason. After all, postmodern philosophy uses arguments from reasoning to make its case! Social constructivism and the like also aren't anti-facts or pro-subjectivity (assuming that's what you were implying, just a guess though) - it's about acknowledging which things we consider objectively true are actually only true by convention or tradition rather than being rooted in physical laws. Also how the human mind models knowledge and the relations between our models of reality and reality itself, so we don't mistake the map for the territory.
- wolverine876 5y ago> As somebody who's interested in postmodern philosophy, I'm not sure I'd characterise it as being against reason or intellectual empowerment. I agree completely! The "new era" to which I referred is not post-modernism, but what I describe as the current 'reactionary' era in my earlier post (the GGGP, beginning "An hypothesis ..."). Sorry if that was confusing.
- beaconstudios 5y agoUnderstood, and agreed :)
- wolverine876 5y agoSo what do you think? Are we in a new period after post-modernism? What would you call it? When and how did it start? I can't be the first to think it - by who and where is it talked about? Some humantities and social science academics I know disdain post-modernism, with all the scholarly reason and social momentum of being 'no longer cool' in high school - 'you're still wearing those shoes?'. I asked one, in front of their friend, about the post-modern person on whom they wrote their thesis. They changed the subject and then later told me quietly, 'I don't read that anymore'. For all the ridiculousness of that, it's serious business. Post-modernism contained the weapons and armor against fascism and other ideology, and we've disarmed ourselves. What do people intend to replace it with?
- fosk 5y agoIf you are referring to Uber the app, "Uber" had nothing to do with ego. The cab experience was poor, and the service was called UberCab to delineate a better cab experience. Cab++ if you wish. They got sued for using the word "cab" in "UberCab", and just shorted the name to "Uber".
- wolverine876 5y agoThe people who named it no doubt put much more thought into the name than we are, and I am confident they knew the implications of the word 'uber'; also, emember that it was founded by Travis Kalanick whose public actions seem to fit some of those implications. Also compare the word 'uber', however you interpret it, with words like 'google', 'yahoo', 'GNU', 'quark', 'charmed', 'C', 'C++', etc. Those have wit, humor, and disarm ego. (In fairess, maybe there are similarly witty names now that I'm not thinking of?)
- fosk 5y agoYou are overthinking this by a wide margin. UberCab was being used with the same meaning of “Ubercool”. And you are factually wrong: UberCab was created without Travis Kalanick, by Garrett Camp. Travis invested in UberCab 6 months later or so, and he became CEO as part of the deal. Do your research please.
- nfoz 5y agoIs that not ego? "We're better than a cab". It would be ego-less if they called it CabApp or something.
- teknopaul 5y ago"We are paying less tax and insurance than a cab" All the other cabapp names are egoless
- bqmjjx0kac 5y agoWeTriedOurBestAndHopeWeDidBetterThanRegularCabs™
- usefulcat 5y agoInteresting, although I think your hypothesis would benefit from additional examples. It’s way too easy to cherry pick with a sample size of 2.
- teknopaul 5y agoI'd like to think Uber is an uncommon example of hubris by a bad actor. Lift, Cabify and Freenow are slightly more down to earth ;)
- wolverine876 5y agoTheranos? Elon Musk? Silicon Valley and IT are full of hubris-based actors, successful or not.
- teknopaul 5y agoLinus invented Git, one can repent ;)
- ptsneves 5y agoYeah, ironically when i think of Uber, i think of Ubermenschen, which featured prominently in Nazi propaganda[1], so 1940s. So much for ego being a new thing and cherry picking how in olden times things were better. Even so, your thesis was falsifiable which makes it good in my book :) [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%9Cbermensch#Use_by_the_Nazis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%9Cbermensch#Use_by_the_Naz...
- wolverine876 5y agoThat's what I think of too. > So much for ego being a new thing and cherry picking how in olden times things were better. I never said ego was a new thing, or that all of history was better. In fact, I chose the post-war period - whose culture, I would guess, was partly a reaction to the fascist ideology (or any ideology).
- the_snooze 5y agoMy favorite one of those is "Hanny's Voorwerp," discovered by a Dutch woman named Hanny, and "voorwerp" just means "object." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanny%27s_Voorwerp https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanny%27s_Voorwerp
- Cthulhu_ 5y agoor the Bloop [0], a mysterious underwater sound that I guess sounded like bloop. Similar: The Ping [1], The Hum [2]. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bloop https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bloop [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fury_and_Hecla_Strait#%22The_Ping%22 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fury_and_Hecla_Strait#%22The_P... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hum https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hum
- beaconstudios 5y agoContinuing the thread, my favourites are the sequence of telescopes named "very large telescope", "extremely large telescope" and "overwhelmingly large telescope"! https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Very_Large_Telescope https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Very_Large_Telescope https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extremely_Large_Telescope https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extremely_Large_Telescope https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overwhelmingly_Large_Telescope https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overwhelmingly_Large_Telesco...
- captn3m0 5y agoSome other cool uses of adjectives: - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Attractor https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Attractor - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_matter https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_matter - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Large_Magellanic_Cloud https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Large_Magellanic_Cloud - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Small_Magellanic_Cloud https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Small_Magellanic_Cloud - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_hole https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_hole - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giant_Void https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giant_Void - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Local_Void https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Local_Void - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Nothing https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Nothing - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supermassive_black_hole https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supermassive_black_hole
- SkeuomorphicBee 5y agoThere is also plenty of bad names in physics, the "colour charge" and all other colour related names in quantum chromodynamics would be a very notable example.
- taneq 5y agoMedicine is the same but they do it in Latin so that plebs don't know they're actually using Buffyspeak.
- ravel-bar-foo 5y agoThis can be really annoying. I went into an ENT for an ear infection. Doctor looks at me really seriously and tells me I have "otitis media". I look it up. It's just latin for "ear infection". That's nice, but I came in to learn what to do about it.
- scgtrp 5y agoI have idiopathic hypersomnia, or "you're more sleepy than you should be, idk why".
- taneq 5y agoI blew up my knee in a motorbike incident, turning my ACL into a puddle of goo in the process. Imagine how impressed I was when after two minutes of research I found out "Ante-cruciate ligament" is "Back-crossy tying thing."
- ncmncm 5y ago"Front-crossy tying thing", anyway. A back-crossy tying thing would be "post-etc." Anyway everything needs a name.
- ncmncm 5y ago"Middle-ear infection". So, more specific than just ear infection. But the same number of syllables as "otitis media". But when you say the latter, you are not only saying you know what it is, but hinting you know what to do about it. (Which you might not.)