In article ,
Stuart wrote:
It was in use long before anybody with or without a geology degree had
heard of the word tsunami in UK.

At primary school more than 20 years ago I was taught the difference between
a tsunami and a tidal wave. To say they're interchangeable smacks of dumbing
down to me.

Assuming that English words have unique meanings, irrespective of
context, is the result of being exposed only to dumbed-down teaching.
Assuming that a self-selected cabal has the right to define the
meaning of words is either ignorance or arrogance.

You get a very good example of this in statistics. People with a
minimal exposure (e.g. "Statistics for geologists") often get on
their high horses about correlation being used for non-linear
association. More qualified and experiences statisticians don't.
We know that every field uses words differently, and that normal
English usage is not scientific usage.

Confusing the two is like calling a spider an insect or am astronomer an
astrologer. Ok, plenty people make the mistake, but that doesn't make it
right.

Insect (1589). An animal with its body divided into segments (from
animalia insecta).

Its original meaning and one of its two main standard meanings in
normal English includes essentially all of the arthropoda. Zoologists
use it to refer to the insecta alone (e.g. not including the
arachnida), but would have done better to follow the botanists and
stick with Latin for such precise use, to avoid ambiguity.


Regards,
Nick Maclaren.