Hello to all,
especially Carl and Bob.
In 1990 the International Union of Pure and
Applied
Chemistry, the supreme international professional organisation of
chemists that
operates under the umbrella of UNESCO, published a list of standard
names for
all chemical elements. They decided that element 16 should be spelt
“sulfur”. This
was not an Americanisation but a compromise to ensure that in future
searchable
data bases would not be complicated by spelling variants. Other
determinations
included using “aluminium” rather than the American “aluminum” and
"sodium"
rather than the more logical German “naterium”. Worldwide the IUPAC
nomenclature is being gradually adopted. Even in Britain
chemistry examiners are now changing to using the IUPAC terminology.
The problem facing the Birding Community is to
what extent
we go along with changes made to make information manipulation easier
and more
accurate. When we have an animal with a crest colored remarkably
similar to the
color of element 16 in its solid state should it be called
“sulfur-crested” to
be consistent with standard recommended practice or should we be
fuddy-duddies
and insist on “sulphur-crested” despite its anachronistic origins and
complications
in information searching. It is true that HANZAB, Birds Australia and
all the
field guides currently prefer “sulphur-crested” but this does not
necessarily
mean that we should use this for all time. Should the spelling of an
adjective
be consistent with the correct spelling of the noun from which it is
derived? Perhaps
it is time to revisit the nomenclature of Australian bird names.
Thanks to Carl for his excellent trip report and
to Bob for
opening this debate. Anne, my partner, thinks that I am being a
pedantic old
fart in raising this point but I feel that William of Ockham was right
when he proposed
the principle that we should always avoid unnecessary complications. We
should
make it as easy as possible for people to learn to use English and to
teach the
use of English.
Meanwhile back to birding. A flock of
sulfur-crested cockatoos
flew silently over our house last week. Does anyone know why sometimes
they are
raucous and at other times silent?
Jim Smart
East Maitland
NSW