Re: Elks (was Re: The absurdity, the absurdity...)

[The Armadillo with the Mask <armadilo@daft.com>]

On Thu, 9 Apr 1998, Chris Campbell wrote:

> Thomas R. Holtz, Jr. wrote:
> > So we have Europeans in Europe calling the big marsh deer "elk", and
> > European colonists in North America calling it "moose" and calling a
> > different animal "elk".
> > 
> > It is because of problems like this that Linneaus and co. proposed a
> > standardized system of names for the organisms of the world.
> > 
> > (Incidentally, the big marsh deer (elk or moose) is technically _Alces
> > alces_, and the North American elk (wapiti) is generally called _Cervus
> > canadensis_).

Don't forget the widely dispersed group of Europeans and European
colonists in N.A. who also refer to a particular version of the Scheme
programming language as "Elk". :)

> 
> Thanks for the clarification.  I think, perhaps, that I'll just excise
> the term "elk" from my vocabulary and be done with it.  :)

You might want to consider doing the same for awk,yacc,bison,python... :)

----Steve