If 90% of the population call them seagulls, and 99% of the population understand what you mean when you say “seagull”, then yes, they are actually called seagulls
It’s like what I say to bother botanists:
If half of the fruits with “berry” in their name don’t fit your definition of berry, you need a new definition
Pretty sure botanists are aware that the same word can have different meaning outside of their scientific field. The people actually bothered by this are pedants who read about it on the internet, not people who studied botany.
A slight distinction:
The people actually bothered by this are the friends of pedants who read about it on the internet, not people who studied botany.
The pedants aren’t bothered, they’re elated they get to display faux superiority, I’m the one bothered by them!
Lol
Well, no, there’s nothing wrong with the definition of berry, but there would be something wrong about a botanist being annoyed with someone using the colloquial definition of berry.
What if I told you that words can have different meanings in different contexts? Just because the same word can be used to refer to different things depending on whether its used in everyday or scientific speech doesn’t mean either usage is “wrong”.
Context specific definitions are the bane of my autistic existence. Figuring out context is a waste of brainpower that could be better used having anxiety over situations that aren’t going to happen.
/Completely serious, but not quite as strongly as worded here.
So I take it no one should mention that in astrophysics anything heavier than helium is a metal
Yeah well, people aren’t computers and language always has multiple levels of ambiguity. I understand if that is difficult to grasp if you can’t understand it on an intuitive level like most people. On the other hand it’s not that hard to understand on an intellectual level.
Doesn’t change that it was a bad idea to borrow a generic term for small sweet fruits to refer to a specific botanical feature. Not just bad, but completely unnecessary and frankly, simply, a bit stupid.
Annoy naturalists with these other animal names too: Jellyfish, crawfish, starfish, Killer Whale, Canadian Geese, and American Buffalo.
The buffalo thing pisses me off the most. Entire cultures are defined by that animal and it’s incredibly significant to the history of the prairies and the continent as a whole. So it seems to me pretty disrespectful to go to these people and go “um actually what you’ve been calling this animal for centuries is wrong actually because Linnaeus or whatever”
Canada Goose
Killer whale is orca which is a predatory whale.
Crawdads. Tasty with some hot sauce.
wtf who’s beefing with starfish
Me
Brainless idjuts
Typical customer service annoyant?
Should we add an exception when it comes to technical discussions?
If you’re an ornithologist writing a scientific paper, you’d presumably be using a genus + species in Latin rather than any colloquial name anyway, while still acknowledging that they fall under the umbrella term “seagull” for most people. But I’m a descriptive linguist, rather than prescriptive, and that’s really what this meme is about (it’s not about seagulls)
Birds actually have scientific common names and it’s completely acceptable to refer to them with those names. They even have standardized bird abbreviations using those names, like Red-tailed Hawk is RTHA. They of course use the latin names too, and those have their own abbreviations (Buteo jamaicensis is BUTJAM) but the common names are handier.
Here’s the thing. You said a “jackdaw is a crow.”
Is it in the same family? Yes. No one’s arguing that.
As someone who is a scientist who studies crows, I am telling you, specifically, in science, no one calls jackdaws crows. If you want to be “specific” like you said, then you shouldn’t either. They’re not the same thing.
If you’re saying “crow family” you’re referring to the taxonomic grouping of Corvidae, which includes things from nutcrackers to blue jays to ravens.
So your reasoning for calling a jackdaw a crow is because random people “call the black ones crows?” Let’s get grackles and blackbirds in there, then, too.
Also, calling someone a human or an ape? It’s not one or the other, that’s not how taxonomy works. They’re both. A jackdaw is a jackdaw and a member of the crow family. But that’s not what you said. You said a jackdaw is a crow, which is not true unless you’re okay with calling all members of the crow family crows, which means you’d call blue jays, ravens, and other birds crows, too. Which you said you don’t.
It’s okay to just admit you’re wrong, you know?
Noooo then how are we going to get memes like this?
I enjoy having semi-serious discussions about nonsense like this, so I appreciate RubberElectron’s reply calling me out
The very first line of the Wikipedia entry on Gull says: "Gulls, or colloquially seagulls, are seabirds of the family Laridae in the suborder Lari. ". Colloquially speaking all gulls are seagulls.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gull
The entry lists 54 species of Gull, and indeed from a pedantic perspective, none of their common names are “seagull”. Nor are any of their binomial names Latin for “seagull”. But there is Larus pacificus, either very calm or associated with the ocean of the same name. Also there is Larus atlanticus, and Larus Marinus (pretty dang close).
I’d just like to interject for a moment. What you’re refering to as a Gull, is in fact, Sea/Gull, or as I’ve recently taken to calling it, Sea plus Gull. Gull is not an categorization unto itself, but rather another component of a full identity made useful by the kingdom, phylum, class, order, family, genus, and species components comprising a full identification as defined by its scientific classification.
LOL, now do the Navy Gulls copypasta or “here’s the thing…”
Something something jackgull
My fellow citizens, we got him.
In Swedish Larus Marinus is called “Havstrut” which would translate to Seagull but I guess that doesn’t count.
It counts for me! But we need something objective, this is SCIENCE after all. A question, when the Swedish Larus marinus, a.k.a. Havstrut walks, what does it look like? I think you see where I’m going with this, is there a bit of a swagger? Does L. marinus have strut?
I really don’t understand what the point of the distinction is. It’s not like there’s something else which is a seagull but not a gull. Seagull is just another word for the same bird… Or am I missing something?
My whole point of posting was to point out how inane, and pedantic the distinction between Gull and Seagull actually is, which is the distinction that OP made. And of course on the Fediverse that generated a whole lot of conversation, including this sentence.
There are weirdly rigid common names around birds. There is a whole thing about renaming them right now. They are essentially regulated terms that low level pedants respect. They are the same types of people who would correct you for calling Frankenstein’s monster ‘Frankenstein’.
The plant community is better. You could call a “sunflower” a “tall flower” and nobody would care. You might get a “oh, I’ve never heard that one” but never “there’s no such thing as a ‘tall flower.’” They just fall back to the scientific names when clarity is important.
IMO common names should just be useful. I will call any gull a seagull when talking to non-bird people because that is a term that is commonly understood and how effective communication works.
I understand the need for having one particular defined name for a species, honestly. That makes some sense to me. But just because taxonomically a bird is not called a seagull doesn’t mean that it is not a seagull. Otherwise what is a seagull? There is no bird that has the ‘official’ name “seagull”. So what, seagulls don’t exist? It’s a semantic distinction that is meaningless outside of its narrow context.
I absolutely agree that there should be a official name. My problem with birds is that there are 2 official names. The American Ornithological Society approves both of them (kind of). One is Latin/Greek/whatever in Genus species format - that is the one for science literature and taxonomy. The other is in English and silly in my opinion because that’s where people will use it to say nonsense like there is no such thing as a seagull.
Wikipedia on Larus marinus, or the great black-backed gull:
The scientific name is from Latin. Larus appears to have referred to a gull or other large seabird. The specific name marinus means “marine”, or when taken together, “sea gull”.
If that’s not a seagull I don’t know what is.
LoL, indeed it’s not tho’, it’s the Great Black-Backed Gull. Damn those taxonomists!!!
Yeah but like, my dog is a dog but it’s also a Labrador and also has a name. The great black-backed gull is also known as Larus marinus which means sea gull, and is also commonly referred to as a seagull. By what notion is that not a seagull?
By the simple minded notion of my sense of humor. ;-) Any more hares you’d like to split?
If we split a hare we’ll both go hungry cause hares are small and I’m vegetarian
Wow who said anything about eating it? You display it on the mantelpiece.
50 species of gulls and every last one of them is a cunt.
Fucking love seagulls. Grew up at the beach, gulls everywhere. They used to dig in our trash cans and we had to put heavy weights on the lids. Still fucking love em. They’re awesome, amazing trash birds who give zero fucks. I have seen gulls fully steal food from people’s mouths. I’ve seen them sit on windshields and refuse to move so you can drive, including just allowing the wipers to fwap into them repeatedly.
Seagulls aren’t cunts. Seagulls serve cunt, and I love them for it.
They most certainly are not. Make friends with one and they will bring you presents. https://lemmings.world/post/14253921
I’ve seen a gull eat a dead pigeon in the town square. I don’t think I want their presents any more than the ones my cats think I do.
Gulls have to eat.
Achkchually, a pineapple is neither a pine, nor an apple.
It’s actually an ananananas.
Je suis un ananas
Bonjour, allô, salut!
Sure, but ananananas-pen doesn’t have quite the same ring now does it?
Do dooo do do do,
ananananas,
Do do do do
Why does a seagull fly over the sea?
Because if they flew over the bay they would be bagels!
This joke echoes in my brain thanks to this one PBS commercial break snippet from my childhood. You’re welcome
I heard this joke for the first time a few weeks back on an episode of The Penguin. :D
That anon’s name? Steven Seagullible
From my experience, they’re “Hanging around outside the chip shop” gulls.
No one actually loves seagulls, but that’s got nothing to do with the fact there is no seagull.
I wonder if seagulls experience love, they’d be the most likely candidates. Hmm…
Oh hey flying vermin.
Now I know this, I will be crying every time I go to the ocean
