
Naming Names
Constant Wonder - Season 2022, Episode 430
- Apr 14, 2020 6:00 am
- 51:01
What's In a Name? Guest: Stephen B. Heard, Professor, Biology, University of New Brunswick, and author, “Charles Darwin’s Barnacle and David Bowie’s Spider: How Scientific Names Celebrate Adventurers, Heroes, and Even a Few Scoundrels” From Spongiforma Squarepantsii to Heteropoda davidbowie, scientists sometimes have a bit of fun naming the creatures they discover. But some researchers have tried to embarrass their rivals by incorporating insults into naming conventions. There's a story behind every name, and we'll get a few of the good ones. Not All Fun and Names (But Quite a Bit More Than You'd Think) Guest: Gareth Williams, Astronomer, Harvard Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, and Secretary, International Astronomical Union’s Working Group for Small Body Nomenclature Did you know that there’s a committee that gets together just to name things we discover in space? Asteroids like one named after David Bowie, another after Jimi Hendrix, and another named after a cat itself named after Mr. Spock. Just a few of the thousands of creatively named things in space. Family Names Guest: Sam Payne, host, "The Apple Seed," BYUradio Sam Payne shares the stories behind many family names around the world and what they mean.