Many plant names are offensive: botanists will vote on whether to change them
Many plant names are offensive: botanists will vote on whether to change them
Researchers at an international meeting will also consider how to monitor names that have problematic roots.
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The Audobon Society recently started working on doing the same thing for birds. As with that, this is likely only changing the common names, not scientific names, as that is a much bigger deal since those are used worldwide by the science community.
To argue that changing the names is some big ordeal, these things already have a different name in every language anyway. Scientific names also get changed when necessary, especially now that DNA testing is prevalent. We learn things aren't related to what we thought, and it changes what we know about evolution diversity, and taxonomy, which is a much bigger deal. Do you want updated scientific facts and names or is what you used to know from year ago good enough? Changing the informal name is no bigger of a deal than if a product changes brand names.
Some of the people these plants and animals named after are horrible people that exploited native people and their homelands with no regard to anything beyond their own personal fame. Graverobbers like Verreaux and racists like Blakiston didn't discover anything, they cataloged it with a colonial power. Language evolves as we advance, and this is a natural part of our development as a society.
To see the reactions in the comments here is really disappointing for a science oriented community.
Ah yes, the Great Tit. Yes, that's an real bird species.
The Great Tit, the Woodcock, and the Blue Footed Booby are safe. It's largely things named after some people that really don't deserve to be remembered in a positive regard. Cornell and Audobon are both in favor of it, though Audobon has not committed to changing their name. Audobon traded slaves to help finance his work, hence the call to change the name.
Useful information.