Tropical year/Talk

Karl, lets settle on a convention about Latin, Greek, English words. I think we should stick to whatever is current in English. If you start to Romanize or Hellenize English words, there is no end - anglosaxons completely screw up foreign words; e.g.:

equinox would be aequinox (equus = horse, aequus = equal (sic!))

Homer would be Homeros

Now the English word is perihelium, not perihelion; like the stuff is helium, not helion. -- Tompeters

This would be a good argument, except for the fact that it's "perihelion" in English. What dictionary are you using that says otherwise? --Zundark, 2001 Oct 25

OK, I screwed up -- Tompeters

Bad example: Helium ends in -ium because it was first found spectroscopically in the sun and they thought it was a metal: and metals get -ium or -um on the end e.g. Thorium, Hafnium, Aluminium, Neodymium, Molybdenum. If the naming convention for noble gases was followed strictly, Helium actually should be called Helion, though no-ones going to rename it at this late date - Malcolm Farmer

Thanx for pointing that out, I never noticed. Good to see someone writing Aluminium, americans usually say aluminum.