Anyone who's a bit inquisitive about what words means will notice that "transform" means "changing shape", and that the teeth that look like dog fangs are called "canines". At that point, "caniformia" obviously means "dog-shaped".

Specialistic terms don't need to be easy for the layman, but to be explicative for the specialist. I can say that "a complete lattice is the generalisation of the power set of some domain" which is a phrase composed entirely of English words but if you haven't studied anything about abstract algebra you don't knkw what it means, but that is a phrase made for math students, not for any random guy.

Also those Latin terms are literally international terms, a Russian biologist will say "Canis lupus" to an Icelandic biologist and they will understand. So you really have nothing to complain about. Just be glad that Linnaeus used an agnostic language for international terminology instead of using his native language (Swedish) like the anglophones do.

P.s. you know that Mussolini had all commonly used foreign words and names translated to Italian? And to this day Italian children don't study Francis Bacon and René Descartes, but Francesco Bacone and Renato Cartesio.

[–] yetAnotherUser@discuss.tchncs.de 3 points 2 days ago (2 children)

I don't have an issue with using scientific names in scientific contexts if you intend to publish something international researchers should be able to parse. But just like maths, there is no problem in just... translating names? Imagine if you had to phrase sentences like: "The numerus realis make up a copia infinita." You'd have to translate Latin every time new studens would be taught because most mathematical terms convey a decent amount of information.

What I do have an issue with is using these terms anywhere outside of international contexts.

A doctor should not tell their patient they have a "humerus" fracture. In German they would take about the upper arm bone.

Or imagine if a doctor told you there is an infection in your digitus pedis. Fortunately English didn't replace the term "toes" with its scientific one... YET.

Hell, I could even apply this to doctor names in English which require a dictionary for anyone trying to parse them. I had to look up half of them by the way.

Children's Doctor <> Pediatrician

Women's Doctor <> Gynecologist

Tooth Doctor <> Dentist (the least bad in my opinion - at least it's short)

Eye Doctor <> Optometrist

Neck-Nose-Ear Doctor <> Otorhinolaryngologist (wtf???)

Skin Doctor <> Dermatologist

Like, surely there must have been (native) English terms for those doctors in the past. It's not like the medical field popped into existence in the 1700's. You can't tell me a 15th century English peasent used Latin/Greek derived names for common specialized doctors.

[–] zaphod@sopuli.xyz 6 points 2 days ago

Otorhinolaryngologist

Ot- => ear

rhin- => nose

laryng- => throat

or just ENT, I've heard that being used.

[–] partial_accumen@lemmy.world 6 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Eye Doctor <> Optometrist

Perfect example of why that is a bad approach. An Optometrist can measure your eyes for basic vision problems and monitor your retina issues, but you'd need an Ophthalmologist if you need surgery on those eyes for something the Optometrist finds.

[–] yetAnotherUser@discuss.tchncs.de 2 points 2 days ago

Optometrists/opticians aren't doctors over here though. They belong to the trades. This field doesn't exist in Germany the same way it does in the US/Britain:

Optometric tasks are performed by ophthalmologists and professionally trained and certified opticians.

Wikipedia

Eye doctors does actually refer to ophthalmologist though, I picked the "wrong" translation which ignores the differing legal frameworks. Looking back, I certainly went to the full blown ophthalmologist just for optometric purposes.