• Question: Why are a lot of scientific words long difficult to say Latin words?

    Asked by Adiboo to Andy, Duane, Giovanna, Katie, Theresia on 11 Nov 2014.
    • Photo: Giovanna Bermano

      Giovanna Bermano answered on 11 Nov 2014:

      We need to remember that science goes back a long while and Greeks and Romans were doing science then…so some words have originated then and we still use them now. In Italy, we study Latin if we decide to do science…..I am still debating if it is plus or not!!!!! I was not very good at it!!!!!

    • Photo: Duane Mellor

      Duane Mellor answered on 11 Nov 2014:

      I agree they are difficult to say, as Giovanna said this is because of the origins of science in Ancient Greece and Rome. I learnt that breaking them up can help and learning what the parts mean, so hyper – means high, glyc – means glucose (sugar) and aemia – means blood so hyperglycaemia means high blood glucose. If you know that you can change it to hypo- meaning low and eu- meaning true, normal or same

    • Photo: Andrew Philp

      Andrew Philp answered on 11 Nov 2014:

      There are a lot aren’t there!! It normally goes back to who discovered the thing in question, or something about the properties of that thing that makes it distinct. As Giovanna and Duane mention, Scientific discovery has been around for a LONG time, so a lot of what we know today has been passed down from civilisations and generations in which latin was commonplace.

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