Tell us why we should unexpectedly come to love your hobby.

  • Zagorath
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    231 year ago

    Maybe you were just deliberately baiting for this, but no!

    Helicopter’s etymology actually breaks down into helico and pter. Helico being cognate with helix, and pter being “flying”, from the same root as pterodactyl (flying finger).

    • sadbehr
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      51 year ago

      Super interesting.

      Does that mean that we’re pronouncing either helicopter or pterodactyl wrong? We don’t say the ‘pter’ parts the same way I think?

      • @[email protected]
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        1 year ago

        nah there’s no “wrong” for a common native pronunciation. but for silent p- words specifically, the /pt/ and /ps/ consonant clusters just don’t occur at the start of words in English. so the p goes silent in those words. pterodactyl, psychology. but in languages like Greek and German they do occur!

      • @SeabassDan
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        21 year ago

        Depends on whether the o is before the p or after the r.