apparently tortoises are squares

[kaberett]

Or, I have been living a lie???

A source of ongoing irritation to me, when it comes up, which is more often than you might think unless you too learn languages as a hobby, is sloppiness around the distinction between "turtle" and "tortoise". At some point (possibly I have a vague sense-memory of a school trip and informative shields?) I gained the conviction that turtles are largely aquatic and have flippers, whereas tortoises are terrestrial and have pondersome feet. Thus I was Indignant when e.g. Duolingo insisted on translating everything as "turtle", and refused to give me words for tortoise as well.

... at some point in the last couple of weeks I finally looked this up, and have been reeling ever since (I exaggerate for comic effect, naturally) over the revelation that all tortoises are turtles, in the same way that all squares are rectangles.

I am looking forward to regaining my equilibrium...

Comments

[forests_of_fire]

whaaaa?

This is news to me, too!

[(Anonymous)]

I think this is dialect specific; yes, I can see the turtle as overarching title thing, but also, when people with my dialect have been continuously using 'tortoise on land, turtle in salt water, terrapin in fresh water' for generations, I think that means that that is an actual distinction in my dialect even though other dialects don't have that distinction.

Perhaps this is an argument in favour of descriptive language over proscriptive, but at this stage in my life I'm happy with that, too.

[ghoti_mhic_uait]

Sorry, that was me and I didn't notice I'd got logged out.

[kaberett]

That's also what I'd been used to but it's not, apparently, how the taxonomy works!

ETA which I care about because I also care about the distinction of lack thereof in other languages - so for me, for this purpose, the taxonomy is actually relevant!

[ghoti_mhic_uait]

Ah yes, that makes sense. I went the opposite way, and thought that I should change my words when I learned the taxonomy, but then decided that that's silly because that's not how languages work.

[kaberett]

I'm unlikely to change my casual use in English (which as you say is dialectically well-established), but I might now experience less irritation when other people exhibit different usage norms!

[ghoti_mhic_uait]

Always a good outcome :)

[fyreharper]

Ooh, I didn’t realize there was also a different word for freshwater turtles! I am used to all the water/swimmy ones being turtles!

[davidgillon]

Taking a long time to get there, but triumphing in the end, is entirely consistent with The Tortoise and the Hare!

[sfred]

I got this a few years ago but was equally thrown!

[mdlbear]

I knew that, but learned just today (when I looked it up) that terrapins are freshwater turtles.

[rmc28]

I did not know this! We are part of today's lucky 10,000!

I too was getting annoyed that everything was turtles in Duolingo, but ... it really is turtles all the way down in every language.

[kaberett]

APPARENTLY SO.

Like! The German word I knew for tortoise is, it transpires (thank you multilingual Wikipedia), ACTUALLY THE WORD FOR TURTLE. :|

[rmc28]

BETRAYAL!

[lnr]

Shield toad, iirc?

[kaberett]

Yep! And tortoises are Landschildkroten.

mice and rats don't exist

[vass]

I thought the same as you about turtles and tortoises. Apparently the definition... moved.

There's a similar issue with mice and rats, re not every language having two different words; except that it's less "mice (or rats) are squares" and more "mice and rats don't even exist": there are individual species but not two discrete categories or even one subcategory of a larger category."

Re: mice and rats don't exist

[kaberett]

....... fantastic I am delighted

Re: mice and rats don't exist

[momijizukamori]

Yeah in Japanese mice and rats are all ネズミ/鼠 (nezumi).

[lnr]

So tortoises and terrapins are both subsets of turtles? Gah, I too have always felt it was something of an Americanism to call a tortoise a turtle! (I am used to Duo being somewhat American though)

[kaberett]

THIS WAS EXACTLY MY THOUGHT PROCESS AND BELIEF-SET YES.

[recessional]

Oh no. Oh I did not realize you did not know this.

It's not exactly the same as pigeons/doves or crows/ravens, but similar (there is no consistent, reliable differentiation, just Vibes, and there is as much different between different species we call "crow" as there is between any given crow and any given raven species, ditto pigeons . . .).

[kaberett]

:(((

[momijizukamori]

Yeah was gonna say, the pigeon/dove distinction is basically vibes XD They're all the same taxonomic family and individual species common names are all vibes.

(Crows and ravens are down to the same genus, heh)

[silveradept]

Oh, no, another casualty of cladistics?

I had the understanding that turtles were sea entities and tortoises were land entities (and now I have learned about terrapins), but apparently, it's sea turtle, land turtle, lake turtle. Fascinating.

[fyreharper]

THEY WHAT

[lokifan]

!!!!!!!!!!!