"Argumenta Meliora Requirunt"
"They Need Better Arguments"

You know, I find it hilarious that the people who say that octopi and platypi are wrong because "they are Greek words with a Latin termination" tend to be the same people who say, in the same breath, that the names Octopoda and Platypoda are a-okay, despite being, you know, Greek words with ( Read more... )

"Omnia Meliora..."
"Everything's Better..."

I found this today:

Everything's Better With Platypi

Much like Monkeys, Penguins and Pandas, the duck-billed platypus has achieved a certain level of popularity.

But this was weird:

Plus, if you want to talk about them in the plural, expect to confound linguists until the end of time. Is it Platypusses ( Read more... )

"Octopus et Fowler"
"Octopus and Fowler"

I bought a used copy of Fowler's Modern English Usage, Second Edition (Revised by Sir Ernest Gowers) a few days ago. As you can imagine, I am overall happy with this book. And, naturally, I looked up octopus and some other words:

octopus. Pl. -uses; -pi is wrong and -podes pedantic.

platypus. Pl. puses ( Read more... )

"Multum Nugarum"
"A Lot of Nonsense"

Yeah, from this page of the book Subtleties of Scientific Style By Matthew Stevens:

I see this often on the Internet. The plural of the English word virus is viruses. The plural of the Latin word virus (for slime), viri, was virtually never used by anyone in ancient Rome
It would not have been used because it ( Read more... )