Disputatio:Felis mutationes geneticae de corpore extero

Zygo

Zygoticus (adj, English zygotic) is attested in Nomina Anatomica (1989) as Nucleus zygoticus. Zygositas (n, zygosity, the zygotic quality) is not attested, but seems to fits the pattern. And then there is English zygote (n, from Greek ζυγωτός zygōtos) so would that become zygotus? Or would it be zygota because a zygote is a cell (cellula)? --Robert.Baruch 16:34, 25 Aprilis 2010 (UTC)

I have zygota attested in Botanika notiser Vol 131 (1878). --Robert.Baruch 16:40, 25 Aprilis 2010 (UTC)

Alterna forma geni

= Alernate form of a gene, i.e. an allele. Allele is a shortening of the original allelo-morph (Greek αλληλος allelos, meaning each other + Greek morphe meaning shape or form). I have no idea how this could be rendered into Latin other than by circumlocution. Allela? Allelum (taking the neuter because of genum)? --Robert.Baruch 20:08, 25 Aprilis 2010 (UTC)

Yes, I would go with allelum as an nominalized adjective. Pantocrator 20:16, 25 Aprilis 2010 (UTC)

I don't know if it's a good idea to carry over the English need to abbreviate everything. The Greek is still apparently αλληλόμορφο γονίδιο (= genum *allelomorphum), or possibly αλλήλιο (= *allelium). —Mucius Tever 20:47, 25 Aprilis 2010 (UTC)

Yeah, I agree, it's a very English thing to do. Case in point, I was looking to find something short in Latin for "cat scratch fever", but when I discovered that the French phrase is "fever from the scratch of a cat", I figured that if it's good enough for Paris, it's good enough for Rome! ;) Most other languages just use both allelomorph or allel stuffed into their own orthographic conventions. Perhaps allele, undeclinable, would work. Now, if we could dig up a whole bunch of examples where an -ele ending is converted consistently into some Latin ending, that might work as well. --Robert.Baruch 01:19, 26 Aprilis 2010 (UTC)

I believe the Greeks use the longer phrase because allelos is still a regular adjective for them (at least in classical Greek which they use for all their scientific terms). Since it is a 1st/2nd declension adjective, it shouldn't be made indeclinable unless you're treating it as an English loanword, which doesn't really make sense in my opinion. From the Greek stem, it has to be allelum or allelon if you prefer Greek endings. Pantocrator 01:31, 26 Aprilis 2010 (UTC)

According to Merriam-Webster, English has taken allele from German Allel, so let's not blame the English. IacobusAmor 12:44, 26 Aprilis 2010 (UTC)

Still, if you were going to borrow the Greek word, you may as well borrow the Greek word—thus 'allelium'. —Mucius Tever 03:44, 26 Aprilis 2010 (UTC)

There is no authority in Latin for such a modification and that Greek word is modern, not classical. Pantocrator 10:11, 26 Aprilis 2010 (UTC)

The "modification" is the ordinary Greek diminutive, which does have Latin precedent, e.g. in Pallas > Palladium. 'Allelum', as described below, is not classical either. Mind you, I'm not proposing the term be used here; this discussion is purely academic as without a source there's no inventing a Latin form, per VP:NF. (Of course it could be argued that the benefit of the actual Greek word, is that it is both declinable [thus convenient] and not Latin [thus NF-compliant]...) —Mucius Tever 00:12, 27 Aprilis 2010 (UTC)

Borrowing a Greek word is no less fingere than borrowing from the English or German. If no one has ever talked about a concept in Latin before, we have to invent something for it. Pantocrator 02:46, 27 Aprilis 2010 (UTC)

No, we don't. Creating a vocabulary word for a concept is a convenience, not a necessity. —Mucius Tever 21:12, 27 Aprilis 2010 (UTC)

Yes, it is a loophole I intend to exploit vigorously, even if the words aren't actually Greek words, but only derived from Greek roots :) --Robert.Baruch 02:23, 27 Aprilis 2010 (UTC)

I have no knowledge of Greek. Would you be so kind as to expand on the reasoning behind Latinizing αλληλος to allelum? --Robert.Baruch 13:53, 26 Aprilis 2010 (UTC)

Sure. Greek works just like Latin here. Allelos is an adjective of the first and second declensions, as if allelus, -a, -um in Latin. When adjectives are made substantive, the neuter gender is usually the default, especially when the implied noun (genum) is neuter here. Pantocrator 22:39, 26 Aprilis 2010 (UTC)

That's right. And "allelium" proposed above comes from the Ancient Greek diminutive suffix -ion which, in Modern Greek, functions as a nominalising suffix. Allelum looks good enough for our purposes. --Neander 23:54, 26 Aprilis 2010 (UTC)

The Greek doesn't work like the Latin here, though. For this word the nominative appears to be lacking, so the series 'allelus, -a, -um' has no precedent[1]; dictionaries place the headword under the genitive plural. Where αλληλος does appear is in compounds ending in -άλληλος, such as ἐπάλληλος "one after another", φιλάλληλος "fond of each other" (but these are not normally adjectives of the first and second declensions — they have second declension forms only, like 'ἔκκεντρος, -ον' [which is likewise 'eccentros, -on' in Latin]. The outcome is perhaps the same...) but even so, using a word with a basic meaning like "each other" directly for 'allele' is quite strange. (In the one case I know of such a borrowing happening, neon, the Latin form at least directly matches the putative Greek [στοιχειον] νεον "new [element]"; using 'allelon' for a word short for 'allelomorph' would be kind of like proposing 'hippus' for 'ιπποποταμος'.) —Mucius Tever 00:12, 27 Aprilis 2010 (UTC)

Well, granted. So what would the Latin look like if we were not shortening allelomorph? --Robert.Baruch 02:20, 27 Aprilis 2010 (UTC)

αλληλόμορφο = *allelomorphum (with or without genum). —Mucius Tever 21:12, 27 Aprilis 2010 (UTC)

Title

Why not the shorter Mutationes geneticae felium? The generis corporalis seems unnecessary and confusing; and if it is intended to mean a particular type of mutations, the ones that affect the visible body, I don't think that's advisable either as we should hardly have separate articles on other types of cat mutations. Pantocrator 02:49, 27 Aprilis 2010 (UTC)

I'm following the English wikipedia, which has separate articles on mutations of body type, and of coats. I believe that Wiki provides guidelines on how long an article should be, and combining the two would go over that limit. --Robert.Baruch 13:59, 27 Aprilis 2010 (UTC)

OK, now I see that you've added the interwiki. Still, I've moved it to a better title, especially about word order. In titles, the head should almost always come first, which is normally a substantive, but not here. Pantocrator 02:41, 1 Maii 2010 (UTC)

The new title does not disambiguate the two types of pages discussed above because it does not have the word 'genus' in it. I also don't see what was confusing in the old title at all. In addition the article does not start with the lemma.--24.107.235.195 07:07, 1 Maii 2010 (UTC)

Felis mutationes geneticae de corpore extero = 'A cat's genetic changes from the outer body'. Felis mutationes geneticae is not the best order for those (three) words. Bradley's Arnold, introduction, #85. The change may have been a disimprovement. IacobusAmor 09:27, 1 Maii 2010 (UTC)

I should defend my name. The word order may not be the most elegant, but it is the most logical, and title should have the more logical order, to make it easier to find stuff, and for consistency. Felis comes first, being the head in my opinion even though it is a genitive. Mutationes geneticae again has head-first order. Finally, de corpore extero is exactly what the vague English 'body type' in trying to say - we're not literally taking about types of bodies, but of mutations that affect the visible form of the body. So the most literal translation of my title is 'The cat's genetic mutations concerning the external body'. I admit that the first three words may better be Mutationes geneticae felis or felium, putting mutationes as the head. Pantocrator 10:25, 1 Maii 2010 (UTC)

For prose, that's still not the best order (Bradley's Arnold, introduction, #85); however, one might allow a special dispensation for the titles of things, especially when two of the words are a set phrase, repeated in numerous parallel articles, and the other word is variable, as in Categoria:Historia naturalis Mexici (instead of the more usual order in that syntax). Is felis mutatio a set phrase? IacobusAmor 11:04, 1 Maii 2010 (UTC)

The set phrase, of course, is mutationes geneticae which we'll want to use in many articles. I'm not sure if your proposed word order actually is that universal; in any case, not enough to assert that other orders are wrong. Pantocrator 11:32, 1 Maii 2010 (UTC)

The caution was Bradley's Arnold's, not mine. IacobusAmor 20:16, 2 Maii 2010 (UTC)

The cat's genetic mutations concerning the external body" doesn't make much sense in English. IacobusAmor 11:06, 1 Maii 2010 (UTC)

It makes sense to me, at least. Pantocrator 11:32, 1 Maii 2010 (UTC)

Quiquid id est, the title should be one the article can begin with (ut titulus sit lemma)--Xaverius 11:44, 1 Maii 2010 (UTC)

It didn't before. The corresponding article on English doesn't, either. Pantocrator 11:56, 1 Maii 2010 (UTC)

That's how articles should be titled in la:wiki at least.--Xaverius 12:07, 1 Maii 2010 (UTC)

Searching the entire Latin library site for every inflection of mutatio I find nothing with de. Everything is with the genitive. For once, man, once could you ask before moving a page what the new name should be? Ask, not tell; research, not move and defend an untenable position. It may "make sense to you" in English, but to Latinists it doesn't, yeah?

As for word order, it seems as if mutatio occurs as frequently before and after its genitive. I would imagine, like you say PC, we want more than one page on mutationes geneticae, and it looks better to me to have mutationes geneticae xxx, mutationes geneticae yyy than zzz mutationes geneticae. --Ioscius ^∞ 19:36, 2 Maii 2010 (UTC)

That's what I was implying above. If mutationes geneticae is a phrase that's going to generate numerous other articles on the same theme, the title might be best given as Mutationes geneticae felium (avium, luporum, piscum, vespertilionum, whatever), instead of the usual order in prose, geneticae felium mutationes. Or maybe not. (Does, say, Mucius or Neander have an opinion?) IacobusAmor 20:16, 2 Maii 2010 (UTC)

It'd be really nice indeed to have some discussion before making changes that aren't self-evident. The present title ("Felis mutationes geneticae de corpore extero") is impenetrable, I'm sorry to say. Given that "body type" is corporis constitutio (cf. Cic.Off.3,117), I'd propose for discussion Mutationes geneticae felini corporis constitutionis or Geneticae felini corporis constitutionis mutationes. --Neander 23:47, 2 Maii 2010 (UTC)

I agree with Neander that felinus would probably be a good adjective to implement in whatever title we come up with — offhand I think the current title has too many nouns. But I get the impression that felinus might go better with mutatio than corpus. Maybe an adjective instead of 'corpus' might help as well, though I'll admit I can't think of any title that doesn't look bulky at best. —Mucius Tever 04:22, 3 Maii 2010 (UTC)

In my proposal (Geneticae felini corporis constitutionis mutationes), I tried to translate the English title Cat body type genetic mutations. Both titles have five words but the Latin title is admittedly bulkier, if reckoned by the number of letters. I must say I'm a bit perplexed by the English title, because I'm not sure how to parse it. As can be seen in the Latin rendering, I parsed "[[cat body] type]] = [[felini corporis] constitutio]". But I'm open to other proposals (which needn't be English-based). To me, the English title looks like saying 'genetic mutations of the type "cat body"', but this silliness is certainly due to the fact that I'm a non-native speaker. --Neander 10:24, 3 Maii 2010 (UTC)

The strongest link is between body & type, thus: cat bodytype genetic mutations. But something's redundant there, since you can't have genetic mutations in things other than bodies, and "genetic mutations in cats" may be the friendliest-sounding alternative. Or is the title trying to say "genetic mutations that affect only the body types of cats"? IacobusAmor 10:37, 3 Maii 2010 (UTC)

As I previously explained, and looking at the English pages will confirm, this is about the mutations that affect the visible body of cats. That's why Robert defended the longer title, and why I chose my corpus exterum. Neander is right that the English phrase does not make literal sense, but if we were to translate it his choice would be fine.Pantocrator 10:40, 3 Maii 2010 (UTC)

Given that "corpus exterum" (or rather "corpus externum") is shortened as "figura" (cf. e.g. Cic.fin.5,12,35), my next proposal is Figurae felinae genetice mutatae (in which all "-ae" are nom.pl.) --Neander 12:26, 3 Maii 2010 (UTC)

Does that mean "Feline bodyforms caused by genetic mutations"? Note that the article concentrates on genotypes (i.e. mutations of the genes), and not phenotypes (i.e. bodyforms). Is there a way to flip the title around so that "Genetic mutations" is the head? --Robert.Baruch 13:58, 3 Maii 2010 (UTC)

He mentioned also the separate article en:Cat coat genetics on English, so perhaps I misinterpreted it since the coat is also corpus exterum. Anyway, I don't know if we should follow them, or have just one article on cat mutations (= Mutationes geneticae felis/felium/felinae). Pantocrator 10:43, 3 Maii 2010 (UTC)

How about Genotypi formae felinae, genotypes of feline bodyform? --Robert.Baruch 14:09, 3 Maii 2010 (UTC)

But now the Latin title would translate 'genotypes of feline form'. For 'bodyform' you need figura corporis (or, more ambiguously, forma corporis). Maybe genotypi figurae corporis felini (if "corpus" is construed as the headword of "felinum") or genotypi felinae corporis figurae (if "figura" is construed as the headword of "felinum"). --Neander 20:01, 3 Maii 2010 (UTC)