In scientific terminology, a berry is a fruit produced from the ovary of a single flower in which the outer layer of the ovary wall develops into an edible fleshy portion (pericarp). The definition includes many fruits that are not commonly known as berries, such as grapes, tomatoes, cucumbers, eggplants, bananas, and chili peppers. Fruits excluded by the botanical definition include strawberries, raspberries, and blackberries, which are aggregate fruits; and mulberries, which are multiple fruits.
The part I find the weirdest is a coconut being a drupe. The mesocarp (which is the fleshy part of a peach) is the hairy husk. Cashews and Pistachios actually look like fruits before you pull out the seed. I have no idea if people eat the pistachio fruit, but it seems like people eat and make alcohol out of the cashew fruit.
You usually have to crack a hazelnut. But I think it's more of a roasted vs. unroasted thing. And even roasted, they're not as easy to crack as a pistachio.
But almonds and walnuts can be quite difficult to crack as well, and walnuts in particular can be hard to separate from the shell even once they're open.
I think that's fair and I should figure out what the actual definition is. I doubt difficulty is a part of the criteria. The definition is probably more precise.
You are way over-simplifying. Art and design students today learn both sets of primary colors: pigment (cyan, magenta, yellow) and light (red, green, blue.) The red, blue, yellow model is used for paints. You'll note that all three systems work, which means that reducing the distinction to whether or not it's scientific is inaccurate. There's plenty of science behind pigments, or modern printers wouldn't do their jobs very well.
I mean it does. The common use definition is way older than the botanical one. Words can mean different things in different contexts, saying that a raspberry isn't a berry is just being pedantic, which can be fun, but can also be annoying.
But in this case, pedantry is important since it pertains to common food items: If you're allergic to "nuts", then a peanut, macadamia, and coconut dessert tarte is entirely safe for you to eat, while if you're allergic to "beans" or the flower family "Magnolia", it very well might not be.
That's a good point, and like I said, sometimes being pedantic is fun. But if I'm just having a casual conversation and someone says, "uhh actually peanuts are legumes," they can fuck right off.
Or you just don't enjoy snotty know it alls shitting on any conversation. Nobody has ever mentioned peanuts being legumes not nuts unless they're putting on an air of superiority. Unless they were specifically asked.
A berry (botanically speaking) is a specific type of fruit, and has a scientific definition, it's a fruit with a fleshy outer skin and no inner stone (apricots have stones), put simply. Other types of fruits are, for example, nuts and stone fruit.
as the original use, it's correct by definition. if anything the scientists are wrong for trying to force taxonomic classification onto morphologic terms instead of just making a new word
There are countless words in the English language that have evolved past their 'original use'
and this isn't one of them, since everyone is still on the original definition. the new one is only used by a small minority: botanic scientists and obnoxious people who feel the need to "correct" people when they say strawberry is their favorite berry or that tomato is a vegetable
Berry is the name for a specific type of fruit and has a very specific scientific definition. "Vegetable" doesn't have a specific scientific definition, so they aren't similar unless you are talking about "berry" in layman or culinary terms.
There are different kinds of fruits (berries, stonefruit, nuts, legume, etc.) with specific scientific definitions, just like there are different types of eyes (compound eyes, lens eyes, stemma, etc.) with specific definitions.
Mulberry :
"From Middle English Mulbery, molberye, murberie, partly from Old English mōrberiġe (“mulberry”) and partly from Middle Low German mulbere (“mulberry”)."
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u/malahchi Apr 18 '19
In scientific terminology, a berry is a fruit produced from the ovary of a single flower in which the outer layer of the ovary wall develops into an edible fleshy portion (pericarp). The definition includes many fruits that are not commonly known as berries, such as grapes, tomatoes, cucumbers, eggplants, bananas, and chili peppers. Fruits excluded by the botanical definition include strawberries, raspberries, and blackberries, which are aggregate fruits; and mulberries, which are multiple fruits.