this post was submitted on 12 Aug 2025
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Science Memes

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[–] MajorMajormajormajor@lemmy.ca 14 points 5 months ago (3 children)

Arctic actually means land without penguins, and Antarctic means land with penguins.

[–] sga@lemmings.world 13 points 5 months ago (4 children)

its the other way round for bears i think

[–] MajorMajormajormajor@lemmy.ca 13 points 5 months ago

Bear without penguins and bear with penguins? I'm no bearologist but I don't think that's right.

[–] troybot@midwest.social 4 points 5 months ago

So for bears Arctic means land with penguins

[–] Ooops@feddit.org 4 points 5 months ago

But the bear referenced there is not the animal but the constellation...

Arctic = towards the bear, so north

Antarctic = the opposite (=ant[i]) direction

[–] WhiskyTangoFoxtrot@lemmy.world 3 points 5 months ago

There aren't many bears on Lemmy, though, so we don't need to use their terminology.

[–] FundMECFSResearch@lemmy.cafe 12 points 5 months ago (1 children)

It’s actually bears. The north is named by the Greeks after the Ursa Major constellation in the north literally “big bear”. So it’s the bear place. While the south is the opposite of the bears.

Happy coincidence it ended up matching polar bear ranges.

[–] MajorMajormajormajor@lemmy.ca 3 points 5 months ago

You're absolutely correct, I was riffing on the commonly mentioned fact you said. Similar to the "mitochondria are the powerhouse of the cell." meme people mention often.

[–] ArmoredThirteen@lemmy.zip 2 points 5 months ago (1 children)

Doesn't 'ant' mean not and 'arc' is without? So it's really closer to 'without penguins' and 'not without penguins'

[–] Ooops@feddit.org 8 points 5 months ago

"Arktos" is greek for bear.

The arctis is the region towards the bear, meaning the constellation so north... while the antarctis is the opposite direction (ant(i) = opposite).