World conker champion found with steel chestnut, cleared of cheating

I saw on the wikipedia page the following totally stupid reason for the ban in some schools:

   In 2004, several schools banned conkers due to fear of causing anaphylactic shock in pupils with nut allergies. Health advisers said that there were no known dangers from conkers for nut-allergy sufferers, although some may experience a mild rash through handling them.[20]

Interesting, as conkers are seeds (not a nut) - so shouldn't be an issue for someone with a nut allergy - though no doubt some people are allergic to them.

It's not quite that simple. The line isn't quite as hard between seed and 'nut'. Namely people may commonly refer to things as a nut when it is a seed.

e.g. a Peanut is a seed, as are almonds, cashews, walnuts.

This rabbit hole goes deep. Berries are particularly poorly named - stawberries, blackberries, and blueberries aren't actually berries but tomatoes and bananas are.

This is only a problem if you mistake words for scientific classifications, instead of ways to convey meaning between communicating humans.

Very few people using the word "berry" are discussing scientific classifications. It would be worse, not better, to make terms more scientifically precise. Berry refers to small juicy fruits, often in bright colors.

> stawberries, blackberries, and blueberries aren't actually berries

Yes they are

> tomatoes and bananas are

No they’re not.

The word “berry” is much older and more fundamental to language than the technical botanical definition that a tiny minority of people know or care about.

Very true - I'll admit that while I knew that peanuts are legumes not nuts, I didn't know that the others you mentioned were not nuts. I learn something new every day (and my son has a severe allergy to many of them - though not all - so I should know these things!).

And while I know my son can safely play with conkers, we most certainly have not tried to eat one!

You clearly understand that there's a difference between the colloquial name and the scientific definition. In the context of the GP comment, the discussion was related to nuts that are poorly named (like peanuts and tree nuts that are actually seeds).

Strawberries aren't berries and tomatoes are. You can say that's wrong all you like, but in the context of how they are botanically classified rather than what we named them you're incorrect.

I was sticking with the context of the GP though. Maybe its pedantic to point out that many berries aren't technically berries, but that's much the same as the point that many nuts are actually seeds.

The botanical classification is irrelevant outside of papers in botany journals.

If I made up a new, niche meaning of already-existing words, and tried to claim everyone else was using them wrong, you would think I was crazy.

> If I made up a new, niche meaning of already-existing words, and tried to claim everyone else was using them wrong, you would think I was crazy

People do this all the time, though it makes me feel old rather than crazy.

On this subject, I’d recommend Richard Osman’s lecture on nuts for “The Unbelievable Truth”: https://www.reddit.com/user/pfobwpfo/comments/18ohqi2/nuts/

Imagine if someone said "this chair is an object", and you told them they were wrong, because in Object-Oriented Programming, an "object" is an abstract entity in a computer program, not a thing in the physical world.

They have never heard of object-oriented programming and yet, they're not wrong. You're the one who is wrong by assuming the terms made up by a niche field override common language used by everyone.

Ultimately it depends on the semantic meaning when you say 'nut'. They are not 'nuts' in terms of the technical definition, but they are in terms of 'what most people think of when you say nut'.

There's also some things with nut in their name. c.f. Nutmeg, coconut.

As others have mentioned, same kind of deal with 'berry'.

And to follow up, if you're travelling abroad it's worth noting that some countries have different naming structures/separate out the families of 'nuts'. So be careful if you're asking if something has 'nuts' in, there can be a language barrier. e.g. tree nuts vs. Lupins (peanut family).

Clearly they're wrong because this chair is a table.

Chairs and OOP have nothing to do with each other. Fruits, seeds, etc are plants and fall into botanical definitions.

I get the point that we call them berries even if they aren't, but your comparison to OOP is apples and oranges.

> I get the point that we call them berries even if they aren't

That wasn’t the point. The point is that they are berries, by the real definition of berries, which is not the different definition used by a tiny minority of mostly irrelevant people in a specific context.

What reason is there to prefer the botanical definition to the common one (that says a berry is a small colorful fruit)? I can see none. On the other hand, I can see many reasons to prefer the common definition: it is older, it is used by far more people, and it more closely corresponds to what we care about in real life (because almost everyone spends more time preparing and eating meals than they do classifying plant parts, so the culinary meaning is more important).

Scientists are not in charge of the whole human experience. They do not get to decide on behalf of everyone else that the salient defining characteristic of berries is not how they taste or what dishes you would use them to prepare, but rather what part of the plant they come from.

Do you take the same issue with the original comment pointing out that what are usually called nuts are actually seeds?

can easily asphyxiate a child

> as conkers are seeds (not a nut) - so shouldn't be an issue for someone with a nut allergy

I take issue with this, and in fact we can see how the pedantic scientific meaning caused confusion about the actual underlying facts: people with allergies to what are commonly called "nuts" can in fact be allergic to things that according to the pedantic scientific definition are "seeds". So the OP is actually wrong to say it shouldn't be an issue for someone with a nut allergy!

Really?

An apple is a pome but an orange is a hesperidium. Different things entirely.

Yep that's totally fair, that could be confusing since "nut allergy" isn't based on scientific definitions.

Though it would make my day if someone tells me they can't have peanuts because of a legume allergy.

I disagree with this on multiple levels. For one, the word "berry" has multiple definitions, and I don't see why the botanical definition should be the only one that counts. If anything, the culinary one should have primacy, as that is the one that is far more relevant to far more people. Botanical jargon is useful to botanists but not very useful in general. And to descend to pedantry, blueberries should not have been on your list of examples. They are berries in both the culinary and the botanical senses of the word.