World conker champion found with steel chestnut, cleared of cheating

Is this game well-known enough in Britain and Ireland that readers will know what on earth is being alleged just from reading this article? Or are you expected to have to google it?

Apparently it’s a game where you take turns swinging a chestnut on a string and trying to hit the opponent’s chestnut and break it. Yes, I can see how a steel fake chestnut would be an advantage here, though I’m amazed it wouldn’t be instantly obvious to even a casual observer that the look and sound were wrong. So maybe I’m still missing something.

I used to play conkers at school in England, however my children didn't.

The reason? Schools have banned the game of conkers due to health and safety reasons.

I asked my 17 year old this morning and he had never even heard of the game of conkers.

So I think the age of conkers is passing, alas.

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.

> 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.

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.

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.

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.

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.