"Viruses" again

[B. J. Tindall]

I think there is a rather "odd" problem here. While it is true that "virus"
has a classical Latin meaning it has nothing to do with the small
biological objects which we know today. The term bacterium is derived from
the Greek "bakteria", "baktron", meaning a rod or stick, "bacterion" is the
diminutive of "bakteria". The word then took up a Latin form "bacterium".
However, in microbiology we know that not all "bacteria" are small sticks,
and the ancient Romans and Greeks really could not have known about what we
call a "bacterium". Similarly the microbiological use of the word "coccus"
has a link to Latin "coccum" and Greek "kokkos", both meaning a seed, grain
or berry, but the link to the small spherical bodies which we call "cocci"
has nothing to do with traditional languages.
The term virus probably has a similar history. In a classical sense it does
have the meaning(s) given in Latin dictionaries, but the modern concept of
"a virus", with DNA or RNA and infecting the cells of prokaryotes or
eukaryotes has nothing to do with the classical definition. I found a
reference in 1957 to the Latin origin of the word, but that same article
uses virus-viruses. One aspect that we must accept is that terms such as "a
bacterium", "a coccus" and "a virus" are modern concepts and may have a
root in Latin or Greek, but have taken on another meaning in modern
science. Why we have bacterium - bacteria, coccus - cocci, but virus -
viruses I do not know, perhaps the person who first used virus - viruses
did not learn Latin at school. While I would object to "bacteriums" or
"coccuses" I doubt whether we can do much about "viruses".
Brian Tindall



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