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Comment by nezumi | Hacker News Reader

Hang on, I thought 'Solar system' means the system orbiting the star 'Sol' i.e. our sun? Isn't the general term 'planetary system'?

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It's bizarrely worded, yes. I think what they're trying to say is it's a planetary system very similar to the Solar system. Announcing it as a new "planetary system" would sound much less dramatic, since we've cataloged more than 700 of those.

Are we then not Solarians?

I see what you did there...

Yes, 'Solar' refers to our sun, Sol. So there is only one 'Solar' system which is our own.

I think 'star system' is acceptable as well.

I'm not disagreeing, but genuinely curious: what do astronomers call the "solar wind" in other systems? Referring to every wind by the star's name would seem odd.

Just replace solar with stellar.

This seems like yet another case of unnecessarily Earth/Sol-centric terminology, much like "apogee" being Earth specific such that you have to use "apoapsis" if you want to be generic. I mean, do we really need a new word for every planet, the sun, a star in general, a black hole specifically, and galaxies? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apsis#Terminology

We should declare terminology bankruptcy to wipe out our existing terminology/language debt, then pick sensible terms for everything. While I'm the topic, we should also do "kilogram"->"grave", "gram"->"micrograve".

Shouldn't that be "milligrave" if you're using SI prefixes?

You are absolutely correct.

When talking about orbits it's very useful to be able to make a distinction between apogee and lunar or solar apoapsis.

You inadvertently gave the solution: "lunar apoapsis", "solar apoapsis", "earth apoapsis".

Much easier than "aposelene/apocynthion/apolune", "aphelion", "apogee".

So, what gets to be "mg"?

I'm not against the idea, but please don't have the new base also start with "g".

Hence "terminology bankruptcy", all existing terminology debt will be erased ;)

I once had a stellar wind, about near blew the doors out my house...

So you see, probably does not work so well.

solar : stellar/star :: coke : soda

I usually hear them referred to as stellar systems. But like my sibling comment said, they are trying to say this stellar system is a second "solar system" due to its similarities.

Interestingly in Norwegian and Swedish "solsystem" can mean any planetary system, but if you say "solsystemet" i.e. "_the_ Solar system" you typically refer to our own. http://sv.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solsystem

In this particular case, the title makes sense. According to them, the newly found planetary system is very similar to our solar system. Hence the title "Second Solar System detected".

Many say "moon" when they mean natural sattelitte of a planet

moon != Moon

Our moon is named Luna.

I've always wondered how Spanish speakers deal with this naming convention— do they have some different naming scheme (tal vez nuestra luna se llama `Moon'?), or is there just not an equivalent proper noun?

That's no moon.

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