origin of entomological symbol?

[Fernando Z. Vaz-de-Mello]

I am habitued to use and see the latter for "couple" (male and female
individuals, when considered together - for instance in the same pin,
collected in copula, etc)....

Fernando



At 11:21 30/05/03 -0500, you wrote:

>According to Jackson (Glossary of Botanic Terms), the
>U
>O
>+
>and
>^
>|
>O
>+
>(arrow on top, plus on bottom)
>are used to mean hermaphrodite.
>
>
>______________________
>Richard H. Zander
>Bryology Group
>Missouri Botanical Garden
>PO Box 299
>St. Louis, MO 63166-0299
>richard.zander at mobot.org <mailto:richard.zander at mobot.org>
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>
>-----Original Message-----
>From: Curtis Clark [mailto:jcclark at CSUPOMONA.EDU]
>Sent: Friday, May 30, 2003 10:54 AM
>To: TAXACOM at USOBI.ORG
>Subject: [TAXACOM] origin of entomological symbol?
>
>
>I've run into conflicting stories on a sign used by entomologists and
>geneticists to refer to virgin Drosophila and other insects. I had learned
>from list members some years ago that the symbol was the same as that of
>the planet Mercury, which looks like the female symbol with horns--a circle
>with cross below and arc above, which in ASCII would look something like:
>
>U
>O
>+
>
>only joined. A correspondent on the Unicode list has suggested instead that
>the horns are actually a V, representing "virgin":
>
>V
>O
>+
>
>Thus, a virgin female.
>
>The latter story seems more logical, with the Mercury sign being used as a
>replacement in type because it was more widely available. Arguing to the
>contrary, I have seen in entomological usage a symbol for hermaphrodite
>consisting of a single circle combining the appendages of both the female
>(Venus) signs and male (Mars) signs. In other contexts, Mercury is often
>used to represent hermaphrodite, but a meaning of virgin in entomology
>would necessitate a different sign.
>
>The reason it matters is that if Mercury is the correct symbol, it is
>already encoded in Unicode, but if "Female with V above" is really what is
>intended, it perhaps should be encoded separately.
>
>If you have any familiarity with this situation, please let me know (1)
>which way you first learned it, and (2) any published accounts that might
>clear it up.
>
>Thanks!
>
>--
>Curtis Clark                  http://www.csupomona.edu/~jcclark/
>Biological Sciences Department            Voice: +1 909 869 4062
>California State Polytechnic University     FAX: +1 909 869 4078
>Pomona CA 91768-4032  USA                  jcclark at csupomona.edu
>
>
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Fernando Z. Vaz-de-Mello
Depto. Biologia
Universidade Federal de Lavras
Lavras - MG 37200-000
BRASIL
http://www-museum.unl.edu/research/entomology/workers/FVazdeMello.htm
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