Idle: New Species Named For SpongeBob SquarePants

An anonymous reader writes "Sing it with us: What lives in the rainforest, under a tree? Spongiforma squarepantsii, a new species of mushroom almost as strange as its cartoon namesake. Scientists from the San Francisco State University have discovered a new species of mushroom in Borneo with sponge-like properties. Its strange behavior convinced them to name it after the famous Bob. There is no word on whether or not their chances of getting future grant money will be improved by this choice." Did you know (prior to clicking on the Wikipedia link above) that SpongeBob was created by a marine biologist?

Re:WTF

[Mindcontrolled]

Oh come on, let the guys just have some fun. If this leads you to question the sanity of the biologists involved, have a look at the gene naming schemata in Drosophila flies...

Let me just point at cheap date, a gene that imposes heightened alcohol sensitive on the flies; or perhaps the ken and barbie genes, mutations in which cause lack of external genitalia. Then there is superman, a mutation that causes extra male genitalia in the plant Arabidopsis. Naturally, it is suppressed by the kryptonite gene. Leaving the genitalia business, there is also embargo in Drosophila, a mutation in which stops nuclear export...

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[ByOhTek]

Or Smaug (can't remember what it does, but yes, it's named after the dragon), or MAD (Mothers Against Decapentapalegia, which, when mutated, produces limbless flies).

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[Mindcontrolled]

Smaug obviously is the supressor for nanos, the dwarf gene. (just for clarity, not made up - it's how it works, Smaugbinds the nanos mRNA).

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[ByOhTek]

OK. They never actually explained it in my developmental genetics classes, the prof just said, "Yes, it is a reference to The Hobbit."

Zbtb7: Gotta catch 'em all

[tepples]

Or "Pokemon", the original name for the Zbtb7 gene [wikipedia.org] until Nintendo threatened to sue [gamespot.com] anyone who would name a gene related to cancer after one of its flagship franchises.

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[iamhassi]

"Let me just point at cheap date, a gene that imposes heightened alcohol sensitive on the flies; or perhaps the ken and barbie genes, mutations in which cause lack of external genitalia. Then there is superman, a mutation that causes extra male genitalia in the plant Arabidopsis. Naturally, it is suppressed by the kryptonite gene. Leaving the genitalia business, there is also embargo in Drosophila, a mutation in which stops nuclear export..."

I see nothing wrong with any of those since they all make compl

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[Mindcontrolled]

Didn't say that I see anything wrong with those. Just some geneticists having some fun while still making sense - isn't that the best kind? Personally, I come from the NMR spectroscopy business, so don't let me get started on the HOHAHA, HEHAHA and HIHAHA pulse sequences...

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[iamhassi]

I know you're AC, but I have to comment. Greek and Roman mythology has been around for thousands of years. Spongeboob came out in 1999. Seriously you're putting a cartoon that's barely 10 years old up against Greek and Roman mythology? Oh right, AC troll, gotcha.

Also naming it after a children's cartoon shows the immaturity of the biologist. I didn't even know what Spongbob was until recently, when my wife, who was young enough to watch Spongebob growing up, introduced me to it. It's a good show

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[Mindcontrolled]

Perhaps we should fix that by teaching people about the muses instead of going on about spongebob, though...

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[tehcyder]

my wife, who was young enough to watch Spongebob growing up,

Jesus tittyfucking Christ I feel old.

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[kryliss]

Ditto!

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[Mindcontrolled]

How could anyone write a lengthy article about a new mushroom without once mentioning what it tastes like?

If it is a proper shroom, it'll taste purple with a slight whiff of G-minor, of course.

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[black soap]

And yet we take all the silly names made up in previous centuries as "well, that's just how they did things, and they needed a catchy name."

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[numb7rs]

No, I can see why they chose that. SpongeBob's a fun guy.

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[exomondo]

/golfclap

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[tehcyder]

No, I can see why they chose that. SpongeBob's a fun guy.

And that ends the thread, I'd have thought. What possible point is there in posting anything else? Bravo.

Not trying hard enough

[sqrt(2)]

Come on, at least roughly translate it into Latin first.

Re:Not trying hard enough

[Mindcontrolled]

Fine. Spongiforma bracae-quadratae then.

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[Samantha Wright]

Lovely. Now, was that really so hard?

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[Mindcontrolled]

Why yes, yes it was. Do you have any idea how rusty my latin is?

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[Samantha Wright]

All that matters is that it's less rusty than theirs :\

The grants, the grants, OH GOD THE GRANTS

[Mindcontrolled]

Thanks for implying the usual "they are only doing it for the grants"-meme in the summary, timothy. It's been soo popular with the science-haters around here lately, I can see why you would want to retain that group of customers.

Even when...

[Aeternitas827]

Even when I escape to the real world (the one that exists for a few hours when the children sleep and vulgar language is allowed), I can't escape mention of that little bastard whose only resemblance to a square is the fact that his faces (not the space where his annoying face-parts are, but rather the surface faces of the prism of his being) are quadrilaterals (rectangles, in fact).

What. The. Fuck.

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[mwvdlee]

What you call the "real" world is what I call the "stuck-up" world. In my "real" world, children do exist, vulgar language is allowed but people generally don't feel the need to use it all the time and spongebob is enjoyed by many even though he isn't quite as square as his last name would seem to (but actually doesn't) imply.
Lighten up.

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[Dachannien]

I think they probably mean "square" in the construction sense - that is, two things (such as Spongebob's edges) are considered square when they are orthogonal.

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[zippthorne]

I think they mean square metaphorically. As in, he's generally the responsible one in his chowda of friends.

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[geekoid]

And yet you post here.

Talk about your passive aggressive attention seeker.

Personally I like Spongbob, and it has sparked some great conversations with my children.
Also, his name does not denote his shape. His name is not SquareSponge.

Patrickus Staroidea

[HideyoshiJP]

No! My name is Patrick! I am not a Krusty Krab...

too bad

[The Clockwork Troll]

Linnaeus must be spinning in his grave just fast enough to clear the shark.

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[Mindcontrolled]

Now what's wrong with latin? (ignoring the fact that squarepantsii is standard latinizing anyway). Personally, I feel it is a shame that today's scientists, including me, are not fluid in latin any more. I used to be, but lost all of it over the last one and a half decades.

Why stop there?

[Windwraith]

We can start naming everything we discover after pop culture! EVERYTHING! We can even rename existing things after it.
Years in the future science symposiums will sound like a conversation between 7-year-old kids in the schoolyard.
I see absolutely nothing wrong with this picture.

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[glwtta]

Good god man, get a grip.

There are two million discovered species, of which a couple of dozen are named after some cutesy pop culture thing - it's just not that big a deal.

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[Windwraith]

But I tried to go for a +1 funny D:

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[AgentSmith]

But I tried to go for a +1 funny D:

Standard procedure reply on Slashdot when someone doesn't 'get it' is WHOOOOSH!

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[JustOK]

yet you use the term "pop culture" like it's a term passed down from the ancients.

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[lxs]

Please continue. I'll be staying in my secret moon base in the Hendrix crater [wikipedia.org] until this discussion has blown over.

Pikachon

[pablomme]

Damn, biologists get all the cool names. Dear physicists at the LHC, when you find a new particle please consider naming it "Pikachu boson", a.k.a. "Pikachon". Don't let biologists win this one.

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[JustOK]

The Weiner particle: emits a few "brief" bursts then tries to disappear.

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[jamiesan]

Isn't it supposed to deny the bursts first, and then disappear?

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[Darinbob]

Can we please stop talking about the congeressman's wiener?

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[hubie]

Don't forget that particle physics has given us strange, charmed, and colored particles.

They already won: Pikachurin

[tepples]

Pikachurin [wikipedia.org] is one of the retinal proteins.

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[jellomizer]

What like when they named the quarks? Up Down Happy Sad....

It gets weirder

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes I did know. I didn't even need to follow the wiki link. Not only is he a marine biologist, I believe he has a doctorate.

Also, if you pay attention to the show, Patrick the starfish comes back from a lump of starfish (regeneration). Mr. Krabs collects things (like real crabs! :O)

And the best of it all? They live in Bikini Bottom. Now where have you heard that before (besides the obvious outfit pun)?
Why Bikin Atoll of course! Where everyone and their grandma blewup nuclear warheads under the water. Now look at the houses in town.
Notice how they look an awful lot like missles? Everyone is talking and alive? It all starts to make a kind of sense now, doesn't it?

Also, Goo Lagoon. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KzUEr7uMnXU For those of you who are familiar with the show may not have been aware of this.

-Shoe

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[Anonymous Coward]

Oh, that's only half of it. Starfish (like Patrick) don't have brains. Explains a lot. Squidward, the "intellectual", is a squid, which are some of the smartest invertebrates. I liked when evil villain Plankton showed some of his relatives in the "plankton family", and they were fairly accurate depictions of several real plankton groups. In one episode Spongebob and Patrick went back in time and there were trilobites crawling around on the sea floor.

It's a geekier show than it looks at first glance.

teehee

[uncanny]

and smells "vaguely fruity

Yeah, we already had our suspicions!

Ocean Man

[alphatel]

Did you know (prior to clicking on the Wikipedia link above) that SpongeBob was created by a marine biologist?

Did you know Ween wrote the title track to the Spongebob Squarepants movie?

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[Mindcontrolled]

I suppose Ween will do anything as long as you can label it "Far out, man"...

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[The O Rly Factor]

I learned the history of Spongebob Squarepants a couple of days ago. If I remember it correctly, Stephen Hillenberg was a marine biologist who also had a part time job working in an animation studio, and his boss was Joe Murray. He worked in Murray's animation studio during the period of the early 1990s when Murray's main project was Rocko's Modern Life. When Murray stopped doing animation after 1995 due to some serious marital issues (his wife eventually killed herself and he went on a 10 year hiatus from

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[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Created by Marine Biologist?

[RNLockwood]

Wow, I had no idea that the Marines even had biologists. Whatever for?

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[Mindcontrolled]

If you absolutely positively need it classified under the Linnean system before sunrise...

ZappaFrank

[Jumpin' Jon]

I think this is cool.. much like the "space object"* named after Frank Zappa.

* Can't remember whether is was an asteroid, meteor, etc. and know I'd be utter flamebait for getting it wrong in /. company ;)

Not impressed

[jseale]

I know Nickelodeon is trying to educate kids with their programming but this little bit of trivia is not going to impress kids one iota. Just try to use the species name in an episode of this show and watch its ratings go down the toilet.