Friday, November 18, 2011

Friday Science: Vegetable or Fruit

This is a science joke. 

One scientist says to Another scientist, Is a potato a fruit or a vegetable?
Another Scientist looks puzzled.
        One Scientist says "Neither".

I can tell you one thing, those scientist are a crazy, happy bunch.

Actually, in the biological science world, there is no such term as a vegetable.  The world is used ubiquitously in the food world for something that hangs on a plant.  There is a vegetative state that currently describes my attitude at work. 

In the plant world, almost every seed bearing ornament, an apple or an orange, a pumpkin or a squash is technically a "fruit".  So you say what is a potato or an onion?  A root.  What is a guava or a pineapple?  A fruit of course.  If I was a plant, my testicles would be a fruit because they contain the workings for the next generation.  They could never be considered a vegetable or a root, well almost never.  Well, there was that one time in Vegas but I got paid for that.

The Fruit of the Loom guys are three fruits and a leaf.  NO this incident was not in Vegas, this was in Cleveland and there was a leopard skin leotard involved.  "Fruiting body" is a more technical term which encapsulates more function with description. 

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