Super Massive Black Hole

I am hardly a victim of the writer's strike, as I neither write for the film industry nor am fiending for new material (Well, I must say I do miss the Colbert Report and The Daily Show). But, thanks to a massive store of unwatched programs, most of which are documentaries, I'm not too bothered by any of it. (This is not to say I don't sympathize with the strikers, though.)

One show I like to watch is The Universe. It's a fun show, although in order to make principles of physics and astronomy more understandable, the writers will come up with an analogy and run with it as far as it can go. Usually these analogies seem to pertain to some hobby of the astronomer being interviewed. Say one astronomer really likes fishing. The programmers will then show the astronomer casting the reel, all the while explaining some concept. "Landing on the surface of Venus would be a lot like fishing for trout." And you're sitting there and listening to this analogy, and thinking, "Huh? What? Well... maybe a little... I guess."

But, it's a good program and fairly spot on.

Now to the subject at hand. They did a bit on black holes. Apparently there are two classifications. There's a Stellar Black Hole (which is just a collapsed star...ho-hum). And now they've discovered a new classification that lies at the center of the galaxy. It's enormous, so logically, it's called the "Super Massive Black Hole".

I don't know. It just sounds so ridiculous. It reminds me of South Park for some reason. Like when someone is making up some new name for an organization that's an obvious cover-up for something else--like the Super Adventure Club that Chef joins, which is really an organization for pederasts.

Anyway, I can't understand lack of creativity some physicists display when the naming new things. I mean, isn't there someone they can name it after? A Steven Hawking-class black hole (since he wrote the book on the subject)? Or couldn't they give it some silly child's name, like "google" or "quark" or "charm" or "strange"? Something a little more creative than "Super Massive".

It's like the "Great Barrier Reef." Sure, that's what it is, a great barrier reef, but certainly you could give it a prettier name, like "Giovanni" or "Rice Pudding".