NASA wants to redefine cosmic terms to avoid offending people

"As the scientific community works to identify and address systemic discrimination and inequality in all aspects of the field, it has become clear that certain cosmic nicknames are not only insensitive, but can be actively harmful," NASA’s memo on their website posted yesterday reads, "NASA is examining its use of unofficial terminology for cosmic objects as part of its commitment to diversity, equity and inclusion."

Giving nicknames to cosmic objects has been popular throughout human history, going back to the Greeks, Egyptians and Vedic peoples, who all in turn had names for the constellations relating them to familiar things on earth. “Zodiac” actually means “circle of animals” in English.

The space agency only mentioned the “Eskimo Nebula” and “Siamese Twins Galaxy” in their official memo, but claims it plans to scour the archives to find more examples of potentially insensitive or non-diverse terms and duly erase them. They hope that by doing this, people all around the world will see fit to follow their example.

Some sufficiently "more approachable and public-friendly" nicknames will likely be spared NASA’s razor. A NASA official stated that the “Horsehead Nebula” seemed fine to him and would likely be allowed to stay under the current rules.

However, in the real world, it would appear that things aren’t as simple and controllable as NASA perhaps wishes them to be. The measures being implemented by NASA seem to be not so popular on social media such as Twitter. This particular tweet makes an important and timely serious of inquiries as to how far the change of nomenclature plans to go.

NASA has recently also been in the news for missing a huge asteroid that narrowly missed the Earth, among other things.