Having more or less completed my research into creating a galaxy, I've decided the next step is to create a consistant stellar nomenclature (or naming scheme). I've decided to take a rather different route than ordinary. I got the idea from Stargate SG-1. Their stargate operates on something like 7 symbol permutation of 17 total symbols, or something like that. That creates like 90 million possible permutations. So I've decided to create names for stars from a database of phonetic groupings (like 'cho' 'ra' 'tha' 'ow', etc.) and have each syllable stand for some information about the star. A quick example would be something like: "Raso Alon Chakoney" where: Raso tells the star's distance from galactic center (two digits from two syllables, base being however many phonetic groupings I come up with) Alon tells star's angle and depth. (So the short a sound = 45 degrees, Lon = 45 light years above galactic plane). Chakoney tells spectral type (Cha = G, Kone = 2, long e sound = V , so Chakoney would be G2V, our sun's spectral class) Obviously I'd have to change the number of syllables attached to each data item once I figure out how many phonetic groupings I come up with and how precise the nomenclature needs to be with the star's data. However, something like this, which is relatively simple to implement considering the sheer number of stars it can name, truly can give each star a unique and pronouncable name. Further, stars close to one another would have similar names. A star close to the one above might be called: Racho Alon Wilanda where such a star would be a bit further back along the same line connecting the star above and the galactic core. Note that stars with the same first syllable would form a ring around the galactic core. Stars in the same system (binary system) would share the same first two groupings, and differ in the last part (the Chakoney in the first example), so binary stars would have similar names, as one would logically expect to see. I've spent only an afternoon dreaming this up, so the idea is still quite in its infancy. I was thinking of finding all the single syllable permutations in the English language by using a phonetic alphabet, such as the Deseret alphabet. I would expect there to be a vast range of them, so I could have maybe ~500+ phonetic groupings. (I really don't know, I haven't even started on that yet). More than enough to create millions of unique names that are actually pronouncable. Another side benefit from such a nomenclature is that the name of each star doesn't need to be stored with it. If you have an absolutely tremendous galaxy (my inital plans are to have something like 1 mill+ stars, with the majority of them never being visited by the player and therefore their specifics never needing to be worked out) this benefit quickly adds up. Obviously the player should be able to "nickname" stars whatever they want, but this namenclature creates a universe that isn't full of just "BF56QUR789-5". The galaxy sure feels cold when the names of stars aren't even pronouncable. And plus, this way each star has a christian, middle, and last name, and we all know how often we try talking to stars and don't know how to address them :P

this is very interesting for me, since i decided to make a virtual universe!
i had the idea of naming the celestial bodies from a database of latin main constellation names, greek prefixes and roman numbers as postfix.

A planet would be called Alpha Draconis III (3rd planet in the Main Starsystem of the constellation Draconis) where the Sun of this System would be called Alpha Draconis.

Quote: Original post by StoryTeller
i had the idea of naming the celestial bodies from a database of latin main constellation names, greek prefixes and roman numbers as postfix.

This is called the Bayer system. Here's a quote about it:

Quote: In 1603, a German lawyer by the name of J. Bayer codified a more comprehensive system of stellar nomenclature: take the genitive (posessive) name of a constellation, and start labelling the stars with Greek letters in order of descending brightness. The brightest star in Centaurus would be Alpha Centauri, the second brightest would be Beta Centauri, the third brightest would be Gamma Centauri, et cetera.

Eventually, however, you run out of greek letters. And such a system is hopelessly geocentric, and I suppose that a true stellar nomenclature would be galactocentric (if such a word exists :P). I don't know how many constellations there are, but you're going to run out for large numbers of stars.

I tell you all of this because I started out thinking of using this, but it seemed inadequate for my purposes, and there really isn't a concrete naming system that scientists agree on anymore.

To understand real world stellar nomenclature, I recommend this link: Nomenclature

Hey, that's a great idea you got there. I love the idea of using the Stargate to create names.
You d think they would have used a similar system themselves instead of using numbers :)
You could even use the Hieroglyphs. And maybe have alternative systems for Runic or other alphabets ?
Well, that would be if you used the ideas of Stargate.
But in any case, I ll have to remember that one !

Quote: Original post by Numsgil
Having more or less completed my research into creating a galaxy, I've decided the next step is to create a consistant stellar nomenclature (or naming scheme).

I've decided to take a rather different route than ordinary. I got the idea from Stargate SG-1. Their stargate operates on something like 7 symbol permutation of 17 total symbols, or something like that. That creates like 90 million possible permutations.

I really like the idea, but you'll need to make sure that you have enough unique names.

For example, the 90 million permutations in SG1 might be enough to describe all the systems with stargates, but it certainly isn't enough to describe all the stars in the milky way. The mass of visible matter in the Milky Way is ~200 * 109 solar masses. Now, even subtracting the mass of the nebulae, you're still left with a hell of a lot of stars, particularly since the vast majority of stars are < 1 solar mass.

As described, you'll need an obscene number of phonemes for some of your parameters, particularly the angle. You may be better off only naming 'interesting' stars, ie those which have planets and/or are populated, or are significant for some other reason, and everything else could be given a numeric designation.

Quote: As described, you'll need an obscene number of phonemes for some of your parameters, particularly the angle. You may be better off only naming 'interesting' stars, ie those which have planets and/or are populated, or are significant for some other reason, and everything else could be given a numeric designation.

I agree. If you give something a name, the player (or onlooker) will assume you gave it a name for a reason. I would hate to see a star named "Gaba weechi Tabahun" and zoom in on it to find out that it has nothing more then galactic dust floating around it.

Some things to think about:

Quote:
Alon tells star's angle and depth. (So the short a sound = 45 degrees, Lon = 45 light years above galactic plane).

- My biggest question with the system - 360 different sounds for each degree? A different sound for every light year above (and lets not forget below) the galactic plane? This sounds worse then trying to do long division with Roman Numerals while blindfolded.

- Considering our galaxy is relatively flat and round, if you start in the center and hit ever star that falls within a one degree arch that is one light year above the galactic plane, I'm guessing you are going to hit several million or more stars. Of course for a game with limited starts this may work.

- What happens in a thousand years when a star creeps from one degree to two degree. Does the name change? Again my not be a problem in a game.

I've decided on the following for the phonemes:

There are 11 vowel sounds:
long a, long e, long i, long o, oo (as in boot),
a (as in cat), short e, short i, short o, short u,
ou (as in cower (albeit that's not spelled the same way :P)

There are 17 consonant sounds:
b,d,f,g,h,k,l,m,n,p,r,s,t,v,ch,sh,th

(note that h cannot end a phoneme since it's hard to pronounce)

There are several vowel and consonant sounds I left out because either (1. They sound similar to another that I have inluded. 2. They sound funny or not English in my tests, such as paj did, that's why there is no j.)

Now, there are three types of phonemes, which I lable as tier one, two, and three

Tier one: single vowel sound : 11 varieties
Tier two: single vowel + consonant. 11*16 +17*11 (since order matters(ak different from ka), and can't end in h.
Tier three: consonant + vowel + consonant 17*11*16 (*16 since can't end in h)

Thus there are 3366 unique phonemes. If you have two syllables (two digits), that gives you 3366*3365 + 3365 groupings, or 11,329,955 values.

Now, the angle from galactic core: I figured the smallest unit I'd need is the angle that creates a 1 LY offset at the fringe. This angle is atan(1/50000) = 2*10^-5 radians. There are 2pi in a full circle, so 2pi/(2*10^-5) = 314160 unique angle units. A two syllable word is more than enough to fit this value.

A similar process shows you that the distance from the core can likewise easily fit within the two syllable word.

distance from the galactic plane is +-1630 at the bulge (the thickest point) so thats 3260 LY thick, which just fits within a single syllable.

There are 490 unique spectral codes (7 spectral types * 10 sub types * 7 luminosity classes), once again easily fits within a single syllable.

And another syllable may be used for luminosity. That gives 7 syllables, which may be divided into [angle distance (zoffest+spectral code+luminosity)]

There, you arrive at two two syllable words and one three syllable word.

Plus, it is far from at its data carrying capacity, so to speak. You could increase angular accuracy by 30x and still have it fit within two syllables. Truely every star would map to a unique name (unless two identical stars formed a binary). There is no problem of running out of names.

Taken another way, there are estimated to be 200billion to 400billion stars in the milky way. we see that 3366 with seven 'digits' forms 4.865*10^24 possible unique names, or rather, 1.216*10^13 milky way galaxies!!! If anything, I think 7 syllables is overkill! (just a note, 1.216*10^13 = 12trillion, 160 billion. That's 12 trillion galaxies like our own. That's huge!)

Quote: If you give something a name, the player (or onlooker) will assume you gave it a name for a reason. I would hate to see a star named "Gaba weechi Tabahun" and zoom in on it to find out that it has nothing more then galactic dust floating around it.

That is only true if having a name makes the star somehow unique, IMO. If EVERY star has a name as unique as "Gaba Weechi Tabahun", it doesn't make such a name unique anymore, so the player has to decide what system to explore based on some other criteria (perhaps spectral class).

Quote:
- My biggest question with the system - 360 different sounds for each degree? A different sound for every light year above (and lets not forget below) the galactic plane? This sounds worse then trying to do long division with Roman Numerals while blindfolded.

Yes, it would be complicated to try and decipher, but the process of the name's creation may be transparent to the player. He won't have to decode names or anything. So all that nasty blindfolded numeral division will be done by the computer, and it doesn't mind that kind of thing so much ;)

Quote:
- Considering our galaxy is relatively flat and round, if you start in the center and hit ever star that falls within a one degree arch that is one light year above the galactic plane, I'm guessing you are going to hit several million or more stars. Of course for a game with limited starts this may work.

Yes, that would be true but you're forgetting about planar distance from the core. You take that into consideration, and you have a more or less "box", which can be made as small as needed to get only 1 star per box, even near the core.

Quote:
- What happens in a thousand years when a star creeps from one degree to two degree. Does the name change? Again my not be a problem in a game.

This stumped me too. The name would change. Admittedly, modern day astronomy takes where and when the star was, so I guess if you wanted to be technical you would have to include a date with the name. But for the game, stellar movements aren't factored in, since it's such a short time span galactically speaking.

I suppose you could include the star's vector into the name, so some syllables would represent speed and perihelion, etc. I'm not sure I want to get into that ;)

Quote:
I love the idea of using the Stargate to create names.
You d think they would have used a similar system themselves instead of using numbers :)

To be honest, I 'borrowed' the idea from the season finale/premiere a few weeks ago when Jack has his brain overcome with ancients' knowledge. They go to a different planet, and he pronounces Earth's name as the Ancients called it. (something Atlantis Terra). That got me thinking...

Sorry for the long post, I just wanted to answer everyone.

[Edited by - Numsgil on July 29, 2004 2:34:59 PM]

One thing to bear in mind: The angular accuracy is more important closer to the galactic plane, since this is where the stars are at their most dense. Perhaps a non-linear scale might be better, giving you more angular accuracy near the galactic plane.

Overall, it sounds good, I'm impressed by your attention to detail.

There's 39 symbols on a Stargate, and staying within our galaxy (ie, using only 7 cheverons) there's 7.7519 * 10 ^ 10 (77 billion) permutations. Earth gives each planet an alphanumerical name (P3X-439), the Ancients have a sound for each symbol on the stargate (Praclarush Taonas). Terra Atlantis is what he said when he was on praclarush, but that's 5 syllables, not enough for a gate address (for referance, Stargate Episode Summary for Episode 722: Lost City, part 2). We only recently found out that the ancients gave symbols sounds at the end of last season, so that's why it's not used.

It certainly seems like a good idea. With the stargate and 39 symbols, it's definitly a good idea, however a longstanding complaint I've had is that I just can't see 39 symbols encompasing the entirety of our galaxy, let alone with the eigth cheveron providing access to a maximum of 39 other galaxies, and whatever the ninth chevron does. As such I think that this naming scheme would be insufficiant for a realistic galaxy--but it is a game we're talking about, and if I were to use this nomenclature I'd define the rest of the generation around it. For example I would make sure that no stars could be too close together so as to have the same name (I don't know enough about stellar spectral class, is it possible to have 2 stars in a binary star system be the same class?), and limit it to however many sounds I could come up with. Also, don't worry if it doesn't sound English (especially considering how much of English came from other languages...) you'd probably run out otherwise.