Why do Don and Ra talk about a lenticular galaxy when our galaxy is spiral?

[unity100]

Of course, but Don was a scientist. Shouldn't his first thought to be to call our galaxy a spiral galaxy?

Our galaxy does not even look like a lens. Lenticular galaxies don't have spiral arms.

Why would he say the complicated word "lenticular" unless he meant the scientific category? No one uses that word in common speech. It's pretty much only used to refer to the scientific category of lenticular galaxies, which are quite a bit different from spiral galaxies, and our spiral galaxy is considered a very average spiral galaxy.

Don says:

depends. i personally always think of galaxies as lens shaped for example. the first thing that comes to mind of many people, is that.

and actually, different types of galaxies are not taught in many university branches. don was an engineer, not an astronomer or astrophysicist. may be erroneous, however a lot of course material around the world is probably teaching that galaxies are lens shaped. even if you google, you will find the examples of such perception.

http://www.google.com/search?q=galaxies+...=firefox-a

It looks like a flat out error but given his education why would he make that kind of error? Why would Ra support him on it?

He makes the error again and again, like 6-7 times.

then it means they were using the term as an adjective. i still think that galaxies look like a lens, when looked from the side, personally. and if i would have to describe it to someone else, i would also describe it like a lens.