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  • Why is it "white dwarfs", rather than "white dwarves"?

    "White dwarf" is short for "white-dwarf star", so that "dwarf" is really thought of in its adjective form — it is a "substantive adjective". Substantive adjectives are pluralized as though they were nouns. Note that "Dwarves" is the plural form for characters from fantasy books, like Tolkien's The Hobbit. "Dwarfs" is the plural for real people affected by dwarfism. Perhaps the use of "white dwarfs" suggests their existence in the real world, rather than fantasy.

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About SXS

The SXS project is a collaborative research effort involving multiple institutions. Our goal is the simulation of black holes and other extreme spacetimes to gain a better understanding of Relativity, and the physics of exotic objects in the distant cosmos.

The SXS project is supported by Canada Research Chairs, CFI, CIfAR, Compute Canada, Max Planck Society, NASA, NSERC, the NSF, Ontario MEDI, the Sherman Fairchild Foundation, and XSEDE.

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