father as a joke and then was later in life promoted to major by "an IBM machine with a sense of humor almost as keen as his father's." Unlike nominative determinism, the concept of aptronym and its synonyms do not say anything about causality, such as why the name has come to fit. Because of the potentially humorous nature of aptronyms, a number of newspapers have collected them. San Francisco Chronicle columnist Herb Caen reported irregularly on reader-submitted gems, including substitute teacher Mr. Fillin, piano teacher Patience Scales, and the Vatican's spokesman on the evils of rock 'n roll, Cardinal Rapsong. Similarly, the journalist Bob Levey on occasion listed examples sent in by readers of his column in the American newspaper The Washington Post: a food industry consultant named Faith Popcorn, a lieutenant called Sergeant, and a tax accountant called Shelby Goldgrab. A Dutch newspaper Het Parool had an irregularly featured column called "Nomen est omen" with Dutch examples. Individual name collectors have also published books of aptronyms. Onomastic scholar R. M. Rennick called for more verification of aptronyms appearing in newspaper columns and books. Lists of aptronyms in science, medicine, and law are more reliable as they tend to be drawn from easily verifiable sources. Definition Nominative determinism, literally "name-driven outcome", is the hypothesis that people tend to gravitate towards areas of work which reflect their names. The name fits because people, possibly subconsciously, made themselves fit. Nominative determinism differs from the concept of aptronyms in that it focuses on causality. The term has its origin in the "Feedback" column of the magazine New Scientist in 1994. A series of events raised the suspicion of its editor, John Hoyland, who wrote in the 5 November issue: Feedback editors John Hoyland and Mike Holderness subsequently adopted the term 'nominative determinism' as suggested by reader C. R. Cavonius. The term first appeared in the 17 December issue. Even though the magazine tried to ban the topic numerous times over the decades since, readers kept sending in curious examples. These included the U.S. Navy spokesman put up to answer journalists' questions about the Guantanamo Bay detention camp, one Lieutenant Mike Kafka; authors of the book The Imperial Animal Lionel Tiger and Robin Fox; and the UK Association of Chief Police Officers' spokesman on knife crime, Alfred Hitchcock. As used in New Scientist the term nominative determinism only applies to work. In contributions