this is merely coincidence due to using similar source languages. Technical vocabulary Modern international vocabulary, much of it Latin or Greek in origin, is of course used as well, but frequently for a family of related words only the root will be borrowed directly, and the rest will be derived from it using Esperanto means of word formation. For example, the computer term 'bit' was borrowed directly as bito, but 'byte' was then derived by compounding bito with the numeral ok (eight), for the uniquely Esperanto word bitoko ('an octet of bits'). Although not a familiar form to speakers of European languages, the transparency of its formation is helpful to those who do not have this advantage. Moreover, even bito has the synonym duumo, based on du (two) and -um- (the affix with undefined meaning). With the exception of perhaps a hundred common or generic plant and animal names, Esperanto adopts the international binomial nomenclature of living organisms, using suitable orthography, and changing the nominal and adjectival grammatical endings to -o and -a. For example, the binomial for the guineafowl is Numida meleagris. In Esperanto, therefore, a numido would be any bird of the genus Numida, and a meleagra numido the helmeted guineafowl specifically. Likewise, a numidedo is any bird in the guineafowl family Numididæ. Competing root forms There is some question over which inflection to use when assimilating Latin and Greek words. Zamenhof generally preferred the oblique stem over the nominative singular form, as in reĝo (king), which follows the Latin oblique forms with reg– (compare English regicide), or floro (flower) as in floral, rather than nominative singular rex and flos. However, European national standards differ in this regard, resulting in debate over the form of later "international" borrowings, such as whether the asteroid Pallas should be Palaso in Esperanto, parallel to French and English names Pallas, or Palado, as in Italian Pallade, Russian Паллада (Palláda), and the English adjective Palladian. In some cases there are three possibilities, as can be seen in the English noun helix (x = [ks]), its plural helices (c = [s]), and its adjective helical (c = [k]). Although the resulting potential for conflict is frequently criticized, it does present an opportunity to disambiguate what would otherwise be homonyms based on culturally specific and often fossilized metaphors. For example, Venuso (the planet Venus) may be distinguished from Venero (the goddess Venus), all three of