Well... if Ricky were coming back, I'd probably write a short note here about how the historical origins of words don't always dictate their current use, but there doesn't seem much point now.
HarryT, do you have a particular edition of Plato's "Phaedo" to recommend? Sounds interesting. (And I hadn't realized that only binary stars can nova-- I knew our sun wasn't big enough for a supernova, and that yellow G stars don't go nova (according to Larry Niven, anyway), but only binaries? Really? Wow. This has been an interesting day.)