Awesome article with some impressive range and footwork. From a linguistic standpoint, unobtanium was the only element that fell flat for me in the otherwise intricately-crafted AVATAR. With all the hard work James Cameron went to in crafting the layered language and culture of the Na'vi, the clumsy construction of "unobtanium" just felt rushed and tacked on. On the other hand, I suppose you could argue that's exactly the point. The colonizing forces completely neglect the rich textures of Pandora in a frantic search for an element whose name totally misrepresents the planet's nature.

The Latin geek in me also would like to submit that its plural should be "unobtania".