"I blame childrens books for all the people who can't name machines correctly. Have you seen some of these wildly incorrect books? My boys get me to read them and make the necessary corrections."

I agree....I also blame childrens books, at least in part, for some of the Old McDonald Farm mindset.  The idea that farm animals should frolic in pastures that are lush green grass right to the barn door with no mud, manure, or an other unpleasnatries.  Why should they think otherwise, this is what they are taught in the first books that we read to them as children.