yeah, that was an intentional feature of the example chosen. i’d guess most people who are aware of this fact do still think of helicopter as a single unit in their head unless they choose to decompose it, because you hear each of these words often enough that you don’t really need to work out the meaning from etymology. and so if pter were pronounced the way it currently is when in helicopter but pronounced as “peter” in pterodactyl it would not actually be that much more confusing than it currently is.
yeah, that was an intentional feature of the example chosen. i’d guess most people who are aware of this fact do still think of helicopter as a single unit in their head unless they choose to decompose it, because you hear each of these words often enough that you don’t really need to work out the meaning from etymology. and so if pter were pronounced the way it currently is when in helicopter but pronounced as “peter” in pterodactyl it would not actually be that much more confusing than it currently is.