Can one use vivio instead of biologio?

Question

For the sake of consistency, is it possible to use the -i- affix in this context?

Indeed life is vivo so the study of life should be vivio.

Souce: http://www.romaniczo.com/esperanto/gramatiko/grammar_13.html

-i-: Science, theory, study, art, system:

Answer 1

No, because -i- could be considered a suffix used when there is a root that names the professional doing that work:

biolog/o - person
biologi/o - science

geograf/o - person
geografi/o - science

Affixes and suffixes have their limitations. Not all of them can be used with all roots. Take mal for example, malhundo would probably not have any universally coherent meaning. Meanwhile -et- will work with almost anything: hund-et-o, dom-et-o, ..., tim-et-o.

Note also that -i- with that meaning is not officially recognized as a suffix, and you will find biologio listed as biologi/o. That's important.

Not all roots are born equal (Fundamentaj, Oficialaj, Zamenhofaj, Novaj) and the same applies to suffixes/prefixes.

Also, some word elements are found/defined a posteriori. And not only by linguists, the speakers do that too. The adverbs baldetaux/apenetaŭ are examples of speakers doing just that. The thing is, since those elements were extracted from a set of words, they are not freely combinable. The neofficial suffix -i- belongs to that category.

You can find more information on -i- in this page from PMEG.

Answer 2

No, because -i- is not a suffix for sciences.

You could use a word like "vivoscienco", but "biologio" would probably be better understood, because it's more often and usual.