For most of us, objectives are something found at the front end of microscopes or telescopes (in contrast with occulars, that are found at the other end!). Yet, in the 19th. Century, camera lenses were called objectives (or occasionally, objective lenses). The function of non-camera objectives and camera "lenses" are exactly the same and all European languages I know use their local variant of "objective" for lenses. Is it just because the word is shorter or has it something to do with the mass popularisation of photography in the 1890's?
Using the word as it used to be used would help an awful lot with descriptions ( objective - cell - groups - individual lenses)!