The aliases don't force you to follow each one through; eyes can do no jumping if you like in either case.
But if you can't infer from the column name which table they will come from, I find having the option to check far more preferable to that of having no way of knowing.
> As an SF writer, it's pretty interesting, though, to think of the weird shapes a society would take when your astronauts are outliving entire civilizations.
Spin, a novel by Robert Charles Wilson, touches on this from a planetary perspective. Quite the interesting read, though I won't say more here for fear of spoilers.
I'm not sure "relatively new" is accurate, though of course it depends on the timescale. They seemed as widespread as other common sugary cereals (Coco Pops, Frosties, Ricicles et al) during the 90s. However, if we're looking back further, it could well be the case that they were comparatively late arrivals.
May I suggest that you try TheStoryGraph? I've found it fills that need for me nicely and, as a bonus, offers an import service for Goodreads data - no need to start over.
The recommendation engine hasn't steered me wrong yet, and the roadmap/developer interaction and feedback are very good indeed.
But if you can't infer from the column name which table they will come from, I find having the option to check far more preferable to that of having no way of knowing.