Q: Why aren't half steps just called steps, and whole steps called double steps?
A: all the steps in an ordinary scale need to be called steps, not double steps. i think that would be confusing. but what i would suggest perhaps that would be slightly less confusing would be to call them big steps and small steps. but over all i don't think whole-half is that much less confusing, either way you just need to have hands on experience and then you'll get what's going on, regardless of names