Early history

[Michael Gochfeld]

Norbert's idealism comes shining through, communication among
scientists----probably not: 

"Kondla, Norbert FOR:EX" wrote:
> 
> Something in the back of my feeble old mind crept to the front and caused me
> to reflect on taxonomy and nomenclature with the perhaps erroneous
> recollection that these noble tools were originally invented to facilitate
> communication among biologists (and everyone else with biological/natural
> history interests) and to facilitate the study of living organisms. I
> sometimes think these pursuits have taken on a life of their own and are
> pursued as an end onto themselves.
> Perhaps we need to remind ourselves of their "proper" place in the grand
> scheme of things. Sometimes it is indeed easy to lose sight of the forest
> because of all the trees :-) I wonder at times if the tail is wagging the
> dog :-) Blast away with impunity and gusto if you see it differently :-)
> 

So with gusto, if not impunity, I will suggest that the original
taxonomy was probably not much concerned with communication among
scientists but with cataloguing of things (and perhaps labelling natural
history cabinets which were much in vogue in educated circles).  They
were probably an integral part of exploration, and collectors were hired
to travel far afield and ship specimens (or even paintings) back to the
bearded wizards in Europe. Even though there were some fledgling
naturalists and namers of things in the Americas, a great many birds,
butterflies and plants were named by Linnaeas, Gmelin, etc.  I remember
as a pre-teen perusing a bird book and wondering why so many American
birds had been named by people who enver bothered to come here
(America). 

Some of the pre-Linnaean namers-of-things were cataloguing God's
creation. And they were probably none-too-happy about indeterminate
things that didn't seem to belong clearly to one species or another.  

Mike Gochfeld

 
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