1. Making sense of our planet’s many species.
Taxonomy
Making sense of our planet’s many species.

2. Which of these species are related?

3. There are only two main groups here:
Perissodactyl mammals
Artiodactyl mammals

4. Within each group, there are more groups:
Bovidae
Equidae
Camelidae
Tapiridae
Rhinocerotidae
Suidae

5. Think about what you just did:
How did you decide how to organize these animal? What guided your choices?

6. Organizing Life: Requires clear criteria, such as:
Anatomy (body structure)
Genetic similarity (DNA)
Mode of Reproduction
Sometimes, behaviour (feeding, communication, locomotion….)
It also requires good observation skills & useful tools/methods.
Classification helps us make sense of the natural world around us.

7. Aristotle: The Scale of Nature
Greek Philosopher, “father of Biology”
Organized all things according to their Psyche (a kind of soul)
Vegetative Psyche (lowest – you exist)
Animate Psyche (middle – you move)
Rational Psyche (highest – you think)
Problems: Anthropocentric; Subjective; unable to prove existence of these psyches.

8. Aristotle: The Scale of Nature
Artist Mark Dion did this installation of Aristotle’s idea in New York, 1994

9. Medieval: Great Chain of Being
In Medieval Europe, not a lot of scientific innovation happened.
Aristotle was so respected, nobody thought to question his ideas…
So they took the Scale of Nature and added a few things to make the Great Chain of Being
Intended to link all of Creation into one unifying system, it added Saints, Angels & God at the top, demons below.
Problems: Still Anthropocentric; Very Subjective; unsuccessfully fused belief systems & scientific thought.

10. Medieval: St. Augustine
St. Augustine (354 – 386) was an even earlier Christian writer.
Believed that the natural world was a reflection of the spiritual world
Decided to classify all living things into just three groups:
Useful, Harmful & Superfluous
Problems: Even more Anthropocentric (useful = to us!); Very Subjective; categories too broad
On the up-side, he left out non-living things and supernatural beings….!

11. Enter Carl Linne – Linnaeus!
Swedish botanist, physician & zoologist (1701 – 1778)
First systematic classification system, based on physical traits.
Publishes his Systema Naturae, 1735
Initially, 3 kingdoms of Life (later 5)
Each kingdom had 6 more Taxa:
Kingdom, Phylum, Class, Order, Family, Genus & Species.
Genus + Species = scientific name
Clear, objective, not anthropocentric!

12. Linnean Classification
Kingdom
Plantae
Fungi
Animalia
Phylum
Anthophyta
Basidiomycota
Chordata
Class
Monocotydae
Agaricomycetes
Aves
Mammalia
Order
Liliaceae
Russulales
Galliformes
Primates
Family
Lilium
Russulalacea
Phasianidae
Hominidae
Genus
Boletus
Gallus
Homo
Species
longiflorum
edulis
domesticus
sapiens

13. Organizing Life: Kingdoms? Domains?
Large groupings of living things based on broadly- shared common traits
Oldest classification method
How many? In the distant past, 3; in current use, 5, 6
Five kingdoms are: Monera, Protista, Fungi, Plantae, Animalia.
Large groupings of living things based on genetic similarities in DNA
More recent method
Three domains recognized:
Archaea = microbes with ancient form of DNA
Prokarya = microbes with no nucleus, more evolved DNA
Eukarya = organisms with nucleate cells, eukaryotes.

14. The Five Kingdoms:

15. The Three Domains:

16. Hints for taxonomists:
Don’t get frustrated at the unrecognizable Greek & Latin words.
Kings Play Chess On Friday, Generally Speaking!
All organisms have their own unique species name.
An organism with the same word for Genus & species is called a Type Species.
When writing a species’ name, it is always Genus + species