The Art of Classification: Carl Linnaeus
You know those strings of Latin words you see on the labels in front of plants and animals in museums? The ones that say things like: Kingdom: Animalia /Class: Mammalia / Order: Primates /Family: Hominidae /Genus: Homo Species: Homo sapiens. Well, all of that was the brainchild of 18th Century, Swedish-born biologist, botanist, scientist and bon vivant Carl Linnaeus.
He had a very interesting life and varied life -- not at all as dry and dusty as one would expect of a classifier of all living things. He traveled quite a bit and it seemed everywhere he went, he would be asked to take on work, studying plants and animals and such. He was always saying he wanted to go home to Sweden, but it sure took him a long time to get around to it and, in the meantime, he started working on his classification system.
Carl was one of those guys who made a good impression on all the right people. It might have been because, according to Rebecca over at Skepchick, not only was he good natured and rather jolly, he was slightly obsessed with sex. Whatever the reason, he was often given money, housing and positions just because he was so enthusastic and easy to get along with, and all of his positions whether looked for or not, brought him in contact with his passions: plants, animals, beauty and order.
And the more he studied, the more Carl felt that scientific classification was in a hell of a mess and so he set out to make order and a sort of beautiful sense out classifying all the plants and animals that he came in contact with. He upset quite a few members of the then-Establishment, including the Luthern Church, when he insisted on classifying humans beings in the same taxonomic way as the "lesser" animals.
In keeping with the standard system of government of the time, his system, the Linneaus System, broke all living things into three "kingdoms." After that, kingdoms were broken down into classes and classes into orders. Orders were further specified into genera, then species. And the lowest "rank" was varieties. He based his method of classification on shared physical characteristics.
Today, only his taxonomy for animals continues to be used, and it has changed considerably since Linnaeus thought of the method. The method of scientific classifications has evolved with expanding and more detailed knowledge, especially DNA sequencing, which has changed the idea of a scientifically valid observable characteristic.
However, Linnaeus deserves credit where credit is due -- 300 years ago, his idea of a system of scientific classification based on observation and detail was a breakthrough in the scientific method, and established a common ground for all future biological research.
There's Art in that.
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