Taxonomy - Tumblr Posts
Physics Can't Stamp Collect
Biology: You always accuse me of not being able to do math, Physics, but can you STAMP COLLECT???
Physics: Uh, sure! I can collect things… like… um…
Biology: Uh-huh?
Physics: I mean, I got a bunch of cool looking Greek symbols!
Biology: Which you invented arbitrarily, not discovered.
Physics: They represent things I discovered! Like phenomena and physical constants!
Biology: And what kind of taxonomy do those have? Do you even have entire sub disciplines dedicated purely to organizing the sheer number of these phenomena and constants? Are there even millions and millions of categories in it?
Physics: Um, wait, you have entire fields dedicated to organizing your stamp collections?
Biology: Why, of course! Sure sounds like you've got a pretty shit collection, then. I bet any attempt at making a universally consistent naming convention or taxonomy isn’t even an impossible Sisyphean struggle against the inherent chaos and inelegance of nature which is entirely incompatible with the human desire to categorize things that by their very nature cannot be categorized. I bet there aren’t even exceptions with exceptions to every rule. Weak.
Chemistry: DID I HEAR SOMEONE SAY A COLLECTION OF MILLIONS AND MILLIONS OF NAMES WITH CONFUSING CONVENTIONS AND EXCEPTIONS WITH EXCEPTIONS?
Meanwhile, at the Annual Mollusk Taxonomy Convention
Taxonomist 1: I think this population of blorb snails count as their own species under the phylogenetic and biological species concepts. Their last common ancestor was between 5 and 100 million years ago, idk, my 35 year old copy of Clustal finally exploded so I just eyeballed it, but they totally got wack cytochrome C oxidase genes, even though for the most part they're genetically pretty similar and they still look and act exactly the same in every way and also both live in the same place as each other. The only reason why they don’t interbreed is they have like a single incompatible protein thingo, which is also more or less the only meaningful phenotypic difference between them.
(this is an actual thing that can happen. They’re called cryptic species and species complexes and they hurt my soul)
Taxonomist 2: No. It’s more pragmatic and useful to just use the morphological and ecological species concepts here; and they say fuck you and your dumb snails. I wanna lump all existing species into half as many species, there’s too many fucking species.
Taxonomist 1: you wanna fucking say that to my face you little shit?
Taxonomist 3: Hey, real quick, what do you guys think about the possibility of reclassifying the Blorb genus under Littorinidae instead of Muricidae? Because I already wrote a paper on it, so that's the case now. Cry about it.
Taxonomist 2: I think today is the day bitches die.
*Mexican standoff using conch shells as blunt weapons ensued, there were no survivors.*
*This is unfortunately the leading cause of death among all taxonomists*
Can we get some cursed facts about this really strange primate colloquially called "Humans" please? I simply cannot remember how to spell the scientific name, and I don't want to embarrass myself in front of you
well I'm AFRAAIIIID that you're going to have to be more specific, because "human" is actually a pretty big group, phylogenetically speaking!
specifically, it's every primate in the genus Homo.
<art src: John Fleagle>
this means that "human" isn't just the term for the only extant species from this group, H. Sapiens, "human" is also the proper term for all of the extinct members!
H. Neanderthalensis was a human. So was H. Erectus.
H. Habilis, H. Floresiensis, and H. Denisova were all humans.
which makes perfect sense, actually, because Homo is just the Latin word for "human" in the first place! fancy fancy.
but as anyone who's ever had to sit through a 300-level STEM class knows, Homo has another definition, this time from Greek, meaning "same".
homodont. homophone. homologous. homogenized.
but doesn't that also make perfect sense? bones aside, if all of the extinct species of human were resurrected right now and you ran into, say, a Denisovan and a Neanderthal on the street, wouldn't you recognize them?
"You are like me. We are the same."
"We are the same."
<art src (all): Alfons & Adrie Kennis>
ultrabirb:
This is a guide to bird classification:
Barb: a mean bird
Berb: a fast, thin bird
Birb: applies to any bird
Borb: a fat and/or adorable bird
Burb: a bird that is diminutive in size
Byrb: a mysterious bird
Thank you for reading! Now you will be able to properly classify any birds you find in the wild!
BIRD PSA
"The common bat (Bat bat) is a small bat microbat"
this bat is the most bat of any bat ever
absolute maximum quantity of bat in this guy
Reminds me of an episode of Blackadder when he thinks he has accidentally burned Samuel Johnsons Dictionary and he and his sidekick Baldrick sit up all night trying to rewrite it. When prompted how it was going Baldrick replies "Well, I'm very pleased about my definition of dog." "All right, let's hear it," Blackadder says, to which Baldrick replies "Not a cat!" 😂
I really hate to break it to y’all but while this specific mishap is uncommon, this is unironically how most people think taxonomy works
Studying taxonomic categories and rank.
25.08.2019
Today I went to school, my grandma needed to do an exam, I stayed a little in the garden, lot of birds and plants. BUT I needed to study so I searched for a quiet place to do it. I'm: desperate.