Naming Nature

Title: Naming Nature – The Clash Between Instinct and Science

Author: Carol Kaesuk Yoon

Publisher:  W. W. Norton & Co, 2010 (First published 2009)

ISBN: 978-0-393-33871-3

Pages: 299

When science journalists decide to publish on their area of specialisation, the happy result usually is a well referenced work written with conviction surging forth from every line and page. Carol Kaesuk Yoon likewise writes on her branch of study coupled with her professional expertise as a writer for the New York Times. The subject matter of the book is the tussle between human instinct which classifies living organisms according to its lights and science, which does the same thing, but leaning on quite different supports and coming out with dumbfoundingly profound categories which find no resonance with human judgement. This is to be expected from an evolved species like humans whose power of classification demanded only one thing in return – the survival of the person. Human life in the wild relied heavily on his successful demarcation between animals he could eat and those who could eat him. This simple truth of the survival of human species forms the bedrock on which human judgement is put together. Obviously, there is no coherence between our inner lights and scientific classifications based on genetic material, namely DNA and its extensive lists of evolutionary taxonomy.

Cataloging of the living world around him forms a basic instinct in humans. With his sense organs, man or any animal for that matter, prepare a perceived environment in its brain, also called umwelt (German word for environment). This term finds elaborate usage in the book.  Umwelt is not necessarily be a true representation of the living world. Human umwelt is constrained by the frequencies of visual light he can perceive, with infrared and ultraviolet being out of range. However, for avian umwelt, these frequencies are part and parcel of the makeup and their umwelt differ markedly from us. There was a time, just three centuries before, when mankind was utterly confused at the vast collection of plants and animals pouring in from the New World to Europe. The explorers and naturalists followed wildly inconsistent classifications so that the same organism was named in quite different ways by various people. Enter Carl Linnaeus, the father of scientific classification. He was born in 1707 in Sweden and possessed great love for accumulating plant and animal specimens. At the age of 28, he published his magnum opus, ‘Systema Naturae’, the 14-page booklet which became the bible of botanists and zoologists. He introduced latin binomial naming system – two part names with latin roots – which immediately set the standard.

A century passed by, without anyone noticing the chinks in the armour of the new system. Darwin made his famous voyage around the globe in 1831-36 and began ruminating over a new theory which would transform the entire scientific world by storm. Unfortunately, Darwin was not a recognised scientist and his theories hence wouldn’t be taken seriously by the professionals. So he began his work on barnacles (rock like immobile creatures which stick on to the hull of ships, whales’ sides and the like). Darwin hoped to classify the forms into species so that he can be an accomplished taxonomist. He managed to attain the coveted level but also found immense variability among the barnacles. Darwin observed the genetic variability which was so fundamental a constituent in his theory of evolution, but which had eluded him for many years. This upended the Linnaean system over its head, which was founded solidly on the concept of immutability, the naïve belief that God’s creations are unchangeable. Thus emerged a new system of classification which is scientifically precise, but totally unconnected with human umwelt. Many outwardly similar species found themselves categorized in different genera (like monarch and viceroy butterflies) and visually different forms found evolutionary kinship.

From this base, Yoon moves on to claim that the human umwelt – humanity’s shared vision of the living world – works identical in various cultures, listing out several examples of bird and fish names in little known American Indian languages and claims that any man, having no exposure to those exotic tongues can discern which is a bird and which is fish, just by listening to how the name sounds. It is even claimed that men are able to manage only around 600-odd names for genera, and goes on ‘prove’ that hypothesis using anecdotal evidence, taking her husband and a friend as the ‘guinea pigs’. The power to classify living forms and the seat of human umwelt resides in the left temporal lobe of human brain. People who suffered damage to this part of the brain failed to register any organic living forms, though they were as powerful as before to understand and group inanimate objects.

The twentieth century undermined human umwelt without even a remaining trace. Subtle differences in genetic makeup of organisms forced the hands of taxonomists to resort to other classification schemes. Ernst Mayr championed the cause of evolutionary taxonomy while Robert Sokal brought into the realm of biology potent tools of mathematics and statistics. In the flash of a moment, numerical methods elevated categorization to objective heights from the trenches of subjective predilection. Numerical taxonomy expressed the affinities and relationships among life forms as a number. Linus Pauling, Emile Zuckerkandl and Carl Woese were instrumental in going a step further to bring in molecular taxonomy – by examining the DNA of specimens. Willi Hennig’s classification, which eventually came to be known as cladistics, produced the most stunning effect. It was thoroughly based on evolution, and the connection from a parent to an offspring is stressed by leaning heavily on acquired traits from a common ancestor rather than traits first seen in that specific organism. Cladists did away with most families in taxonomy, fish among them. Fish is a too wide a variety to be grouped together even under the widest assemblage. According to them, in a set of salmon, lung fish and cow, the last two are most closely related than with salmon, even though it and lung fish have characteristics inherent to fish. If examined closely, the resemblances are obvious – cow and the lung fish share the same respiratory mechanism against the more primitive one of salmon. To top it all, they grouped birds along with dinosaurs.

The book is noted for its earnestness in conveying the idea that humans has lost touch with everything nature. We have no need of the umwelt, which was absolutely essential for survival even before a few tens of generations. This also paves the way for lethargy displayed by society in responding to distress calls originated by scientists for the preservation of endangered species. The author has rightfully identified the disconnect between modern society and nature and analysed it in detail. It also provide some curious facts about scientists and their behaviour. Carl Linnaeus delighted in derogatorily applying the names of his enemies to malicious organisms. He named the nasty weed Siegesbeckia orientalis after Johann Siegesbeck, one of his harshest critics. Also, he named Rudbeckia, a tall and ‘noble’ plant, after a valued patron.

Nevertheless, the book is a drudgery and unappealing. No exciting concepts which dot the landscape of molecular biology has been described, even though she has come close to PCR and DNA manipulations which make it so exciting. A very regrettable lapse is that the author’s study was not based on tried and tested scientific method. Often she resorts to anecdotal proof, like taking her husband and a friend as sample data to prove that humans are capable of managing only about 600 animals names and her infant son’s first utterance to prove that kids develop a strong sense of the living world. The evidence is very much subjective and the conclusions can only be taken as mumbo jumbo, not science. Yoon’s tall claims that names of fish and birds used in one part of the world could be understood elsewhere is also not conclusively established. She did this experiment with about 50 students and came up with a score of 58% correct answers. With this figure, which is slightly more than pure chance (50%, like tossing a coin) that can be explained by the exposure of the students to similar jargon earlier in their lives, she argues that her assertion is vindicated. Such extravagant statements would only help to spread a smile on scientifically minded people’s faces. After completing the book, the reader would be forced to consider whether the time invested in it has been spent in a worthwhile cause.

The book is recommended only to biologically minded persons.

Rating: 2 Star