Names in Biology

Scientists in general and especially biologists are weird. But the worst thing? When they name things, they are either as uncreative as someone who plays a hunter in World of Warcraft and names his pet bear “bear”, or think they are the funniest person on this planet.

For your entertainment, I want to share the best names that you can find in the field of biology. Feel free to add your own – but remember to provide sources.

When naming this guy

The person choosing the name was probably in deep thought, as the Latin name of the Plains bison (a subspecies of the American bison) is literally bison bison bison. Very original, guys.

But repetition seems to be a common tool. Or why else would you name the Eurasian magpie “Pica pica”?

Does it remind anyone else of a certain Pokémon?

The “hedgehog pathway” already has a pretty neat name, even though it doesn’t really have anything to do with this fella

Instead, the genes in this pathway are responsible for the formation of certain patterns in an embryo. But why would you ever call one gene from this family Sonic Hedgehog? It’s surprising that there hasn’t been a copyright lawsuit yet.

Sometimes when reading names, I feel reminded of the scene from Monty Python’s “Life of Brian”: “And from our father’s father’s father’s fathers”. Behold, the MAP kinase kinase kinase.

Cherax destructor sounds highly unpleasant but it’s just the name of an edible crustacean that lives in Australia. But maybe you need a name like this to be taken seriously on that continent?

A different animal is truly terrifying and on the first look, it’s scientific name sounds pretty dangerous: Ursus arctos horribillis

The grizzly bear. But what does his name mean?
ursus is bear in Latin
arctos, or rather árktos is bear in Greek
horribilis is horrible, in latin again

So not only could they not decide on one language, no. They named the grizzly “horrible bear bear”. Slow clap for whoever came up with that.

Fun fact: This basically makes the “Arctic circle” the circle with bears and the “Antarctic circle* the circle without bears. Which is correct.

Those are so far my favorites, although I am pretty sure I forgot a handful. But hey, you should have the chance to leave a clever comment, shouldn’t you?

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_{Pictures taken from pixabay.com}