Kevin Thiele, ‘Species, taxonomy, genomics and you: a guide for the perplexed’

Dr Kevin Thiele is the head of the Western Australian Herbarium and a practicing taxonomic and systematic botanist. He and his colleagues at the Herbarium and elsewhere regularly discover and name new species (and of course also rename perfectly good existing ones), and have to grapple with many of the issues that will be discussed in this talk. He also has a particular interest in the social context and implications of taxonomy, causing him perhaps to struggle even more than average with the conundrums of taxonomy and its relationships with science and society.

Species are important. They are one of the fundamental units of biodiversity, and provide a necessary underpinning for almost all biological sciences, from ecology and conservation science to pharmaceutical bioprospecting and quarantine biosecurity. And yet, understanding exactly what species are and how they should best be recognised is a highly contentious issue in science, and has been for decades. How do we best define species? What are the best methods for discovering and delimiting them? Do species even exist? If they do, are they objective things that exist in nature, or subjective things that exist only in human minds (or are they perhaps both)? Do the new genome sciences mean we need to radically reshape centuries of taxonomic practice and a naming system that was invented in the 18th Century? And what role do you, the public, have in the debates currently going on in corridors and around the water-coolers of taxonomy and genetics. This lecture aims to discuss these issues and more (and will hopefully leave you a little less perplexed).