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Issue: Vol. 8 No. 3: June 2025
Type: Article
Published: 2025-06-27
DOI: 10.11646/palaeoentomology.8.3.4
Page range: 278-289
Abstract views: 159
PDF downloaded: 127

Is fossil insect taxonomy compatible with database-based research?

Department of Paleobiology, National Museum of Natural History MRC 121, Smithsonian Institution, 10th & Constitution Ave. NW, Washington, D.C., 20013-7012, USA
Department of Entomology, National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution, 10th & Constitution Ave. NW, Washington, D.C., 20013-7012, USA
FDACS-DPI, 1911 SW 34th St, Gainesville FL 32608, USA
2nd Zoological Department, Natural History Museum Vienna, Burgring 7, Vienna, Austria
Systematic Entomology Laboratory, USDA-ARS, c/o National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution, 10th & Constitution Ave. NW, Washington, D.C., 20013-7012, USA
Paleoentomology form taxa open nomenclature

Abstract

The lack of veracity in assignments of fossil insects to generic and even higher taxonomic levels has been a well-recognized problem since the late 19th century. This is of course partly a function of the lack of well-preserved morphological detail in fossils, but also to a misplaced sense of the need to assign generic and specific names–that specimens not assigned genus and species names are somehow of less value than those that are. In the present review, the early history of paleoentomological assignments is reviewed, including the origin and use of “Open nomenclature” and other attempts by authors to indicate a degree of inaccuracy in their identifications. Numerous examples are provided, both old and recent, as the problem of incorrect taxonomic assignments persists. Public databases are of increasing importance to the field of paleoentomology, but the numerous inaccuracies in the primary literature have often been transferred directly to the databases. In many cases, original attempts to suggest degrees of inaccuracy are not countenanced. The advent of database-based research is particularly susceptible to the burden of incorrect taxonomic assignments. We suggest changes in the way that databases record indications of uncertainty but recognize that it is not the responsibility of database managers to ascertain these inaccuracies. Every scientist in the field is obligated to correct inaccurate assignments and to assign, where necessary, previously named specimens to incertae sedis. We submit that the field must recognize that a specimen identified to, at some level, incertae sedis, can be as valuable to science as those that are assigned valid and well supported taxonomic assignments.

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