In a world with many organism, different groups of people had different names for the same animal. This did not only pose a problem in language, as the information was usually interpreted wrong, but made it difficult for scientists to communicate with each other about the same organism. 

 

Carl Linnaeus was a, "Swedish naturalist and explorer who was the first to frame principles for defining natural genera and species of organisms and to create a uniform system for naming them (binomial nomenclature)," (Carolus Linnaeus | Swedish Botanist). In other words, Linnaeus created a solution for the above problem by standarizing (he never created it) an uniform system to name organisms. "Bi" means two, "nomial" means name and "nomenclature" refers to a system used to name things (Damon, McGonegal, Tosto, Ward). This uniform system was adopted worlwide and consisted on naming organisms based on two names their "genus" and "specie". The system's three main objective includes;

1. Ensuring that each organism has an unique name that cannot be confused with another organism,

2. Having a universally understood name, 

3. Not allowing people to change the names of organims without valid reasons (Damon, McGonegal, Tosto, Ward). 

 

Fun fact: 

• Most words used in binomial nomenclature are Latin or Greek in origin

• Genus name is capitalized, and species is not. Both are itilicized. 

Example of bionomial nomenclature:

• Equus zebra  

 

Works Cited 

 

"Carl Linnaeus (Carl Von Linné, 1707-1778)." Carl Linnaeus. Älmhult. Web. 26 Mar. 2016.

Damon, Alan, Randy McGonegal, Patricia Tosto, and William Ward. Higher Level Biology. 2nd ed. Print.

"Carolus Linnaeus | Swedish Botanist." Encyclopedia Britannica. Web. 26 Mar. 2016.