Why Fish Don't Exist

The importance of naming in shaping our understanding of the world is a core theme of the book. Early on, Miller describes this as a way to bring order to existence and as the product of an insatiable curiosity about the world. But by the end of the book, she’s come to see names as fallible and even restrictive. Speaking with a woman who’d been labelled ‘unfit,’ Miller hears “sympathy for the idea that once you name something, you tend to stop looking at it” (181). In this way, we see how the drive to apply names to the world should be tempered with humility.

David Starr Jordan showed an interest in learning the scientific names things early on, in childhood, spending large amounts of time learning the names of all the stars in the night sky over his farm in New York State. As he grew older, he would apply names to more of the world, even as these names came to acquire greater significance. At a training camp for young naturalists run by Louis Agassiz, Jordan learns that all beings exist in a divine hierarchy that could also serve as a course of moral instruction—if one were able to place all beings on a ladder, then one could also deduce which traits were most valued by God. While Agassiz and Jordan didn’t agree on all matters—Jordan accepted Darwin’s theory of evolution, while Agassiz did not—Jordan nonetheless maintained his belief that ‘bad habits’ could cause a species to degenerate. As Miller points out, this is not only wrong, it also ignores how species boundaries are fluid. Nonetheless, the very act of classification—and of assigning names to species—created, for Jordan, a sense of fixity and of certainty. In time, he would apply the kind of naming to humans, deeming some humans ‘unfit’ for reproduction because, he thought, they possessed inheritable traits that led to poverty or promiscuity. For Miller, this echoes the way that society once gave names like ‘slaves’ or ‘witches’ to people, and how those names justified their cruel treatment. Names are not neutral. The ordering function of names situates that object or being in relation to other things around it.

While science has discredited some of Jordan’s work—in particular the work supporting eugenics—he remains a giant in the field of taxonomy. Meanwhile, the act of naming continues to play a key role in science. Miller describes visiting the Smithsonian to see the ‘holotype,’ or first named example, of the fish species that Jordan named after himself. This specimen, as well as Miller’s discussion of the cladists shows the complexities and ambiguities of naming. Species identification remains an important scientific ritual, and some of the pioneers of the cladist understanding of the category of fish are disappointed because “few people have accepted this new vision” (180). Miller argues that approaching the naming of the world with humility is more important than ever, as we continue to discover new facets of existence and as forces of political and social division push people into rigid categories.