Mihi itch or « Mihisucht » describes the state of those whose main ambition is to describe new species (or other taxa: subspecies, hybrids, genera, etc.) as a mean to immortalize their names.[1] The expression appeared in print as early as 1884.[2]

A consequence of the Mihi itch may be the unwarranted description of new taxa, differing only slightly from already established taxa, leading to taxonomic inflation. A more extreme case may be termed taxonomic vandalism when a large number of species are described with limited scientific evidence.

Examples

• La "nouvelle école" in malacology, led by Jules René Bourguignat, was responsible for the description of hundreds of new species of molluscs in Europe at the end of the nineteen century.

• Harold St. John published 440 names in the genus Pandanus, which encompasses c. 600 accepted species, and 283 names in the genus Cyrtandra, which encompasses c. 700 accepted species.[3][4]

• Between 2000 and 2011, Raymond Hoser published 582 species names, and 340 generic names of animals (mostly reptiles).[5]

References

  1. ↑ Evenhuis, Neal L. "The" Mihi itch" a brief history." Zootaxa 1890, no. 1 (2008): 59-68. https://doi.org/10.11646/zootaxa.1890.1.3
  2. ↑ Anonymous (1884) Meeting of the Entomological Club of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. The Canadian Entomologist, 16, 169–172.
  3. ↑ https://www.ipni.org/
  4. ↑ https://powo.science.kew.org/
  5. ↑ Wüster W., Thomson, S.A., O’shea, M., Kaiser, H. (2021). Confronting taxonomic vandalism in biology: conscientious community self-organization can preserve nomenclatural stability, Biological Journal of the Linnean Society, 133(3): 645–670, https://doi.org/10.1093/biolinnean/blab009
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