Species Name Changes?

[RMau]

While I'm not new to fish-keeping, I'm new to an emphasis on keeping loaches. I've violated one of the cardinal rules of the hobby, 'know what your fish needs before you bring it home' and have acquired about a dozen different loaches.

Pinning down an identification for all of them has been a challenge. Beside the normal challenges of varied common names, it seems that even the scientific names have been changed in some cases.

Which brings me to my question. Once a critter has been studied, classified and named, why would all of that be changed? It seems to me that doing so would cause the general public not only a great deal of cinfusion, but also a bit of 'why bother to learn that, it will change soon anyway'.

I suppose it's like any other thing, a constant effort to refine and be more exact, or more efficient. But still, for the layman, it seems to make things a bit harder than they might need to be.

Any comments from the more experienced members of the forum?

Rick

[Mark in Vancouver]

But that inconvenience for the layman is science. If the layman cares not to know the taxonomy, then fine. The taxonomy changes, and it does so more rapidly with species that are relative newcomers. How do we sort out which loach is which? Which hummingbird or orchid is related to the next?

At first I saw the changes in taxonomy as a bother. Now, when it happens, I imagine capable people are honing in on something I can use as a standard. With a standard, we can start pooling information.

[NancyD]

I agree Mark, the names have meaning & imply relationships. As we learn more they sometimes need to change to reflect the information or its interpretation. It doesn't really matter to me if my clown loaches genus is botia or chromobotia to enjoy them as pets. Regional variation vs separate species would be important to breeders especially if they are rare. That's one of the things I like about the LOL Species chart, the history of loaches through synonyms & reclassifications, although I'm sure it will need future updates. If it were up to me I'd vote for easier names with consistant spelling, with science there is always room for improvement.
Nancy