Taxonomy, the naming of living things, is not something most of us need to think about often. Ok, a Tyrannosaurus rex (still one of the coolest names ever) means "tyrant lizard king," and the moose is Alces alces, and humans are Homo sapiens ("intelligent man," or so we hope). There's a genus (group) name and a species name (making a "binomial"), and it all fits into a larger classification scheme of families and phyla and other things you may have learned a mnemonic for back in school. This is standard "Linnaean" classification. It's gotten more complicated in the age of DNA, cladograms, and disputes over who had the right to name something, but it's still the dominant way to refer to animals and plants. A published name sticks even if there is something wrong with the name itself. The discoverer of an ancient whale thought it was a marine reptile and gave it the genus name Basilosaurus. Even though we know now it's a mammal, its stuck with a name including "lizard" for all time.
To name something you need a holotype, an original example other scientists can look at. According to International Code of Zoological Nomenclature (ICZN) Recommendation 16C, Preservation and deposition of type specimens, "Recognizing that name-bearing types are international standards of reference (see Article 72.10) authors should deposit type specimens in an institution that maintains a research collection, with proper facilities for preserving..."
That doesn't mean holotypes are always available. Some years back, scientists at the Museum of Zoology QCAZ, Quito, Ecuador, looked for invertebrate holotypes deposited there and couldn't find proof 16 holotypes and 51 paratypes ("sibling " specimens deposited with the holotypes), had ever been deposited. This added up to "...some 20% of all invertebrate type material for the country..." Holotypes get lost in transit, lost in museum moves, destroyed, and occasionally stolen. In
1981 and 1983, Russian mammologists described two new species of killer whales, or orcas, Orcinus nanus and Orcinus
glacialis. However, one never had a proper holotype and the other can't be found, so no one uses the names.
A holotype does not have to be a stuffed or skeletal specimen, although that's the preferred method. Species have entered general scientific use (practically speaking , the closest thing there is to a formal acceptance) through descriptions based on DNA samples, fragmentary specimens, and, controversially, photographs when the photographs are clear and taken under conditions ensuring they are genuine (such as of a captive animal that is released, or a worm that conveniently crawls over the viewport of a submersible and is captured from an inch away). Dr. Grover Krantz' publication of a name for Bigfoot was based on footprints: it found little acceptance and it was invalid anyway because someone had previously proposed a name.
So, to get where I was going, the rules here seem pretty clear, but as paleozoologist Darren Naish explains here, things can go sideways. The first publication of a description of a creature carries the name (assuming it's available) fixed until and unless invalidated (a name can be disputed in other publications). Add to that the fact it's understood different scientists have different ideas of where to classify a new beetle or shark or whatever, and the rules written back when everything was done through peer-reviewed journals allow for weird results in the internet age. People can publish in pay-to-play journals, public access journals, blogs, etc. Practically anything is a publication available anywhere in the world. Finally, this isn't limited to scientist with some qualifications: anyone can do it. Dedicated, careful amateurs have published names universally accepted. BUT...
We have a situation Dr. Naish calls "taxonomic vandalism." He refers to one incredibly busy amateur herpetologist named Hoser who has named "well over 100 supposedly new snake and lizard genera, this individual has also produced taxonomic revisions of the world’s cobras, burrowing asps, vipers, rattlesnakes, water snakes, blindsnakes, pythons, crocodiles and so on. But, alas, his work is not of the careful, methodical, conservative and respected sort that you might associate with a specialised, dedicated amateur; rather, his articles appear in his own, in-house, un-reviewed, decidedly non-technical publications.." The diagnostic characteristics Hoser cites in distinguishing the holotype of a new species from its relatives are mostly unimportant, accidental (a damaged specimen), or within the bounds of known species (like counting a snake with two more rows of scales on its head as a species). Scientists used to be, in general, "splitters" who named species based on minor stuff: a hundred years ago there were 86 species of brown bear. This was eventually reduced through the work of other scientists to one, with four subspecies. But Hoser is taking splitting to new levels, naming animals for pets and relatives (honoring people is normal, but ...pets?) and generally making a hash out of existing herp taxonomy.
So when you see a new species named, pay some attention before you celebrate it or refer to it. Is the publication legitimate? Dr. Melba Ketchum's "Bigfoot DNA" paper was published in a self-produced journal that never published a second issue. Has anyone published a disputing article or letter (easy to find with the internet)? Is the journal peer-reviewed? Peer review is not a guarantee of anything, but it means the description has been critiqued by other specialists who know the topic.
Also, see what the person has published before. Has she done articles in journals, or has she published screeds like Hoser's attacking the evil anti-truth scientists who've rejected the work? See this doozy.
Thousands of new species are named every year, and we have (it's estimated) hundreds of thousands of beetles alone to find and name. A new species is always accompanied by some form of publication, but the species has to furnish the foundation for the publication, not the other way around.
