ABSTRACT
Despite the mantra of the importance of all biodiversity, people have remarkably specific likes and dislikes when it comes to species. The polymath J B S Haldane (founder of population genetics, geneticist, Marxist and scientific author) famously replied to a question about what might be learned about God from a study of his works, ‘an inordinate fondness for beetles’. 2 Haldane's humour was as usual in service to his science: over 360,000 species of beetles have been described by taxonomists, with probably several million more that have not yet received their attention. 3
