Endless forms most stupid, icky, and small: The preponderance of noncharismatic invertebrates as integral to a biologically sound view of life

Abstract

Big, beautiful organisms are useful for biological education, increasing evolution literacy, and biodiversity conservation. But if educators gloss over the ubiquity of streamlined and miniaturized organisms, they unwittingly leave students and the public vulnerable to the idea that the primary evolutionary plot of every metazoan lineage is "progressive" and "favors" complexity. We show that simple, small, and intriguingly repulsive invertebrate animals provide a counterpoint to misconceptions about evolution. Our examples can be immediately deployed in biology courses and outreach. This context emphasizes that chordates are not the pinnacle of evolution. Rather, in the evolution of animals, miniaturization, trait loss, and lack of perfection are at least as frequent as their opposites. Teaching about invertebrate animals in a "tree thinking" context uproots evolution misconceptions (for students and the public alike), provides a mental scaffold for understanding all animals, and helps to cultivate future ambassadors and experts on these little-known, weird, and fascinating taxa.

The Sixth Mass Extinction: fact, fiction or speculation?

“…Much of this has been said many times by many people, but rarely more eloquently than by Dijkstra ( 2016 , p. 174): “In an era of extinction, there are no greater priorities than to accelerate the synthesis of life, salvage knowledge and increase awareness. To do so, we need our strongest familiarity with all species.” Furthermore, to develop a sound view of all life on Earth it is crucial that in addition to the large, beautiful and charismatic animals we also focus our attention on the “endless forms most stupid, icky, and small” – the non‐charismatic invertebrates (Czekanski‐Moir & Rundell, 2020 , p. 12638).…”

Invertebrates in Science Communication: Confronting Scientists’ Practices and the Public’s Expectations

“…They are not a "natural" lineage in evolutionary terms, but, unnoticed to most of us, this group contains over 97% of all animal species known to science. To those unfamiliar with their astounding diversity, complex structures, and the many evolutionary reasons behind them, invertebrates might come across as ugly, bizarre, or even repulsive creatures (e.g., Bjerke and Østdahl, 2004;Batt, 2009;Cardoso et al, 2011;Czekanski-Moir and Rundell, 2020). Only few of them are expressive or charismatic enough for most people to bond with and, with little to no empathy involved, discussing some invertebrate-related topics becomes an uncomfortable moment for a good deal of the general public (Kellert, 1993b;Batt, 2009).…”