How Many Species Are on Earth?

When it comes to the questions about the universe that people can't answer, they can't help but mention how many species there are on earth. The Earth is home to an amazing variety of animals and plants. Pink flamingos fill the skies, elephants stomp through the savannas, and strange fruits and ferns hide in crevasses all over. People will never know how many species exist on the planet. There are simply too many. But that hasn't stopped scientists from attempting to find that elusive number.

Carl Linnaeus, a botanist, realized two and a half centuries ago that humans required a system for tracking the species on the planet. He started classifying plants and animals using taxonomic language, which named, ranked, and classified creatures and plants.

According to some estimates, after generations of work, people have only accounted for 1.5 million species, or about 15% of the total number. This means that the vast majority of organisms still require an adequate description. That is especially true for undervalued and underappreciated species like fungi, of which people have only described 10%. In contrast, people have done a good job with the fellow mammals, the majority of which have already been logged.

Because all of the numbers are simply statistical guesses, people may never know if they are correct. Perhaps more concerning is the fact that species appear to be disappearing at a faster rate than at any time since dinosaurs vanished 65 million years ago. After all, if creatures are going extinct in droves, humans could be next.